施氏食狮史

I found out about this "story" in Wikipedia (I can spend hours in there!). I wonder why I've never seen it! For those who aren't familiar with 文言文 (Classical Chinese), I've written a translation below (well, usually classical chinese is tough for me too, but this story was rather easy. Still, there might be some mistakes).

What's so unique about this story is that if it is read in Chinese (Mandarin), all the characters have the sound "shi", in either 1 of the 4 tones. Almost no one would understand you if you were to read it out loud, yet it would be rather clear for someone reading it.

施氏食狮史

石室诗士施氏，嗜狮，誓食十狮。
施氏时时适市视狮。
十时，适十狮适市。
是时，适施氏适市。
氏视是十狮，恃矢势，使是十狮逝世。
氏拾是十狮尸，适石室。
石室湿，氏使侍拭石室。
石室拭，氏始试食是十狮尸。
食时，始识是十狮尸，实十石狮尸。
试释是事。

The Lion-eating story of Mr. Shi

In a stone room lived Mr. Shi, a poet, who liked lions, and swore to eat 10 lions.
Mr. Shi always went to the market to look for lions.
10 o'clock, 10 lions arrived at a market.
At the same time, Mr. Shi arrived at the same market.
Mr. Shi saw these 10 lions, and using the might of his arrows, made these 10 lions dead.
Mr. Shi picked up these 10 lions, and went back to the stone room.
The stone room was damp, Mr. Shi asked his servant to wipe the stone room dry.
The stone room was dried, Mr. Shi began trying to eat the 10 lion corpses.
As he was eating, he realised that the 10 lions, were actually 10 stone lions.
Try to explain this matter.

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I like Classical Chinese as it is complex and yet simple. The same text, written in Modern Chinese is always longer than the Classical Chinese version. But it's difficult to understand, as sometimes a same character is used for different meanings, or the word has a different meaning from its present use, or I don't know the word at all. @.@

Me & 石狮 @ Pergamon Museum, Berlin, Oct 2007