One Wise Advice from My Grandma That Made Me Wealthy and Happy

Childhood Memories: Lessons from childhood snail hunting experiences on a Mediterranean farm over a half-century ago

Photo byThe author created the image using Adobe Fryfly to reflect childhood memories.

My First Encounter with the Money Concept and Lessons Learned

My grandparents used to live in a Mediterranean country and bought a farm after their retirement. This farm was my haven where I connected with nature from the early years of my life.

Our parents used to take us there during long weekends and school holidays. I never wanted to leave the farm as it brought me so much joy with all the Mediterranean fruit trees, including oranges, mandarins, apples, cherries, and plumbs.

I also loved the grapevines and olive trees that I climbed. Playing with animals, including dogs, horses, donkeys, cows, lambs, goats, chickens, and ducks, was joyful and fun.

During the summer holiday when I was six years old, my grandparents introduced me to several children from adjacent villages. Later, I learned they supported these kids and sent them to cities for better education.

On one particular day, a few kids took me snail-hunting. It was the first time I had seen a snail, and I got excited, wanting to keep them as pets. However, my new friends did not understand the concept of pets. They taught me to collect the snails in a bag and sell them to a local shop.

I remember asking what the shoppers did with those snails. They said they sold them to rich French people because they loved eating snails. The thought of eating a pet nauseated me, but with childhood excitement, I joined them and collected a bag of snails.

We went to the local shop and sold them. The shopkeeper gave me some money, but I didn’t know how to count it. It was the first time someone had given me money. I put it in my pocket and rushed back to the farm to share my first earnings with my grandparents.

They congratulated me for earning my first money, but they focused on making me social and bonding with these friends. So, they encouraged me to hang out with them carefully around the farm.

The next day, my friends came to the farm and invited me to snail-hunting again. We rushed to a place where snails abounded. I collected two bags this time, but I started feeling a terrible burning sensation in my hands, arms, and face.

It was unbearable, and I started crying. My friends asked me to stop being a baby as they said it was a little nettle sting and would disappear quickly.

They wanted me to grab some soil and, even better, mud, which they did for me. In a few minutes, the pain disappeared, and I got excited again but was more careful not to touch stinging nettles.

We went to the shop with my two bags, and this time the man gave me more money. I rushed back to the farm and shared my victory with my grandparents, who congratulated me again.

My friends said they would come early the next day as snails start moving in the early mornings, and we could catch more. I got excited and asked my grandparents to wake me up very early.

They asked why. I told them I wanted to earn lots of money. When they asked what I would do with the money, I said I would buy a bunch of toys, lots of chocolates, and lollies, which I loved.

My grandma asked, ‘Wouldn’t you share some of your money with your friends by buying them presents?’ As the first kid in the family, until then, I had no idea about sharing my money with others by buying gifts with them. But I shared my toys with my younger sister.

As I went to bed early that evening, they woke me when my friends arrived around six o’clock. With the same excitement, we went snail hunting again. This time, I collected three bags and earned more money.

My grandpa made a wooden piggy bank to save my money. Instead of playing, I kept working and earning money with these friends, which excited me. My piggy bank was full after a few weeks.

After a while, my parents came to pick me up as school was about to start. I did not want to leave the farm, and I told them I wished to attend the school in the adjacent village.

My father got concerned and asked the reasons. I told him I wanted to earn money and become rich. They had no clue how I would earn money until I told them the whole story with the support of my grandparents, who helped me articulate the several weeks of unique experiences.

My parents were happy with what I did, but they were not happy. I was so obsessed with it. So I felt resentful as they prevented me from earning money.

To show my bad reaction to them, I locked myself in a room and started crying. My grandparents came to soothe me.

They asked why I was so upset and overreacted to my parents’ reasonable request for my benefit. I told them I wanted to earn lots of money and become a rich person on the farm with my friends.

Then my grandma told me a beautiful and long story.

In a nutshell, the message was that if we seek money, it will elude us, but if we make service our goal, money will come to us.

The story touched my heart and convinced me to go with my parents, focus on my education, and have fun with farm friends in the next school holidays. It created a win-win-win position, which I understood in later years.

When I went to the farm on the next holiday, I did not have the intensity of money-earning as my parents started giving me pocket money for the service I did at home. So I saved them.

When I went snail-hunting with my friends this time, I did not care to collect them anymore. Instead, when they were collecting, I helped them hold their bags and told them jokes I learned from my city friends.

Interestingly, they all gave me some money from their earnings, which was more than what I earned from collecting them myself.

Then, in secondary school, during a lunch break, I wanted to go to local shops. It required passing lights to cross the street, which we had learned to do carefully.

An elderly woman said, ‘Hey, my son, can you please help me walk across the crossing?’ I eagerly and compassionately held her arm and slowly walked her across.

She asked my name and wanted to learn more about me as she missed her grandchildren living in another city. I didn’t understand what she was trying to do, but I kept listening to her attentively and acknowledging her points. Apparently, she found solace in talking with me.

She understood when I told her I needed to go to my class. She hugged and kissed me affectionately and gave me money. But it was a lot. I didn’t want to accept it, but she insisted, so I had no choice but to take it.

However, I didn’t want to spend that money. The next time we went to the farm, I told the story of an elderly lady to my grandparents and asked them to exchange this paper money for coins. My grandma shed a few tears, and she shared the reasons with me when I got older, which I will cover in another story as it is comprehensive.

Then, my grandpa asked what I would do with the coins. I told them to give my friends presents. He taught me that giving money was not a good idea but that it would be better to buy them presents, which I did. It made my friends so happy and made me happier than the days I earned money from snail-hunting.

The moral of these childhood stories is that they cemented in my memories, and I only focused on service rather than money.

Sharing my pocket money with those in need became a habit in my adolescence. I shared a story about it within the karma context.

When I started working, unlike my colleagues, I never asked for a pay rise. Over the 40 years of my employment until 2021, I did not ask for a single pay rise but was given many bonuses by my employers and clients.

As an independent consultant now, I still don’t discuss money with my clients until I provide the service needed, and the money always comes to me more than expected, nicely surprising and delighting me.

I documented an example of how money finds me. I also wrote a recent story about how caring for beggars brought intangible benefits, titled The Day When I Saw a Social Worker Training Himself as a Beggar.

Thank you for reading my memoirs. I wish you a healthy and happy life.

I regularly contribute to NewsBreak, sharing my decades of original research and experience in science and technology.