Have you ever noticed how flies pester cows in the field? Do you ever wonder why they constantly buzz around the cows’ heads? Well, this is the story of the events that made the fly to start doing this.
A long time ago in the animal kingdom, the lioness, queen of the animals, called all the animals together. It had been a great year and she wanted to celebrate it with a month long feast. The lioness told the animals “the king and I will hold a feast every night with the heads of each family and they will take food home to their families“. And so every day the animals looked forward to the queen’s feast.
Although there was enough food for everyone and their families, Maluu the cow became greedy. She started bullying the other animals and stealing their food for herself. The other animals couldn’t fight back because she was so big and strong and they were afraid she would hurt them.
At one feast, Maluu stole food from the fox and he went home with nothing for his family. At another, she stole the food from the rooster. She also stole from the antelope, the warthog and the flamingo.
Afraid of the cow, all the animals arrived early to the next feast to avoid her. They took their food and left before Maluu could steal it from them. The only creature that wasn’t able to get away was Esinsin, the fly who arrived late. “Your food is mine now” Maluu said as she took the pot of food away from the fly. “I can’t let you take my food Maluu. I have a lot of children to feed” Esinsin protested. “I don’t care how many children you have. This food is mine” said the greedy cow. Esinsin flew home empty-handed and sad.
“What will my family eat?” he wondered as he flew home. Before he could come up with a plan, his children ran out to greet him excited for the feast he had brought back. Upon realising he had no food with him, the confused children asked “Daddy, where’s the food?”. Esinsin looked into their disappointed faces and blurted, “my good friend Maluu is keeping it in her mouth for us. She is a trickster so don’t believe her if she says she doesn’t have it”. The excited children immediately flew to Maluu’s house and all 50 of them landed on her face trying to get to the food in her mouth. “We’ve come for our dinner!” they cried, very excited.
“What dinner?!” Maluu mooed angrily trying to get the flies off her face. “I don’t have any food. Go away!” But no matter how hard she tried, the flies just wouldn’t leave her alone. She complained to the fly and asked him to call off his children but he refused. “You did take their food,” he responded.
Frustrated, the cow went to the king, “Oba Kiniun, Esinsin’s children won’t leave me alone and their father won’t call them off. Please help”.
The king sent for Esinsin. When the fly arrived at the palace, he told the king how Maluu had stolen people’s food at the feast including his family’s. Hearing this, the king was upset. He commanded Esinsin and his family to pester the cow until she returned their food and the food of all the other families she had stolen from.
Since that day, the cow has always had flies flying around her face constantly buzzing, “where’s our food, where’s our food?”
The end.
The Moral of the Story:
This story shows us that it is wrong to bully others. Just because a person is big and strong does not mean that they should be mean to others.
