The Story of Bobo Bakau from Taiwan - Long, long ago, there lived a farmer named Liu I-shen. He was married but he did not have any children, every night, his wife prayed for a daughter.
One day, Liu went to cut some firewood. Suddenly, a voice came from a large bamboo, “Can you please let me out? I will become your daughter.”
He cut the bamboo with his axe. Out jumped a tiny girl only two inches tall. “Where have you come from, little girl?” he asked.
“I have come from the moon.”
He took the little girl back to his wife. The little girl told them that her name was Yue-ngo, which means “pretty girl in the moon.”
Yue-ngo lived with the couple very happily for many years. When she was grown up, many men wanted to marry her. The farmer and his wife wanted her to marry a man who had enough money to support them. One day, a writer came to see them.
“You are old.” He said. “If I can marry your daughter, I will look after you.” The couple agreed. He gave them one hundred dollars. They promised that he could marry their daughter at the end of the year.
“You are old.” He said. “If I can marry your daughter, I will look after you.” The couple agreed. He gave them one hundred dollars. They promised that he could marry their daughter at the end of the year.
After some time, the money was finished. Then, a hunter came to see them. He too wanted to marry Yue-ngo.
“I will give you one hundred dollars if you will allow me to marry your daughter,” he said. The couple agreed that he could marry Yue-ngo at the end of the year.
Some months later, the old couple had also spent this money. An acrobat and his monkey came to see him. “your daughter is very beautiful,” the acrobat said. “Please let me marry her. I will give you one hundred dollars.
The couple agreed. They also told him that he could marry Yue-ngo at the end of the year.
On the last day of the year, the three men came to see the couple and their daughter. Yue-ngo said to them. "I am sorry, I can’t marry all of you. You must take part in a contest I shall marry whoever finishes first.
She told the writer, “You must write ten stories.”
“And you,” she said to acrobat, “must run to the village and bring back a drum from the temple,”
“I would you to shoot all the leaves from the trees in our garden,” she told the hunter.
Three hours later, the writer had only finished writing eight stories. The hunter still had not finished shooting the leaves from the tree. Suddenly, the heard a shout. The acrobat ran towards them carrying a drum. He had won the contest
The writer and hunter left. Yue-ngo asked the acrobat, “How can you run so fast?”
“my monkey ran to fetch the drum for me,” he replied, “He can run much faster than I.”
Yue-ngo felt very unhappy that the acrobat had won the contest in this way. She decided not to marry him.
“Aiyah!” she cried. “I have a pain in my chest. Please bring me some medicine.”
“What do you want?” asked the acrobat.
“I can only be cured by eating a monkey’s heart,” said Yue-ngo
The acrobat killed his monkey straight away.
“how can you that?” cried the girl. “Your monkey helped you so much. Even if I ate the monkey’s heart, I would not be cured. Come and see me again in one week’s time.”
When the acrobat came to see her, there was a cloud around her house. A road opened from the sky to the ground. Yue-ngo started to rise towards heaven. “This is my last day on earth,” she said. “I came from the moon. I am now returning home. Goodbye dear mother and father! Goodbye ungrateful man!”
So the acrobat had neither wife nor monkey. Even now, in Taiwan, a man who is poor and has no wife is called “Bobo bokau”
The End
