The slow-witted men gathered in St. Petersburg to buy goods. Let's go. They travel all day. In the evening we arrived in the village and stopped at an inn to spend the night. They say among themselves:
- Let's put the sleigh with its shafts forward, towards St. Petersburg, so that in the morning we don’t have to guess which way to go!
And so they did. And the village guy heard this conversation and decided to play a joke on the passers-by. As soon as they fell asleep, he turned the entire sled in the opposite direction. In the morning the men harnessed their horses and rode on. They pass by a village. Here's one who says:
- It seems like we already passed this village yesterday?
“You haven’t traveled much around the world, that’s why you don’t know that there are many identical villages!” - answers the other.
They move on. They are approaching the bridge. Again one says:
- This seems to be our bridge.
— A bridge can look like a bridge, more than one of our bridges in the world! - they object to him.
They enter the village. The others were already doubtful.
“This village looks a lot like ours.” Another house - just like mine!
And the most stubborn ones do not give up:
— There are many such villages around, and the houses are identical!
- Yes, there is a woman rinsing her clothes on the shore, she looks like my wife like two peas in a pod!
- There are many identical women in the world! - And we drove past.
The woman heard their speech and screamed:
- Oh, you unlucky, stupid fools, why are you coming back, and even decided to drive past your village?
At this point they believed that they had returned to their village. Know someone was playing a joke on them. They never went to St. Petersburg again.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru