look like (picks up a nearby napkin, and draws for the Tortoise these four
figures):oococo
Tortoise: They are mysterious-looking.
Achilles: Only to the uninitiated. Now once you have made the messenger,
you rub your hands in some ribo, and-
Tortoise: Some ribo? Is that a kind of ritual anointment?
Achilles: Not exactly. It is a special sticky preparation which makes the
string hold its shape, when folded up.
Tortoise: What is it made of?
Achilles: I don't know, exactly. But it feels sort of gluey, and it works
exceedingly well. Anyway, once you have some ribo on your hands,
you can TRANSLATE the sequence of symbols in the messenger into
certain kinds of folds in the string. It's as simple as that.
Tortoise: Hold on! Not so fast! How do you do that?
Achilles: You begin with the string entirely straight. Then you go to one
end and start making folds of various types, according to the geometric
symbols in the messenger. I
Tortoise: So each of those geometric symbols stands for a different way to
curl the string up?
Achilles: Not in isolation. You take them three at a time, instead of one at a
time. You begin at one end of the string, and one end of the mes-
senger. What to do with the first inch of the string is determined by the
first three geometric symbols. The next three symbols tell you how to
fold the second inch of string. And so you inch your way along the
string and simultaneously along the messenger, folding each little
segment of string until you have exhausted the messenger. If you have
properly applied some ribo, the string will keep its folded shape, and
what you thereby produce is the translation of the koan into a string.
Tortoise: The procedure has a certain elegance to it. You must get some
wild-looking strings that way.
Achilles: That's for sure. The longer koans translate into quite bizarre
shapes.
Tortoise: I can imagine. But in order to carry out the translation of the
messenger into the string, you need to know what kind of fold each
triplet of geometric symbols in the messenger stands for. How do you
know this? Do you have a dictionary?
Achilles: Yes-there is a venerated book which lists the "Geometric Code".
236If you don't have a copy of this book, of course, you can't translate a
koan into a string.A M u Offering