Tenali Rama - Indian

Hello! My name is Tenali Rama, and I love to think in my sunny garden. The flowers are bright red and happy yellow. One hot day, I heard a whisper, whisper, whisper. Two sneaky thieves were hiding behind my big green bushes! They wanted to take my treasure. Oh no! But I did not feel scared. I felt clever. My brain went 'ding!' and I thought of a fun plan. I would teach them a little lesson. This is the story of how I tricked some silly thieves and got my garden watered for free.

When the moon came out, I waited for the thieves to listen. I said to my wife in a big, loud voice, 'Let’s hide our treasure box in the well! It will be safe there.' We found a big, heavy box. Thump, thump, thump. We carried it to the well. Then, with a giant SPLASH, we pretended to drop it deep into the water. Later, the two thieves came tiptoe, tiptoe into the garden. They started pulling up water. Up went the bucket. Down went the bucket. Splash, splash, splash! They did it again and again. They worked so hard all night long, making my whole garden wet.

When the big yellow sun came up, the thieves were very sleepy. Yawn! They did not find any treasure. I walked into my beautiful garden and smiled a big smile. 'Oh, thank you!' I said. 'Thank you for watering all my thirsty plants! You did a wonderful job!' Their faces looked so surprised! They looked at the happy, wet flowers. They knew they had been tricked! Then they ran away as fast as they could. Zip, zoom, gone! They never came back to my garden again.

This story is from a place called India. People have told it for a long, long time to make children smile and laugh. It shows that being clever is much better than being sneaky. Using your brain to think of a fun idea is the best way to solve a problem. The stories about me still remind everyone that a smart idea and a happy smile can save the day. A clever thought is the best treasure of all.