Juan Tabagwang and I had the most unusual experience ever in one of our drinking bouts over the drink “agua de pataranta” at the Tomadors’ Tavern. We were literally attacked by crazed, drunken, blood-sucking fleas. The attack started after we drunk 14 bottles of “agua.”
Though tipsy, Juan jumped out of his seat after being bitten by a blood-sucking bug. “I was bitten by a ‘super flea’,” he said, surprised, as he scratched his butt.
Though initially startled, I laughed at Juan. But I was also bitten by a blood-sucker and nearly screamed. The pain was like being stabbed by a small needle. Juan was right; they were “super bugs.”
“Let’s find those critters,” I said, irritated, as I also scratched my butt, “and catch them.”
Juan and I looked under our seats. He was lucky. He easily found and caught the flea that bit him and put it into his empty glass. It took me some time before I found the bug that bit me. I also put it into the glass where the other bug was. Then Juan and I examined the unusual fleas. They were huge, really super compared to ordinary fleas.
“They seem to be drunk,” Juan said.
Since I was also drunk, I humored Juan. “Probably became drunk from our ‘agua’ diluted blood,” I said. “Pour more ‘agua’ on them and let’s see what happens.”
I expected the bugs to drown but they didn’t. Instead, they seemed liked crazed drunks and tried to jump out of the glass as if trying to attack us.”
“These bugs are crazy,” Juan said. “Let’s squash them now.”
Before I could say anything, Maria D’Kapri, our pretty waitress friend, who’s known among the drunkards as Super Kapre because of her powerful upper-cut, suddenly butt in. “What idiotic things are you two doing again?” she asked suspiciously.
“I was just trying to drown these two fleas with our leftover agua,” I said as I pointed at the glass where the bugs were. I then scratched my head and at the same time I tried to shrink in my seat so as not to make her excited. “But Juan wants to squash them.”
“You two are very mean,” Maria said as she squinted her eyes. “Release them!”
Juan, who was so fearful of her, promptly complied and released the blood-sucking fleas on the floor. She left, but looked back at us, still suspicious, probably expecting us to do foolish thing again.
After Maria was out of sight, I asked Juan, “Do you know the parable of the fleas and the carabao?”
“Nope,” replied Juan, unconcerned as he looked at me with weary, drunken eyes. “First time I ever heard of such a parable.”
“It’s a crazy, but very interesting parable,” I said.
“Okay, let me hear it,” he said. This time his eyes showed a glint of interest.
I reclined in my seat to make myself comfortable, and then I told Juan the story.
Once upon a time, there was a group of ravenous blood-sucking fleas who gorged themselves with the blood of a carabao, a water buffalo. They bloated themselves every sucking session. For pleasure, they tormented the carabao by biting its balls. The carabao, in return hit them with the tip of its tail. Every time many of the fleas were whipped to death. The rest always fled and hid inside its butt crack. Two of the fleas, flea A and flea B, were enraged.
“We’ll teach the carabao a lesson once and for all time,” flea A said. “We’ll wrestle it to the ground.”
“Great idea!” uttered flea B with delight. “Let’s do it!”
“How are you two supposed to do that?” inquired flea C, with a look of disbelief on its face.
“Easy,” flea A said, “we’ll all go on top of the carabao while it’s lying on the ground, then wrestle it.”
“Excellent idea!” flea B declared with a wide grin on its face. “You’re a genius, flea A.”
But some fleas showed blank stares as they looked at flea A because of its moronic idea, but others thought flea A and flea B were loonies.
“Anyone care to join us?” inquired flea A, totally believing its idea was brilliant.
“Why don’t you two just go on with your screwball idea,” flea C said. “It’s safer for the rest of us here inside the butt crack.”
Flea A was disgusted at the other fleas for not supporting them. Together with flea B, they slowly sneaked out to wrestle the carabao. On their way out, another great idea hit flea A. “Why wrestle the carabao to the ground,” he said to flea B, “when we can destroy it instead.”
“Super idea, flea A!” flea B agreed with eyes wide, intrigued.
But flea A paused suddenly, another greater idea came to his mind. “Ah, it’s easier to destroy God,” flea A said with an evil smile. “Once we destroy God we can easily destroy the carabao. And then we become gods like God, or even greater than God.” Flea A then roared with wicked laughter.
“A most fantastic idea!” flea B exclaimed in total conformity with flea A. “How about if we made ourselves gods of God?”
“That too,” agreed flea A.
However the other fleas were jolted to their senses when they overheard the unbelievable, blasphemous idea of flea A and flea B.
“But God is not responsible for the death of our companion fleas. It's the carabao,” flea C protested.
“Why destroy God?” asked the other fleas, siding with flea C.
“If all of you don’t like my idea, then get off the carabao,” flea A shouted in anger at the other cowardly fleas.
“Indeed, we will,” countered flea C. Turning to the other fleas, “Let’s jump off and go to another carabao and not become partisans to these two demented fleas.”
One after another, the other fleas exited the butt crack of the carabao. Then they jumped off to go to another. But flea A and flea B chuckled with delight at the thought of their good fortune.
Flea A looked at flea B and said, “Now we have no competition. We’ll be the only two who will become gods after we destroy God.” Then flea A roared diabolically with laughter.
“Now, how do we destroy God?” flea B enthusiastically inquired.
“We’ll destroy Pedro, the master of the carabao, first,” flea A said with determination. “Then we destroy God afterward.”
“But how do we destroy God?” flea B asked insistently.
“We’ll destroy Pedro first and then worry about God later,” flea A answered with finality.
Just then, the two fleas spotted Pedro, who was about to ride on the carabao. They rushed headlong as fast as they could, then they leaped, jumped, and dived over the forest-like, hairy back of the carabao to stab him with their suckers. They reached him just as he’s about to sit on the saddle. Once Pedro’s butt touched the saddle, they sneaked under his butt and jabbed him with all their might with their suckers with the intent of killing him. Pedro yelled, but then smacked the two fleas flat on his butt. With its dying breath, flea A cursed and blamed God for their misfortune.
“Why curse God?” inquired flea B, who was also near death. “Why blame God?”
“It’s His fault for creating Pedro,” flea A answered, moments before its death. “Anyway, we can even the score. With our death, God will cease and is destroyed in our consciousness.”
Flea B is a fanatic believer of flea A. With their last breath the two fleas cursed and blamed God. They even forced themselves not to breath to accelerate their death in order to destroy God in their awareness, lunatics to the end.
But what happened to the other fleas? They were already on another carabao sucking its blood. However, they had learned their lesson not to torment it. And that concludes the story.
“What’s the lesson of your parable?” Juan asked as he scratched his head, unable to understand it.
“What a moronic parable!” joined in Maria who was nearby, listening all along to my story, but unnoticed by us. “Anyway, what’s the lesson?”
I glanced at Maria with a playful smile. “Well, flea A and flea B represent the insignificant megalomaniac madmen,” I explained. “A multitude of them want to be like God, like Adam and Eve, and also a great many of their descendants. Others think they are gods, the like of which are Caligula, Commodus, Nero, and also Alexander. Many want to be greater than God, doing things even God won’t do. These are people like Attila, Genghis Khan, Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, and many more. A great number want to be gods of the God. These are the idol worshipers who are more powerful than their controlled idol gods. Finally, there are those who want to destroy God by denying His existence and saying all kinds of perverted things about Him. Many of these megalomaniacs are dead, like the two flattened fleas, undone by their lunacy. Their remains are trash scattered in the dustbins of history. Others, by time, will follow them.”
“Who are those who curse and blame God?” Juan asked, now showing great interest.
“These are the worthless human fleas,” I explained, “they curse and blame God for all the misfortune and calamities that befall them, of which the fault are their own. The same destiny also awaits them, like the crushed fleas.”
Maria seriously looked at me sideways. I sensed that she was about to lash out at me when suddenly a drunk screamed in pain after being bitten by a blood-sucking flea. This was followed by the scream of another drunk, and then another. Almost all the drunks in the tavern screamed. Juan and I also jumped out of our seats. We were bitten again, this time by more bugs.
“I think I was bitten by scores of bugs,” Juan said excitedly as he vigorously scratched his itchy butt. He even rubbed his butt against the rough wall of the tavern.
“So was I,” I said as I also scratched my butt non-stop. “I think these suckers are out to torment us. Something is driving them mad.” I stopped scratching and picked up an empty bottle of “agua.” I looked at it and just to make more fun of the situation, I said, “I think our blood diluted by this ‘agua’ made them crazy and attack us.”
“No!” Juan strongly disagreed with me. “Those two demented, huge fleas we released are leading the attack against us.”
I stared at him in disbelief at his loony theory. I was about to explain to him to prove him wrong when all of a sudden most of the drunks in the tavern run out shouting, “Run, hurry!”
Though taken by surprise, Maria quickly ran after them. She caught one of the drunks and gave him an upper-cut. The drunk flew up and then crashed to the ground, flat on his back, unconscious. Maria really deserved to be called the Super Kapre. Anyway, when the drunks saw what happened, they all returned to the tavern and paid Maria for their drinks.
Along the way home, though Juan and I were drunk, we did not sing the drunken parable song. We were busy scratching our itchy butts bitten by those crazy, drunken, blood-sucking fleas.
“I strongly believe that those two suckers we released, like the two demented fleas in your parable, lead the attack on us and on those runaway drunks. They want to destroy us,” Juan said. “We should have crushed them earlier.”
“C’mon, Juan, don’t be a loose screw like those two fleas,” I reasoned. “It’s the instinctive nature of the fleas, but those drunks used the bugs as an excuse and ran away from the tavern because they didn’t want to pay Maria for their drinks.”
Juan was still unconvinced. We argued all the way home. Even now we still don’t agree about what happened that night.
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