Ethiopian Folktales

Narrator Unknown

Whenever the priest went to church the lover comes secretly and has sex with the priest’s wife.

One day the woman is so fond of her lover, she woke one morning and said, “Your time is up, shouldn’t you go to the church?”

The priest woke and went out and the lover came in and she was preparing the gomfo (cake). The priest found a hyena and wild animals on the way and realised it was still night – about four – so he went home.

And when she realises he’s come, the wife told the lover to hide under the bed and she goes on making gomfo.

And the husband says, “Why are you cooking gomfo at such a time?”

She says, “I realised I woke you, so thinking you would come back I prepared for you.”

So he sat on the bed and she gave it to him to eat and sat on the ground, and they began eating together. When the husband turns his face, she gives gomfo to her lover. But accidentally she misses his mouth and puts the hot gomfo on his face.

Because he was so hurt he stands up and the bed and the priest are thrown down.

The priest is terrified and the woman says, “You must have come with a devil. Say ‘God bless me, God bless me’ and throw holy water in his face.”

So the lover runs out without being identified.