Extra Reading Diary: South African Folktales

South African Folktales

The Lost Message: The ants are prey to may different creatures. The different varieties of ants decided to make their homes in different places. The red ants made their home on the ground and the rice-ants lived under ground, but anteater ate them anyways. The Wagtail ants lived in trees but birds and centipede ate them. The gray ants tried flying away but birds and insects were much faster. The king ant sent a message for all the ants to unify again but the message was lost because a beetle failed to deliver.

The Monkey's Fiddle: Monkey went to work for his uncle because food was scarce. After a while, Monkey wanted to return home and his uncle thanked him with a bow and arrow that could kill anything and a fiddle that will make anybody dance. He shot a dear with his bow and arrow and shared the meal with Wolf. Wolf wanted the bow and arrow and accused Monkey of stealing it when Jackal was around. Jackal decided to hold onto until there was a trial. Everybody came to the trial and Jackal lied so that he could keep the bow and arrow for himself. Monkey was to be hung, but he played his fiddle and everybody started dancing. They were all begging him to stop and he did when Wolf admitted that he lied. The animals were afraid that he would start playing again, so they fled.

(Vervet Monkey, Source:UnTextbook)

The Tiger, The Ram, and The Jackal: Tiger was on his way home when he ran into a strange creature named, Ram. He ran all the way home in fright and told Jackal. Jackal thought he was foolish and decided that they would go eat Ram the next day. Ram saw them and went to his wife and she said to take the child and pinch him and make cry like he is hungry. Jackal tied himself to Tiger so Tiger wouldn't run away. Ram said that Jackal did a good job in bringing food home for his child. Tiger was so frightened that he ran away and dragged Jackal along with him.

Week 7 Storytelling: Anansi and Nothing

Author's Note: In the original story of "Anansi and Nothing," Anansi and Nothing were on their way to town to find wives. Anansi persuaded Nothing to change clothes. Now that Anansi was dressed in fine clothes, he found many wives while Nothing only found a wife because a woman felt bad for him. They all walked back home and when the wives saw Anansi's shack they were all disappointed. They decided to live with Nothing and his wife. Anansi was furious and decided to kill Nothing. After many attempts, Anansi finally succeeded. I decided to rewrite it because I didn't like the character Anansi or how the story ended. I don't like how Anansi took advantage of his friend and then got mad at him and tried killing him multiple times.

Anansi and Nothing
Anansi was a very poor man. He lived in a little run down shack while his friend, Nothing, lived in a lovely palace nearby. One day, they decided to go a few towns over to find some wives.

Nothing was dressed in a very nice, velvet jacket while Anansi wore a ragged cotton one. On the way to town, Anansi asked, "Do you mind if we switch clothes for a bit? I'm starting to feel a bit chilly."

"Well of course!" replied Nothing. "You don't want to catch a cold on the way to meet our future wives." So they switched clothes and on they went, continuing their journey.

As they were nearing the town, Nothing asked to switch clothing again. Anansi evaded the question and said "Actually, I'm still a little cold..." Nothing felt sorry for him and let him continue wearing the jacket.

By the time they got to town, it was too late to trade clothes. Anansi was dressed magnificently and didn't have any troubles finding a wife. In fact, he found multiple wives to take home with him.

Poor Nothing was stuck in the ragged jacket and was being overlooked. Until a sweet woman came towards him and started talking to him. They talked for ages and she decided to be his wife. She didn't care that he looked poor. She liked him for him.

So Nothing and his wife and Anansi and all of his wives all walked back home together. At the split of the road, where Nothing and Anansi would part, Anansi took off the jacket and said, "Thanks for the jacket Nothing! I really owe you one!"

Anansi continued walking but instead of going towards the palace, he walked straight to the run down shack. Nothing and his wife walked hand-in-hand towards the palace. Anansi's wives were furious.

They went with Anansi anyways, but the six wives and Anansi had to share one small bedroom and they barely had anything to eat. Nothing's wife felt sorry for her friends and invited them over for dinner.

The wives joined Nothing and his wife for dinner and saw how great he treated her. He surprised her with flowers, pulled her chair out for her at dinner, and looked at her adoringly.

The wives realized that Anansi didn't treat any of them like that and that they deserved better. After dinner, they marched back to the hut and told him that they were all leaving him.

Anansi was furious. He thought of many ideas to kill Nothing, but none of his plans worked. He decided to dig a hole in front of Nothing's door and fill it with sharp knives.

He banged on the door and shouted for Nothing to come out. But Nothing's wife begged him to stay inside.

After a few minutes, Anansi grew impatient. He was so frustrated that he started pacing and mistakenly walked right into the hole. He was so wounded that he died almost immediately.

(Velvet Jacket, Source:Dark Brown Hairs) 

Bibliography: "Anansi and Nothing" from West African Folktales by William H. Barker and Cecilia Sinclair (1917).

Reading Diary B: West African Folk Tales

West African Folk Tales

How The Tortoise Got Its Shell: The chief Mauri decided to have a huge yam festival. He sent all of his servants to gather supplies for the festival and sent Mr. Klo, the tortoise to buy palm wine. Mr. Klo was very fast and a strong traveller so he made it to the palm fields of Koklovi, the chicken. Koklovi refused to sell his palm wine and said that Mr. Klo could have all the wine and pine trees if he could beat him in a fight. Both were very strong fighters, so the fight lasted for hours before Mr. Klo finally won. He filled his pot with the wine, drank all the rest, and went on his way with the palm trees on his back. The wine made him sleepy so he could not walk fast with his load. When he reached the palace, the gates were already closed. For the next two months, rain kept falling so everybody stayed in the palace. By the time the gates opened, Mr. Klo had died. He was restored back to life, but the pot and dust were caked together forming a shell. 

Elephant and Wren: There was a tree in the palace courtyard and because it was starting to overshadow the nearby fields, the king ordered it to be cut down. He offered the payment of an elephant to whoever could cut it down. Spider was very cunning and wanted the elephant for himself. A servant was ordered to stay with spider to ensure that he only use the wooden axe. He hid in his bag a steel axe and tricked the servant to run off and used the steel axe as often as he could. Finally, the tree was cut down and Spider was able to take the elephant home. He was very greedy and decided to hide it from his family. He saw a wren in a tree and decided to take that home for his children and to keep the elephant for himself. He tied the elephant to the tree and climbed up but the wren flew away. He climbed back down and saw that the elephant had escaped. He had to come home empty-handed. 

How Mushrooms First Grew: Two brothers were in debt and were tired of running so they decided to make a farm and settle their debt. They had a very nice field of freshly sowed corn seeds when a batfowl came by and ate all the seeds. The debt was then transferred over to it. He tried laying eggs to  hatch and sell for money, but a storm came and a branch from the silk tree broke off and landed on the eggs. The debt was then transferred to the tree. The tree made silk cotton to pay off its debt but an elephant came by and plucked all the cotton. The debt was continually transferred until it came upon a group of ants. They discussed together and contributed all their money and sent one of the men to go and buy linen thread. They would then weave it and sell it to repay the debt. They would often spread it out in sunshine to keep it nice. Men would often see these and call them "mushrooms" and pick them for food. 

(Mushrooms, Source: UnTextbook)

Reading Diary A: West African Folktales

West African Folktales

How We Got the Name "Spider Tales": A spider was very jealous that all of the stories told were about Nyankupon, the chief of gods. So the spider went to the god and asked if future stories could be told about spiders. Nyankupon agreed but only if the spider could bring back a jar full of live bees, a boa constrictor, and a tiger. So off the spider went and he tricked a hive of bees to go into the jar, tricked a boa constrictor and tied it to a long stick, and tricked a tiger and sewed its eyes shut and let them all to Nyankupon. He was so impressed of how the spider fulfilled the conditions that he allowed all the stories to be Anansi tales.

Anansi and Nothing: Anansi lived next to a very wealthy man named Nothing. One day, they agreed to go into town and find wives. On the way, Anansi convinced Nothing to trade clothes on the way to town. Anansi kept putting off switching clothes until they got to town. When they arrived at their destination, all the women saw the velvet coat on Anansi and flocked to him. Poor Nothing couldn't get any wives. One woman felt bad and gave him her daughter. They all walked back to the houses together and saw that Nothing was actually the wealthy one. Anansi's wives had to survive off of unripe bananas. Nothing's wife felt bad for her friends and invited them over for a feast. They were so happy that they decided to stay. Anansi was so mad that he tried to kill Nothing multiple times. He succeeded one night and Nothing's wife was so upset that she made food and took it around the district and told children "to cry for Nothing."

Thunder and Anansi: Anansi and his family were very poor and had nothing to eat. Anansi was out searching for food when he saw a tree that he could possibly get nuts from. He had to steer an old boat out to it though. He climbed the tree and dropped the nuts one by one hoping they would land in the boat, sadly they all fell into the water. He threw himself into the water and instead of drowning he came upon Thunder's cottage. He told him of his troubles and Thunder gave him a pot and said that he would always have enough food for him and his family. But he was very greedy and decided to hide it from his family. His family found out and his wife had the pot cook for everybody in the town, but under the stress, the pot melted. Announce couldn't find the pot and immediately thought of his family as the culprits. He went back to Thunder and told him of his problems and was given a stick. When Anansi asked the stick to do what it does for Thunder, the stick began beating him. Announce jumped out of the boat and had to swim all the way back to shore.

(Snake Beach, Source: UnTextbook)