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THE ARRIVAL OF A NEW BORN BABY INTO A YORUBA HOME IN THE OLD DAYS.

The arrival of a new baby into a family among the Yorubas' is usually greeted with joy. The reason is that the Yoruba believe that the family which has the new baby is expanding and prosperous. They regard the gift of a child from Oduduwa, their progenitor, as a mark of the fact that the fact the family is not forgotten by its forefathers. Immediately a child is born, a message is sent to all the relations who are around in the village or town and to those who have gone to farm to come home for the naming ceremony of the baby. The naming ceremony for a male child comes up on the ninth day after his birth while a female child usually named on the eight day. The reason for this is that the Yoruba people believe that a man has nine bones while a woman has eight. So, those relations at home and those in the farm know the day a new baby will be named due to the sex of the new born baby. On the day of the naming ceremony, the entire family will come together at the house of the "Olo...

A PATIENCE DOG EATS THE FATTEST BONE.

Once upon a time, there lived two sisters who were twins,  Kehinde and Taiwo. They were poor. Their parents struggled everyday to make both ends meet. Their father was full of wisdom and he always created time to counsel his daughters about the need to be patient in whatever they were doing. He talked to them about so many other virtues, like tolerance, endurance, good behavior: and he always ended his talks with a saying that "whoever had patience had everything."  When these twins were eighteen years old, their father died. They felt greatly impact of their father's demise because they lost a good companion who always counselled them and a breadwinner. Soon after the death of their father, their mother found things difficult. As a result of this, she took the twins to her distant relation who was living a few kilometres away. Their mothers relation accepted them but he was a cruel man who maltreated the girls so much. They were to do all the house chores at home...

SOW WIND AND REAP WHIRLWIND.

Once upon a time, there live a man called chief Ade . He was a rich man who was highly respected in his town. Chief Ade had two wives. The name of the first wife was Phebe Admosun while the younger wife was Ebun . Chief Ade married the first wife when he was poor. Phebe was a loving wife, who loved her husband and struggle very hard with her husband to acquire money. She had seven children for  chief Ade, six of whom were girls and the last was a boy. It was because it took her a long time to have a male child that her husband decided to marry Ebun, his second wife.  Ebun was the daughter of the great herbalist in the town of illugun. Ebun's father was famous for bad medicines and charms. When she became chief Ade's wife, Ebun was about eighteen years old while the first wife was twenty-nine. Phebe, the chief's first wife accepted Ebun as her wife and always took care of her when she newly came into the family. At the time chief married Ebun, Phebe had five female ...

AN EXPERIENCE I WOULD LOVE TO HAVE AGAIN.

If you have not experienced a public disgrace during which you are regarded as an outcast and a bastard by the people of the community which you had always regarded as yours, you may not know the import of what happened to me. I was brought up among the people of a tribe called Tango in the Gambia. My mother belonged to this tribe and I had lived all my life among the people. I grew up to know everything a child needed to know about the people and at the age of nineteen, I was initiated into the cult of adulthood as the tradition of the people demanded.  I lived with my mother and her brother who I had always thought was my biological father. I behaved like an adult from the tribe of my mother and I related with other adults of my age until one day an incident happened which made me realize that I did not belong to the tribe.  Wuse was a girl that I had love all my life. I knew her when she was a little child and we grew up together to love each other. We were so in...

ADAMU AND HIS BEAUTIFUL WIFE

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In a certain town there lived a poor man named Adamu. Although he was very poor, Adamu was a very good man. He was liked and respected by everyone, and even the birds and animals seemed to trust him, for it was very noticeable that they showed no fear whenever he came near them. In the same town there lived a beautiful girl who was few years younger than Adamu. Her name was Farida. Farida was good-natured as she was beautiful, and many men wanted to marry her. Farida's father was a wealthy trader, and he was naturally anxious that his daughter should make a good marriage, preferably to one of the other rich merchants who lived in the town. However, the ruler of the town made it clear that he wanted to marry Farida, and her parents felt that there were little alternative, for they had no wish to offend the ruler of the town. But when they approach their daughter on the matter, they were shocked by her response.   "How can i become the junior wife of a man old enough to be ...