The Teacher

More than 10 years ago my friend Jim Elsworth and I published a report on public participation and governance. In it, we included a short story that was meant to illustrate the reluctance that people have for doing something new or different. I've since heard the story told a number of times but then it was new to me. It was a Sufi story. Sufism is the concept in Islam that, for many, involves following the path of spiritual advancement. Sufi masters traditionally use short stories to teach people important life lessons. The story (at least as we told it) went as follows: 

A policeman came across a man on his hands and knees searching the road under the light of a street lamp. "What are you doing?" said the policeman. "I'm searching for my keys" said the man. "Where did you lose them? " asked the policeman. "On the other side of the road" replied the man. "Then why aren't you looking for them over there?" the policeman asked him. "Because this is where the light is" the man replied. The message being that, in order to get what you want, you sometimes have to move out of your comfort zone.

A couple of years ago I was in Bodrum, Turkey. One evening I had a meeting with a university professor about the possibility of future project collaboration. We met in the hotel bar and he told me a story about himself that on reflection sounded very much like a Sufi parable, and here is my interpretation:

There was once an assistant professor at a Turkish university. He was passionate about his chosen subject, entomology. Once, when on a field trip with a small number of students, they discovered a species of cricket that was thought to have become extinct in Turkey. Delighted, he collected one or two individuals to take back alive to his lab so that he could confirm the identification. On the journey home their minibus was stopped by the Jandarma, the Turkish military police who were checking for draft dodgers (which is a relatively routine activity on Turkish roads). When questioned by the officer in charge, he explained what they had been doing and, one thing leading to another, they ended up having dinner in a roadside restaurant with the soldiers.

After dinner and raki (an aniseed flavoured alcoholic drink that is popular in Turkey) the assistant professor was talking animatedly about his new find. Curious, the officer asked to see one of the insects. Excited that the soldier was interested, he ran to the minibus and brought back a live specimen in a collecting tube. He handed it to the officer who looked closely at the insect and then shook it violently! The cricket was a fragile animal whose long, delicate antennae were used for prey detection. Shaking it like that could potentially cause irreparable damage to it. 

At this point in the story, it is also important to know that touching a soldier's uniform (when the soldier is wearing it) can get you into trouble in many countries and in Turkey is strictly forbidden. It is therefore a potentially rash and foolish act. Thus, the assistant professor, enraged at the treatment of his prized specimen, leapt up and tore it from the officer's grasp. He then grabbed him by the lapels and shook him violently, shouting: "There, now you know how it feels!"

When he stopped there was silence. The soldier stared at the entomologist; his troops, hands on their weapons, waiting to see what would happen next. Then he smiled and said: "Hocam (my teacher) why did you have to do that in front of my men?"



We can see who was the real teacher here. The assistant professor was lucky; and the cricket indeed turned out to be the supposedly extinct: Schizodactylus inexpectatus.