Funday Times

The two sisters
There lived in a village, two sisters and their husbands. They lived in adjoining houses and they were very poor. Both husbands had no jobs and they found it difficult to live in comfort because they had no money.

One day, the younger sister got up early in the morning, prepared some rice and curry, made a lunch packet, gave it to her husband and said to him: “Take this lunch packet and go and somehow find a job”. The husband, taking the lunch packet, went all over the country looking for a job, but could not get one.

He walked and walked till his feet started aching. The pain was unbearable and he was very hungry too. So he sat at the foot of a large shady tree. Angry with himself for not being able to get a job, started eating, saying aloud, “I shall eat you up! I shall eat you up!”

The devata (a god) who was living in that tree, heard this and got afraid thinking that the man was going to eat him. He came down and told the man, “Please do not eat me. I will give you three balls of food with magical powers. Swallow them, wishing for whatever you like to have and you will get them”.

The man was delighted. He quickly got up, happy and refreshed after the meal, set forth and went back home. He told his wife what had happened. The husband and wife settled between them what they should wish for first. The husband swallowed the first ball wishing that they may get a beautiful house, with all the furniture. And lo and behold! A lovely house with all the beautiful furniture appeared.

Then they thought they needed money. So they wished that all the extra store-rooms may be filled with money. Then the husband swallowed the second ball, made the wish, and the money appeared.

Then the husband swallowed the last ball, wishing that they may be supplied with all the cows, bulls, horses and chariots and servants necessary for the household. All these things appeared as wished for and they were exceedingly happy.

The next morning the elder sister saw that the younger sister’s hut had disappeared and in its place was a building that looked like a palace. The elder sister went quickly to the younger sister and asked her, “sister dear, how did you become rich overnight? Please tell me so that I too may be rich”.

The younger sister was a kind-hearted person and wished others also to prosper. She told her sister exactly what she did and how the husband got the wishing balls of food from the deva. So the elder sister too prepared a lunch packet, gave it to her husband and asked him to do exactly as her sister’s husband had done. So this man too went under the same tree that the brother-in-law had gone to.

He sat under it and opened his lunch packet and started eating, saying, “I shall eat you up”. Then the deva came down and gave him the three wishing balls asking the man not to eat him (the deva). The man took the three balls and happily went back home. He told his wife that he got the three balls of food.

However, they could not settle between them what they should wish for. All that the husband wished to have were a comfortable house to live in and some money and other necessary material for a comfortable life. But what the wife wanted was a much bigger house than the sister’s and more money and other wealth that the sister had got.

They could not decide and they started quarelling. The husband got angry and said, “Ona olu gediyak vecchave” (let anything happen ) (oluva – head), and swallowed the first ball. To their horror they found that the man’s body was covered with heads.
Then the man got frightened and swallowed the second ball saying, “May all these heads disappear”. And then he lost even the one he had!

Then he swallowed the third ball of food wishing, “May I get back my head”. He got back his head. The wishing balls being over they were in the same state of poverty as they were before, because there was no unity between them. (From Sri Lankan folk Tales by Derbie Pandita-Gunawardene)

Back to Mirror Magazine