A DOZEN AT A BLOW - A European Fairy Tale E-Book

Narrated By Baba Indaba

• Herausgeber: Abela Publishing
• Kategorie: Fantasy und Science-Fiction
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2017

Beschreibung

ISSN: 2397-9607 Issue 44 In Issue 44 of the Baba Indaba Children's Stories, Baba Indaba narrates the old European tale of the tailor who through guile and cunning eventually wins the hand of a Princess. How did he achieve the feats that enabled him to win? Well many things happened, some silly, some strange and some serious. To find the answers to these questions, and others you may have, you will have to download and read this story to find out! Baba Indaba is a fictitious Zulu storyteller who narrates children's stories from around the world. Baba Indaba translates as "Father of Stories". Each issue also has a "WHERE IN THE WORLD - LOOK IT UP" section, where young readers are challenged to look up a place on a map somewhere in the world. The place, town or city is relevant to the story. HINT - use Google maps. BUY ANY 4 of the 375+ BABA INDABA CHILDREN’S STORIES FOR ONLY $1, 6 for $1.50, 8 for $2 etc. 33% of the profit from the sale of this book will be donated to charities. INCLUDES LINKS TO DOWNLOAD 8 FREE STORIES

Leseprobe

A Dozen At A Blow

An old European Folktale

BABA INDABA CHILDREN’S STORIES

Published by

Abela Publishing, London

[2015]

A Dozen At A Blow

Typographical arrangement of this edition

©Abela Publishing 2015

This book may not be reproduced in its current format

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without the prior written permission

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Abela Publishing,

London, United Kingdom

2015

BABA INDABA CHILDREN’S STORIES

ISSN 2397-9607

Issue 44

Email: [email protected]

www.AbelaPublishing.com/dozen.html

Introduction

Baba Indaba (pronounced Baaba Indaaba) lived in Africa a long-long time ago. Indeed, Baba Indaba told his stories to the British settlers over 250 years ago in a place on the South East Coast of Africa called Zululand, which is now in a country now called South Africa.

In turn the British settlers wrote these stories down and they were brought back to England on sailing ships. From England they were, in turn, spread to all corners of the old British Empire, and then to the world.

In olden times the Zulu’s did not have computers, or iPhones, or paper, or even pens and pencils. So, someone in the tribe was assigned to be the Wenxoxi Indaba (Wensosi Indaaba) – the Storyteller. It was his, or her, job to memorise all the tribe’s history, stories and folklore, which had been passed down from generation to generation for thousands of years. So, from the time he was a young boy, Baba Indaba had been apprenticed to the tribe’s Wenxoxi Indaba to learn the stories. Every day the Wenxoxi Indaba would narrate the stories and Baba Indaba would have to recite the story back to the Wenxoxi Indaba, word for word. In this manner he learned the stories of the Zulu nation.

In time the Wenxoxi Indaba grew old and when he could no longer see or hear, Baba Indaba became the next in a long line of Wenxoxi Indabas. So fond were the children of him that they continued to call him Baba Indaba – the Father of Stories.

When the British arrived in South Africa, he made it his job to also learn their stories. He did this by going to work at the docks at the Point in Port Natal at a place the Zulu people call Ethekwene (Eh-tek-weh-nee). Here he spoke to many sailors and ships captains. Captains of ships that sailed to the far reaches of the British Empire – Canada, Australia, India, New Zealand, Mauritius, the Caribbean and beyond.

He became so well known that ship’s crew would bring him a story every time they visited Port Natal. If they couldn’t, they would arrange to have someone bring it to him. This way his library of stories grew and grew until he was known far and wide as the keeper of stories – a true Wenxoxi Indaba of the world.

Baba Indaba believes the tale he is about to tell in this little book, and all the others he has learned, are the common property of Umntwana (Children) of every nation in the world - and so they are and have been ever since men and women began telling stories, thousands and thousands of years ago.

This story was told to Baba Indaba by a passenger who hailed from a town called Zakopane. Can you find Zakopane on a map?

A DOZEN AT A BLOW

An old European Folktale

A story, a story

Let it come, Let it go

A story, a story

From long, long ago

Umntwana Izwa! Children Listen! A long, long time ago, in a land far, far away, a little tailor was sitting cross-legged at his bench and was stitching away as busy as could be.

“Baba, what is a tailor?” asked one of his students.

“Ah ha! Now this I know. A tailor is someone who makes the clothes the Abelungu (Europeans) wear. Now, on with the story….”

A woman came up the street calling out: "Home-made jam, home-made jam!"

So the tailor called out to her: "Come here, my good woman, and give me a quarter of a pound."1

And when she had poured it out for him he spread it on some bread and butter and laid it aside for his lunch. But, in the summer-time, the flies commenced to collect around the bread and jam.

When the tailor noticed this, he raised his leather strap and brought it down upon the crowd of flies and killed twelve of them straightway. He was mighty proud of that. So he made himself a shoulder-sash, on which he stitched the letters: A Dozen at One Blow.

When he looked down upon this he thought to himself: "A man who could do such things ought not to stay at home; he ought to go out to conquer the world."

So he put into his wallet the cream cheese that he had bought that day and a favourite blackbird that used to hop about his shop, and went out to seek his fortune.

He hadn't gone far when he met a giant, and went up to him and said: "Well, comrade, how goes it with you?"

"Comrade," sneered the giant, "a pretty comrade you would make for me."

"Look at this," said the tailor pointing to his sash.

And when the giant read, "A Dozen at a Blow," he thought to himself: "This little fellow is no fool of a fighter if what he says is true. But let's test him."