The boy and his waterpot of gold
The boy and his waterpot of gold
THE BOY AND HIS WATER POT OF GOLD
Once upon a time in the land of Imo, there lived a boy known as Obinna. Obinna had a family that was very rich. Every one loved the family. His father was the most loved because of his philanthropic works in the village. He helped people a lot especially the village widow's Guild. Everyone talked about his yearly generous donations to the village orphanage. He helped set up business for several indigent people. He was indeed a man of the people. No wonder the village gave him a much deserved traditional title of "Ochiriozuo nke ala Imo".
And true to his title, he helped train as much people as possible. One example that readily comes to mind when Ochiriozuo is talked about had always been the manner he helped his neighbour Mazi Amadi take care of the financial burden that fell on his shoulders when his wife died. Ochiriozuo had taken over the burial as if he was the one bereaved.
His first and only son Obinna was also loved by people. He was just seven years old. He did not allow his father's wealth get into his head nor did he sheepishly begin to cash in on his father's goodwill. He rather helped people in a manner other young children of his age could render help. He would always help old people fetch firewood from the forest, help in the chores around the neighborhood, and even fetch water from the village stream for some.
The stream had a mystery about it. Some said it could help a poor person, others said the mermaids in the water helped bring good fortune to people who stepped into it on selected market days. A story even went around in the village about a woman who was barren and had gone to the stream and saw a baby boy. She quickly got pregnant and gave birth to a handsome looking boy. The stream was mysterious yet it also served as a source of local water for the villagers.
Obinna enjoyed going to the stream because going there made him happy. However, he was not sure if the stories about the stream were true.
Notwithstanding the fact that Obinna's parents were rich, Obinna helped people so much that some began to call him Ochinawata'.
As time went on, it was like fate was jealous of the perfect way Obinna's life went. Little by little things started getting tough for the family. His father's farm land would not produce as much as expected. The rains did not come in time as expected and when it did come, it was with so much rush that the first harvest was washed away. It was like a disease had also infected the farm goats, they began to die rapidly. As the workers saw the fortunes of the Ochiriozuo family diminishing they left him to find work elsewhere.
To put a crown on it all Obinna's mother died!
The whole village was thrown into mourning. How could God allow such a good family to experience such shock! Ochiriozuo was sad for many days as he mourned his wife. Obinna was no different, he was angered a lot by the sudden death of his mother. He loved his mother dearly and could not imagine death snatching her from him.
During those days, he would be alone crying. On one of those days, his father saw him. He was crying by the corner of the house obviously he was missing his mother very much. His father tried comforting him.
He told his son "Everything in this world has a reason, there is always a thing or two to learn from any life event" "Sometimes bad things happen to good people, but the fact that something bad had happened to you would not give you the opportunity to be discouraged"
Those words would not even penetrate Obinna's body. His father feared lest his only surviving family line be cut off. Inside him, he was considering getting Obinna a stepmother. One day Ochiriozuo called his son to the sitting room
"Obinna my son, it is clear to me that your mother's death is affecting you too much negatively".
"Yes father, you know I loved mother a lot and that we were very close".
"Yes I know that, I also know that I cannot replace your dead mother, but I will try. I have decided to get married again, this is to make you have some one you can call mother."
"That would be very nice father; I would love you to marry again. We really need another mother here she will take care of the both of the house chores and also us. I would be delighted to find someone I can call mother again".
"Thank you my son for giving your support to this my request I have always looked forward to filling the big gap your mother left in my heart and also find a way to make you more cheerful".
Over the next couple of weeks, Ochiriozuo was very busy. He helped set up a traditional panel to investigate the causes of the rains. He also got married a second time. This time he married to a woman called Odinaka.
Odinaka was a lot younger than Ochiriozuo himself. People say he married her because of her nice behavior and good cooking. Her face was cut by the sides making her look very beautiful. Her nose stood between her eyes like a dutiful sentry. She had this stocky shape and liked talking about her village. When she laughed, her buttocks shook and she laughed a lot.
For the first few weeks running into months, Odinaka had been a good woman. Her meals would always be delicious. Obinna in his heart started comparing the love the stepmother had for him and his dead mother's love which one was bigger. Odinaka would always be there to talk to him, advise him and do every job a good mother should do. This her good behavior continued until she got pregnant and gave birth to a male child.
She was worried lest Obinna in his stake as first-born take over the entire Ochiriozuo's properties. She talked to her friends and they advised her to find a way of killing Obinna.
"Since he was a lot older", they said, he would make sure that none of Ochirizuo's riches came to her young son. She did not think that killing would be good enough, she told her friends. They laughed at her and told her to wake up to reality. So she went in search of a viable poison.
Odinaka who had been kind to Obinna suddenly started treating him wickedly. Whenever Ochiriozuo was not around, she would become very hostile and wicked to him. She would take every single mistake to slap him. She kept dealing with him until he would start crying.
The newborn son was growing. Odinaka saw in her son, a personification of all her heart's desires. She took it as a challenge to take Obinna out of the way so that she would not have anybody sharing Ochiriozuo's wealth with her son. She decided to visit a witch doctor who would give her poison to put in Obinna's food.
One day chief Ochiriozuo and his son went to visit a distant relative. Odinaka saw it as her chance to fulfill her negative desire. She prepared food. She covered it in separate plates so that she would not misplace them. She sprayed the poison she got from the witch doctor on Obinna's food.
When father and son came back, Obinna brought Ochiriozuo his food. She left Obinna's own in the kitchen. As Ochiriozuo was about to eat, he remembered that his relative had told him to drop an urgent message to his neighbor. He did not go on to eat but rather rushed out to deliver the message.
Odinaka's plan was to stay in her room so that when Obinna started vomiting, she would not be seen as being responsible for it, so she did not hear when Ochiriozuo left. Obinna himself finished undressing and came to the dining. He saw food on the table and since his father was not around, he thought the food was meant for him so he ate it up.
By the time Ochiriozuo came back he was doubly hungry, he told Obinna to get him food, Obinna said he thought he had eaten: he said no. Obinna then rushed into the kitchen to get the food since he knew there must be food kept for his father. He came into the kitchen and saw the meal kept ready. He brought it for his father. His father began eating.
Odinaka in the room waited and waited to hear Obinna vomit all to no avail, so she decided to come into the sitting room to see if her job was done well. When she came in, she saw Ochiriozuo eating, she looked carefully, he was eating from the bowl she had prepared for Obinna! She had felt like screaming but held herself. She quietly went back to her room and started crying.
Meanwhile after Ochiriozuo finished his meal, he felt dizzy and went in to sleep. He never woke up!
Ochiriozuo's burial was attended by nearly everybody in the village. Everybody loved him and everyone missed him much. He had helped the majority of the villagers in one-way or the other. People came; some to mourn him, some to show their gratitude for the things had done for their family. During the burial, Odinaka wept much. She cried and cried even her little son could not comfort her. Obinna was surprised at her thorough broken heartedness.
After the burial, things became hard for Obinna. His step mother now had every opportunity in the world to deal with him. She even accused Obinna of causing Ochiriozuo's death; this painful accusation often made Obinna cry and wish his real mother was alive. On one occasion, she starved Obinna for two days she said he brought bad luck on the family.
Meanwhile her son had also been growing. The boy was very proud and rude. He would not greet his elders and he carried his shoulders high. Instead of his mother telling him to do the right thing, she would encourage him to insult others. She would always tell him. "They killed your father!"
And the boy believed her and did everything she said. She sometimes would tell him to go to the neighbor's farm house and steal yams in the night. The boy was just growing to be bad.
One day, Odinaka needed water badly. Her son was in front of the house chatting with his friends but she still went on to call Obinna who was busy washing the dishes in the kitchen to go and get water from the stream for her. She gave him the huge water pot and ordered him to run to the stream and come back before her cooking dries up.
Obinna who had been used to her violent conduct ran as much as was possible for him to the stream. When he reached the river, he kept the water pot by the bank of the river and went nearby to urinate. On coming back he saw the water had overflowed and carried the water pot with it. The pot was sinking when he sighted it. He knew that without the pot, it was better that he took a rope and hung himself in the bush nearby or his stepmother would help him achieve just that. In short he was dead without the pot. It was better he came back beaten half dead than coming back with no pot and no water and that meant death!
Without thinking, he dived into the stream to rescue his dear water pot. The pot was dear since the consequence of its being lost was more dear than life. He swam toward the water pot but before he could reach it, it had found its way at the bottom of the stream. He made a dive for it.
As he made for the bottom of the river, it was like he had entered into another world. Suddenly he did not need to hold his breath anymore. He found movement easier. What could be happening? Was that how people drowned? He checked himself he was still okay. He looked around and saw three water pots. This three water pots looked exactly like his own.
One was large, the other larger and the last was the largest of them all. They all had jewels inside. He did not understand what was happening. He went to the pots and looked well at it; every one of them looked alike. He could not even guess the size of his pot. He took the smallest of the three then tried to turn it upside down so that the content would pour away. "This way" he said to himself, "the owner of the water jewels would know I left his jewels for him and only took back my pot!"
As he was about to turn the pot, he heard his dead mother. He turned around and screamed. He wanted to rush and hug her but it was not possible since she was now in spirit form. She spoke to him. "My son take both the jewels and your water pot. I have seen the evil your stepmother has been doing to you, that was why I decided to use this means to pay you back".
Obinna smiled then took the pot with him. He was pleasantly overjoyed as he carried his pot of jewels which were mostly gold home. He had forgotten about bringing water. When he reached the corners of his house, his step mother was already waiting at the door ready to unleash trouble on him. But when Obinna came closer, she stopped.
She angrily asked him "where have you been?"
Obinna replied he had been at the stream.
She further demanded who has all these shiny jewels on your head?"
Obinna told her a story of how a mermaid had taken his water pot and filled it with jewels for him. She collected the pot of jewels from him and took it to her room. Still full of envy for the thing Obinna had done, she called her own son. She told him to go to the stream. The boy refused. She then told him about the jewels Obinna had gotten. He suddenly developed interest. He even took the largest pot in the house and headed to the stream.
On reaching the stream, our young man was at loss on what to do. He waited for a mermaid to come out of the water nothing happened. He then threw his pot into the river. The pot floated around for a while before it started sinking. He dived into the water after his pot. He swam until he saw himself in front of three water pots. All looked alike to him; all was filled with pure gold. He watched the three pots and then moved to them. He put the big into the bigger and the bigger he put into the biggest pot there.
He tried to carry them but they were heavy. He strengthened himself and still carried it. On moving the water pot, he heard and saw an old woman tell him "My son, do not be greedy, please drop one of the pots, if you carry the three it could destroy you."
He replied "shut up old woman, it was your foolishness that made you like this. If one of the pots is good, then the three would also be better even best. And I did not tell you I needed your foolish advice anyway" with that he carried off the three pots and headed for home.
He hummed to himself as he went along.
When he reached the house, his mother ran out and embraced him. Her son had gotten three water pots of gold while Obinna had gotten only one.
"Stupid boy" she thought. She helped him bring the pots down and then she carried the three into her room. Her son suggested to her that they open up the jewels and find out how many precious stones were in there. She agreed. They locked the door.
Meanwhile Obinna was in his room, he was regretting why he had to let his stepmother collect his pot of gold from him. She had taken his father, even everything his father left for him and now she had also taken his water pot of gold. As he was still thinking about it, he heard a huge shout from the direction of his step mother's room. He ran there. The room was locked. He tried to open it to no avail; the shout was still going on. Obinna had to use the pestle in the kitchen and hit the door open. But it was too late: his stepmother and her son were lying lifeless on the floor!
Obinna alerted the villagers. Everyone who saw the dead bodies were convinced something dangerous had happened to them. Their two dead bodies were thrown into the evil forest. However before alerting the villagers, Obinna had taken his own pot of jewels and hidden in his room. When he was hiding it, his mother appeared to him again.
She said "your stepmother and her son are dead now because of her greediness. The three pots if collected singly were real gold but if collected together would turn into a wild animal and eat up the person".
Many years later Obinna became a very big man. He had sold the jewels at a very high price then used it to build a business. Some people say that it was his father's wealth and goodwill that made him great; others insist it was his own good behavior that made God bless him with riches. How Can Art Classes for Kids Make Your Child More Successful? Tips for Children's Hair Care End A Divorce and Child Custody Conflict Using This One Idea Children Books: Brings Colours To The Life NLP Cures Anxiety in a Survivor of Child Sexual Abuse and Even Answers Prayers To Santa Divorce With Children Involved The way to Launder Kids Clothes and Sustain Kids Jeans Uncontested Divorce With Children Big Boys Toys To Make Him Smile How To Help Your Kids Avoid Childhood (And Adult) Obesity How to Encourage Your Child's Natural Learning Abilities What's Trendy In Teen Toys Today Denims beneficial to your Children