Reading Diary B: The Congo

Congo:

The Antelope And The Leopard

·      Leopard hid from the Antelope and they bet on it

·      Antelope found him and the leopard was mad so he wanted the antelope to hide

·      Leopard couldn’t find him

·      Leopard was too fat to keep looking and picked some nuts and returned to town

·      A dog came from a nut

·      Married to 4 wives (common consent, Boomba, Funzi, Lembe)

·      Dying Dog changed to a damsel an leopard wanted to marry her

·      Damsel wanted leopard to kill the 4 wives

·      Did anything for her, even trimmed his nails

·      She was scared of his eyes and she asked for him to take them out so he did

·      Then he cut off his ears, then feet, then teeth

·      That damsel turned out to be the antelope that had outdone him

How The Spider Won and Lost Nzambi’s Daughter

·      Nzambi is a creator god with a daughter

·      Couldn’t marry her without the heavenly fire from her father

·      Spider took on the challenge but only if he had help and rewarded them

·      Spider dropped into the earth from his silk from the heavens

·      Told the others to climb up

·      Nzambi let them in and wondered what was going on up there

·      They told him that they wanted his terrible fire

·      The king thought they were imposters

·      Told them to bring him bamboo so he knew they were really from there

·      The king believed them of who they were

·      Nzambi from land was going to give it to them if they could say where it was kept

·      The spider took the case where it was hiding

·      Upon returning, the spider married the daughter

·      But since none of the helpers were good sports about it and wanted to claim the daughter as their own because of their part, the father did not give them the girl but paid them in other ways

The Turtle And The Man

·      A turtle and man built a town but they didn’t plant anything so they starved

·      Want to built a trap to catch the antelope

·      Too big so they divided it in two

·      Turtle caught an antelope but couldn’t lift it

·      The ox was willing to help them

·      While the ox was out finding leaves for the turtle, turtle locked him out

·      Turtle wouldn’t give him his share and was mean to him

·      The ox went to destroy the trap but the turtle already reset it

·      Ox died in the trap

·      Same thing happens with the leopard with helping the turtle with ox

·      Leopard outsmarted the turtle by acting dead in his trap

·      When the turtle came to get the leopard, he bit his head off

·      Then the man ate the turtle meat, too

[Source]