Week 2 Story: The Lakeside
The Cranes: Wikimedia Commons
The Cranes were starving. After months of raising their young, the Cranes’ offspring finally flew away from home to live their own lives, but left their parents hungry and tired. They were flying around for days unable to find food until the Cranes happened upon a pond. It was the height of summer, and the pond and the animals in it were heating up. Seeing this, the Cranes came up with a plan. They would gain the animals’ trust to allow the Cranes to bring them to a bigger lake and a better life. However, the Cranes were not going to bring them to the lake. They would stop short only to kill and eat them. Despite the pond being full of the life, the Cranes knew they would likely become hungry quickly if they ate all the animals too fast. To keep themselves fed longer, the Cranes planned to make the nearby lake sound like a couple hour trip. After devising the plan, the Cranes descended on the lake to speak with the animals and gain their trust. First were the Fish. The Fish were naive, so it was not difficult to gain their trust. The Cranes simply told them of the lake a couple hours away and that the fish would thrive in. They reassured the fish that there was plenty of water along the way, so they would not die during the flight. The fish were taken to the lake and eaten for the next week, but the Crane’s got hungry again.
After eating
all the Fish, the Turtles had to be next. The Turtles were difficult to coerce,
but after flying one over the lake and showing its beauty, the rest followed slowly. The
Turtles were dropped from a great height to crack their shells and make their meat easier to eat. After all the fish and turtles were eaten, there was only the
Crab next. The Cranes knew the Crab was smart, but had no other choice but to
try to convince the Crab to come with them. The Crab obliged, but only if he could
hold on by both of their beaks. This was so the crab could have support for the
long flight ahead. The Cranes eagerly agreed, and took the Crab to the lake. As
the Crane’s flew over the lake, the Crab began to realize that the Cranes were
not planning on letting him live. Right when the Cranes were at the lake’s edge,
the Crab broke the Cranes’ beaks with his mighty claws and fell a short way
down into the water. The Cranes were hurt and hungry. Unable to eat, the Cranes
flew around in search of easier prey until their beaks healed. Unfortunately for
the Cranes, their broken beaks were a beacon for weary animals that the Cranes were
not out to help them. The Cranes searched and searched until they eventually
succumbed to hunger dying at the same lakes edge where they had eaten the Turtles
and Fish just a few weeks ago.
Author’s Note: I started with the story of the Cunning Crane
and the Crab. I wanted to change the story to make the two Cranes have a reason
as to why they needed to eat the animals in the pond. I wanted to show the Cranes as less evil. I also included
the part of the story of elongating their feeding on the animals in the pond to
change the story and add additional depth. Finally, I chose to end the story later
than the Crab just killing them immediately to show that they did not chose to
just die, but tried to survive.
Bibliography:
"The Cunning Crane and the Crab" by W. H. D. Rouse Website: The Jatakas
I like your retelling of this story. You give a little more backstory into the cranes and show why exactly they need to eat these creatures. You also gave them a trickster characteristic, which I thought was an interesting twist.
ReplyDeleteHey Trace, I just got done reading your story on the Crane and the Crab. I have to say I really enjoyed this rendition. I too had done a story on the Crane and the Crab and although I loved the original, I found it easy to retell the story as well. In my story I used turtles instead of crabs. I saw that you also used turtles but in a different manner, to give more depth and realism to the story. Wow, I really liked how you did it. It makes the Cranes seem even more cunning. In the end or the story, I thought your use of the crab breaking the beak off was a nice touch as well! The crane had to suffer for what he had done and suffer he did. What if the crane was so angry that he spent the rest of the time chasing and trying the find crab and that is why he starved as well? Great job on the story though, it was really great.
ReplyDeleteHi Trace, it was really interesting to read your story and completely different from the other student who has done the story on "The Cunning Crane and the Crab". I never read the actual story but I can see the similarities of your story and the story of other student which gave me insight of how the story is like. I was curious why Crane leave their parents to starve, they could have taken with them and there will four Crane. It would have easier to find food with more than less though they could have stayed alive by eating little bit every day. What if you could have shown young Crane eating the parent Crane if they could have taken with them? I would not have done that it would suck because I hate the endings like dying and killing. The story was great it shows me why Crane try to eat all of animal in lake and it was to survive. Good JOB!
ReplyDeleteHi Trace, Wow what a fun way to tell this story. This story was one of my favorite to read in the class. It just told a real tale of how people can attack us mentally and we can choose to let them break us or make us stronger.Who likes cranes anyways? I can't wait to read more from you. Thank you.
ReplyDelete