Muang Seng Saetern
Once upon a time there was a woman who worked very hard in the fields by herself. One day when she had worked and worked until she was exhausted, she decided to rest and take a short nap. Suddenly, she woke up and saw a tiny turtle crawling away from her.
Soon after she discovered she was pregnant, but when her baby was born it was a turtle! She raised her turtle son, caring for him day after day. Everyone else in the village was happy with their big families. The men in the families went hunting for wild animals for their meat, but she had no one around to help her except her turtle son. People in the village gave her the worst parts of their wild animals to eat. She felt very upset with her situation, and one day she started crying.
The turtle son spoke to her and said, “Mother don’t cry! Go borrow a gun from someone so I can hunt deer.”
So she asked other people in the village to lend her a gun for her turtle son, but they didn’t believe he could use one. Finally she found a family that would lend her their old gun. She rushed home, put the turtle in a basket, and carried him up to the top of the hill where she left him with the gun.
She went home and waited until she heard gunfire. She asked a neighbor to go with her to help carry the deer home which she and her son then cooked and ate.
It was then the season for them to work in the fields to produce crops for another year. Her turtle son helped her do all the farm work magically. He advised her to ask people for as many cucumber and honeydew melon seeds as she could get for planting in their field. Meanwhile, other people were planting rice, corn, and other crops in their fields.
When the time came to gather the crops the turtle helped his mother build two separate storage barns in order to sort the cucumbers and the honeydew melons.
After the crops were picked and stored, the turtle son told his mother that he wanted to marry the king’s third daughter. She replied that since he wasn’t a real person but only a turtle it would be impossible to marry the third princess.
After winning two contests, however, the turtle ended up marrying the third princess. In the first contest, his little chick fought against the king’s giant rooster and won. In the second contest, his little puppy won a fight with the king’s huge, mean, old dog.
Nevertheless, the king was not satisfied. He told the turtle he must give him a full barn of silver and also a full barn of gold. By doing magic again, the turtle was able to turn all the cucumbers and honeydew melons into silver and gold which he then gave to the king. Then the turtle married the third princess.
After they were married, the princess slept on the bed, but the turtle husband slept under the bed. Every morning the wife went out for their daily fresh vegetables. While the princess was out of the house the turtle would change himself into a very handsome young man and go out riding on their white horse.
On their way home one day, the wife saw a handsome man on a white horse exactly like theirs, but she couldn’t believe what she saw. Next morning she put some white betel lime on the horse’s hooves. Later, on their way home she again saw the same handsome man riding the same horse which had white betel lime on its hooves. She hurried home and saw the same white horse in their barn.
Then she realized that her husband was a prince sent by the gods even though he appeared as a turtle. So she just waited patiently until the turtle came out of his shell and turned into a very handsome man. And he and his wife and mother lived happily ever after.