Lord Bao And The Stone (Chinese Folktale)

                                     

Hundreds of years ago a man lived in south China . He was a government official. He was so honest and fair , people loved him and they called him "Lord Bao".
One day during his routine visit to a town Lord Bao found a little boy who was crying badly. 

''Why are you crying my child'' ?  Kind hearted Lord Bao asked the young boy.
''Sir, I use to sell oil to earn my livings.  I have lost all my money." 
 ''How ?", asked Lord Bao.
"In the afternoon I felt tired , I put my  the money next to me and put my head on this stone and fell asleep'' the boy said pointing towards a stone.  
''When I got up I found out that my money wasn't here.'',he added. 
                                                
''Oh! So the stone has stolen your money, it is the thief.'' ,said Lord Bao. He lifted the stone with his hands and screamed,''Where is the money of this little boy , give it back! '   People who heard him shouting laughed and whispered in each others ears, '' How can a stone steal the money? Lord Bao has gone crazy."                     

 ''How dare you people call me crazy? Now each one of you will pay fine of one cent.'' Lord Bao ordered one of his men to collect the coins in a bag. 

While the people were putting their coins in the bag , Lord Bao was checking every coin by himself. 
"He is the thief , catch him!", suddenly Lord Bao pointed his finger towards a man and shouted. 

"But how can be you so sure that he is the thief ?", Someone  questioned Lord Bao.
''See! the coin has oil on it and the boy is an oil seller, he must be having  oil on his hands therefore there is oil on the coins too. This is little boy's coin.'' , said Lord Bao.
All the people gathered around the man..... he got scared and took out all the boy's money which he had stolen. 

Bao returned all the collected coins. The little boy got his money back and thanked Lord Bao. People praised Bao for his intelligence.

                                                                                                       Chinese Folktale
                                                                     Retold by - Aunt Mary

"THE MAN WHO NEVER TOLD A LIE"- African Folktale

                                                  image source-pixabay.com
A long time ago in the amazing land of Africa there lived a man . The one thing which was famous about that man was... that he had never lied in his whole life.
 People knew him as '' The man who never told a lie.'' 

This came into the knowledge of king and he ordered his men to get that man and bring him to the court.
                                     

image source-pinterest.com

The man reached. The king asked him ,'' I have heard that you have 

never told a lie '' ?''

"Yes my king , I have never lied. '' ,The man answered.

''Do you think you will never lie in the future too?"

''Yes my lord ,I will try my best to do that .'' , said the man respectfully.

''That is a very good quality of your's but you can't be so sure about not telling a lie every time in life, anyway you can go now .'' The king let him go.

image source-enwikpedia.org

A few days later the king called the man again and said'' I am going to hunt , the queen is in the other palace and I want you to go to my second palace and tell the queen that after hunting I will meet her and we will enjoy the meal together so she should get ready for that.''

''As you wish your majesty'' , said the man and left the king's palace.

Now king said to the people around him '' I will not go for hunting and I will not go to meet the queen today and... ''The man who never told lie will be proved wrong '' , he laughed aloud .

On the other hand the man reached the queen's palace and went to her and said ...

''O Queen there is a possibility that the king will visit you after the hunt and he might have lunch with you. "

"Tell me clearly will he come or not?" , asked the queen.

''Well, he is the king , he is the master of his own, may be he will come , may be he will not.'' The wise man answered.

Next day the king went to his queen and said that the man lied to her and has been proved false. But the queen told him that the man was very intelligent, he didn't lie to her, he was still

 '' The man who never told a lie.''

                                                               African Folktale Retold by                                                                                    - Aunt Mary

                        Have a beautiful day                             

                                                                                 

                                                image sourece-pixabay.com                                                                                                                                            

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The Miser Old Woman ( Indian Folktale)

                                                                                

Once upon a time an old woman lived in a village. She was  wealthy but was very clever and miser. She lived alone in an old hut and never allowed anyone to enter her hut. Though she was getting weaker day by day due to old age but did not have any servant or other helping hand and used to do all the household work by herself.
She had only one thing in her mind.....
'' If I allow someone to enter my house the person will steal away  all my money and I will get poor.'' 
                                             

One day a young man from other village came to the old woman's village and he heard about that woman from the villagers.
The young man thought that how good it would be for him if he succeeded in getting a good share of the old woman's wealth by any means.
Next day he went to old woman's house and knocked the door .
''Who is there'' ? ,asked the woman. 
''I am a relative of yours" ,the young man replied.
 ''Why have you come here?'' ,old woman asked again .
 I heard that you are living alone and it is not good for you to live alone in this old age so I decided to stay here and  look after you.
The woman did not allow him to come in but he started to live in the compound of the house.
Many days passed like that and one day the old woman got sick and she called the young man in the house as she had no one else to look after her.
The young man served the woman like her own child, she became so pleased with him that she allowed him to stay with her.
After some time the illness of the woman worsened.

                                             
Now she knew that she was going to die soon , she called the young man and said to him, '' Son, I want to tell you my last wish , that when my body will be placed on the pyre please burn my pillow with my body."
Two days later, the woman died. The young man did exactly what the  woman had asked him to do. He burnt the huge pillow with her.
After completing the funeral and rituals he rushed to the old woman's hut and started searching madly for the money.
He searched here, 
he searched there,
he searched everywhere.
But the young man didn't find a single penny.
So where was the money? Well, it was in the pillow which was burnt with the old woman.
 Ah ! all the efforts of the young man failed.
                                                                      Indian folktale
                                                                      Re-told by-Aunt Mary

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                          The crazy old woman and the sky

THE GAMBLER AND THE KING

One day a king came out from his palace for the morning walk surrounded by his soldiers. A man who was standing outside the palace wanted to meet the king. The king's soldiers took him to the king . The king asked " Why did you want to meet me?''
"O' respected king , you are so lucky for me. I have gambled in your name and I have won a big amount of money, so I bought a chicken for you please accept it, my heart will break if you will not take it." King was flattered by what the man said about him and he accepted the gift ( the chicken ).

After few days after that man again came to the king and said, '' O my king how lucky you are for me , today I have again gambled in your name and I won a very big amount of money , I am so grateful to you and I want to gift you a goat. The king became very happy and he accepted the goat.

The very next day the gambler came crying and said ,"O' king yesterday I gambled in the name of you and I lost my cow. What do I do now? I get my earnings by selling cow's milk.Now my wife and children will die with hunger. Please help me''. 
The King had to behave like a king so he gave the man a cow, but he learned a lesson that never get flattered by any one's sweet talks and never accept a gift from a gambler. 
                         - Indian folktale Retold by Aunt Mary