• Tell Me a Story: Tortoise Jumps From the Sky (a West African tale)

  • Long ago, there was a drought in the land and all the animals were starving.
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    But Tortoise, the trickster, noticed that the birds were still singing. When he looked closely, he saw they were plump.
    "Why are you so fat?" he asked Kingfisher one afternoon. "As a matter of fact, why are all the birds so fat?"
    Kingfisher looked closely at Tortoise. "The gods feed us in the sky," he said.
    Tortoise asked the other birds the same question, and Hornbill and Wagtail and Vulture and Starling and Hawk told him exactly the same thing.
    Tortoise decided he must find a way to reach the sky, and he began to concoct a plan. That's what tricksters usually do.
    He visited each of the birds one by one and asked each for a feather. He asked Coucal and Bee-eater, Firefinch and Mannikin, Crane and Kingfisher, Vulture and Hawk and Egret. He asked for feathers from the red birds and from the blue birds and from the yellow birds. Everyone said yes. Giving up one feather was easy, and they were flattered by Tortoise's request.
    When Tortoise had gathered dozens of feathers, he glued each one to his body, and then he joined the birds who were gathering to attend the Feast in the Sky.
    Nobody recognized Tortoise. He looked like a brand-new creature, the strangest, most colorful bird in the world. The others came and looked and twittered.
    "What beautiful feathers you have," someone said.
    "Who are you?" Kingfisher asked.
    Tortoise had thought about what he would tell the birds. "I am called All of You," he answered.
    "Let us fly to the feast," the birds sang.
    "Perhaps someone will give me a ride," Tortoise said. "I do not know the way."
    "Hop on me," Eagle said. "I'm very strong."
    And that's what Tortoise did.
    Up and up they flew, all the way into the clouds to the home of the Sky gods.
    Tortoise gasped at the sight of the marvelous feast up there in the sky. It had been years since he had seen so much food. His mouth began to water. His eyes burned with desire.
    The Sky gods welcomed all the birds.
    When everyone had gathered around the long table, Tortoise said, "Who is all this food for?"
    "It's for all of you!" the Sky gods said.
    "That's me!" Tortoise cried. "I am All of You, and that means all of this belongs to me!"
    Before the others could say a word, he rushed for the table and began to gobble down everything in sight.
    The birds were furious at the sight of such greed. "Who does he think he is?" they whispered.
    Eagle, sensing a trick, leaned forward and plucked at what looked like an eagle feather on Tortoise's back.
    Naturally the feather came right off. "He's no bird at all!" Eagle said, and soon the others were rushing forward.
    "These red feathers are mine!" cried Firefinch, and sure enough, they were.
    Everyone began to peck at the feathers that covered Tortoise, and before long, he was just a featherless Tortoise once again.
    "Now you'll have to stay up here forever," Eagle said. "Nobody will fly you back to Earth."
    Tortoise was horrified and begged the birds, "Please, someone have mercy on me. I was starving. I meant no harm. I would have shared with you."
    But no one believed a word he said, and one by one each bird took a portion of the feast and flew back to Earth.
    "Someone, please tell my wife where I am!" Tortoise wept. "Please tell her to lay out all the grass she can find so she can prepare a soft landing."
    Parrot had an idea. "I'll tell her you'll be jumping from the sky, and I'll make sure she's prepared," she said.
    And so Parrot flew to Earth and hurried to Tortoise's house. When she found Tortoise's wife, she said, "Your husband wishes you to lay out a platform of rocks and stone. He'll be coming home soon."
    Tortoise's wife happily obliged, and she built a platform of rocks and stone.
    When Tortoise leaped from the sky, he landed on his back on that hard platform, and his nice, smooth shell broke into many pieces.
    "It's not fair!" Tortoise wept. "I'm injured, and I'm still hungry, and nobody cares about me!"
    But that wasn't true. His wife cared for him. She glued all those pieces of his shell back together again, and she nursed her poor husband to health. Alas, the scars between the bits of shell remained, and ever since that day, all tortoises have had cracked shells to remind everyone of the day Tortoise tried to trick the birds and wound up jumping out of the sky.
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