There once lived a wealthy farmer called Otit. He had ten girls and a wife called Layado. Otit reared dozens of chickens but prohibited his family from eating any. He cultivated a garden of sorghum solely for feeding the birds and built beautiful coops for them to sleep in.
Whenever he returned from the garden, the first thing Otit did was to call the chickens. They flocked around him. He fed them and gave them water to drink. The chickens never left his side whenever Otit was home. They were his friends.
Otit’s favorite was a big rooster that he fondly called Kilero. He loved the rooster so much that he made a separate eating spot for it. Otit couldn’t go to bed unless he had seen and fed Kilero.
***
Otit lined up his children along the river bank at sunrise. Each of them was supposed to take an oath: “I didn’t kill Kilero. If I’m telling a lie, may water return to this river and drown me.”
***
One day, Otit and Layado went to the farm, leaving their daughters threshing millet in the courtyard. When Kilero saw millet grains, it ran to eat. Accidentally, one of the girls called Apiny, hit Kilero with her threshing stick.
Otit’s favorite rooster dropped dead.
The girls dug a small hole and buried Kilero.
When Otit returned from the garden, he called the chickens and they gathered around him. As usual, he fed and gave them water. After a while, Otit noticed that Kilero was missing.
He called Kilero’s name in vain.
In the evening, as the family prepared to sit around the fireplace for a meal and folktales, Otit took his wife aside to inquire about Kilero. “Layado, today I came back from the garden but didn’t see Kilero. I thought it had wandered away from home but even when I called, it did not return. Later, I thought it could have been eaten by a predator, but even when I looked around the home, I did not see any feathers.”
“You should ask the girls. If any of them knows the whereabouts of Kilero, they should say so,” Layado said.
Otit reminisced how Kilero protected the other chickens from danger. “Kilero used to scare away any prey that came lurking, including kites and eagles that targeted the chicks.”
When the family finished having a meal, Otit asked why Kilero was nowhere to be seen. “Why didn’t it come to eat today like it does every day?”
The girls answered in chorus: “We don’t know where Kilero is.”
But Otit insisted: “Show me where my rooster is. Kilero never goes anywhere.”
When the girls stuck to their response, Otit said they should wake up early the next morning for a trip to Lamin Olel, a river that dried up long ago.
“I’ll take all of you to the river to swear an oath of innocence,” Otit said.
“Father, it is okay, take us,” the girls responded.
Apiny remained quiet, her body shaking with guilt and fear.
***
Otit lined up his children along the river bank at sunrise. Each of them was supposed to take an oath: “I didn’t kill Kilero. If I’m telling a lie, may water return to this river and drown me.”
The first girl stepped into the river and started dancing and singing:
Who killed father’s rooster called kilero?
Who killed father’s rooster called kilero?
At sunrise, Kilero, at sunrise, Kilero
She danced for a long time but only a cloud of dust rose. She stopped when her father declared her innocent. The second girl repeated the oath, stepped into the river and began dancing. She sang:
Who killed father’s rooster called kilero?
Who killed father’s rooster called kilero?
At sunrise, Kilero, at sunrise, Kilero
She danced but only dust rose. This happened to all the girls until it was Apiny’s turn. She took the oath slowly, her voice shaking. As she stepped into the river, her body trembled. Eventually, Apiny gathered courage and began dancing as she sang:
Who killed father’s rooster called kilero?
Who killed father’s rooster called kilero?
At sunrise, Kilero, at sunrise, Kilero
The spot where Apiny was dancing started getting damp. Dust settled and the area soon turned muddy. Apiny continued dancing and singing, tears flowing down her cheeks. The water level started rising and covered her ankles, then her knees and her waist. Apiny sobbed. Her voice rose even higher when the water level reached her neck.
Eventually, Apiny drowned.
Otit said since his daughter killed his rooster and refused to confess, she deserved to die. He cut the branch of an Acacia and placed it on the water, at the spot where Apiny’s head disappeared.
As Otit subjected his children to the test, a young man was seated on a nearby tree, watching in silence. As soon as the girls and their father left, the young man climbed down. He removed the thorny branch from the water and dived in.
He soon emerged with Apiny in his arms, her stomach filled with water. He resuscitated her and took her to his home. He took care of Apiny and later married her. Apiny and her husband embarked on farming. For years, their crops yielded bumper harvests. They filled their granaries will a variety of foodstuff.
***
When famine struck the land, several households struggled to get what to eat. Only Apiny and her husband had foodstuff in plenty. Soon, word reached Otit that her daughter was alive after all and enjoying a life of plenty with her husband. Otit was filled with both guilt and joy at the news. As famine continued to ravage his family, Otit decided to go visit Apiny.
“My daughter won’t refuse to give me food. I’m still her father. I won’t die of hunger here,” he said as he set off on the journey.
Apiny was excited to see her father. She welcomed him warmly, cooked for him and attended to him for all the days he stayed at her home. Several days later, Otit said: “My daughter, you have taken very good care of me but I have to go back home now.”
“That’s okay, father. It was great having you here.”
Apiny picked a big reed basket to pack foodstuff for her father. She poured dry millet fingers at the bottom of the basket. On top of the millet, she placed several hot coals. She added another layer of millet and handed the basket to her father.
“Please deliver my regards to my sisters,” Apiny said as she placed the basket on her father’s head.
Otit was overwhelmed with joy at that fact his daughter was alive and doing well. She had even forgiven him. Along the way, the millet started catching fire but the big head pad on which the basket rested, shielded Otit’s head from the heat.
The first man who walked past Otit warned him about the smoke billowing on his head. “Mzee, there is fire in your luggage.”
“I know you have seen the millet my daughter gave me and you are indirectly asking for some,” Otit retorted as he balanced the basket proudly on his head.
Soon Otit met a woman. “Ah! Old man, there’s fire in the luggage on your head,” she said.
“Liar! I know you have seen the millet my daughter gave me and you want me to give you some,” Otit said.
By the time Otit reached his doorstep, fire had spread all over the millet. As he lifted the luggage off his head, the basket caved in and its contents poured on him.
Flames engulfed him. Otit burned to death.
When she heard about her father’s death, Apiny was unmoved. “Back then, he wanted me dead; why did he come looking for me?”
END
***
From this folktale, comes the proverbs: A greedy person ends up eating poison and a stingy man’s rooster has become mere tendon (meaning, miserliness can make one lose their most prized possession)
***
NOTE: The Ododo Series is a project launched in April 2020 to translate, document and share Acoli folktales in English. These folktales were narrated to children by (grand) mothers in a fireplace setting in homesteads of the Acoli of Northern Uganda and elsewhere. Care has been taken to stick to the story-line as originally told in the Acoli language, but small variations are inevitable.
***
Written by Caroline Ayugi
Journeys Within 