My Life Lesson Learnt in Porto Vecchio

I was visiting the ancient town of Porto Vecchio, Corsica. Under a beautiful, shady tree in the town square was a board with a map of the town and relevant tourist information. In the bottom right hand corner of this board, the words, "Attention! Achtung! Warning! Arachnoide Corso Terrificus Vecchio Mortelum" had been pasted.

I was looking at the map and wondering about the odd words when a huge, brown spider slowly lowered itself down from the tree onto the map. I only noticed it only when it came in line with my face, and although I was startled, I am fortunately not scared of spiders, so I just looked at it curiously. It was then I noticed it was, in fact, plastic, and there was a thin line running from its back up into the tree. Following the line with my eyes, I discovered it ended over the road at pavement café, where a group of four men sat drinking beer and manipulating the spider. When they saw me looking at them they roared with laughter. They knew their game was up.

I watched the men playing their joke for a while – they would roar with laughter every time a tourist screamed when the spider dropped down in front of them. They were still playing their joke a few hours later when I came back to the square. It was great to watch the good, clean fun the men were having. Their laughter was infectious, and their joke made my visit to Porto Vecchio that much more memorable. I will never forget it

Don't take life too seriously – make time to have fun and play – it makes life memorable and is good for the soul.