For the yarn club. based off of a story about a boy who can paint anything into life.Check out my website [link] and thanks Kate for doing this awesome story for me!Soe Than’s BrushK. Bachus, retold from Burmese traditionalThere was once a boy in Burma named Soe Than.He was poor, and an orphan, and worked all his days as a laborer. The rest of the time, hepainted.Soe Than had no brushes, so he used sticks, and cloth, and even with just these things paintedsuch amazing pictures that people would marvel. Many of his paintings were of things he’d never seen,like tall distant mountains, grey and blue and ringed in mist or wide green rivers all jade green, or tigers.Always tigers. Most often, tigers.After his day laboring he would sit under a teak tree and people would come and watch, andthis simple boy’s fame as an artist spread throughout the village, and even through the province.Then one day Soe Than was visited by a Nat, who came to him as he painted and swirled aroundhim all foggy spirit and said “I have a gift for you. Paint the world.” And when Soe Than woke as if from adream, he was holding a golden paintbrush.Soe Than dipped the brush, and began to paint.First he painted soup and rice, because he was always hungry and as he painted a warm ngapismell rose and when he was done there was a meal in front of him so he stopped painting, and ate.Then he painted for himself a longyi, and shoes, and put those on in place of his tattered ones. Thenhe painted a lotus, and took it in curved hands and set it at the base of the tree where the Nat hadappeared.The next day Soe Than went through the village, painting rice and fruit and fish curry and sweetpashu mont and pairs of shoes. These he gave out to the poor like himself, and by the end of the day,everyone was talking about Soe Than and his magic brush.Soe Than continued to paint. He painted a water buffalo for a farmer and he painted bangles fora little girl, and he went through the province painting and giving, but it wasn’t always shoes and oxen.He painted puppets for a puppeteer, that danced and leapt without strings. He painted a green and pinkstick bug for a little boy to play with. He wanted to paint tigers, he missed painting tigers. But obviouslyhe couldn’t paint tigers.Now, the king heard rumors of Soe Than and his magical brush, and sent his adviser to Soe Thanto command him to paint whatever the king desired.Soe Than refused.The king was outraged, and threw Soe Than into a dungeon, without food or water. Soe Thanpainted himself meals, and fruit, and little blue and green bugs to play with. Hearing that Soe Than hadmade himself perfectly comfortable in the dungeon, the king flew into an even greater rage, and sent hisguards to kill Soe Than.So the boy painted himself a trapdoor and escaped.The king’s guards pursued him, but he painted himself a horse to ride away on, and fled toa remote village to the Kachin province far to the north, and tried to live quietly and without notice.He painted only small and simple things, just enough. Not too much. But one day he grew bored andforgot and painted a bright green monkey, and the next day the king’s soldiers came and arrested him.They took him to the palace, where the king demanded Soe Than paint him a vault of treasure.Scared now, and tired of running, Soe Than complied, hoping this would satisfy the king and he could goand live in peace again. But the king demanded another vault, and another. He painted so many vaultson top of each other that they all collapsed, but the king didn’t care.“Paint me a huge palace,” he told Soe Than, “larger and more resplendent than any other.” SoSoe Than painted him a fantastic palace, with towering spires and marble floors and gold leaf adorningthe walls. “Make a garden,” the king demanded. “The most beautiful garden anyone has ever seen.”Soe Than painted a beautiful garden. It was full of white and yellow orchids, and fragrant sabae,and huge pink lotus flowers. “Make the garden bigger,” the king demanded. “And all the lotus should bewhite. Do it at once!” Soe Than made the garden bigger. Narrow paths twisted through it, tall trees roseup making dark, deep glens.“White lotus!” the king insisted. “Bigger!”“I’m finished,” said Soe Than. “You have a beautiful garden, and a beautiful palace, and there isnothing wrong with a pink lotus.” And he calmly and quietly put away his brush.“Bigger! White!” shouted the king and summoned his guards to force Soe Than to do hisbidding. But Soe than had left his paints behind and walked into the garden.It was the biggest garden in all of Burma, maybe all of the world.The king followed, and all the guards. Neither Soe Than, nor the king, nor the guards were seenagain.The palace crumbled, over time, but the garden flourished. Only the very brave will venture intoit to see its wonders, though.They say it’s full of tigers.