I was raised by Polish speaking parents who told me a lot of Polish folktales but the only one I can remember clearly right now is the story about an old ugly witch called Baba Jaga. I remember being threatened with a visit from Baba Jaga whenever I was misbehaving. Baba Jaga lives deep in the woods in a small cabin with a big oven and when children behave badly she flies out on her broomstick brings the children back to her cabin and cooks them in the oven before she eats them. She appeared as the villain in a lot of Polish children’s books my mom used to read to me.

This story was one of the only one’s I was able to remember from my childhood, I was barely able to remember all the details. Fortunately I was able to find the whole story on the internet to refresh my memory. The link is here:

http://www.sacred-texts.com/jud/jftl/jftl25.htm

The story is called ” The Rabbi’s Bogey-Man”  and it is a short tale about a very smart Rabbi, that creates a machine to cook and clean for him, and be his worker on the sabbath. While the machine is very helpful and magical, it also results in chaos, by burning down houses. Eventually the Rabbi destroys his first machine, and creates a second one. The second one is stronger and bigger and threatens to kill all Jews. The Rabbi destroys the second machine as well. This story passes on a valuable lesson that can still be applied in life today, which is to not trust into the power of technology and machine too much, while also incorporating the anti-semitism that Jews have had to endure throughout most of their history.

In my family I never have been told typical folktales, but my parents always share their experiences of coming to the United States and starting a whole new life. I would consider these experiences as a form of folktale. I am sure that I will share these stories with future generations of my family. My family has always been the type to talk about where they come from. They tell me how it was to come to this country and the struggles they had to endure. My father tells me how he left his home at the age of twenty and traveled throughout Central America trying to make a living and better his life. He was involved in commercial trading and because of all the traveling he went though a lot of different experiences. Going from country to country to make a few dollars are memories that he will never forget. He lost countless friends to the Civil War in El Salvador and almost lost his own life. He reminds me that God helped him throughout all his struggles and because of God he was able to make it as far as he has. He started his life in the United States in California, but saw opportunities in New York to make a living and eventually a family. He constantly tells me that God was the one that continued guiding him throughout the course of his life. Starting his life in New York was very difficult because it was so much different then his life back home. He tells me the first time he saw snow and how such a simple thing as snow really astonished him. This is a story that has been told to my brother and myself. And will probably be continued told to other generations because my parents were the ones who gave me the opportunity to grow up in the United States and I now have the opportunity to achieve amazing things.

Growing up in Haiti was a memorable experience, mostly because of the richness of the Haitian culture and folklore.  When I was a child, what I enjoyed the most was the stories told after supper. When there was an occasional power outage, we often gathered around a gas lamp called “tet gridap” and tell all kind of stories and charades. The stories would sometimes evoke one’s laughter or fear, sometimes they told to teach a lesson of wisdom, and other times, one would not know what to make of the story. Some stories were told just for the sake of telling stories. The storyteller would say “Krick” and the audience would respond “Krack”. One story I remember is the story of Tezin, a big fish. This story plays an important role in the Haitian Folklore and culture. I’ll try my best to keep it brief and to tell it to the best of my knowledge.

Krick!

(Krack!)

As the custom wants it, boys and girls who grew up in rural areas actively participated in the family’s duties. So there was a brother and a sister who, sometimes, were sent off to collect water in a river (or pond) located not too far from the family house. When both returned home, the family always complained about the boy not bringing crystal clear water like her sister did. So, the parents asked the  brother to learn from her sister, but the brother was really hard-headed and never really listened to her sister’s instructions. He would rather play in the woods, and who knows, enjoy nice naps under the shadows the “Mapou” (a tall tree) . One day, while the sister was collecting water, a big Fish appeared. The Fish introduced itself as Tezin and told the girl that it would help her because she is nice and loyal. So Tezin and the girl made a pact. The fish would go and collect the utter most clear water from the depth of the pond for the girl if she kept it a secret. Upon arriving to the river, the girl had to sing a song to invoke the fish. However, Tezin warned the girl not to tell anyone about his existence because this would put his life at stake. Also, he gave her a handkerchief; if the handkerchief becomes stained with three drops of blood , this means that Tezin was killed. From then, because of Tezin, the girl would bring the clearest water they have ever seen home . Her parents were very suspicious and asked the brother to spy on the girl. So the next day, after witnessing the interaction between the fish and her sister, the boy ran home and divulged her sister’s secret friendship with the fish. The parents got mad and worried that the fish was a monster who meant harm to their daughter. They thought that the monster of the river had taken their daughter’s soul, so they planned on killing the fish. The next morning, they sent the girl off to the marketplace instead of the pond. Meanwhile the parents went off the pond and sang the song and killed Tezin. The next day she went to the pond and sang countless times but the fish didn’t appear; she took a look at the handkerchief, and it was in fact stained with the blood. She went off to her house and that evening, fish was served at the family dinner. The girl refused to eat and went out and cried. As she was singing the song she usually sing to invoke Tezin, she was surprisingly going into the ground!  Her brother went out to fetch her but he saw her slowly going into the ground. Astonished, The boy ran inside and called their parents but they didn’t believe him. When he went back the girl was already deep into the ground up to her neck. he went and called his parents and they finally came to see only one of her braids on the surface of the ground!

As the storyteller tells that story, she always finish off by saying that when one passes by the river on a full moon night, one can hear the  girl sing and Tezin splashing out of the water.  We, Haitians, are know to be very superstitious, so this story might confirm your doubts. But what culture or ethnic group doesn’t share some kind of superstitious beliefs, truly?

Stephanie Joseph

Hi everyone!

So this is not necessary a folktale but more of just an account.  I don’t really know of, or, can’t remember, any folktales that I may have been told, recently, however I did have a random experience that prompted my aunt to tell me a story about an incident when she was younger.

Recently, I was in the lobby of the Waldorf Astoria waiting for a friend and a strange woman approached me.  She apologized for disturbing me, but that she had to because she sensed a lot of positive energy emanating from me.  Apparently she is a psychic of some sort and felt the need to come talk to me.  This psychic told me she sees that I worry a lot, about many different things.  More specifically, she told me she sees a lot of good things for me this year and that i should stop worrying. The psychic went in to detail about how this year I will make a lot of strides in my field of interest or in any sort of business i was trying to get into, that i worry about my love life too much and that i keep a wall between myself and other people due to past relationships, and that i need to be more open to the new people in my life.  I repeated all of this to my aunt, and i was somewhat torn whether i believed anything this woman said.  On one hand, speaking of businesses and work is very general, but on the other hand, she seemed completely dead on about how i am with love and how aloof i am in regards to other people.

My aunt told me that i should believe in such things because this psychic didn’t have to come up to me and say anything, and also because she knew nothing about me yet was spot on.  When my aunt was in her 20’s she and her best friend decided for fun to go and see a psychic.  The woman they saw practiced santeria.  As soon as my aunt walked in, the woman told her she had a man sitting on her shoulder.   She said this man was sitting there with the intent to tell my aunt something.  He was trying so hard to tell her something but that my aunt just wasn’t open to it and that’s why she couldn’t hear anything.  Now, at this time, my aunt had been suffering from neck and shoulder pains for quite some time, but of course this is not something the psychic would have known.  A short time after this, my Nana started having a number of health issues that could have been prevented had she been monitored more.  My aunt firmly believes that the man sitting on her shoulder was our Grandaddy, who passed away some years before this. She believes he was trying to warn her to look closer, or to pay more attention to our Nana.  For this reason, she told me that when anything like this happens, that I should lend it some credibility because you never know what might happen.