Week 5, Extra Reading Diary: Welsch (Thomas) (Second Half)

Welsch (Thomas) 2nd Half

Owen Goes a-Wooing
This story is very short, but very interesting. Owen is on his way to see his sweetheart and gets lost and falls into a lake. He can't swim, so he sinks and sinks until he comes to the bottom. He miraculously can breath and when he lands, there is green fields and trees. An old fat man asks him to stay so he does for a couple of hours. He then realizes that his sweetheart will be worried about him since he is a couple of hours late so he asks to leave. When he leaves, he ends up coming out from underneath the hearth of his sweetheart, who is sitting there weeping. He finds out that he had been gone a month.

The Devil's Bridge
In this story, there is an old woman who has lost her only source of income, her cow, to the other side of a very rapid river. Suddenly a monk appears and offers to build a bridge so she can retrieve her cow, on one condition. He says he wants to keep the first living thing to crosses the bridge. The old lady goes home while the monk builds the bridge. After thinking it over, she realizes that the monk is probably the devil trying to steal her soul. She decides to sacrifice her dog so that she and her cow will be okay. She tricks the devil by getting her dog to cross first by throwing some bread on the bridge. The devil is so annoyed that he leaves and never comes back.

Devil's Bridge in Bulgaria. Source: Wikimedia Commons.

Week 5, Storytelling: The Oxen Effect

Once upon a time mankind was very wasteful and ignorant of the consequences of their ways. The deities of the universe decided to send the Ox to man to deliver a message that if they did not change their wasteful ways, they would perish from their wants.

Along the way, the Ox was bothered by little bugs and flies that were dining on his hide. Soon a Crow came to eat the bugs that were bothering the Ox. The Crow decided to stay and help the Ox on his journey and started asking questions about where he was going and why. The Ox told him of the message he was sent to deliver to man. This weighed heavy on the Crow’s mind because he and all the other smaller animals and birds of the forest lived heartily off of the excess of man. The Crow begged the Ox to not deliver the message or to at least alter the message so he and the other creatures would not perish. The Ox told the Crow that he would consider his request, but the Ox decided that the gods knew what was best and didn’t want to suffer their wrath.

The Ox arrived to man and told them of the warning from the gods. Man immediately took the warning to heart and began only making what was necessary for them to eat and made sure that all of their food was ate so as not to waste anything. The Crow sat nearby on a tree limb and thought about the Ox and how he had condemned them to death by delivering his message. Slowly the birds and small animals of the world started dying out. Man started noticing that the birds did not sing any more and the little creatures did not come around them like they used to. Man sent their strongest warrior into the woods to find out what was wrong with the animals. The warrior found the Crow sitting at the bottom of a tree, barely alive. He sat down and talked to the Crow and found out what the Ox had done.

American Crow. Source: Wikimedia Commons.

The warrior went back to man and told them what he had learned from the Crow and they decided that they would find the Ox and make him pay for what he made them do. It didn’t take much looking to find the Ox since he was grazing on a field nearby. Man caught the Ox and brought him back to their villages and made him work for penance for what he had done.

Authors Note: This story is about how the Ox was sent to mankind to warn them about their wasteful ways. On the way a Crow convinced the Ox not to warn man because he and the other birds and wildlife fed off of man’s spoils. In the story, the Ox doesn’t tell the humans what he is sent to tell them, but I thought it would be an interesting butterfly effect for the other animals of Earth if he had ignored the Crow and told mankind anyway.

Bibliography: Folk Tales of the Kasis, KU Rafy, 1920. Web Source: Mythology and Folklore UnTextbook

Week 5, Reading Diary B: Khasi Folktales

Khasi Folktales

The Leap of Ka Likai
This story has to be one of the saddest and most horrific myths I have read so far. There was a woman named Ka Likai who had a wonderful husband and beautiful little girl. Ka Likai's husband died and so she ended up marrying another man to help her burden of raising a girl by herself. Her new husband was very selfish and was mean to the girl when Ka Likai was gone. One day she had to go on a long trip for work and left her husband to watch the girl. The husband decided to kill the girl and had chopped her up and cooked her to feed to the girls mother. After dinner, she pulled a bowl of betel nut towards her and saw her daughters severed hand in the bowl. The husband confessed to what he had done and she went and jumped over a waterfall to end her life. 


How the Ox came to be the Servant of Man
Most of the stories in between the first and last of this half seemed to have a laziness theme. Also, most of these stories were about how different animals came to live with man. This one stood out to me because of the warning that is given. It seems to resonate today as well.
Man had become wasteful and ignorant. The god called on the ox to deliver a message to them. The message was to not be so wasteful because they would perish from want at some point. On the way to tell man, the bugs and flies kept bothering the ox. A crow came and took care of the bugs for the ox. The ox then told the crow what he was going to do. The crow became distraught because he lived on the extras from the humans. After some pleading from the crow, the ox mixed the two requests into one to help the humans and the crows and other animals that lived off of mans waste. After the god found out what the ox had done, he knocked his top teeth out and punched a hollow in his waist. Afterwards, the ox was looking for pasture and shelter and offered his help to mankind in return for those things. 

Rekla Race. Source: Wikimedia Commons.

Week 5, Reading Diary A: Khasi Folktales

This week I chose to read the Khasi Folktales. The first half is full of stories about animals. Some are sneaky, some are lazy, and some are spoiled.

The Tiger and the Monkeys
The Tiger was once appointed king of everything and was a very self-centered animal. One day he was once taking a nap in the shade and woke up to a beautiful voice singing. He couldn't see where the voice was coming from so he asked the monkeys near by. A monkey, wanting to joke with Tiger because of his ignorance, told him it was their sister, even though it was actually the most famous singing bug in the forest. The Tiger then said he wanted to marry there sister. The poor monkey didn't know what to do since his joke backfired on him. The made up a story about their sister not being ready to meet the king and made a date for a week later for them to meet. The monkeys, not wanting to be torn limb from limb by the Tiger, decided to make a "sister" out of clay. They put all kinds of adornments on her to hide the fact that she was a statue. The Tiger had made a necklace and put it on the statue. When the statue didn't respond, the monkeys told him to pull on the necklace. The statues head fell off since it wasn't attached very good. The poor Tiger was beat up because he dared to "kill" their sister.

How Dog Came to Live With Man
In this story, there was once a fair that was held each year by all the animals in the forest. The Dog, U Ksew, was very lazy and hunted for something to acquire so he could sell it at the fair. He stumbled upon a house where humans were cooking their dinner. They invited the dog to come eat with them. Even though it was stinky, the beans were very good. The dog bought a pot full from the man and went back to the fair. The next day after opening his pot, all the animals made fun of him and broke his pot and stomped on the stinky beans. The dog, being sad about what he thought was going to make him a lot of money, wandered back to the mans house. He lived there with the man and helped him hunt the other animals, which were easy to find since their feet still smelled like stinky beans. One day the man came home and saw the pig and dog being lazy together so he decided to put them to work in the field. The pig spent all day digging while the dog played in the shade. When they were done, the dog walked all over what the pig had done. After a couple of days of dealing with the dog, the pig told the man what was happening. When they went to the field, though, the dogs footprints were everywhere making it look like HE was the one doing all the work. So that's how the dog came to live in the house of the man and not have to do any work.

Pointer Dog with Duck. Source: Wikimedia Commons