Week 7 Reading Diary, Continued: Folk Stories From Southern Nigeria

I enjoyed the second half of Folk Stories From Southern Nigeria by Elphinstone Dayrell. I really liked the monkey character in The Bush Cow and the Elephant story because it was funny how easily distracted he got. By the time he made it to the chief he couldn’t even think of why he had gone there in the first place! I don’t really understand why the chief killed both the cow and the elephant. Why didn’t he just try to get them to move to a less crowded area to fight? I could use this for my storytelling assignment and instead of having the two animals killed, they would finish off the fight and I could discuss what happened after! Why Dead People are Buried was a very interesting, but also sad story. It would be so cool if our loved ones came back 24 hours after burying them. I got really frustrated when both the dog and the sheep got distracted and couldn’t remember exactly what the Creators message was. Of the Fat Woman who Melted Away was one of my favorites from this half of the reading. I thought the fat daughter was such a funny character because the idea of someone having such oily skin that they melt in the sun is so weird! I thought it was interesting that the men could have more than one wife in the story. I also think that I would be jealous too if the other wife just got to sit inside all day while I had to work! It was very creative how the fat woman could come back to life in three months if a part of her was planted in a pot… I wonder how I could use this in my storytelling assignment! I also enjoyed the story called The King and the ‘Nsiat Bird. I thought it was such an unnecessary custom their town had on having to kill both twins when they’re born and also banishing the mother! It made me want to know where it came from. I thought it was clever how the ‘Nsiat bird convinced the king to let the twins and Adit live as long as they lived in the air. I thought it was a fun explanation as to why these bird tend to have nests near people.

(Weaver bird/'Nsiat, by Srihari Kulkarni. Source: UnTextbook)