Muey Sio Fong and Famh Ian Saechao
There was a couple, husband and wife, and they had only one child—a daughter. They were very poor, and all the people in the village looked down on them. When the fruit season came everyone had to go to the mountains to pick the fruit, and sometimes they had to climb up the trees. But the couple was old and could not climb up the trees, and the daughter was also unable to climb the trees. All the other people in the village had sons and daughters who could climb up the trees or chop down the trees, but the couple couldn’t do that, so they could only get the fruit when it fell down.
Sometimes the fruit was not very good because it had worms or it was over-ripe. They went again and again. One day they went into the mountains and they looked at the fruit up in the trees. It was too high so they couldn’t pick it. So they said, “Whoever helps us pick the fruit can marry our daughter.”
A black snake heard them and answered, “Is it true that if I pick the fruit for you I can marry your daughter?” They said, “Sure, whoever will get the fruit for us can marry our daughter.” But they only heard the talking—they did not see the snake.
After they agreed, then the snake came out, and they saw that they had been talking to a big black snake. The snake asked them which fruit they wanted him to pick. They told him they would like any fruit from any tree he could reach. So the snake picked a lot of fruit for them. When they carried it home the snake followed them. They were scared. They were thinking about what would happen when they got home. They were afraid the snake might eat their daughter.
They went home and entered the house. They called the snake ‘Son-in-Law’, and they asked their daughter to take care of him. The girl got a chair for Son-in-Law to sit on. She didn’t get a real chair. She got the flat rice tray and put it down for the snake to sit on. They asked him what he wanted to eat, and he answered, “Whatever you have,” because he knew they were poor and they didn’t have much to eat. And they gave him a small pig and chicken to eat. He ate those two things, and they asked if he wanted more and he said, “Enough.” He knew they didn’t have many things to eat.
The parents told their daughter to make a bed for the snake. The daughter and the snake went to the daughter’s room to sleep. And the parents went to bed to sleep, too. But they couldn’t sleep, and they kept worrying all night, They listened all night but they heard nothing. All the other people in the village listened, too. They all listened, but they heard nothing They thought the snake might eat up that whole family.
Early in the morning the parents couldn’t sleep. They got up and cooked. When the breakfast was ready they were afraid to go see their daughter. They called, “Daughter, the breakfast is ready. Bring Son-in-Law and come out and eat.” When they came out to the bedroom, the snake came out a handsome young man. They ate breakfast.
When they finished eating the parents went into the daughter’s bedroom and saw the snake’s skin lying on the floor. They asked Son-in-Law, “where do we throw your old clothing?” He said, “We won’t throw it out, we’ll burn it. We’ll get the firewood and put it on top of the skin and burn it.”
The daughter and her parents went with him to get the firewood, and they put the skin on the bottom and all the firewood on top. They burned it, and next morning they went to see it. Where the fire was there was a pile of silver and gold, and they were rich.
Another couple wanted to do the same thing the first couple did. This couple also had only one daughter and no sons. The mango season came and families who had men or boys could climb up the trees to pick the mangoes, but they could not because they had only a daughter and she couldn’t climb up. One day when her father went to the jungle to the mango trees he called out in a big voice and said, “If somebody comes to pick the mangoes for me, I will let my daughter marry that person.”
So a yellow snake came and told the man, “If I will pick the mangoes for you, will you really let your daughter marry me?”
The man said “Yes.” He thought the yellow snake was just like the black snake, and he felt very excited. He thought, “Now the snake promised to marry my daughter. He doesn’t have to pick mangoes, I can just take him home.”
So they went home to the couple’s house. When they got home the couple told their daughter to bring a pig for the snake to eat, but the snake didn’t want to eat the pig. She brought a rooster but the snake said no, he wasn’t hungry.
After the couple finished dinner, they told their daughter, “Make your bed and tell the snake to sleep with you tonight.” The daughter was very happy to do what her parents asked because she also thought the yellow snake would be like the black snake.
So she slept with the yellow snake. But he yellow snake swallowed her leg from the foot to the knee. She called to her mother and father, “The snake is eating me!” The father and mother said, “No, he’s just playing because he loves you. Be quiet.”
The snake then swallowed her from the knee to the hip. She called to her mother and father again, “The snake is eating me now!” But they said the same thing again, “No, he’s just playing because he loves you.” The snake’s third swallow was from the hip to the neck. She called her parents again, “The snake is really eating me! He swallowed me up to the neck, and I can’t breathe!”
Her parents still said, “No, be quiet, he’s just playing.” After that the yellow snake swallowed her whole body into his stomach. She could not call out to them anymore.
The next morning the girl’s mother got up early and cooked breakfast for her daughter and son-in-law. When she finished cooking, she called them but she heard nothing. She thought they were so happy they were sleeping late. By noon the daughter still hadn’t gotten up. Finely, the couple went into the daughter’s bedroom and their daughter was gone. They found no gold or silver.
The yellow snake went away into the jungle. There was a young man living alone in the jungle. His parents had died and he was living alone, so he could not grow rice and corn. He just put his traps everywhere to catch animals.
One day his trap caught the yellow snake. The next day when he went back to his traps he saw the big yellow snake dead in one of the traps. He saw the snake’s stomach was very big and very long. He thought, “What did he eat? Is that a deer? A deer is not really long like that. It looks like a person.”
He cut open the snake’s stomach and he found the girl inside. He took her out of the stomach and put her on the ground. He put his hand on her chest and felt it was still warm. So he kept calling her and pushing her stomach until she became alive again.
He took her to his house, and they talked to each other. He asked her, “Where are you from?” She didn’t know where she came from. The boy said, “If you know your village, I’ll take you back.” But the girl said, “I don’t know where I can find my village. If you like, I’ll be your wife.”
The young man agreed so they got married, and they moved to a village where he had sold meat before. When they got there, they found her family. The parents felt very happy to have their daughter back and to also have a new son0in0law. After that, they were happy living together again. They were not very rich but they were not poor either, and they had everything they needed.