The Foolish Parentsሞኞቹ ወላጆች

Narrated by Kassa Alamrew

Once there was a foolish family with many children, so many that they can’t love them all. Most of them are dead, due to one reason: their parents want them to be good cowherds and when they are still small they tie the left hand of their son to the tail of one of the cows and send them to the green pasture. Pulled by the cow, the child’s arm was pulled out so he bled to death.

The cow came home with the arm attached to the tail, so the parents went to look for the child and found his body lying down. He mouth was full of ants.

“Oh! He’s been eating ants!” they said. “And he’s dead because he ate so many.”

The father beat him with a stick.

“Please stand up!”

But he was dead.

They told all their neighbours and the neighbours responded, “Ah! Ah! A little kid tied to a cow! How could you do this to a baby? Why don’t you learn from the last time? It’s better for you to die than to kill your children like this.”