Folk Tales of Vaar-Jaintia

THE CROW, THE JACKAL AND THE RED CRAB[1]

(A Folk tale of Jong-U-Shen[2] as retold by D. R. Michael Buam)

There was a crow; of course a clever crow, because stupid crows are unheard of in the books that we read (please keep me informed if I have missed a stupid crow somewhere). No, we shouldn’t dare call them stupid, since the story of the ‘clever crow’ got published! There, you see, the significance of a precedent! Of course, the crows are fallible to flattery; but you know that already. That is another precedent.

Well, after agreeing on the IQ of the crow, let us get down to the topic. This crow was allegedly the same crow that was ‘foxed’ by the jackal into singing like a gay ‘jay’ so that it dropped the food from its jaws into the open greedy jaws of the jackal. You must have heard of this rumour too. I heard that it did get published in some textbooks.

Anyway, there were several adventures between the jackal and the crow such that their relationship deteriorated into a ‘mouse’ and ‘cat’ relationship instead of the regular jackal and crow relationship.

In this context, you will understand the following events that I relate as happened to them.

One day, the crow was basking in the sun on the topmost branch of an Oroxylum tree overlooking a small bog filled with the delicious (to humans) species of swamp colocasia plants growing beside a stream. These plants grow wild and gregariously at that, such that they look like a mono-cultivated crop – very misleading. But it is not uncommon to see orderliness in the wild. As opposed to humans, who avoid talking to their hated enemy, the jackal can’t resist talking to the crow. Maybe, animals still love their enemies, like Jesus told humans to do so and animals have copied the advice. I did ask my dog for confirmation and he just barked at me. I am not sure whether he meant “yes” or it meant “give me a bone” because it sounded like “I want a bone”. So, let me give him a bone so that I can continue with what we started.

Well, the jackal couldn’t resist taunting the crow. You must all have known by now, that, pure love or pure hatred calls for absolute attention and obsession. Not knowing all the facts we stated in the previous paragraph (of course, this was written after the event and so there was no way the jackal could have read about it and be forewarned). So, the jackal walks up to the Oroxylum tree and asks the crow, “What are you doing my beloved enemy?” The crow looked down and screamed at the jackal, “Why have you stepped on the King’s crops? Don’t you know that I have been appointed to guard the King’s crops? Step back at once or I will have the soldiers on you!”

The jackal did indeed jump back in astonishment but quickly recovered his composure and enquired, “What crops are you guarding? I don’t see anything worth to a King.”

The crow smiled a fake benevolent smile at the jackal and replied, “Have you never seen a sugarcane plantation in all your cunning life? Be clever for once and recognize the plants that surround you here and now!”

The jackal looked around at the colocasia plants but couldn’t say what they were. Now we must take into account here that the jackal has limited knowledge of botany. The clever crow is aware of this. The jackal is more into zoology with specialization into smaller mammals like rabbits and flightless birds like pheasants. He is of course the master in the subject of domestic poultry of the human habitat and has on several occasions received gun salutes, spear throws, sling shots and arrow shots from the humans for his endeavours to capture and digest the subject of domesticated animals in human habitat. Needless to say, some of his brethren were ultimately absorbed into the digestive system of humans despite their foul smell.

I think I am prey to the habit of digression. But that is my weakness and you will all indulge a person to at least one thing or the other. Let me get back to the events then. Yes, we were talking of the jackal’s knowledge of botany. I must digress again or you will not understand the import of botany or zoology on this important event. You see, this jackal was, to speak in local sense, a hill jackal. In the hills, you won’t see a sugarcane plantation.  Of course, you will occasionally see a sugarcane plant or a cluster of them in a human habitat. But in the plains, especially in the alluvial plains of the then undivided Bengal[3], the sugarcane plantations are a forest in themselves. This jackal of the hills had been told about large sugarcane plantations from his cousins living in the plains because they frequently hunt and hide there. He too did tell them about the areca nut and betel leaf cultivations in the hills where he lived.

In the light of this, the jackal looked once again at the colocasia plants growing beside the stream and seemed to understand what the crow was referring to. He had heard that sugarcane was very sweet to taste and therefore having never seen it in his life, he wanted to taste it. He asked the crow, “Please sister crow, let me get a taste of the sugarcane. I have never got this opportunity before.” The crow deliberately refused at first and only after the jackal had entreated for the umpteenth time did she relent. The jackal took a bite of one stalk of the colocasia consuming the whole plant in his ignorance.

He had visions of sweetness but it never came to him. Maybe the Creator didn’t equip him with taste buds for sweetness. Maybe the carnivore’s taste of sweetness is completely different from an omnivore’s or a herbivore’s. These are simply my allusions and you should not be distracted by them. Another botanical fact which the jackal never knew so far was that, all Colocasia species contained an irritant which can cause intense irritation and discomfort to the lips, mouth and throat when consumed. The main culprit causing the discomfort is the microscopic needle-like raphides of calcium oxalate monohydrate and aided by another small ruffian we suspect to be a protease. If eaten raw or half-cooked, these microscopic needles pierce the tissues of the lips, mouth and throat and cause a severe irritation of the throat that would leave you in a situation similar to a person who is bound hand and foot face-wards to a pillar and having a sudden and severe itch on his bum having no way to scratch the itch.

Well, you can leave your visions of the itching bum and come back to the visions of the jackal. This preceding fact was already known to humans from their earlier experiences or through accident (no satisfying record exists to prove any) and so they found a way to safely consume the edible colocasia leaves and corms by boiling them long enough and adding something tangy to go with it. The crow knew this through her aerial acquaintance with humans. This knowledge did come at a cost because she did survive the missiles of catapults aimed at her. Though she did lose some feathers in the process, her head and life were intact. Now, she used that knowledge to settle a score with her beloved enemy.

I think you can imagine what happened to the jackal a few minutes after eating and swallowing a few mouthfuls of his ‘sugarcane’. You see, if he also had kept his English dictionary close at hand, he would have immediately seen through the crow’s bluff. The colocasia plants did not even resemble a cane. They were just herbaceous and weak plants without anything hard on them (on the outside of course), you would need a microscope to see those microscopic needles. But then, he must have learned his lesson since his last visit to the town. He had bought a “Dressed Chicken” from a store only to discover later, on unpacking the package, that it had been completely undressed. So, we’ll give him the benefit of doubt.

Within a few minutes, the itches began to show and the jackal immediately understood that the crow had gotten the better of him this time. His throat itched and irritated him so much that he couldn’t even exclaim the curses and expletives he so much wanted to hurl shamelessly at the crow, who was currently enjoying the misery of the jackal. You can try imagining the laughter of a crow. It is something like this: “Caw! Caw! Caw!” Yes, yes. You can tell me that the expression is similar but here you will have to add a sneer to it and imagine the famous Bollywood villain of the silver screen, Late Amrish Puri doing it. Yes, that’s it. You are getting it.

The jackal drank the water from the stream and gargled his throat in the hope of easing the discomfort. He howled in anger at the crow but it only enhanced the evil pleasure of the crow. Well, I won’t dwell longer on the jackal’s suffering and call it a day.

It was several days later that the jackal chanced on the crow and asked her by which road she would go to the market the next day. The crow replied that she would take the old road to the market. So the jackal waited in hiding for the crow along the old road the next day hoping to catch her unawares and have his revenge on the crow. He had in fact kept the utensils and firewood ready beside the stream in order to cook the crow alive and savour his revenge. The crow had already suspected him and instead went to the market using the new road.

It happened again the next market day. The crow having told the jackal that she would take the new road to the market had instead taken the old road this time. So, next time, the jackal had smarted and waited in hiding for the crow to come along the new road to the market. She had told him that she would take the old road again. He did not have long to wait and pounced on her as soon as she passed by him while he was hiding behind a broomstick bush by the road.

The fire was burning under the pot of water which the jackal had put on the makeshift fireplace beside the stream. The crow was held captive after he had tied her with a string made of a lilaceous plant. The crow glanced furtively at all directions in the hope of finding a means to escape. She saw a crab in the water and pleaded with it to help her escape.

The jackal was busy with keeping the fire burning, pushing and shoving the logs and blowing air from his lungs to keep the fire steady and stronger. When the water had boiled, he turned his attention to the crow and gloated with glee in front of the crow before taking it from its tethering. “So, you thought I will never catch you, is it? See! I have the last laugh! I will cook you alive and eat you - feathers, entrails and all! This will be my complete revenge on all the insults I suffered from you. No, no use of shouting for help! No one will be able to free you from my clutches! You see, once I have my prey in my grips, no power can stop me!”

The crow did not get any help from heaven but it did get help from a small creature of the water. The crab had surreptitiously walked sideways (as is the custom of crabs – of course it walked crabwise) out of the water and reached the foot of the jackal who was holding the crow in his hands while gloating over her. The crab then bit the jackal hard on his little toe that it nearly snapped into pieces. The sudden pain and shock made the jackal jump with a howl and spread his hands apart letting the crow free. The crow flew away and perched herself beyond reach on a tree.

(The original version of the story as told to me was that the crab, using its larger claw, had actually pinched the jackal by the balls that it hurt beyond description. Any male will understand what this attack means – in terms of pain, while the rest will enjoy the comic effect of the action. I stated that the crab clawed him on the toe only to appear more respectable. But I have already given myself away. Guilty as charged.)

So, the jackal after recovering from the initial shock and pain searched for his attacker and sadly for the crab who was not quick enough to rush back to his hideout was pounced upon by the jackal.

The jackal, as was his habit (or his weakness) was prone to give a speech before his actions. So he said to the crab, “So you want to join the list of my enemies, do you? Well, I will show you how I treat my enemies once I have them in my grip. You deprived me of my revenge and my meal! I will get that crow one way or the other. However, for the time being, you will satisfy my hunger for food and revenge.” With that he put the crab into the boiling pot of water.

The crow had watched all this from a safe distance. But as soon as the jackal put the crab into the pot of boiling water, she flew down and thought hard how to save her rescuer. She picked a heavy rock from the ground and carried it high over the point where the pot was placed. She then dropped it on the pot and it overturned pouring the boiling water and the crab into the stream. The crab was not yet dead but almost so. Its shell was already turning bright red from being cooked (Prawns and crabs turn bright red in colour when they are cooked). As soon as it touched the cold water of the stream, it made a supreme effort and rushed to the nearest hiding placed in a crevice beneath a huge rock in the stream. The jackal rushed in vain to catch it. The crow and the crab had the last laugh on him.

The crow went off to live in another forest having had enough of the jackal. The jackal returned every day to hunt for the crab in the stream but it was in vain. The crab gave up its water abode and settled on the hill beside the stream. The jackal didn’t know this and without the crow in sight he had no enemy to wage war on and so continued to overturn the rocks and push pointed sticks through the crevices under the large rocks in the stream hoping to catch his new-found beloved enemy.

We are more familiar with the freshwater crab that now and then finds its way into our diet. It is also a spoilsport during our fishing of the freshwater snakehead fishes (Hee-shlaa). So, with this legend, our ancestors have tried to explain the existence of the local land crab, which is an uncommon species even in those times. They still survive today because they are not usually part of our diet. There are many species of land crabs around the world. In the Khasi Hills, we come across a smaller species which is just 2 to 3 centimetres across. But the hero of our story is about 8 to 10 centimetres long or maybe more (I am yet to find a larger species) and it is bright red in colour, unlike the freshwater crab we find here, which is dark brown in colour. But when this freshwater crab is cooked, boiled or fried, it turns red in colour which gives rise to the notion that the local red crab was the one that escaped the boiling pot of the jackal.

It was this brave crab that we come across on the jungle path in the southern slope of Jaintia hills. It is truly a brave creature because whenever you come across it, it stands its ground and bares its claws at you. I do not talk crab but the attitude it shows reflects that it doesn’t take crap either. It ignores the fact that you can kill it by just stepping on it. But I guess, it does not matter to a faithful warrior who stands for righteousness. You can dominate the body but not the spirit. Yes, dear friend, keep baring those claws and bite the villains’s foot (or balls, if present). I will cheer you on that. Live long my fellow-living being, I will not eat you, yet…

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Copyleft 2013, D. R. Michael Buam.

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[1] The Red Crab is a name I conjured for the land crab in the story because of its bright red colour as opposed to the dull colour of the freshwater crab.

[2] Jong-u-Shen or Cjongmuchen as it is locally known, is a village in the south-western slope of Jaintia Hills overlooking the plains of Bangladesh. It is a kilometers to the west of Syndai, a village famous worldwide for its caves and historical significance. The inhabitants of the southern slopes of Khasi and Jaintia Hills are referred to as the Vaar. Thus, we have the Vaar-Khasi in Khasi Hills and the Vaar-Jaintia in Jaintia Hills.

[3] Bengal was divided like a piece of cake in 1947 between India and Pakistan of which the latter got a smaller piece called East Pakistan to be later called Bangladesh after the liberation war in 1971-72.