G is for Genitalia (Body Folktales)

This year, my A to Z Challenge theme is Body Folktales. Enjoy!

CW: Adult themes incoming! Obviously.

You didn't really think I was going to do a theme like this without addressing the obvious, did you?

(Note: Some of these tales say 'vagina' instead of 'vulva'. It may be factually incorrect, but I didn't want to mess with the translations.)

Wandering genitalia (Saora people, India)
This story claims that in the old days genitalia could detach themselves and go wandering at night. One evening, the creator Kittung accidentally stepped on a vulva which made a squealing sound. Feeling sorry, he put the small creature into the river, where it turned into a turtle (the head is the clitoris). He then made non-detachable parts for people.

Clitoris legends (India)

This collection from India contains a whole collection of amazing stories about the clitoris. One creation myth claim that lightning was born from Earth Mother's clitoris, therefore it "flashes and sparkles as the clitoris does." Another story says a woman was fishing in a stream one day when a crab pinched her vulva; a deity told her to cut off the claw, and she will have as much pleasure from it as she had pain. A third story tells of a girl who was so busy working that she misplaced her clitoris; she borrowed one from a bird and never gave it back.

My favorite, however, is another tale that claims that body parts used to go wandering on their own. One day, the breasts picked a fight with the vulvas, and chased them all away into the mountains. Dismayed, men set out to bring the vulvas back, but they are skittish creatures and hard to find. By the time they got back, some old women died, and people were left with extra vulvas. They divided them up equally in smaller pieces - creating the clitoris.

The wandering vagina (Mehinaku people, Brazil)

Yet another story that claims that in days of old, genitalia could wander around. A woman named Tukwi had an "especially foolish" vagina that crawled around the floor at night, looking for something to eat. It got into the porridge and started slurping, awakening a man in the house who went to see what it was, and accidentally scorched it with a torch. The vagina fled back to Tukwi, who then warned everyone not to let their vaginas wander around.

Vagina dentata

If there is one folklore trope that a lot of people are (painfully) familiar with, it's this one: vaginas with teeth (F574.1.1). There are entire books written about the folklore and mythology of this trope, so I'm not going to get into it. But I'm going to highlight some favorites. 

One is a Khond legend from India about a woman who used to have shiny, fiery teeth in her vagina until her husband took them out with a cord. After a long life, when their children were grown, she found the teeth again, buried in the garden - and they turned into fireflies. Ever since, they have been allowed to take shelter in people's houses.

The other story is a Mongolian legend about the death of Genghis Khan. It claim that the great khan desired a gorgeous woman named Gürbeljin Ghoa (Lizard Beauty). He put her husband to death and forced her to marry him. On her wedding night, she hid blades in her vagina - and thus murdered Genghis Khan. (Source here.)

An origin story from the Makka people in Paraguay claims that in the beginning, no one could have sex with women because they had piranhas in their vaginas. A wise shaman organized a dance party where he made women dance so much that all the piranhas fell out. Or rather, almost all - the smallest one stayed in and still gnaw, which is why periods exist.

Penis, Vagina and Testicles (Cameroon)

Penis and Testicles are best friends and they go fishing together. On the way back they meet Vagina who asks for some of their fish. Penis is happy to share, but Testicles are stingy. Later on, in the hot season, Vagina happily offers shelter from the sun to Penis, but not Testicles. The latter still try to get as close as possible. (A similar tale is told in Ghana about Penis and Testicles sharing ground nuts with Vagina, and getting shelter from the rain.)

Kwazerema and helpful Ant (Kapsiki people, Cameroon/Nigeria)

A man has two wives, but treats one of them very poorly, making her fetch water from the river every day. The woman meets a Red And who takes pity on her, and gives her medicine to put into her water jar. The husband has a habit of urinating in her jar - but this time, as he does, his penis gets stuck in it. Not only can no one break the jar, it also keeps singing a mocking song. Eventually he begs his wife to undo the curse, and decides to treat her better. She thanks Red Ant for the help.

Kapo-kohe-lele (Hawaii)

In Hawaiian mythology, Kapo of the Flying Vagina is the sister of the volcano goddess Pele. In one legend, the pig-god Kamapua'a pursues Pele and tries to rape her, but Kapo comes to her rescue: she uses her detachable vagina to distract the pig, leading him away from the goddess. (This story is reflected in Hawaiian place names. Other source here.)

The vagina girls (Jicarilla Apache legend)

The hero Killer-of-Enemies goes through many adventures, battling monsters and shaping the world. On his journey he defeats a monster and meets his four daughters in a house full of vaginas. The four girls are themselves vaginas in human form, and they use their teeth to devour people. The hero feeds them medicine, taking the teeth away, and they lay down the ground rules of how vaginas shall work. He picks two from their collection and takes them home to two girls; people experiment with where to put them on the body until they settle on their current placing. The four girls go on to live good lives among the humans.

The three wishes (1001 Nights)

A man earns three wishes - and immediately uses the first one to wish for a larger penis. His penis grows to a gigantic size, at which point he panics and wishes for it to go away. It does, and now he has to use his third wish to get it back.

The four champions (Hausa tale)

Four friends acquire grain together: they break the corn on one's head, thresh it with one's penis, winnow it with one's mighty farts, and carry it home with one's scrotum. The question of the dilemma tale is: who was the most heroic of the four?

(14th century illustration)

I am somewhat worried about the comments section now. Also, my general search history and upcoming Facebook advertisements.

Have a nice Sunday break, everyone!

Tarot Tales: K is for Kings and Knights

Welcome to the 2021 A to Z Blogging Challenge! My theme this year is Tarot Tales. I am making a selection of folktales, legends, and other traditional stories that correspond to tarot cards. Storytelling and tarot go well together. Do other stories come to mind? Let me know in the comments!

This post is the first one about the Minor Arcana. So, instead of one card, I'll be focusing on eight: four Kings, and four Knights. Comments will be shorter, but since Kings and Knights are very common in folklore, the selection process was also a lot easier. 

(If you have suggestions for Kings and Knights from more non-European cultures, let me know!)

CUPS (emotions, water)

King of Cups: Zal (Persia)

The King of Cups is emotionally mature, compassionate, caring, and kind. He is diplomatic, intuitive, warm-hearted, and an excellent mentor. For these reasons I chose my favorite hero from the Persian Book of Kings, Zal. Born with white hair, Zal was put out into the mountains by his father to die, but the mythical Simurgh bird raised him. As an adult, he returned to his kingdom and became a wise, level-headed and diplomatic ruler - and a kind and loving father to one of the greatest Persian heroes, Rostam. He also has a gorgeous love story.

Knight of Cups: Oisín (Ireland & Scotland)

This is my favorite guy in the deck. Romantic, creative, charming, and on top of that just as caring, kind, and compassionate as the King. He is all about beauty and love, all heart and imagination. He is the downright knight in shining armor. I chose another old favorite of mine: Oisín (or Ossian), the famous bard of Irish and Scottish legends. Oisín is the son of the legendary hero Fionn Mac Cumhail, part human, part fae. He is the odd one out of the rowdy warriors of the Fianna, more a musician and a diplomat than a fighter (although he can definitely hold his own in an adventure). He is most famous from the love story where he runs away with the Queen of the Land of Youth.

WANDS (action, fire)

King of Wands: Setuli, King of the Birds (Eswatini)

This king is THE King. He is a true leader, a great role model. He takes on challenges, defeats obstacles, makes dreams into reality. He is a visionary, all energy, action and innovation. If I was going to put Arthur in the deck, this would be him - but I wanted to pick someone less obvious. So, let me introduce you to Setuli, King of Birds, from the tales of Eswatini. He is born deaf and mute, but when his magician brother takes him into the wilderness, he meets a wise old woman and she helps him gain magic powers through his own bravery and determination. Setuli then uses his new powers to turn birds into people, and sets out on a journey. He ends up breaking a curse on another kingdom, and those people join him too; he defeats monsters and makes daring plans, and in the end he lives happily ever after as the ruler of a prosperous land. 

Knight of Wands: Astolfo (Italy)

This Knight is daring, enthusiastic, and passionate. He has a lot of energy to go around: he gets into spontaneous adventures, sweeps damsels off their feet, helps out friends, goes on quests, makes magic happen. He has as much charm as Cups, but in a less dreamy and more adventurous way. For these reasons I chose Astolfo, one of the heroes of the Italian epic Orlando Furioso. He is an English prince, one of Charlemagne's paladins, most famous for riding the first hippogriff recorded in legends! After rescuing the magic steed from a wizard, he flies it to the Moon to find the lost wits of his friend Orlando. It is quite an adventure story!

SWORDS (intellect, air)

King of Swords: Solomon (Jewish, Christian & Muslim traditions)

This King is all about wisdom, knowledge, and intellect. He makes good, impartial judgment, he is respected and trusted by everyone, and he always finds the truth. He follows logic instead of emotions, and he is good at what he does. He is also a strong authority figure. I thought the legendary King Solomon would be a good fit for this card. Recently I was doing some research on Solomon's judgment (the baby-cutting-in-half thing), and it is a lot deeper than most people realize.

Knight of Swords: Mercury Ali (1001 Nights)

Knight of Swords is a bundle of energy and intellect. He is unstoppable, always up for a challenge, good with words, and usually the smartest person in the room (sometimes annoyingly so). He is all about action and winning (I love it that Telluric Tarot symbolizes him with the coffee plant). Now, I could have picked a lot of heroes for this one, but I wanted to highlight the intellect part. So instead of a knight I chose a trickster: the infamous Mercury Ali from the 1001 Nights. He is a legendary rogue from Cairo, who travels to Bagdad and gets into an endless prank war with a clever lady named Zaynab. He goes through many adventures, sometimes fighting with wits, and sometimes with a magic spear, until he can marry his lady love.

(CW: this story has a few seriously problematic parts, but in my opinion none of them are essential to the plot, and can be easily skipped.)

PENTACLES (material things, earth)

King of Pentacles: Laurin (Germany)

This King symbolizes wealth, abundance, and material security. He is grounded, respected, traditional, and successful in making his domain flourish. He is also kind of a fatherly figure and a family man. I immediately thought King Laurin would be a good fit. In German legends he is the Dwarf king of the mountains of Tyrol. He reigns over a wealthy underground kingdom full of treasures, and has a beautiful rose garden in the mountains. He features into a long and amazing legend about the struggle between humans and Dwarves.

Knight of Pentacles: Kay the Senechal (Britain)

He is not a very knightly Knight. This guy is about hard work, planning, and practical things. He is patient, responsible, reliable, persistent, and honorable. He is also, to me, one of my favorite knights from Arthurian legends: Sir Kay the Senechal. Kay is generally known for his sharp tongue and grumpy demeanor (and for being King Arthur's mean foster brother), but behind the scenes, he is the one that keeps the lights on in Camelot. In the old Welsh legends he literally keeps everyone warm by the heat radiating from his body. He might not be a good fighter, or a romantic hero, but he keeps all of them housed, clothed, and fed. You're welcome. 

Who are your favorite heroes, kings, and knights in shining armor?

(And don't worry, we'll get to the queens too!)

O is for Olives and Detectives (A to Z Challenge 2019: Fruit Folktales)

Well, we just had oranges yesterday, so today I have to do olives. Luckily, olives play an important role in many cultures, and a such there are countless tales and legends that revolve around them. Today, I picked one of my favorites. Here is a story from the Thousand and One Nights (more specifically, from nights 639-643).

Ali Khwajah, the merchant lives in Baghdad in the time of the famous wise caliph Haroun Al-Rashid. One day he decides to go on the pilgrimage to Mecca. He sells all his goods, and since he doesn't want to carry all his wealth to Mecca, he puts a thousand gold coins into an olive jar, spreads some olives on top, and seals the jar. He then takes the jar to a merchant friend of his, and asks him to store the jar in his house while he is away. The merchant friend agrees, puts the sealed jar in his cellar, and forgets about it.

Ali Khwajah goes on the pilgrimage to Mecca. On the way, he meets other merchants, and decides to accompany them to faraway lands, and travel the world. He is away for seven long years.
In the meantime, towards the end of the seven years, the other merchant's wife starts craving olives. The merchant opens the sealed jar (despite his wife's protests), and finds that the olives have gone bad, but there is gold underneath them. He takes the gold, fills the jar with fresh olives, and seals it back up.

Soon after Ali Khwajah comes home, greets his friend, and takes back his jar. When he opens it, he finds it full of olives, and all thousand pieces of gold are gone. He returns to his friend to complain, but the merchant denies that he's ever opened the jar. The matter ends up at court before the judge, but since there are no witnesses about the gold, the case is dismissed. The desperate Ali Khwajah goes before Haroun Al-Rashid, asking for justice. The caliph promises to think it over.

That evening Haroun Al-Rashid goes walking in his city, and notices a handful of children playing. They are reenacting the (high-profile) case of Ali Khwajah. One child pretends to be the judge. He asks "Ali" to bring the jar of olives in for inspection. He tastes the olives and finds them fresh. He orders two olive merchants to tell him, from their expertise, how long olives keep in a jar. The merchants testify that no olives keep for more than three years. The child-judge thus concludes that the jar had been opened and refilled, and decides the trial in Ali's favor.

Haroun is so impressed with the child that he orders him to court for the next day. When the merchant and Ali Khwajah arrive, the caliph does exactly what the child has done, and since the olives are fresh, the truth of the matter comes out. Ali gets his money back, the boy also gets a thousand pieces of gold, the merchant is hanged for his crime, the judge is disciplined for being bad at his job. Justice prevails, thanks to the wisdom of a child.

(Read the story here.)

Do you think there would have been another solution for Ali to reveal the truth and get his money back?

(Also, I checked, and modern olives also have a 3-year expiration date...)

P327. Barmecide feast (WTF - Weird Things in Folktales)

Welcome to my A to Z Challenge blog series titled WTF - Weird Things in Folktales! Find the introduction post (explaining the theme) here. Find all other participating blogs in the comments of each day's post on the main blog! You can also follow us on Twitter and Facebook.

P in the Motif Index stands for Society, and the people in it: Kings and Queens and where they come from; artisans, peasants, people of the church - as well as families ("P233.8. - Prodigal son returns"). It also includes law, military affairs, hospitality, things that go with dealing with other people ("P361. - Faithful servant"). The story I found the most entertaining was

P327. Barmecide feast 

On the thirty-first of the Thousand and One Nights, a barber tells a tale about his past adventures (The barber's tale of himself).

The story begins in Baghdad, where ten highway robbers had been arrested, and they are being taken to the Caliph for judgment. They are being embarked on a boat just when the Barber walks up, and seeing the ten men getting the boat, he immediately jumps into the conclusion that they must be going to a wedding feast. Not wanting to miss out (FOMO), he gets in the boat with them.

The boat takes the prisoners to the opposite bank of the river, where they are chained - the Barber along with them. He is too polite to complain, and never says a word. The robbers are taken to the Caliph, who orders them to be beheaded. The executioner goes down the line with a sword, striking heads off... until only the Barber remains.

Here is where things get a little confusing. The Caliph demands to know why the executioner only killed nine of the prisoners. The executioner swears up and down that he cut ten heads off, but the Caliph points out that one man is still alive, therefore they must have miscounted. In the end, they count the heads again, and turns out that ten are dead, and the Barber makes eleven. At this point a very confused Caliph asks the Barber who he is, and just what on earth he is doing in the lineup. The Barber very politely explains what happened, how he misunderstood a situation, but he did not want to make a fuss about it. 

The Caliph falls over laughing.

(Read the story here.)

Now, "Barmecide" according to the dictionary means "illusory or imaginary." The term comes from the Arabian Nights itself - and it is directly related to our Barber above. The Barber tells the Caliph stories about his brothers. The sixth brother, impoverished, seeks charity at the house of the Barmecides, a noble family famous for its generosity. The old Barmecide pretends to serve him food and drinks - but it is all just play. Still, the beggar goes through the motions, even pretending to get drunk from the invisible wine. The lord of the house is so pleased with his miming capabilities that he keeps him around as a guest for twenty years.

Runner-ups
P11.0.1. Prophecy that brother who first kisses saint will be king
P14.6. King‘s (prince’s) sulking chamber. He sulks here until his wishes are carried out
P14.7. None permitted to enter hall of king unless he possesses an art
P15.4. King is cursed by disguised dwarf-smiths whose work he criticised
P19.3. King must procure whatever visiting poets ask, or suffer from their satire
P192.4. Fool can live under water
P214. Wife drinks blood of slain husband
P233.3. Berserks scold their father who apparently without reason called their adversary invincible
P311.2. Flower-friendship
P341. Teacher dies of pride over success of pupil
P412.3. Hero as rabbit-herd
P427.7.2.1.1. Poets and fools closely allied.
P641. Injured husband will not kill a naked man.

Gemstone Mountain (The Storyteller Does Her Homework)

(This is one of those posts where I reveal how the storytelling sausage is made)
(The sausage is bigger on the inside)

In two weeks' time, people will be telling Turkmen folktales at the Silk Road House in Berkeley, CA. Since I'll be in town for Epic Day, I volunteered to join in the fun.

It is not easy to find folktales from Turkmenistan. I have yet to locate a full book dedicated to them in either English, Spanish, or Hungarian. My initial search frustrated me to no end; I had to resort to cherry-picking Turkmen folktales from "Tales of the Soviet Union" type collections (well, that was a delightful trip down Retro Lane, bringing up memories of Russian children's books back home).

One of the few stories I kept coming across was a tale titled Gemstone Mountain (or, alternately, Mountain of Gems or Diamond Mountain).

I like shiny things.

The story was immediately familiar from the Second Voyage of Sindbad the Sailor. It tells of an inaccessible mountain range filled with gemstones, and people being wrapped in raw ox hides to trick giant birds into carrying them to their nest on the peak. People get rich from harvesting gems this way - but the brunt of the work is done by poor workers destined to die up on the mountain since they can never get down.
Or can they?...

All the versions of the Turkmen folktale I located were almost verbatim the same (both in English and in Hungarian). After frustrating myself for another day or so, I resorted to pursuing the Sindbad version instead.

Jackpot.

Illustration by Nadir Quinto

The Valley of Diamonds is a true Silk Road story: It stretches from Greece to China, and spans several centuries from the 4th all the way to the 15th (AD). Apart from Sindbad, some versions feature Alexander the Great as the protagonist, and such prominent writers included it in their works as Marco Polo and Buzurg Ibn Shahriyar. We know it from Greek, Arabic, and Chinese sources, as well as from Armenia, Russia, and Persia.
And, of course, Turkmenistan.

In this most well-know type of the story, there is a hidden valley in the mountains, filled with gems, inaccessible (and often invisible) to humans, crawling with deadly snakes and/or scorching fire. People in the area devise a way to get the gems by throwing sheep carcasses into the valley, and waiting for birds of prey to bring them up to their nests. Then, chasing the birds away, people gather the gemstones that stuck to the carcass. This job is dangerous, so convicted criminals and slaves are often tasked with it.

Here are some useful things I discovered:

1. The two earliest (Greek and Arabic) sources locate the Valley in "Scythia" or in "Khorasan," both of which historic regions cover Turkmenistan. Other sources usually locate it in India.

2. The earliest known (Greek) source claims the gemstones in the valley are hyacinths (red-orange zircon), but it was later changed to diamonds.

3. Diamonds are actually lipophilic - they do stick to grease or greasy meat.

4. The mountains on the southern border of Turkmenistan - along which the southern route of the Silk Road traced - belong to the Alborz range, the legendary home of the giant Simurgh bird of Persian mythology. The Simurgh is not only a giant bird living on an inaccessible mountain peak, but it also builds its nest from ebony and sandalwood. In an alternate version of the Valley of Diamonds (recounted by Herodotus, III, 3), people actually harvest spices like cinnamon from the nest of a mythical bird in a very similar fashion, with the use of carcasses. The stories probably share the same roots.

5. The mountains on the southern border are also rich in minerals and gemstones. Khorasan as a region is famous for its jewelers.

All in all, this was a fun rabbit hole to get into. And the story itself is the better for it.

If you want to hear me tell this story, along with some other great Turkmen folktales, join us on Valentine's Day at the Silk Road House!

Storytelling Pet Peeves

If you thought storytellers were docile, merry, peaceful individuals who spend their time frolicking in meadows and consorting with fairies... you have clearly never met a storyteller. Believe me, we can be quite terrifying. Especially when someone hits the right buttons.

Every storyteller has their own, story-related pet peeves. These are mine:

1. Excalibur and the Sword in the Stone ARE NOT THE SAME SWORD. Not in most stories, anyway. Arthur pulls one sword from the stone (AND ANVIL), and gets the second one from the Lady of the Lake. This second one is the one usually named Excalibur.

2. Morgan le Fay is NOT Mordred's mother. That's Morgause. Wrong sister.

3. Pandora's box HAS ALREADY BEEN OPENED. It is not some mystical chest full of evils. The only thing left inside it is Hope.

4. Dionysus is NOT an old fat drunk man. He is a youth. In fact, he is one of the most attractive of the Greek gods.

5. Andersen stories are not "Danish folktales." In fact, they are not even "Danish fairy tales." They are Andersen stories.

6. And while we are at it, Peter Pan, Alice, or the Wizard of Oz are also not folktales.

7. Rapunzel doesn't get RESCUED from the tower by the prince. He just visits her and gets her pregnant, and then the witch throws her out.

8. Snow White was persecuted by her BIOLOGICAL MOTHER. At least in the original first edition of the Grimm tales. Stop blaming stepmoms for this one.

9. Stop with the "if the shoe fit perfectly, why did it fall off?" memes. Cinderella lost her shoe because the prince smeared pitch on the stairs. Read the story.

10. It's "the 1001 Nights," not "the Arabian Nights."

+1. Stop using "trail of breadcrumbs" as a metaphor for leaving clues. Hansel and Gretel got lost in the woods because birds ate the crumbs. The metaphor for leading someone somewhere, based on this story, should be "trail of pebbles."

Whew! I feel so much lighter now.
Back to frolicking.

E is for Ebony

Ebony is a kind of wood known for its shining black color. Because we already used B for Blue. Also, ebony sounds better!

And with this letter we return once again to the palace of Bahram Gur, the Persian King with the Seven Wise Princesses. After visiting the Turquoise Pavilion in B for Blue, we no visit the Black Pavilion of the Ebony Princess.
The Ebony Princess is from India. She tells a tale about a king who comes across a town during his travels, a town where everyone is dressed all in black, but no one is willing to tell him why. Finally, after spending a year there and gaining the trust of a butcher, he is show in secret to the ruins outside the city, from where he is transported to the realm of the fairies. There he falls in love (or, rather, desire) for the fairy queen, but is refused; when he finally tries to force himself on her, he gets kicked out, returns to the city, and dresses all in black in mourning for his stupidity (poetically called "unrequited love").

A less rape-y and more delightful tale, one of my favorites, is that of the Ebony Horse from the Arabian Nights. It is about a Persian magician that invents a mechanical flying horse, just to have it stolen by the king's son, who goes on all kinds of adventures before he learns how to steer the creature. I also included this tale under Technomancy in my book, Tales of Superhuman Powers (a collection of folktales with superpowers in them). A lot of fun to tell.

(Incidentally, the Ebony Horse is also a Magic: The Gathering card, from the time they did an Arabian Nights run)

Z is for Zzzzzzz, or, the many stories of Sleeping Beauty

As an archaeologist, I have always been drawn to the story of Sleeping Beauty. I mean, finding a castle that has been fully magically preserved for a century? Heck yeah.

Anyhow, every once in a while you hear people mentioning "the real Sleeping Beauty" story just to illustrate how dark and gruesome the Grimm tales really are. There is, in fact, a less child-friendly version of the tale - but it is not Grimm.

The tale is called Sun, Moon and Talia, and it is from Italy, included in the collection called the Pentamerone. The basic idea is about the same as the well-known and Disneyfied story, with one small but significant exception: instead of prince finds girl, prince kisses girl, girl wakes up, it is prince finds girl, prince kisses girl, girl fails to wake up, prince tries for a while, prince goes home. Nine months later the still sleeping princess gives birth to twins. Well, that'll wake a girl up.

(Anyone having flashbacks to Almodovar's Habla con ella?)

I have told this story in high school, it was great fun.

Another version of the tale comes from the Arabian Nights. In this one we have a very twisted version of the "childless queen makes a wish" story motif: She says "I wish I would have a daughter even if she was allergic to flax!" What the heck, lady.
Anyhow, Sittukhan is born and she is indeed allergic to flax. Her condition, however, is actively used in the story to smuggle her out of her castle and into a prince's garden who, like a real gentleman, wakes her up first and then proposes to her. Things go right, things go wrong, and in the end of the story, it is the prince who has to fake his own death to win her back since now she is rich and independent. Go princess.

And with this interesting tidbit, we conclude this year's run of the A to Z challenge. It has been great fun! Thank you all for visiting and sticking around. The blog will keep going as usual, with more stories and some musings along the way. 

Happy Z!

Z is for Zerzura

Phew! I almost dropped the challenge on the last day! I have been busy.
But, fortunately enough, part of what kept me busy starts with a Z. So, it all works out in the end.

Zerzura is a legendary lost oasis somewhere in the Sahara. It is one of the most famous lost cities in world literature, particularly because it is featured in one of the most amazing tales of the Arabian Nights.

But, let's tart from the top.

A year ago I was working as a screenwriter for an online game called Nadirim. My job was to take stories from the Arabian Nights and other related oral traditions, and turn them into parts of the game. Well, one of the stories that I have always found fascinating was the City of Brass - basically, it is the story of an expedition sent out by the Caliph of Damascus to hunt for djinn sealed into bottles by King Solomon. It is Indiana Jones meets Arabian Nights meets... well. Djinn. The expedition is lead by a soldier, a diplomat, and a sheik who is kind of an archaeologist, and they do end up finding the City of Brass, following an ancient book called the Book of Hidden Pearls. This text, by the way, actually exists, and have been used by countless treasure hunters in the past centuries for it contains descriptions of lost cities and hidden treasures all over North Africa. It mentions the oasis of Zerzura, or, the Oasis of Birds, that have been associated with the city in the Arabian Nights.

The story, however, does not stop here. The Hunt for Zerzura was a series of expeditions at the turn of the 19th and the 20th centuries - German, British, French, everyone wanted to find it first. Among them, a Hungarian gentleman called Almásy László - generally known from the movie as "the English patient". He brought an airplabe into a car race, and enede up finding wadi Abd-el-Malik, one of the three wadis that form the rain oasis in the heart of the Gilf Kebir in southern Lybia - a rain oasis that appears and disappears according to rainfall, is on a bird migration route, and is also known as Zerzura.

I took the three stories - the book, the Arabian Nights, and Almásy's journal - and turned them into a full-hour storytelling show, titled The Book of Hidden Pearls. I have been telling the three parts separately, but did not have an opportunity to do the whole show on stage... until this weekend, when I had the honor of being invited to the Connecticut Storytelling Festival as a performer!

I was excited and nervous at the same time. I have worked a lot with this story, and it is one of my favorites ever; but it has a lot of details that need to be done just right, and one has to keep the timing, and... just, generally, a first full performance always feels like a jump in the deep end. The performance space was pretty, and comfortably small; we had a full house of about 30 or 40 people. I shared a 90 minute session with Bob Reiser, an amazing storyteller who started the show with his tale of the civil rights movement, and was a very tough act to follow!

Finally, it was my turn to tell the tale of Zerzura. At this point the smiling faces and the atmosphere of the festival had dissolved my nervousness, and I was able to just sit down, look my listeners in the eye, and tell my story with the "you are all gonna love this because this story is awesome!" attitude. That is one of the many reasons why I only tell stories I absolutely love: they give you a sense of "I must share this with you!" and the enthusiasm takes care of the rest. The telling went really well, I certainly enjoyed every moment of it, and in the end, people stood up and applauded. And what made this experience even better, I kept getting questions from people all day later on about Zerzura, and the City of Brass, and Almásy, and all in all, how much of it was actually true? I enjoyed these conversations immensely, and was happy that I could share a glimpse into a different culture, a different time, and a different dream.

I really need to turn this into a book right now.

In the meantime, happy A to Z to everyone!!! It has been a lot of fun blogging with you, see you all next year!
Next stop: More posts about the CT festival. Yay!