Narrative Text

The Smartest Animal

Once there was a farmer from Laos. Every morning and every evening, he ploughed his field with his buffalo.
One day, a tiger saw the farmer and his buffalo working in the field. The tiger was very surprised to see a big animal listening to a small animal. The tiger wanted to know more about the big animal and the small animal.
After the man went home, the tiger spoke to the buffalo; “you are so big and strong. Why do you do everything the man tells you?” The buffalo answered; “oh, the man is very intelligent”.
The tiger asked; “can you tell me how intelligent he is?”. “No, I can’t tell you”, said the buffalo; “but you can ask him”
So the next day the tiger asked to the man; “Can I see your intelligence?”. But the man answered; “it at home”. “Can you go and get it?” asked the tiger. “Yes” said the man; “but I am afraid you will kill my buffalo when I am gone. Can I tie you to a tree?”
After the man tied the tiger to the tree, he didn’t go home to get his intelligence. He took his plough and hit the tiger. Then he said; “Now you know about my intelligence even you haven’t seen it.

Generic Structure Analysis
1. Orientation; introducing specific participants; farmer and his buffalo, once in Laos
2. Complication; revealing a series of crisis: the tiger wanted to know more about the farmer and the buffalo, the tiger wanted to know about the farmer’s intelligence.
3. Resolution; the crisis is resolve: the farmer hit the tiger

Language Feature Analysis
o Using saying verb; answered
o Using thinking verb; saw, was surprised to
o Using action verb; tie, hit
o Using time conjunction; once, one day
o Using connectives; after, the next day
o Using past tense; there was a farmer, the man tied the tiger.

The Three Feathers

There was once upon a time a king who had three sons, of whom two were clever and wise, but the third did not speak much, and was simple, and was called the simpleton. When the king had become old and weak, and was thinking of his end, he did not know which of his sons should inherit the kingdom after him. Then he said to them, go forth, and he who brings me the most beautiful carpet shall be king after my death.

And that there should be no dispute amongst them, he took them outside his castle, blew three feathers in the air, and said, you shall go as they fly. One feather flew to the east, the other to the west, but the third flew straight up and did not fly far, but soon fell to the ground.

And now one brother went to the right, and the other to the left, and they mocked simpleton, who was forced to stay where the third feather had fallen. He sat down and was sad. Then all at once he saw that there was a trap-door close by the feather. He raised it up, found some steps, and went down them. Then he came to another door, knocked at it, and heard somebody inside calling - little green waiting-maid, waiting-maid with the limping leg, little dog of the limping leg, hop hither and thither, and quickly see who is without.

The door opened, and he saw a great, fat toad sitting, and round about her a crowd of little toads. The fat toad asked what he wanted. He answered, I should like to have the prettiest and finest carpet in the world. Then she called a young one and said - little green waiting-maid, waiting-maid with the limping leg, little dog of the limping leg, hop hither and thither, and bring me the great box.

The young toad brought the box, and the fat toad opened it, and gave simpleton a carpet out of it, so beautiful and so fine, that on the earth above, none could have been woven like it. Then he thanked her, and climbed out again.

The two others, however, had looked on their youngest brother as so stupid that they believed he would find and bring nothing at all. Why should we give ourselves a great deal of trouble searching, said they, and got some coarse handkerchiefs from the first shepherds' wives whom they met, and carried them home to the king.

At the same time simpleton also came back, and brought his beautiful carpet, and when the king saw it he was astonished, and said, if justice be done, the kingdom belongs to the youngest. But the two others let their father have no peace, and said that it was impossible that simpleton, who in everything lacked understanding,
should be king, and entreated him to make a new agreement with them.

Then the father said, he who brings me the most beautiful ring shall inherit the kingdom, and led the three brothers out, and blew into the air three feathers, which they were to follow. Those of the two eldest again went east and west, and simpleton's feather flew straight up, and fell down near the door into the earth.

Then he went down again to the fat toad, and told her that he wanted the most beautiful ring. She at once ordered her big box to be brought, and gave him a ring out of it, which sparkled with jewels, and was so beautiful that no goldsmith on earth would have been able to make it.

The two eldest laughed at simpleton for going to seek a golden ring. They gave themselves no trouble, but knocked the nails out of an old carriage-ring, and took it to the king, but when simpleton produced his golden ring, his father again said, the kingdom belongs to him. The two eldest did not cease from tormenting the king until he made a third condition, and declared that the one who brought the most
beautiful woman home, should have the kingdom. He again blew the three feathers into the air, and they flew as before.

Then simpleton without more ado went down to the fat toad, and said, I am to take home the most beautiful woman. Oh, answered the toad, the most beautiful woman. She is not at hand at the moment, but still you shall have her. She gave him a yellow turnip which had been hollowed out, to which six mice were harnessed. Then simpleton said quite mournfully, what am I to do with that. The toad answered,
just put one of my little toads into it. Then he seized one at random out of the circle, and put her into the yellow coach, but hardly was she seated inside it than she turned into a wonderfully beautiful maiden, and the turnip into a coach, and the six mice into horses. So he kissed her, and drove off quickly with the horses, and
took her to the king.

His brothers, who came afterwards, had given themselves no trouble at all looking for beautiful girls, but had brought with them the first peasant women they chanced to meet. When the king saw them he said, after my death the kingdom belongs to my youngest son. But the two eldest deafened the king's ears afresh with their clamor, we cannot consent to simpleton's being king, and demanded that the one whose wife could leap through a ring which hung in the centre of the hall should have the preference. They thought, the peasant women can do that easily, they are strong enough, but the delicate maiden will jump herself to death.

The aged king agreed likewise to this. Then the two peasant women jumped, and jumped through the ring, but were so clumsy that they fell, and their coarse arms and legs broke in two. And then the pretty maiden whom simpleton had brought with him, sprang, and sprang through as lightly as a deer, and all opposition had to cease. So he received the crown, and has ruled wisely for a length of time.

Golden Egg

Long time ago a remote village, in central China was inhabited mainly with farmers and hunters.
One day, a poor farmer lost his entire livestock to flood. He prayed hard to God for help or his family would die of starvation.
Few days later, an old man with long grey beard, passed by his house took pity on him. He gave him a goose and said “ I don’t have any expensive thing to give you and hope this goose will help you to ease your hardship.”
A week later to almost surprise the farmer found and egg in his yard. This was no ordinary egg. It was a golden egg. He was suddenly overcome with joy.
Thereafter, his livelihood had rapidly improved but the farmer had forgotten his earlier hardship. He became lazy, arrogant and spendthrift.
Strangely, the goose only laid one golden egg every six months. The greedy farmer lost his patient and slaughtered his goose thinking there were plenty of golden eggs inside its stomach.
Though he very much regretted for his foolishness, it’s already too late.

The Three Sheiks and Queen of Arabia

Maura, who liked to be thought of as the most beautiful and powerful queen of Arabia, had many suitors. One by one she discarded them, until her list was reduced to just threes sheiks, all equally young and handsome, rich and strong. It was very hard to decide who would be the best of them.

One evening, Maura disguised herself and went to the camp of the three sheiks, as they were about to have dinner, and asked them for something to eat.

The first gave her some leftover food; the second gave her some unappetizing camel’s tail; the third sheik, who was called Hakim, offered her some of the most tender and tasty meat. After dinner, the disguised queen left the sheiks’ camp.

The following day the queen invited the three sheiks to dinner at her palace. She ordered her servants to give each one exactly what they had given her the evening before.

Hakim, who received a plate of delicious meat, refused to eat it if the other two could not share it with him, and this act finally convinced Queen Maura that he was the man for her.

“Without question, Hakim is the most generous of you,” she announced her choice to the sheiks, “So, it is Hakim I will marry.”

The Moon, A Balloon, and A Spoon

This is a very strange story about the moon, a balloon and a spoon-but who's to say it isn't true?
It happened late one night when everybody had gone to bed. All the children in the houses had been fast asleep for hours, and all the grown-ups too. Only the cats that sat on the rooftops were wide awake in the monnlight.

Suddenly there came a noise like..,,,...thunder perhaps, or a jet plane maybe, or the roaring, rushing sound of a hurricane......no-one could really say for sure.

All at once everyone was out of bed opening their windows and looking up into the sky.
There it was again, and again, and again. The noise was so loud that it knocked off some of the chimney pots and sent them rolling down the roofs.

"What is it?" the people in the houses cried with fright.

A ginger cat who had been sitting on the roof seemed to know the answer.

"Its the Moon!" he purred, looking very aloof. "The Moon has a bad cold and he keeps on sneezing!" and the ginger cat strolled off to find a quieter rooftop.

Sure enough when the people looked up into the sky, they could see that the Moon had a dreadful cold red nose and all!

The stars were scattered across the sky, for they found it very difficult to hang on when the Moon was sneezing so hard.

All through that night the moon sneezed and sneezed. No-one got a wink of sleep and everyone felt very tired and grumpy next morning.

"What are we going to do?" neighbours asked one another-but nobody had the least idea.

"How long does a bad cold usually last?" someone asked the chemist in the shop down the street.

"At least a week," he said gravely, "and in some cases up to a fortnight!"

Everybody groaned. No sleep for a fortnight.....it was unthinkable!.

"What the Moon really needs is a bottle of my best cold medicine," the chemist went on, "that will stop him sneezing in a jiffy."

"This all sounds very silly indeed," said a lady who lived in one of the houses. "How on earth can we give medicine to the Moon?"

"Somebody could float up there in a ballon," said one little boy "they do it all the time in nursery rhymes and fairy stories!"

"That sounds like a very good idea to me," a man spoke up, "I have a hot-air balloon and would gladly help the Moon's bad cold!"

First the medicine had to be mixed. The chemist found everything he needed and put all the ingredients into a great big bowl. He had a giant bottle in his shop window so he carefully poured the cold mixture into that.
"So far so good," smiled the chemist looking very pleased with himself.

"We shall need a giant spoon!" piped up the little boy (whose idea it was in the first place).
"I've just the thing," cried the baker. "I use it to stir my cakes at Christmas time.......I've such a lot to make!"

So straight away he ran to his shop to fetch the giant spoon.

The man who owned the hot-air balloon started getting things ready.

The little boy (whose idea it was in the first place), was going up in the basket to give the Moon the medicine.
By the time darkness fell and the Moon appeared in the sky, everything was ready.

You could hear that the Moon's cold was no better, in fact he sounded much worse. Even the clouds were being blown all over the place.

"Soon we shall be sneezing instead of twinkling," some of the stars grumbled loudly.
At long last the man in the hot-air balloon and the little boy, (whose idea it was in the first place), reached the Moon.

Very, very carefully the little boy gave the Moon the cold medicine from the giant spoon.

"Is it alright to take the whole bottle?" asked the Moon wheezing and sneezing.

"Perfectly alright," the little boy replied, "it says so on the label!"

The cold medicine worked wonders. In next to no time the Moon recovered and all was peace and quiet.
Everyone in the houses had a good night's sleep, for there was nothing to disturb their slumbers......and the cats walked along the rooftops as usual and gazed up at the moon, who was asleep too!