New stories: Olomuroro and stolen aroma

I am trying to catch up on writing folktales I have been told and have just posted two new ones. The first is about Olomuroro and the second about a woman who stole the aroma from her neighbor's soup.

Olomuroro is a Yoruba word that literally translates into 'one with droopy breasts' but I have no idea what that has to do with the story. Olomuroro is a monster who stole a boys meals while the boy grew thinner. The name is perhaps a visual of what this monster supposedly looked like. I had never heard this story before but the person who narrated it to me said she always pictured of an ugly creature with huge breasts that dragged on the floor. As I wrote the story, I also wondered if perhaps this monster represents a disease that afflicted children. One that stumped the child's growth and caused the child to get emanciated. I also couldn't help wondering if the name is descriptive of an afflicted child (or person/woman - maybe it's not even about children). Anyone know a disease that causes such an appearance i.e droopy breasts. If the name meant distended stomach, then the story may have been referring to kwashiorkor.

I also never heard the second story before and I find it to be funny and lighted-hearted. A woman seeks a 'court order' to keep her neighbor from 'eating' the aroma from her soup. I guess the moral of that story is "do not be petty."

One thing I must had on my mind as I wrote both these stories was Egusi soup. Egusi is the seeds from a melon plant. The seeds are dried, shelled, ground and cooked in palm oil with vegetables and tomatoes. Delicious.

Do we have big bad wolves?

Every fairytale lover is only too familiar with the big bad wolf. I had never come across this character in West African folklore though…at least, not until recently when I was told two separate stories by two separate people that involved ‘creatures’ which swallowed people who were later rescued by being cut out of the ‘creatures’ stomach.

Here is the first of those stories – the monster who had fire – and it was unclear in the original telling if this monster was a man with severe deformities and anger management issues or just a monster. In the story, I say he was the only one in the village who had fire but it wasn’t told to me that way. However, the villagers risked their lives to get fire from this man/monster/creature, so it must have been their only option. In which case, killing him must have put the villagers in a bad position…but it’s really fruitless (sometimes) to analyze these folktales.

Let your children be what they want to be

Recovered somewhat from the computer crash and enjoying the holiday season with family visiting.

I was told the story of the farmer, his wife and their son…their son who wanted to be a hunter to the parents dismay. Then I was asked what the moral of the story was and before I had a chance to think about it, I was told “let your children be what they want to be”.

As I write this, there are three noisy kids running circles around me. I can’t help thinking that “I don’t want them to be what they want to be”. I want them to be quiet, well behaved, quiet and unheard. But then I guess they wouldn’t be children.

Back to our story, perhaps the moral we see in it now is a modern interpretation. Perhaps the story simply highlighted the relationship that may have existed between hunters and farmers. Perhaps farmers thought themselves to be superior to hunters. Hunting may have been the old, unpredictable and dangerous way of life but farming was the new, safe and sensible occupation. And the moral of the story may be “do not look down on hunting as a profession”. Maybe some hunters concocted this story to drive home their point of view but I think they could have done better, after all, the hunter in this story met riches through pure luck, luck that the farmer had as much chance of meeting on his farm as the hunter had of meeting in the forest. Oh well, it’s still a good story.

Bird steals babies

Posted this folktale yesterday about a bird that stole Iyawo's baby, then rewarded the woman. Iyale gets greedy and tries to get same reward but is punished instead. Iyale and Iyawo are Yoruba words meaning "senior wife" and "junior wife" respectively. They are terms used to label wives in a polygamous situation to indicate their order of seniority and many tales abound in Yoruba folklore depicting iyale/iyawo interactions. Such stories, as in this tale almost always portray disharmony in the family - a mean iyale and a long-suffering iyawo with the husband rarely playing any role in the drama. Apparently, the tales did not warn enough people off the practice considering its dominance in ancient Yoruba culture.

Reading A.B. Ellis's Yoruba Speaking Peoples of the Slave Coast of West Africa helped me remember most of this story. In his version, there are three wives, not two so you may want to head over to read that.

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I posted this commentary yesterday night. Then decided to upgrade to blogger-beta after reading about the new features. Completed the upgrade without a hitch (none expected either). Then today, I wanted to edit my post and alas, just like iyawo, my post was gone. Blogger-beta had taken my post and no matter how fervently I sang, it wouldn't give it back to me. I did not have copy of that post and I think it was nicer than this one. Lost posts always are.
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