Once upon a time…

There was a merchant named Ali Cogia. …He lived in Baghdad.

He had a nice little shop, and lived quite comfortably all on his own. One night, he started having dreams about traveling the world. He was Muslim, and his dreams told him it was a good idea for him to go to Mecca. So he decided, why not. He didn’t have any family tying him down, he could get a bunch of merchandise and go sell it in Mecca!

It took him a while to set everything up. He sold his furniture and rented out his house, then sold his shop and packed his merchandise onto camels, ready to join a caravan. Not wanting to take a whole bunch of cash with him on a caravan, he decided to hide his money somewhere. So Ali Cogia got a big clay jar, the type usually used to store olives, and put a thousand pieces of gold in it. Then he set a layer of olives on top, and sealed the jar. That done, he went to his old neighbor and asked if he could leave a jar of olives with him.

The neighbor was like “yeah, sure, stuff it in the basement, no one ever goes down there. It’ll be safe and forgotten about until you get back.”

Ali Cogia thanked him, rolled the jar into his basement, and left. The neighbor promptly did as promised, forgetting it was there.

Ali Cogia had a great time with the caravan. He’d never traveled, and everything that happened on the way to Mecca was such an adventure! When he got to Mecca, he visited all the Mosques and… stuff… sorry, I don’t know what Muslims do in Mecca. But he did all of it! And then he went to the market and set up his wares.

On his first day there, his stall-neighbors looked at his merchandise and told him “y’no, we just came from Cairo. You could charge double for your stuff there.”

Ali Cogia decided that was a great idea! He’d enjoyed traveling with the first caravan so much, he instantly packed up and joined a caravan heading to Egypt.

He got to Egypt, and indeed sold all his stuff for stupid high prices. Since he was rich now, he spent a month sight-seeing, visiting the pyramids, sailing on the Nile, and just being a tourist. Finally he joined a caravan heading home, by way of Damascus.

In Damascus he found stuff that he knew would sell for stupid high prices in Baghdad. He bought a bunch, and rejoined his caravan. But he’d made friends with some merchants from Persia, who saw what he’d bought. They told him his new merchandise would sell even better in Persia, so why not join them?

So he did! He went to Persia, then India, and had the time of his life. He had such a good time that it took a full seven years for him to eventually make his way back to Baghdad.

Meanwhile, his neighbor had forgotten about the big jar of olives. …For six and a half years. At that point he presumed Ali Cogia was dead, since the man had only planned on being gone a couple months.

One day, his wife was making dinner, and was like “heck, I forgot to buy olives at the market. Do we have any in the basement somewhere?”

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

And the neighbor was like “ehhhh well, we do, but they’re not ours per se…”

She told him “that’s what’s in the jar down there? Look, the dude’s dead, or we would have heard from him. Just take a couple olives, and if he somehow comes back and gets mad about it, we’ll buy him a new jar of olives.”

This seemed reasonable, so the neighbor went downstairs and cracked the seal on the olive jar. The top olives were totally rotten and gross, having been sitting there for the better part of a decade. But the olives further down in the brine might still have been edible. So the neighbor moved the top olives, and found gold.

A lot of gold.

He took a few pieces out, looked at them thoughtfully, and went back upstairs to his wife.

“So, we’re sure he’s dead, right?” he asked.

“Yup, or he would have written us something in the past couple years,” she shrugged.

He showed her the coins and told her they were now about a thousand gold pieces richer. They replaced the money in the jar with more olives, and re-sealed it, in memory of their generous benefactor.

They weren’t particularly greedy or stupid people, so they didn’t spend the gold all at once. They fixed the roof, got a fresh coat of paint on the house, ordered a new sign for the shop, and put more variety in their diets. Six months passed, and they’d spent about half the gold.

And that’s when Ali Cogia finally came back to Baghdad.

Ali Cogia had rented out his house, so he spent the first night in town at an inn. The next morning, he went to check on his tenant. After making sure the house was still in good order and collecting seven year’s worth of rent, he went to see his neighbor.

The neighbor and his wife were like “holy crap, you’re alive???”

Ali Cogia was like “yeah, I’ve been having a great time! I’ll tell you all about it! But first, hey, you’re probably tired of seeing my olive jar in your basement, right? Mind if I get it?”

They were like “oh, that thing? Haha, yes, we forgot it was there. Haven’t looked at it in half a decade, nope!”

Ali Cogia was happy to hear that, thanked them for keeping it, and took it back to the inn.

To his horror, he discovered the olive jar… was full of olives!

He ran back to his neighbor, demanding to know why his olive jar was full of olives.

The neighbor was like “uhhh what did you expect to find in an olive jar? Did you think the olives would turn into emeralds?”

Ali Cogia was furious. He declared he would take the neighbor to court, and stormed out to find a lawyer!

Now, I read this story as a child in 1001 Arabian Nights, in which all the stories are connected by Scheherazade stopping halfway through to keep her head.

And in that book, this is where Scheherazade stops this story. On the one hand, stopping right before a long, drawn-out court case doesn’t sound all that smart. Cuz who cares, right? But on the other hand, I remember that second part more than I remember the first part.

So I’ll stop here, and continue with the fascinating legal battle tomorrow.

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Moral: If you leave a couple thousand dollars with your neighbor for seven years, make sure they know you’re still alive on a regular basis.