Garau Antzu

There weren't always dragons in the valley. There was a time when our valley was the haven of peace, the refuge for hope, the shelter for faith, and the sanctuary of goodwill. The dragons didn't show up until Filbert and I decided to travel the world with our pet otter, Philip.

Yes your honor? Ah, pardon — too abrupt? I see. Yes, I will slow down, excuse me. Introduce myself? Oh sure, yes, quite, indeed.

Members of the jury, my name is Albert of SinpanRa, but generally, I am known in my land as Thunderface or Chrysanthemum. Filbert is my long lost twin brother, and Philip has always been like a — sort of a… well, he’s always been there. Filbert and I grew up together in the Valley of SinpanRa, and have been best friends since birth. We grew up in the chickpea industry. – Yes, pardon your honor? – Yes, I did say long lost. – Well we did grow up together, you see, we didn’t know we were brothers though, that’s part of the story. Are you with me your honor? – Well yes, we always thought it was a bit of a coincidence that we were identical. – Well pardon me your honor, but I don’t think it’s your place to insult my intelligence — Excuse me ma’am, but you and Philip have a certain something in common but I don’t see you assuming yourselves to be long lost brothers. – Well I happen to think it was called for, Filbert, she’s just insulting us to my face and I just think …. — ….

— 15 minutes later —

As I was saying. We grew up together in the valley. Well, the time came when Filbert and I decided that canning garbanzo beans was not all its cracked up to be. 10 hours a day of putting chickpeas in cans hardly makes you feel like a man. We were beginning to feel like a couple of garbanzo beans ourselves, and heaven knows that’s not the life. So we decided to run away. See the world. Get our hands dirty. Do something about the chickpea aura that seemed to follow us everywhere. We wanted to sort of air ourselves out, if you see what I mean?

Of course, we were devastated to leave Philip behind. But who knew he was destined to find his, er, long lost, er, I think I’ll just keep that comment to myself.

So Filbert and I planned to stow away in the chickpea train that journeyed out of the Valley of SinpanRa and into the great, wide world. – Pardon your honor? Ah? Yes, that’s a fair question. We couldn’t just leave, you know, we had to sneak. Our father was the chickpea boss.

You see, he happened to run the chickpea company, and well, I don’t mean to brag, but Filbert and I were sort of the beating heart of the business. Let me put it this way, your honor, do you like chickpeas? – No? Ah, well, can't blame you, I'm not so fond of them myself. But the point is, if it weren't for Filbert and I, not so much as a single chickpea could have journeyed out of the valley. You would never have experienced the flavor of garbanzo or the taste of hummus. A carrot would never have met its bride. Not only did we can chickpeas by day, but by night Filbert was head of advertising, and I of financing. Did you perchance notice when we switched the wrapping on the garbanzo beans in 2016? No? Too bad, it was quite a drastic change. I don't know how you missed it really. You see, originally, we had a red wrapper with a picture of a chickpea on it. But Filbert rightly pointed out that a garbanzo bean doesn't have much going for it in the way of looks, if you know what I mean. Just sort of a beige lump. Looks like a wadded up bandaid. Anyways, I noticed that switching to lighter colors would save us a quarter of a penny per can. And so now we have a picture of a garbanzo bean field, which is just a light green – no red. Cheaper, and much more appetizing. Saved us millions. Anyways, that's just one of the momentous things we've done for the company. Just generally speaking, we both have a way with the chickpeas. When either of us walk past a chickpea, it can't help but tame its wild heart to our loving hand.

My point is that we were not able to just slip out the back. The chickpea boss was not about to lose us — we were sort of guarded night and day. Believe me we tried to bolt on many an occasion, but out of nowhere swarms of chickpea employees would be after us. I think also that the other employees had a sort of a bitterness toward us. You see, we provoke envy. We flourish in a way that the other chickpea people did not. What can I say, we both have wit that seems to go beyond what the typical chickpea employee is capable of; and, generally speaking, after looking at our works, the mighty tend to despair. So we had to sneak, you see? Our plan was to clothe ourselves in chickpea cans you know — well it’s hard to envision and it was a complicated process, but it was doable.

So we bid farewell to Philip and snuck onto the chickpea train in our garbanzo garb. And then what do you know but they leave the back of the train cracked a little bit on accident, see? Something that wouldn’t have happened with us on duty of course…. But as we drive off we see Philip waddling behind us trying to catch up. So I leapt out in sort of a heroic moment, and grabbed Philip and ran after the train. All the chickpea people are running behind me, you know. And then there was this touching moment, as Filbert is reaching his hand out of the chickpea train, and I’m racing towards him with Philip in my arms. I mean, just picture it, it was beautiful. Sort of resembled that scene in Lion King, you know? Except with an otter. Anyways, we made it, of course. All three of us, bound for adventure aboard the chickpea train.