Funny Children’s Stories
The columnist Nazneen Gulamhussein Mukhtar (Arusha, Tanzania) is the headmistress of Yaadgare Murtazawi Madressa, She is a mother to five children and loves writing and reading. She always wanted to inspire children – her favourite audience. Writing has been her passion for as long as she can remember and believes that effective learning takes place through storytelling.
It was her first day of work and she was eager to do her very best. She was about 12 years old, but she wanted to do something to help her parents during the holidays. So she applied as a caregiver to a
family who lived near her home.
Now, when she came to the house she saw the neighbour, who welcomed her and gave her the keys to enter. “Ruwaida! I was told you were coming soon! Mr and Mrs Salman have had to go out for some urgent work, but they will come back in a few hours. Please go inside, they have left a list of things for you to start doing”. Ruwaida thanked the neighbour and went inside. It was a beautiful house. On the Table in the kitchen, she saw a list written by Mrs Salman, for her to follow.
“My! What a beautiful house! I’m going to love working here!” Said Ruwaida to herself. It was such a grand house! “They must be very rich! But I must get to work. I think before I look at the list and start working, I’ll make a surprise for them” she thought. so she decided to make a chocolate cake. “I make the best chocolate cake!” She said smiling to herself. So she quickly went to the kitchen. She put a little of this and a little of that, a pinch of that, and she mixed and soon the cake was ready to go into the oven. “There! That’s done! Now let me see what the list says”. So she read…
Change the towels in the green bathroom. So Ruwaida went into the green bathroom and saw some beautiful towels and said- “those towels are so pretty, why change them?” Then she remembered what her mother had advised her that she must try her best to do whatever her mistress said. “Well all right!” she said. She found some scissors and she snipped a little here and a little there-and she “changed” the towels.
(Ha ha ha)
“There! Done! Let’s see what the next thing was”. So she saw the list again. No.2-dust the furniture. “Did you ever hear of doing such a funny thing? I mean at home we “un dust” the furniture! But everyone has
their own way!” she thought giggling. So Ruwaida went to the bathroom and saw a big box with something that looked like dusting powder! It was a darkish soap powder! But she didn’t know that!
“Well look at that! A special powder to dust with! Wow!” So Ruwaida started dusting the furniture till she sneezed and said “That should be dusty enough. My! How nice this dust smells!” (third thing on the list)–Draw the drapes when the sun comes in! she looked up and the sun was coming in and said- “What? draw the drapes? I am not so good at drawing! But I’ll try!” So she sat down with a big piece of paper and pencil and started “drawing” those drapes on paper.
Now what? She saw the list and no 4 was- put the lights out, when you finish in the living room-“oho! Put out the lights? But Why?” anyways- she put them off and unscrewed each bulb- and then she put them
outside! “Aha! So lights need to be aired out too- just like pillows! Oh! I do have a lot to learn!’ said funny little Ruwaida to herself.
Suddenly she remembered her cake in the oven- and quickly went to see it- there! It was ready- she took some slabs of chocolate from the freezer and melted them and made a most delicious-looking chocolate
cake. “Just right!” She said!
Then she looked at the list again. Number 5- measure 2 cups of rice. So she found 2 cups and measured the rice with a measuring tape and laughed! “Mrs Salman wants me to do such funny things!”
What do you think will happen next? Stay tuned to find out!
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