Week 7 Reading Diary: Filipino Popular Tales

This week I read Filipino Popular Tales from Dean Fansler's monumental Filipino Popular Tales, published in 1921. My favorite story from the first half of the reading was The Three Friends: the Monkey, the Dog, and the Carabao. It immediately caught my eye because my two best friends and I think that three is the perfect number for a balanced friendship. I also really like stories that are told in steps. Like first one thing happens with one character, then the next day another character tries the same thing and doesn't succeed either and so on.

This story started out like that, but then the ending was totally different. So I think if I was going to retell this story I would want to keep it going step by step until the final character tried something and succeeded. I also like that this story is all about cooking. I like to cook, but I think cooking is even more fun when I get to do it with my friends!

I really liked the part of the story where the three of the animal friends work together and the story goes "there is strength in unity." That's an important theme, even more so when it comes to friendship. This would be a really fun storytelling post if I kept some of the main characters and changed up the plot a bit.

boa constrictor

Week 6 Reading Diary: Brer Rabbit Tales Continued

This week I read the Brer Rabbit Unit from Joel Chandler Harris's series of books of Brer Rabbit tales. In this second section of reading, I think I found my favorite little story of them all. I liked the Mr. Rabbit and Mr. Bear story because it was a double trick! First, Brer Fox had to catch Brer Rabbit, then Brer Rabbit had to find a way out of it, and this time he did it by tricking Brer Bear! I also laughed every time the story mentioned goobers. This was probably mainly due to the Spongebob song "Goofy Goober," which is an American classic for sure.

I would describe Brer Rabbit and Brer Fox as frenemies. They pretend to be nice to each other half of the time, but their ultimate motivation for basically everything in life is to destroy each other by foiling the other one's plans! Everyone else in their social circle is basically just a pawn in their disputes and tricks. This is a lot like the leaders of two disputing cliques in a high school movie. The two clique leaders are usually the main ones feuding, but the other people in the movie get their own subplots usually. This could be a really fun way to retell the Brer Rabbit stories with humans instead of animals, which I think would be a really fun change up. Especially if I could make the main theme one of the proverbs from these stories!  

I really think these stories have lessons/morals that could be great in a sort of modern retelling. You just have to rethink the whole fox eating the rabbit thing!

 

illustration by A. B. Frost

Week 6 Reading Diary: Brer Rabbit Tales

This week I read the Brer Rabbit Unit from Joel Chandler Harris's series of books of Brer Rabbit tales. Before I read these stories, I had heard of Brer Rabbit, but my main exposure to the stories was from riding Splash Mountain about a million times at Disney World.

I really liked these stories because I always think trickery is fun to read about! I also liked getting to read up on the history of these stories on Wikipedia. The fact that all of the characters in these stories are animals makes me wonder if there is a way to retell the stories using human characters. Since the whole thing centers around Brer Fox eating Brer Rabbit that might be kind of difficult! 

Since so many of the stories are just short little details of the overall story or other random extra details, it could be fun to write a storytelling post like it is just another chapter in the story! It would also be fun to write in the same style, but I think that might be a bit too much of a challenge.

Usually my favorite parts of movies are the happy parts at the beginning, and I always wish I could just cut out the sad part before it gets happy in the end. However, in Splash Mountain, the sad part before it gets happy is the 50 foot drop, which is the best part of the ride! So maybe in my storytelling post this week I'll give the story a really good sad part before it gets happy in honor of Disney World and Brer Rabbit!

illustration by A. B. Frost

Thoughts about Comments

I really enjoy comments that are more specific. Although I like to have freedom to edit my posts however I think it best, comments make more of an impression on me if they mention specific aspects of my story. For example, would really stand out to me if they not only mentioned that they liked the ending, but if the comment said specifically what exactly they liked about the ending. I also like to hear about common experiences that the commenter might share with me! That's a really great connection to have.

I think I could improve my own comments by being more specific as well. I could also improve by reading the comments before me so I can either agree with them in a more helpful way, or give some new insights that others haven't.

Week 4 Reading Diary: Arabian Nights

Persian miniature: a polo match

I really liked reading all of these framework/nested stories in the Arabian Nights unit from The Arabian Nights' Entertainments by Andrew Lang and illustrated by H. J. Ford (1898). My favorites were towards the end. I liked the story of the king being cured of leprosy and the jealous vizir, and the following story was with the parrot was very entertaining as well!

I liked the magic in the story with the king being cured because it made me wonder how it was done. Sometimes I think stories give a little too much detail, and I know that I don't like to leave anything up to the imagination by the end of the story if I can help it. But by nesting several short stories together, these Arabian Night stories left a lot up to the imagination! Also, almost all of these stories seemed to involve someone feeling jealous or wronged, which I thought was really funny as well.

In the story with the parrot, the wife felt wronged that the parrot had told her husband what she was doing, so she tricked the parrot. I don't really understand why the husband was so mad that he killed the parrot, however. But I guess if you trust something, lying is a pretty big deal, even if it is only a bird. I feel like it could be fun to tell this story because the story of the parrot is very short. So even in one of my weekly storytelling posts I could use the framework story technique as long as I keep the nested story short, like this parrot one!

Week 5 Storytelling: Dan and Gladys Forever

Lightning struck the giant tree not even thirty yards from the house, and it immediately burst into flames for no more than five seconds before the torrential downfall extinguished the fire. Dan was scared. “I don’t want our house to catch on fire, even if it is only for a second,” Dan said to his fat grey cat, Gladys.

Gladys said nothing in return; she was only a cat.

The storm stopped in the early morning, and Dan went outside to look at his yard. There was more than one tree damaged by the lightning, but there was no damage to his house. He looked at Gladys and said, “I’m glad that you, me, and the house are safe. But I wish the place looked nicer since my brother will be here before too long.”

Dan was a laid-back guy with not much going on in his life. He loved his cat, he liked his job as a book critic, and he didn’t like things that made him have to leave his house or go out of his way. He was happy when family members, like his brother Brian, came to visit him because it meant that he didn’t have to go to visit them.

Around lunchtime, Brian knocked on Dan and Gladys’ front door. “Hey bro, how’s the hermit life?” Brian asked his older, shorter, and balder brother.

“No complaints,” said Dan.

Before an hour had passed, the brothers slipped into their routine. Brian was looking around the house, fixing little things that he found that had fallen into disrepair since his last visit, while Dan was cooking dinner and playing with Gladys.

“How old is that cat getting to be?” Brian asked Dan.

“Oh, she’s old alright, but she’ll probably hold out for a few more years at least. She likes it here better than she did at the old place,” Dan answered. He tended to be more motivated to talk when he was talking about Gladys, something his talkative brother never understood. Dan continued, “Oh and by the way, I’ve got to go to the post office tomorrow to pick up this quarter’s new book releases so I can start reviewing them. Will you be okay here with Gladys?”

Brian looked at Gladys and said, “Oh sure, me and the cat will be just fine. As long as she doesn’t croak on me.”

The next day while Dan was gone, Brian heard someone yelling outside. He looked out of the window and saw a woman with a basketful of kittens. Brian asked her what she was doing.

“I’m just exchanging any old, grey cats for brand-new white kittens. I thought I saw an old cat around here. Do you want a kitten?” the woman said.

“Yeah sure! That would be great!  Here, go ahead and take this old one. We won’t be needing it any more!” Brian was excited about doing something nice for his brother.

Once Dan got home and saw the new cat, he asked where Gladys was, since it was her usual dinnertime.

“Check out this new kitten!” was Brian’s only reply.

“Yes, I see the kitten, but where is Gladys?” Dan persisted.

Brian explained, “I exchanged her for a brand-new little white one! There was just this woman walking around offering to switch, and I thought it would be nice to have a new pet.”

Dan was shocked. “What? Why would you do that? What is your problem? Gladys was my best friend! You can’t preemptively replace her with some kitten from the street!”

Brian really didn’t understand anything about his brother. Who would rather have an adult cat than a cute little kitten? “Hey man, I’m really sorry. I really thought I was doing you a favor. I’m sure I can find your old cat. The woman trading them out can’t be that far away,” Brian said, trying to placate his brother.

Brian did eventually find Gladys, and she and Dan continued to live together for many years. A few months after Brian left Dan’s house, the two brothers made up. Dan and Brian had been brothers for all their lives after all, so they were fairly accustomed to never understanding anything about each other.

Author’s Note: The original story of Aladdin and his magic lamp with the genie inside has an interesting plot point where his wife falls into a trap set by someone jealous of Aladdin. The jealous sorcerer decided to advertise that he’s exchanging old lamps (like the one with the genie inside) for new lamps. When Aladdin finds out that his wife has traded his valuable lamp for a new, genie-less one, he sets out to bring back his genie and endless wishes. I thought it was really funny that the jealous sorcerer thought that the lamp-switch was a good idea, and it was even funnier that Aladdin’s wife fell for such an odd trick! I also wanted to tell a story with a lot of dialogue that begins in the middle of something exciting, like a thunderstorm. Although Aladdin has a lot of interesting magic, I wanted to tell a more realistic story. And who doesn’t love cats named Gladys? I also wanted to give a shout out to adult pets, since puppies and kittens usually get so much attention. I think that adult pets are more fun than young ones because then you can really get to know their personality and you don’t have to train them or spend all of your time entertaining them!

Bibliography: This story is part of the Arabian Nights unit. Story source: The Arabian Nights' Entertainments by Andrew Lang and illustrated by H. J. Ford (1898).

Image Information: Grey cat

Week 5 Reading Diary: Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp

illustration by Walter Crane

For an extra reading this week, I read part B of the Arabian Nights unit. Story source: The Arabian Nights' Entertainments by Andrew Lang and illustrated by H. J. Ford (1898). I have never liked most stories about love at first sight, but Aladdin has always been one of my favorites despite this! It was really interesting to hear the original. I liked how the mother and Aladdin worked together, and I liked that Aladdin wasn't quite as hopeless/helpless as he is in the Disney movie!

Another thing I really liked about this story was all of the trickery! It seems like things would be a lot easy if the characters in this story would stop lying to each other and just be honest, but that would make things so much less exciting! It was really great that Aladdin stayed humble and kind instead of becoming stuck up since he lived in great honor and wealth.

It seemed strange that that the villain was jealous of Aladdin. It seems like he should be glad that Aladdin wasn't dead after all. I was also surprised that the Princess fell for the new for old lamps scheme. Who would listen to a crazy old guy in the streets? And then when the princess also fell for the fake holy woman, I was surprised again! I was just glad that Aladdin and the princess lived happily. However, I was disappointed that he didn't free the genies.

Week 5 Reading Diary: The Life of Buddha Continued

Kanthaka

Kanthaka, the horse who took Buddha to his hermitage, really stood out to me in this reading. Horses are so special to so many people, that I think it was amazing that as soon as Kanthaka came home from taking Buddha, he immediately died. I like to think that he was old and knew it was his time after he had been in so many battles with Buddha's father, but his love for his family was so strong that he wanted to stay and help Buddha fulfill his life's purpose before he died. 

I also liked how much the women in Buddha's life stuck together after he went away. Their love for him united them, and I think that's very important. Once he actually became the Buddha, I thought the realizations he made were very important. These were the problems, such as death and sickness, that had led him away from his family. I liked his realization about each evil of the world being a direct response to a good thing.

Within this story from the Buddha unit; The Life of Buddha by Andre Ferdinand Herold (1922).t's also important that Buddha now go and illuminate the problems of others and teach them about his own realizations and how he overcame a sheltered and protected life in order to find truth in the world. There's a lot of different dimensions within the life of Buddha that could be made into really great stories.

Week 5 Reading Diary: The Life of Buddha

ascetic Buddha

This week I read about the life of Buddha from the Buddha unit. Story source: The Life of Buddha by Andre Ferdinand Herold (1922). I really liked reading about the Buddha's birth and youth because I always think it's nice to hear about a famous person's childhood. I think that's why most memoirs start out with a person's earliest memory; it's just so interesting to think of noteworthy people as babies!

I thought it was so funny how devastated Buddha was once he found out about all of the sad things in life like sickness, old age, and death. I don't know a lot about Buddha, but it was really interesting to read exactly how sheltered and loved he was. I think that it could be fun to retell this story with Buddha being a spoiled brat. Maybe he would see all these sad things and be convinced that they wouldn't affect him because he is rich and has a loving family.

I also really liked Buddha's adoptive mother, so I feel like I would want to include a character like this who loved Buddha so much and took over for her sister. Buddha has so much love and support in his life, it's truly amazing that he would be able to leave all of that in order to live the life of a monk!

Week 4 Storytelling: If the Coffin Fits

Once upon a time, there was an extremely famous family, the Mortons. Everyone in the whole world knew about this Mortons, but they were famous for something a little unusual. You see, everyone in the family for ten generations had been in the funeral business. Some members of the family had more normal occupations, like florists, but because of their family connections, they spent most of their time making flower arrangements for funerals. However, the most common funeral occupation was something extremely specialized. Over half of the Mortons were carpenters who built nothing but coffins.

To be buried in a Morton coffin was the highest honor a deceased person could hope for. There were amazing rumors about what would happen to the person or their family if they were lucky enough to be buried in a casket made by one of the world-famous Mortons. Some said that you would return as a ghost, or that your family would be endlessly rich, but these were just stories of course.

The only true magic that the Mortons had to offer was actually the sole reason that ten generations of Mortons were in the funeral business. Ten generations ago, when Marty Morton had his first son, he built he first coffin. The coffin didn’t look much different from other coffins at the time, but when he built it he told his wife how important this coffin was. He said that it was extremely special and that the person whose body fit this coffin exactly would be the one whose family took on the Morton family business. Mrs. Morton didn’t even know what the Morton family business was yet, since this was Marty’s first coffin, but she listened and the legend lived on among the Mortons.

Finally, after ten generations of this special coffin being offered to every deceased body that came to the Mortons, there was a man who fit the proportions perfectly. The Mortons weren’t sure what exactly to do because Marty’s story had been shortened and summarized so many times that it was lacking details. They decided it would be best to just let the man’s family have the coffin free of charge.

As soon as the man who fit the special coffin exactly was buried, the Mortons lost all of their business. The florists started making bouquets for weddings and the carpenters started building grandfather clocks. And suddenly, the entire family of the man who had fit inside of the coffin opened a funeral home. Now there are stories about the powers that this new family holds, but, once again, it’s mostly rumors. However, this family, like all families, has just one nugget of magic, but it might be ten generations before their special magic is revealed.

Author's note: The original ancient Egyptian story was about a chest that was made by Set to the proportions of Osiris that many people tried to fit inside, until Osiris finally did and was killed according to Set's plan. I liked that the plot was similar to my favorite Disney princess movie, Cinderella, except that in the end, the person who fit into the object had something bad happen instead of something good! I decided to make it about a coffin because I thought that made more sense to accompany death than a chest.

Bibliography: The Death of Osiris from Egyptian Myth and Legend by Donald Mackenzie (1907).
Image: Coffin

Week 4 Reading Diary continued: The Two Brothers

The story The Two Brothers from the Egyptian Myth and Legend by Donald Mackenzie (1907) in the Ancient Egyptian Myths and Stories Unit immediately stood out to me because I always like stories that involve siblings since my brother and I are very close. This story is really cool because the brothers get in a small fight over the older brother's wife, but then they make up and remain close for the rest of the story. Even when the younger brother keeps having his soul carried in different vessels (a branch, a seed, a bull, a tree, and a baby).

flowering acacia

I really like the magic in this story with the soul being carried through in different ways. I had never heard of an acacia, and so it was cool to read what kind of tree the brother ended up having his soul carried in.  I really didn't like that both of the women in this story were evil. If I retold this story in a storytelling post I would probably make the siblings or their significant others mixed gender so that it wouldn't be a story about two brothers who were awesome and their wives who kept messing things up for them. 

Other elements of the story that I liked were the change in setting. In following along with this story I felt that I got to read about many different places. In my usual storytelling posts I just stick to one setting, so it would be cool to try to get in an extra setting or two, even though the stories are pretty short.

Week 4 Reading Diary: The Death of Osiris

For week 4, I chose the Ancient Egyptian Myths and Stories Unit. I grew up always wanting to go to Egypt, and this weeks reading was like a free trip since I got to read so many stories that I had never heard before! Because I was so unfamiliar with a lot of the characters and their backstories/character traits, I found some of these stories a little hard to follow, but I found some incredibly interesting! I can't wait to do the second half of the reading so that I can get even more into this awesome ancient culture.

The story that stood out the most to me was The Death of Osiris. It reminded me of my favorite Disney Princess, Cinderella! Except the evil version because Osiris fits into the chest and it kills him. But I can still totally see a mash-up of these two stories working together so well. For example, instead of Osiris meeting a prince, his death makes the one who loves him super sad. I'll have to think some more about how Cinderella and Osiris can be united into one, but I think the general framework of fitting into something in order to win a competition is such a cool idea that you could really play with a lot.



Image information: Osiris from Wikimedia

Story source: Egyptian Myth and Legend by Donald Mackenzie (1907)

Tech Tip: Weather Widget

I thought it would be cool to add the weather widget since I'm a little bit obsessed with checking the weather! I liked getting to choose a design for the sticker, and it wasn't too difficult to figure out how to add the HTML to the blog. I spend so much time on my blog that I know I'll be checking this weather widget all the time!

Week 3 Storytelling: Camp Gopher Wood

Everyone loves summer camp, so I'm always so surprised by how little attention the classic literature gives the world's first ever camp. Everyone is dying to tell the story of Jonah living in a stinky old whale, and everyone loves to talk about Adam and Eve's brief time in paradise, but those stories aren't even half as good as mine! 

People will even start to tell the story of the first ever camp when they talk about Camp Counselor Noah bringing us all together for a year of fun at Camp Gopher Wood so we wouldn't die in the flood. But then they skip all the juicy details! Why would a story about a guy bringing a big group of animals into a boat fast-forward through the songs, crafts, and campfires? What's the point in telling a story if it ends in a dove flying all around with an olive, when the rest of us animals got to stampede around eating s'mores on the poop deck?

I guess I should let the ancient past go and just appreciate that I'm even getting to tell this story at all. It all started, as most experiences do, with tons of rules. There were rules about how many of each kind could climb aboard, rules about where boys and girls had to stay, and really strict rules about not jumping off the boat (something about not enough lifeboats). Luckily, the rules didn't apply so much to me because I'm an elephant. We're pretty big, so no more than two elephants could have even fit on the boat, and people can't really tell the difference between a boy and girl elephant very easily anyways, and finally, elephants are strong swimmers. The only real rule that applied to me was that I could almost never go onto the deck unless it was a special occasion.

Even with the rules to govern all the different kinds of animals, Camp Gopher Wood was pretty much the best year of my life. I had never gotten to hang out with so many different kinds of animals. Back home in ancient Africa, we pretty much stick to our own kind, so getting the opportunity to become friends with a flamingo and a cat was unheard of. Because elephants are big and no one can tell me what to do, I never learned their names. But the flamingo and the cat were still the fastest and easiest friends I ever made, whatever their names were. We got to do so much cool stuff together.

Probably the most fun we ever had together was right at the end of our time at camp. Counselor Noah had already set the aforementioned dove out to search for land, or an olive, or a rainbow or something. But the flamingo, the cat and I wanted to see for ourselves if the flood had dried up for. We were all bigger than the dove, so we could definitely figure out a better way to check out the state of the world. You'll never guess what our devious master plan was. Or maybe you will, who knows?

Anyways, we decided that instead of doing something weird and complex, all we had to do was look outside! The only problem was that Noah and the rest of the counselors didn't like to let animals on the decks very often. You see, way back during the Camp Gopher Wood days humans lived for a freakishly long time, like hundreds of years. And as you could imagine, their bodies basically hardly worked at all by this point. Most of the counselors couldn't really see well, so they didn't know how close they were to the edge of the boat. Even if they could see past their cataracts, their balance was no good because their hips and knees were all failing, and the few young counselors never wanted to go on the deck because they knew all the responsibility for safety would be on their young shoulders.

I told the flamingo and the cat, “With our great diversity of size, we could definitely find a way to sneak out onto the deck and have a look outside at the dry land!”

 I outlined a pretty simple plan that required a three-person stack-em-up. The flamingo was on my back, and the cat was on the flamingo's head. Then, the flamingo fluttered her pink wings to catapult the cat up through the chimney, and from there the cat presumably walked around just long enough to take a gander. Finally, the cat tumbled down the chimney and I caught her with my long and flexible trunk.

The cat seemed sad as we asked her what she had seen and if anyone had seen her. She said,  “There is basically no water left at all, and there is seemingly endless green grass all around.”

I guess I understood why that made her sad. Dry land meant that camp had to be over, and Counselor Noah had already prepared us for our serious and important job by telling us over and over, “Repopulating the earth with your own species after the flood ended was the entire reason you animals get the opportunity to go to camp.” I probably wouldn't ever get to hang out with the cat and the flamingo again because we would all be so busy on various continents raising the next generation.

When the dove came back to tell Noah what we already knew, we all had to leave Camp Gopher Wood and start our new families. I never got to spend time with the flamingo or the cat again, but I hope that one day, maybe in a few thousands of years, some future generations of elephants, flamingos, and cats get the chance to spend time together and become friends and prove how capable they can be as a team (especially compared to a dove).

Author's note: This story is based on the Biblical story of Noah following God's instructions to build an ark out of gopher wood and save a few of every species and his family from the deluge. After more than a year, a dove is sent out and comes back with an olive branch while there is a rainbow to symbolize God’s promise. 

I filled in some fun and exciting details during the year that Noah, his family, and all the animals are on the ark. Because this is a Biblical story, I didn't want to change any main details of the actual story, so I added new information! Of course, I have no idea what actually happened during this long period, but I decided to make it about camp because everyone loves camp, and I think it's a much more uniting and universal experience than building a giant wooden structure. 

I think some of these classic Biblical stories can get told and retold so many times in the same way that it can be really exciting to use your imagination and think about what the story might be leaving out. And as for the elephant's particular obsession with his size, I channeled my brother, who is 6'4" and very proud of it! Hopefully by reading this story, people of all sizes can realize that they've got to work together to accomplish something really noteworthy!

Bibliography: Noah unit. Story source: The King James Bible (1611), Genesis 5-6

Image Information: Noah's ark; Wikimedia