HOW THE RAJA'S SON WON THE PRINCESS LABAM - A Children’s Fairy Tale from India E-Book

Anon E. Mouse

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

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2017

Beschreibung

ISSN: 2397-9607 Issue 297In this 297th issue of the Baba Indaba’s Children's Stories series, Baba Indaba narrates the Indian fairy tale - “HOW THE RAJA'S SON WON THE PRINCESS LABAM”Rumour reaches the son of an Indian Raja of a beautiful princess whose magnificence is like no other throughout time. All that is known about her is that at night her beauty shines like the sun, but no-one can say exactly where she lives. The Prince decides that he must have her for a wife and sets off to find her. On his way he must cross deserts and pass through forests, each with their own dangers and challenges which he must overcome before he finds the elusive princess.Will the prince find the princess? How does he woo her and convince her to marry him, a complete stranger? And what of her father? Like many Raja’s any potential suitor must first pass a number of tests before the father will allow the suitor to set eyes upon his daughter? After overcoming the dangers and tests of the deserts and forests, will he lose his life pursing the hand of the princess?Download and read this story to find the answers to these and your questions and if the prince is able to overcome the hardships presented to him.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 

Leseprobe

How the Raja’s Son Won the

Princess Labam

A Fairy Tale

Baba Indaba Children’s Stories

Published By

Abela Publishing, London

2017

HOW THE RAJA’S SON WON THE PRINCESS LABAM

Typographical arrangement of this edition

©Abela Publishing 2017

This book may not be reproduced in its current format

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Abela Publishing,

London, United Kingdom

2017

Baba Indaba Children’s Stories

ISSN 2397-9607

Issue 297

Email:

[email protected]

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.

Location of KwaZulu-Natal (shaded in red)

Where in the World? Look it Up!

This next story was told to him by a man who hailed from a magnificent city called Patna. Can you find Patna on a map? What country is it in?

HOW THE RAJA’S SON WON THE PRINCESS LABAM

A Fairy Tale from India

 

 

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 and far, far away there was a Raja who had an only son who every day went out to hunt. One day the Rani, his mother, said to him, "You can hunt wherever you like on these three sides; but you must never go to the fourth side." This she said because she knew if he went on the fourth side he would hear of the beautiful Princess Labam, and that then he would leave his father and mother and seek for the princess.

The young prince listened to his mother, and obeyed her for some time; but one day, when he was hunting on the three sides where he was allowed to go, he remembered what she had said to him about the fourth side, and he determined to go and see why she had forbidden him to hunt on that side. When he got there, he found himself in a jungle, and nothing in the jungle but a quantity of parrots, who lived in it. The young Raja shot at some of them, and at once they all flew away up to the sky. All, that is, but one, and this was their Raja, who was called Hiraman parrot.

When Hiraman parrot found himself left alone, he called out to the other parrots, "Don't fly away and leave me alone when the Raja's son shoots. If you desert me like this, I will tell the Princess Labam."

Then the parrots all flew back to their Raja, chattering. The prince was greatly surprised, and said, "Why, these birds can talk!" Then he said to the parrots, "Who is the Princess Labam? Where does she live?" But the parrots would not tell him where she lived. "You can never get to the Princess Labam's country." That is all they would say.

The prince grew very sad when they would not tell him anything more; and he threw his gun away, and went home. When he got home, he would not speak or eat, but lay on his bed for four or five days, and seemed very ill.

At last he told his father and mother that he wanted to go and see the Princess Labam. "I must go," he said; "I must see what she is like. Tell me where her country is."

"We do not know where it is," answered his father and mother.

"Then I must go and look for it," said the prince.

"No, no," they said, "you must not leave us. You are our only son. Stay with us. You will never find the Princess Labam."

"I must try and find her," said the prince. "Perhaps God will show me the way. If I live and I find her, I will come back to you; but perhaps I shall die, and then I shall never see you again. Still I must go."

So they had to let him go, though they cried very much at parting with him. His father gave him fine clothes to wear, and a fine horse. And he took his gun, and his bow and arrows, and a great many other weapons, "for," he said, "I may want them." His father, too, gave him plenty of rupees.

Then he himself got his horse all ready for the journey, and he said good-bye to his father and mother; and his mother took her handkerchief and wrapped some sweetmeats in it, and gave it to her son. "My child," she said to him, "When you are hungry eat some of these sweetmeats."