Keloglan and the Magic Pumpkin

Once upon a time, Keloglan and his mother lived in a tumbledown house at the edge of a village. One spring morning, as Keloglan was coming back from the market, he saw a wounded sparrow by the road. Its wing was hurt and it could not fly. Keloglan picked the sparrow up in his hand, brought it home and bound its wing with a little twig. His mother gave it breadcrumbs, and Keloglan gave it water. The sparrow stayed with them for days, and at last it got better and flew away.

A few days later the sparrow came back. In its beak was a tiny pumpkin seed. It dropped the seed into Keloglan's palm, chirped, and flew off again. Keloglan planted the seed in the little garden behind the house and watered it every morning.

The pumpkin vine grew so fast that everyone who saw it was amazed. In a week it had climbed onto the roof; in a month it covered the whole garden. On it grew a single pumpkin, but what a pumpkin! It was bigger than a cart and rounder than a barn. The villagers came every day to look at it and asked, "Keloglan, what will you do with this pumpkin?" And Keloglan would say, "In winter my mother and I will sit and eat it."

When autumn came, Keloglan took his axe and set about cutting the pumpkin. The moment the axe touched the rind, the pumpkin split in two by itself. Instead of seeds, things began to pour out of it: first wheat, then rice, then raisins, walnuts, jars of honey, skeins of wool, copper pots... The house filled up, the yard filled up, the street filled up. His mother slapped her knees: "Son, what a blessing!"

Keloglan thought for a moment. "Mother, the two of us can never finish all this. There are many hungry people in the village." He called Hasan the drummer and had him beat the drum in the village square: "Hear ye, hear ye! The blessing from Keloglan's pumpkin is enough for everyone. Whoever has an empty storeroom, come and take!" The poor of the village came with sacks, and Keloglan filled each sack with his own hands.

The news reached rich but miserly Kara Agha in the next village. Kara Agha was so jealous that he could not sleep at night. "I want a pumpkin like that too," he said. He had his men catch a sparrow, hurt its wing with his own hand, and then bandaged it carelessly. When the sparrow got better, he waited for a seed. And the sparrow did bring him a seed.

Kara Agha planted it. His pumpkin grew too, even bigger than Keloglan's. Kara Agha danced with joy: "I won't give what comes out of this pumpkin to anyone. It's all mine!" When autumn came, he called all the villagers: "Come and see, and be jealous!" He struck the pumpkin with his axe.

The pumpkin split in two, but out of it came not wheat but buzzing bees, mud, thorns and dry leaves. The bees chased Kara Agha, and he ran and jumped into the stream. The mud filled his storeroom and the thorns filled his garden. The villagers were frightened at first, and then they nearly split their sides laughing.

When Kara Agha climbed out of the stream, soaking wet, he knocked on Keloglan's door. "Keloglan, why did those things come out of my pumpkin?" Keloglan let him in, gave him dry clothes and set a bowl of hot soup before him. Then he explained gently: "Agha, I didn't bandage the sparrow hoping for something. You broke its wing first, and then you bandaged it hoping for something. A pumpkin gives back whatever is inside the heart."

Kara Agha hung his head. That winter, for the first time, he shared the wheat in his own storeroom with the poor of the village. The next spring a sparrow built a nest on his roof. Kara Agha never touched it; he only put out a handful of grain for it every morning.

The blessing from Keloglan's pumpkin did not run out that year, because bread that is shared never runs out. They had their wish come true; may we have ours too.