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by MostlyStable 1035 days ago
Once there was a remote mountaintop monastery, nestled high in the clouds above a deep gorge. To reach the monastery, visitors were required to ride in a basket pulled up from the top, after paying the ticket fee for the ride. One day, halfway up the cliff, a tourist noticed the sparkling condition of the titanium cable upon which they were suspended. He asked his guide, why did it cost me ten years salary to take this ride? The monk answered "If we didn't charge that much, we couldn't replace the cable after every trip". The tourist asked "is that really necessary"? The monk replied "Well, we used to use a hand woven hemp rope, and it broke once during a trip. We wouldn't want that to happen again, now would we?"