"- Two firefighters go into the forest to put out a small fire. When they are done, they go to a small stream. One of them has a face full of soot, but the other is spotlessly clean... which one will wash his face? - This is a stupid question: obviously the one whose face is full of soot. - You are wrong: the one with the sooty face looks at his companion and thinks that he is just like the other. And vice versa: the one whose face is clean sees that his companion is full of age and says to himself: I must be that dirty too, I have to wash myself. - What do you mean by that? - I want to say that in the hospital I understood that I was always looking for myself in the women I loved. I looked at their clean, beautiful faces and saw myself reflected in them. But they also looked at me and saw that my face was sooty, and as smart and confident as they were, they also saw themselves reflected in me and thought themselves worse than they were.
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Author
Paulo CoelhoAll Translations
All Translations
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- Two firefighters go into the forest to put out a small fire. When they are done, they go to a small stream. One of them has a face full of soot, but the other is spotlessly clean... which one will wash his face? - This is a stupid question: obviously the one whose face is full of soot. - You are wrong: the one with the sooty face looks at his companion and thinks that he is just like the other. And vice versa: the one whose face is clean sees that his companion is full of age and says to himself: I must be that dirty too, I have to wash myself. - What do you mean by that? - I want to say that in the hospital I understood that I was always looking for myself in the women I loved. I looked at their clean, beautiful faces and saw myself reflected in them. But they also looked at me and saw that my face was sooty, and as smart and confident as they were, they also saw themselves reflected in me and thought themselves worse than they were.
""- Két tűzoltó bemegy az erdőbe, hogy eloltsanak egy kisebb tüzet. Amikor végeztek, odamennek egy kis patakhoz. Egyiküknek csupa korom az arca, a másik viszont makulátlanul tiszta... melyikük fogja megmosni az arcát? - Ez egy hülye kérdés: nyilván az, amelyiknek csupa korom az arca. - Tévedsz: a kormos arcú ránéz a társára, és azt gondolja, hogy ő is olyan, mint a másik. És fordítva: az, akinek tiszta az arca, látja, hogy a társa csupa korom, és azt mondja magában: biztosan én is ilyen piszkos vagyok, meg kell mosakodnom. - Mit akarsz ezzel mondani? - Azt akarom mondani, hogy a kórházban megértettem, hogy mindig önmagamat kerestem a nőkben, akiket szerettem. Ránéztem tiszta, szép arcukra, és magamat láttam tükröződni bennük. De ők is rám néztek, és látták, hogy kormos az arcom, és bármilyen okosak és magabiztosak voltak, ők is magukat látták tükröződni bennem, és rosszabbnak hitték magukat, mint amilyenek."