Week 2 Story: Human vs. Turtle
The Ocean of the Turtles was a peacefully run kingdom filled with all types of sea creatures--big and small. The King Turtle was very fond of his family, especially his youngest son.
"Could I have a coral reef down by the bay, father?" asked his son.
"Of course, my son. I will have the fish build it by dawn tomorrow!" The King granted.
And so, the fish gathered in the bay and hurried to complete the reef the young prince desired for. The reef was beautiful, filled with dazzling, vibrant plants and sea creatures. The prince was satisfied and loved playing in the reef every day.
One day, the young prince was swimming through his reef when he stumbled upon something, or someone, peculiar. Among the plants, a human was snorkeling. The prince had never caught glimpse of anything like it. The prince was terrified and swam straight to his castle. He complained to his father about an unknown creature in the reef that was comparable to a shark.
The king decided to have his strongest subjects capture the human and bring him to the castle to be executed.
An army of sea creatures swam to the reef and captured the human, bringing him to the King Turtle.
The King's subjects began to debate on how to execute the human threat. "The jellyfish could sting it to death!" one said.
"Why not feed it to the sharks?" said another.
"What about banishing it from the kingdom? It would never be able to fend for itself on land!" the young prince finally spoke.
The human widened his gaze. Rapidly, he began begging not to be released and thrown on the land. "I would never survive. The land creatures would kill me, please do not let me go!" begged the human.
The King Turtle unknowingly fell for the human's trap and set him loose onto land.
As the human swam back to the shore, he took his snorkeling gear off and safely walked onto the land. "Foolish sea animals, their ignorance has made me live another day!" he laughed to himself.
Author's Note: I based my story off of The Turtle and The King in Two Turtle Jatakas. The original story tells of how humans captured a turtle and saved itself by tricking the humans into thinking he is scared of the water. I decided to switch the character roles of the story, making the turtles in place of humans and the human in place of the turtle. I wanted to display the relationship between humans and ocean life or animals in general. The ignorance of wildlife is something humans often take advantage of for their own gain.
Bibliography. "How the Turtle Saved His Own Life", from Jataka Tales by Ellen C. Babbitt.
Hi Isha! I thought this story was really amusing. Changing the roles around was a cool twist! I could see all sorts of animals seeing humans and thinking how strange or scary we seem, especially in scuba gear or anywhere near human cities with all the noises and giant structures. I also agree that humans take advantage of higher intelligence to manipulate animals, which can be sad or cruel.
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ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed your story! It was an intriguing take on the Jataka by reversing the roles of the turtle and the humans. I appreciated the small detail of the turtles using “it” to describe the human because they would not refer to a human like how we would refer to one another. Though your story parallels the plot of the original very closely, I wonder how the human would have reacted to being taken prisoner by turtles. What would he have thought when he was taken prisoner by turtles? I know I would have thought I was dreaming. Also, you mentioned in your author’s note that you wanted to explore the relationship between humans and ocean life in this story, but it was not clear to me upon my first read through (I did understand how you displayed it after a second read). So, what if you included something about the human littering or damaging the turtle prince’s reef in addition to him being a scary human, and that is why the turtle prince was scared of the human and why the turtles captured him. Well done!
Hello Isha, what a delightful story! I love how you flipped the original story on its head by making the King a turtle and the prince turtle was scared by a human diver. It gave a whole new feel to a classic jataka. I agree with what you mentioned in your Author's Note. Instead of rejoicing in the turtle's cleverness in the original tale, it's hard to rejoice with the diver who has used his cunning to trick the ocean animals.
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