Pula

During nights wet with lightning, the Kutu children get together in the great hut of the old shaman

He knows all the stories there are, the shaman, and for him each one is like a precious relic, that he keeps jealously on the tip of his tongue

There's one story, though, just one, which is absolutely his favorite, the one that even today, after years, he loves to tell, the only one

This story is called Pula, that is, rain

A long time ago, a time of monsters and heroes, there lived a humble farmer, with a kind and faithful soul

He owned a vegetable garden of modest size, which nonetheless was enough to feed his family. His wife didn't wish for a richer husband, nor his kids a more handsome father, nor his buddies a more honest friend

And for him this was enough to be, in some way, happy

But, like all good stories, at a certain point the balance was broken. A crack in the wall, a cavity in the tooth, a candle that inexplicably reaches the ground igniting the fire

The season went on, and the farmer's eyes wheezed under the silent sky. His kind and faithful soul bent more and more, day after day, like a plant whipped by the wind. And a question flowed through his veins: "Where is the rain?"

The treacherous days wrapped around the dry soil and not a single drop fell from the sky. So the farmer decided to turn to a hunger, begging him

"Chase down a cloud, capture it and bring it to me, as though it were a bird, and I will be in your debt."

So the hunter built a huge cage and went up to the peak of the highest mountain. He waited, waited, waited, and finally a cloud came. From behind a bush, the hunter threw the cage over the cloud, but it easily freed itself, continuing on its never-ending voyage

The hunter didn't know that clouds are like memories, and they decide when it's time to stay and when it's time to leave. So he tried to ask a shaman for help

Is there perhaps some way to change my ill-fated fortune? Wash yourself with your sweat, so that the gods might be satisfied with your misery

Drink of your tears, so that the gods might rejoice by your pain. Eat of your own spit, so that the gods might amuse themselves by your weakness

But ten days later, the rain still hadn't come

Soon enough word got around that the humble farmer had been cursed. And everyone stopped greeting him, with the same spite disguised as wisdom with which one takes away a child's toy

The humble farmer lost all hope, he buried his eyes in his hands and decided that he would never open them again. He would die like that, and his children would find him exactly in that position

It was at this point that the screenwriter from Hollywood came forward. "I come from a land far away" he said, "and our lives are certainly very different, as are the problems that plague us. But I know the solution to yours, and I can reveal it to you".

The farmer's eyes reemerged from the sea of his hands; he was listening

"Look, it's simple. All you have to do is look there, right into the camera, and utter these exact words: 'It couldn't be any worse than this'."