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Text of the page (random words):
of our work we organize 6 or 7 of them every summer in the story center in paloznak a magical peaceful lace by lake balaton storytelling is an integral part of every camp but for kids aged 8 11 we specifically organize story camps around a theme this year our theme was knights and chivalry and i would like to tell you more about it the camp was five beautiful sunny days long we started off each day with nursery rhymes and storytelling and closed each one with a story and a lullaby it might seem like nursery rhymes and lullabies are strange for this age group but they create a connection that the kids rarely get to experience the theme was all about chivalry especially virtues we used the stories to start discussions and activities about how real knights treat each other and the people around them we had many adventures built castles made shields and even held a tournament at the end of the week after which we knighted all fourteen children of course all of this would not have been a coherent whole without the storytelling story camp is always especially fun for the tellers because we get to tell to the same audience regularly opening and closing every day the story collection for the camp took a lot of research planning and collecting to fit the age group the virtues the themes the activities and the világszép philosophy i had a lot of fun compiling it and i was quite proud of the result we ended up having nine official stories prince milinkuc hungarian folktale about a prince who has an incredible dream that he holds on to through many trials and an evil ing who sends him various riddles to solve dame ragnell a 15th century feminist classic asking the big question what is it that all women want the most sistram and the dragon king dietrich and his mentor drag a young knight out of a dragon s mouth teamwork people the kitchen knight sir gareth arrives to camelot as a kitchen lad but then goes on a quest with sassy lady lynet and proves his worth astolfo travels to the moon a snippet from orlando furioso where an english knight takes a hippogriff to the moon to find the lost common sense of his best friend sir gawain and the green knight i love telling a classic to an audience that has not heard it before the bonny lass of anglesey scottish ballad about an epic dance off between a brave lady and some english lords culhwch and olwen old welsh superhero team up with a brave prince and some famous knights from arthur s court damon and pythias a medieval retelling of an old greek tale of friendship where one friends offers to die in the place of another it is always great fun for a storyteller to tell to the same audience for days kids get used to the stories and the medieval world and become familiar with some of the characters sir gawain obviously became a fan favorite three of us shared the nine stories above so the kids also got to hear different styles of storytelling you could tell that they were very much engaged because they made comments asked questions and even corrected us when we said something wrong sometimes to the point where i had to take a pause to laugh myself beside the official storytelling times i also adored spontaneous storytelling moments of which we had quite a lot we had afternoon nap time every day but since this age group doesn t really nap or stay quiet anymore i offered them that they could join me in the story room yes we have one and lie down to listen to some tales these were my favorite moments of the entire camp i sat on a couch surrounded by children some listening intently some dozing off and some lying quietly until it was their turn to open their eyes and tell me what i should tell next they were peaceful beautiful afternoons filled with stories at one point the kids discovered that i like superheroes and i speak marvel we got into a conversation over lunch about whether or not thor s hammer is made of vibranium it isn t they came to the afternoon sessions to ask for superhero stories i defaulted to thor and loki since the interest was already there and i ended up telling them my entire norse mythology repertoire they listened with rapt attention asked questions discussed details compared myth to marvel and even acted out some fun moments of the stories such as thor pretending to be a bride once again i discovered how pop culture can be a bridge to traditional stories and i got to nerd out to my heart s extent every once in a while a kid asked for a story when no one else was around these moments also had a certain kind of magic and i tried my best to select stories that would fit that very special one person audience i told twenty three stories in five days and each of them was a very memorable unique experience whether it was with the whole group or with a few kids or just one child they all carried the story magic of paloznak and the világszép lit beauty of the world atmosphere they were days filled with smiles hugs sunshine swimming fruit straight from the trees and peace it was the perfect place to be and i would not trade it for any other gig or performance i m already counting down the days for next summer posted by a tarkabarka hölgy at 5 58 pm 5 comments labels camps children dietrich cycle king arthur knights legends storytelling világszép foundation animal tale bonanza following folktales around the world 124 gabon today i continue the blog series titled following folktales around the world if you would like to know what the series is all about you can find the introduction post here you can find all posts here or you can follow the series on facebook where animals talk west african folk lore tales robert h nassau the gorham press 1918 these tales have been collected by the author at the end of the 19th century from local bantu peoples along the coast of the gulf of guinea the first chapter presents folktales from mpongwe storytellers from libreville the second from benga tellers from the island of corisco and the third from a batanga teller who learned his tales from bulu people from cameroon in this post i will only talk about the sixteen stories of the first chapter since equatorial guinea has a whole other book the collector took notes during oral storytelling evenings trying to keep as much of the vernacular as possible but he also translated a few of the stories from other written sources the book comes with a short introduction and a long list of local animal names at the end each tale comes with a list of characters and settings almost like a theater play and comments from the collector highlights the book is full of animal and trickster tales both familiar and new types one of the resident tricksters obviously was tortoise in one story he fulfilled various clever tasks to win a wife and though leopard stole her for a moment eventually tortoise had the last laugh next to tortoise the other popular trickster figure was rat who also was in the business of making a fool of stronger animals like tortoise he also stole a wife from leopard this time by changing his name to strangers so that every time the bridal party was addressed he claimed all the goods in another story he stole back the meat that leopard kept taking from him by force leopard eventually caught rat with the classic tar baby trick but when he came to see the thief rat started yelling i got him i got the thief i m holding him which is pretty genius in the end rat managed to take what was his in a third similar story leopard pretended to be dead to catch animals who came to pay their respects gazelle did not fall for the trick and with the help of tortoise came up with some tests he threw bees ants and pepper at the corpse which immediately came alive one of my favorite stories in the book was about animals gathering for crocodile s funeral and trying to decide who the next of kin was birds claimed it was them because they are also born from eggs while beasts said they walk on four legs and so did crocodile the argument was never fully decided in another chapter there was a similar tale but with bat in another fin tale manatee oyster and hog were having a contest over who had the most fat and used it to decide where they will live manatee the winner moved into the rivers oyster into the edge of the salt water and hog who messed up the contest lost its horns forever i was also thoroughly entertained by the story that explained why mosquitoes buzz in people s ears apparently ear promised some oil to mosquito but never delivered and the insects have been bugging ear ever since asking for some ear wax connections there was yet another classic tug o war trickster tale here tortoise claimed to be as strong as elephant and hippo another classic about two animals making trick feasts for each other featured tortoise and monkey the story about the suitors of princess gorilla reminded me of all the tortoise and hare tales here suitors had to drink an entire barrel of rum the contest was won by a family of tiny monkeys who all pretended to be one monkey that sometimes ran away into the tall grass to pee among the longer stories there was once again a variant for the mysterious and dangerous husband here a leopard in disguise the girl who married him was rescued by her faithful horse where to next equatorial guinea posted by a tarkabarka hölgy at 12 00 am no comments labels africa animals folktales following folktales gabon trickster monday september 23 2019 strange dilemmas and just decisions following folktales around the world 123 republic of congo today i continue the blog series titled following folktales around the world if you would like to know what the series is all about you can find the introduction post here you can find all posts here or you can follow the series on facebook notes on the folk lore of the fjort french congo r e dennett the folk lore society 1898 it is tricky to find folktale collections from some parts of africa because political and cultural borders shifted around so much in the past two centuries this book contains folktales from french congo mostly from the regions that are now the republic of congo and a small part of gabon since i could not locate any more recent folktale collections from the rc i settled for this one collected by a british merchant in the 19th century he spent 17 years in the colonies learned the local languages and studied customs folklore and religion the book was organized and edited by famous traveler mary kingsley who also wrote an introduction and some additional studies for it there is a separate chapter that introduces storytelling traditions complete with examples of call and response stories and story songs at the end of the book we find some local songs in the original language as well as english and latin translated with the help of ms kingsley the book was not always easy to follow and parts of it are definitely dated but i found a lot of cool stories on its pages highlights i appreciated the tale about the married couple that went on a journey and entrusted their son to a neighbor the neighbor mistreated the boy who fled into the forest and was threatened by chimbindi ghosts luckily his parents got home decided not to believe the neighbor s lies and went looking for their son they arrived just in time to chase the ghosts away with a gun loaded with chili pepper and a basketful of pepper powder the story of how gazelle got married was thoroughly entertaining the suitor had to find out the secret names of two girls in order to marry them his dog spied on the girls and found out the names but on the way home was always distracted by something and forgot them so he had to keep returning eventually he made it to the gazelle and disclosed the names but on the way to the girls home they both forgot them again so the names had to be retrieved one more time my favorite story from the collection was the surprisingly titled ngomba s balloon a girl was abandoned by her mean sisters and kidnapped by a monster while the monster was away she worked together with the other prisoners to create a balloon and they eventually flew safely home when the monster followed them the villagers helped chase it away i also loved the story about the younger brother who knew more than the elder they lived apart but when the younger brother almost lost his wife as a result of his pride and a bad agreement with someone the elder showed up just in time to trick the other party and help save the wife nzambi i was very happy to find a new fire theft tale in the collection in which a team of animals spider tortoise woodpecker sand fly stole fire from heaven together since spider was their leader he would have won a wife for the effort but the girl s father decided not to make her life miserable so he gave everyone money instead this was not the only wise decision in the book either a crafty woman overreached herself when she set a trap for someone in the hopes of demanding a payment for her stolen goods however the judges examining the case decided that her loss was intentional and thus the decision was not made in favor of the trickster even nzambi the creator mother goddess was called in front of judges once for stealing the world s first drum made by a small wagtail bird she claimed that as creator she had a right to everything but the judges declared that she did not create drums only creatures with free will who had a right to their own inventions therefore nzambi had to pay for the drum and also had to pay a fine for stealing it flora and fauna featured prominently into the stories in one true story a local man described a fight between a gorilla and a chimpanzee in which the latter lost another tale explained why crocodile doesn t eat chicken with the fact that chicken convinced him that they are related since they are both born from eggs connections i once again encountered the tale about the wives who saved their husband together dreamer guide and raiser of the dead brought the man back to life and then demanded to know which one of them was the most valuable the man chose the last one and the men of the village agreed but the women declared that he should have given each of his wives equal appreciation the story of the twin brothers is well known in europe and i have also seen it in africa before one brother sets out on an adventure and dies but the other saves him in this version there was an intriguing house full of mirrors that all showed different places including the forbidden village where the first brother perished sadly after the rescue the two brothers had an argument and they killed each other among the local beliefs there were mentions of people who could shapeshift into crocodiles or leopards the crocodile people even had their own village on a river island a nameless trickster started a fight between two friends by walking between them in a coat that was half red and half blue i knew this story with the yoruba trickster eshu another trickster tale 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