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- Herausgeber: Abela Publishing
- Kategorie: Fantasy und Science-Fiction
- Sprache: Englisch
ISSN: 2397-9607 Issue 188In this 188th issue of the Baba Indaba’s Children's Stories series, Baba Indaba narrates a true story, titled “Gazelle the Tortoise – Passages in the life of a Tortoise” told by Alexandre Dumas. Dumas asks his friend Joseph to look after his new pet while he is out and about. On returning he is astounded by what he finds. He has to educate Joseph in the care of pets, but eventually finds a suitable home for Gazelle.………….Download and read this story to find out about Gazelle’s life and the home of the famous person he eventually goes to live with.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.33% of the profit from the sale of this book will be donated to charities.INCLUDES LINKS TO DOWNLOAD 8 FREE STORIES
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Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2017
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GAZELLE THE TORTOISE
Passages in the Life of a Tortoise
Baba Indaba Children’s Stories
Published By
Abela Publishing, London
2016
GAZELLE THE TORTOISE
Typographical arrangement of this edition
©Abela Publishing 2016
This book may not be reproduced in its current format
in any manner in any media, or transmitted
by any means whatsoever, electronic,
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(including photocopy, file or video recording,
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information storage and retrieval system)
except as permitted by law
without the prior written permission
of the publisher.
Abela Publishing,
London, United Kingdom
2016
Baba Indaba Children’s Stories
ISSN 2397-9607
Issue 188
Email:
Website:
www.AbelaPublishing.com
An Introduction to Baba Indaba
Baba Indaba, pronounced Baaba Indaaba, lived in Africa a long-long time ago. Indeed, this story was first told by Baba Indaba 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 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, 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.
Where in the World – Look it Up!
This next story was told to him by a man who hailed from the small town called Meilhan-sur-Garonne. Can you find Meilhan-sur-Garonne on a map? What country is it in?
GAZELLE THE TORTOISE
Passages in the Life of a Tortoise
A story, a story
Let it come, let it go
A story, a story
From long, long ago!
Umntwana Izwa! Children Listen!
ONCE upon a time long, long ago, in a far, far away land, there lived a man called Alexandre Dumas, from whose book I told you the story of “TOM’ the PARISIAN bear” (issue 125).
One day Dumas was walking past the shop of a large fishmonger in Paris. As he glanced through the window he saw an Englishman in the shop holding a tortoise, which he was turning about in his hands. Dumas felt an instant conviction that the Englishman proposed to make the tortoise into turtle soup, and he was so touched by the air of patient resignation of the supposed victim that he entered the shop, and with a sign to the shopwoman asked whether she had kept the tortoise for him which he had bespoken.
The shopwoman (who had known Dumas for many years) understood with half a word, and gently slipping the tortoise out of the Englishman’s grasp, she handed it to Dumas, saying, ‘Pardon, milord, the tortoise was sold to this gentleman this morning.’
The Englishman seemed surprised, but left the shop without remonstrating, and Dumas had nothing left for it but to pay for his tortoise and take it home.
As he carried his purchase up to his rooms on the third floor he wondered what could have possessed him to buy it, and what on earth he was to do with it now he had got it. It was certainly a remarkable tortoise, for the moment he put it down on the floor of his bedroom it started off for the fireplace at such a pace as to earn for itself the name of ‘Gazelle.’
Once near the fire, Gazelle settled herself in the warmest corner she could find, and went to sleep.
Dumas, who wished to go out again and was afraid of his new possession coming to any harm, called his servant and said: ‘Joseph, whilst I am out you must look after this creature.’
Joseph approached with some curiosity. ‘Ah!’ he remarked, ‘why, it’s a tortoise; that creature could bear a carriage on its back.’
‘Yes, yes, no doubt it might, but I beg you won’t try any experiments with it.’
‘Oh, it wouldn’t hurt it,’ assured Joseph, who enjoyed showing off his information. ‘The Lyons diligence might drive over it without hurting it.’
‘Well,’ replied his master, ‘I believe the great sea turtle might bear such a weight, but I doubt whether this small variety——’
‘Oh, that’s of no consequence,’ interrupted Joseph; ‘it’s as strong as a horse, and small though it is, a cartload of stones might pass——’
