week 7 story: the myth about rice

Let me tell you the story of how rice came to be…

Image of a person holding rice in their hands. Web Source

Many centuries ago, when Earth was young, healthy, and at its purest, the people were healthier and lively. The land was a vibrant green of which taintless air flowed through. Fruit and vegetables were enormous in size, much bigger than what we see today, and there was plenty for all to devour. Yes, this was a time when rice, the food which nourished the people, was massive in its magnitude. Just one grain of rice was enough to satisfy man’s hunger. Of course, because rice was plentiful in size and abundance, it did not require much labor and energy to garner. The rice, when it was ready, was practically rolling into the hands of the people in the villages. 

Now one day, a young girl and her little brother were walking alongside a stream at the base of a slightly steep hill and just across the rice fields. Mother had instructed them to gather some rice while she prepared dinner at the house. She reminded them not to go into the rice fields because they, alone, would have lost themselves in the towering stalks. As many siblings do, the girl and her brother wanted to find a rice grain that was bigger than the other’s, even though most rice grains were nearly equal in size. 

“Now that we have mother and father’s rice grain, let’s pick ours!” the girl exclaimed. 

“Oh, I am going to find the biggest rice grain--” the little boy remarked. “--and it’s going to be all for me!” 

The two children were gleefully searching through the grassy fields and near the small river, hoping to each find the perfect rice grain. Each would pick one up and toss it back down when they did not think it was the perfect size. Then they noticed a rice grain that was stopped at a tree trunk. To them, this rice grain was the largest they had seen that day, so they hurriedly ran for it. The two siblings approached the rice grain at the same time. 

“I saw it first, so it’s mine!” the boy hollered as he was trying to pull the rice grain out from his sister’s hands. 

“No you didn’t!” his sister retorted. “Plus, I’m older than you, so the rice grain should be mine!” 

“Go get another one!” they would tell each other.

The children continued to bicker and shout, which awoke a magical monkey sleeping in the tree branches above them. “It’s mine, it’s mine!” was all the monkey could hear. Then, when the monkey decided he had enough of their squabbling, he used his magical powers to turn the rice grain into thousands of pieces. He became irate that he turned all of the enormous rice grains into little rice grains. 

"From now on, all and any rice grains shall not be larger than the nail on my finger!” the monkey declared. 

Thus, from that time on, rice remained a tiny grain that the people had to laboriously gather from the rice fields. 

Author's Note: This story is an adaption of "The Legend of the Rice" story from the Laos Folktales unit written by Katherine Neville Fleeson. I began my story with the same as the original--how rice grains once were enormous. But everything else, I added my own characters. In the original, it was a mom and daughter who were working to build a larger granary when a large rice grain disrupts them and decides to divide itself into tiny pieces (the rice we see today) in response to the mom's scolding.