OF THE PRETTY GIRL AND THE SEVEN JEALOUS GIRLS

In the land of Ibibio there was once a beautiful girl named Akim whose beauty knew non bounds. She had beautiful full lips, kinky hair that resembled a lion’s mane, and bronze skin which looked like it was kissed by the sun itself. Her beauty was renown throughout the village and was the target of envy for her female peers. Recognizing the jealousy of her classmates, her parents vigilantly took her out of her class in favor of teaching Akim at home.They kept Akim preoccupied with school work and household chores, however this did not take away the attention that she naturally brought to herself. One day while running errands Akim ran into the seven sisters, the richest and most popular girls in her former class. Out of feigned kindness the seven girls invited Akim to participate in a play that they were performing at the end of year, however Akim knowing joining something like that would be against her parent’s wishes politely declined the offer.  The seven sisters who in all of their lives was never spurned by anyone could not fathom that Akim, a mere farm girl would ever reject them. Does her beauty make her think she’s better than us, they thought. Their sudden thoughts of disbelief turned into jealousy and subsequently turned into rage. They all felt a deep need to get back at Akim, even though she did no wrong. Altogether they began to formulate a plan to hurt the innocent Akim . Their plan was well thought out and devious for young, adolescent girls. The annual NewYears Eve festival took place in the neighbouring village, and it was the main event of the year. The Akim’s village and the neighboring village was separated by a river which was the domain of a local river god. While crossing the river during the return journey and return home the river god demanded a gift of two slices of lamb. If one did not meet those requirements the river god would entrap the offender underwater forever. This information about the river was commonplace knowledge in both villages, however the seven sisters knew that Akim was a sheltered child who knew nothing of the world and was willing to bet that Akim would not know anything of the river and its demands. In order to make sure that Akim would go to the festival with them, the sisters decided to befriend Akim and help her with her chores for two months. The two months went by in a flash, and thus the time for the end of year festivities and the girl’s revenge was finally at hand. Akim, the naive girl that she was easily swayed by the sisters into sneaking out and attending the party. When they all reached the banks of the river they were met by a bird named Akpe who took notice of Akim’s beauty and praised her for it throughout the journey. In time they reached the festival which astounded the sheltered Akim. She saw people dressed in beautiful, vibrant colors and dancing harmoniously around a bonfire under the luminous night sky. The vibrations and energy Akim felt from the party compelled her to join in on the festivities and she quickly became the life of the party. This filled the sisters with anger, who were reminded of their mission and sneakily took two pieces of lamb and hid it in their pockets for the return journey. The festival would eventually finish and during their journey home Akim and the sisters found themselves once more at the banks of the river. As they were crossing all of the sisters offered up their slices of lamb to the river god, however Akim not knowing the god’s demands did not bring any food at all in offering and was dragged down into the river in retaliation. Akim screamed and begged for the girls to help her, but her cries were all in vain as the girls pretended not to hear her and went on their merry way.   Unbeknownst to the girls, there was a witness to their evil deeds. Akpe the bird watched the entire scene from atop his nest. In the next hour after the girls returned home, Akpe rushed to Akim’s parents to inform them of what happened. Akpe told them if they hurried there is a chance to save their daughter, however the cost would be steep. They were told that they were to offer their prized cows, chickens, and lambs in order to get their daughter back and like any good parent would they did it without question. They got their daughter back, but they couldn’t be satisfied until the perpetrators of the crime was punished. The parents called for a trial in which the seven sisters would be judged by the wisest of the village elders for what they did to their daughter. The sisters vehemently objected the accusations, but when Akpe and Akim came as witnesses all knew the truth. The Akim’s parents called for the girls deaths however the village elders thought that to be too harsh. Instead they agreed on blinding the girls so they would never succumb to their jealousy of another’s beauty again. In the article “3 Reasons Why Envy and Jealousy Lead to Bullying” the author Sherri Gordon explained that envious emotions can be the root cause of bullying. When a kid or potentially anyone perceives that another is better than them, jealousy occurs. When these negative emotions are allowed to fester it can lead to bullying. This is exactly what happened in this story. The seven sisters perceived that Akim was better than them due to her beauty and no one gave them any positive reinforcement throughout the story to help correct their emotions. Instead they only fed into the sisters jealousy as all the characters such as Akpe openly praised Akim, but disregarded the sisters. This intense jealousy caused them to commit the atrocious acts  against Akim.                                                     Reflection   I didn’t have a difficult time writing this narrative. I’ve always felt confident in my storytelling and descriptive writing. However I do acknowledge that one of my biggest problems in these types of essays is overwriting. In my second draft the climax was excessively long being at least 15-18 sentences long, maybe even more. Also when I wrote in class I made a lot of runoff sentences that lead nowhere and didn’t make any sense. This is why typically I need to read what I write as sometimes it can just end up sounding stupid or excessively wordy. Even now I had to revise my climax and second rising action, which to me are the weakest parts of my story. These are things I plan to work on as I continue to write throughout this year.