Tuesday, October 20, 2015

Week 9: Reading Diary B


READING B:

Origin of the Sierra Nevadas and Coast Range
  • this story explains why the sierra nevada range is larger than the coast range
  • Hawk and Crow took mud from a dead duck's mouth to create the mountain ranges
  • Hawk thought Crow stole mud from him since Crow's mountain range was larger, so he put his where Crow's was
Legend of Tu-tok-a-nu'-la (El Capitan)
  • tutokanula means measuring worm
  • the story is about why the rock is called tutokanula
  • two boys fell asleep on the rock that is continuously growing
  • as a result, no one could go and wake them up to bring them home
  • so various animals tried to jump up, but only the measuring worm was able to climb up and get them to wake up
The Children of Cloud
  • this is the story of two twin boys who had the power of the cloud: thunder and lightning
  • they did not know who their father was and so their mother sent them to go see him
  • once they met their father, he was skeptical and had them go through various trials to make sure they were his children
  • he finally accepted them, but after they lived to him for a while, they wanted to see their mother
  • he sent them on their way and told them to not talk to anyone, but they got caught by a wolf and turned into agave plants
  • there was a priest with a beautiful staff who bestowed the people with 4 eggs: 2 blue and 2 red.
  • he told them the blue would give them good fortune and happiness and the red would give them cold hard winters, so essentially, misfortune
  • the stronger people took the blue egg from the weaker ones
  • the blue egg ended up to be a raven 
  • the red egg was a beautiful macaw
Coyote and Hare; Coyote and Fawns
  • in the first story, a hare gets caught by a coyote and uses its wit to get away. 
  • it does so by saying that all of the things that can kill it are its 'friends' whereas the weak stuff was harmful
  • in the second story, the coyote wanted its children to be beautiful like the deer, so it put it in a cave of fire and accidentally burned them all to death
  • the deer misled the coyote. so sad.
Coyote and the Quails
  • some quails stole some meat from the coyote's body without him noticing
  • he woke up and stole that meat from them and ate it
  • they told him he was eating his own meat
  • he finally noticed they had cut meat from him, so he went after them
  • they disguised a cactus to look like them
  • he bit the cactus and died
How the Bluebird Got its Color
  • the bluebird used to be an ugly color, but it bathed in a river for 4 days and come out blue
  • the coyote wanted the same, so he followed its instructions
  • but he was so busy wanting to see if people noticed him that he ran into a stump and got covered with dirt
  • as a result, all coyotes are the color of dirt
Coyote's Eyes
  • I didn't really understand this story
  • it seems there was a bird that could take out its eyes and throw them up and back into its sockets to make them "brighter" 
  • the coyote wanted the same, so he copied it, making the bird do it for him
  • the first time, it worked, but later one, he lost his eyes
  • then the bird found some gum on a tree and used them to fill his sockets
  • that's why his eyes are no longer black, but yellow
Coyote eyes.
Source: Larry 1732.

  • the rattlesnake was known as the soft child because all it could do was rattle its tail
  • other animals would poke it and bother it in order to hear its tail
  • so the rattlesnake was given teeth with poison made from hair
  • the rabbit bothered it and got bitten and died
  • the others tried to cremate the rabbit without letting the coyote know, but fail and the coyote ate its heart
  • but the coyote also got burned from the fire in its mouth, which is why it is black

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