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Vietnamese Cinderella: The story of Ta^'m and Ca'm

© lana lebozec

Once upon a time there was a little girl named Ta^'m. Her father got remarried to a very wicked woman after her mother had died. After the birth of her half sister, Ca'm, the wicked stepmother got worse: most of the times, Ta^'m had to sleep in a wretched place even though she had to work very hard and was never given enough food for supper.

She never complained even though she was forced to do the hard chores all day long. The stepmother looked for opportunities to get rid of Ta^'m ; so one day she asked the two girls to go and catch some fish and threatened to whip the one who would come back empty handed. Ta^'m knew that her stepmother was simply looking for an excuse to beat her up because she knew her step-sister would never be whipped, Ta^'m was so used to this unfair treatment, did not complain and diligently worked until her basket was full of fish. Ca'm on the other hand was busy playing and did not catch anything By the end of the day, she tricked Ta^'m into leaving the basket full of fish at a certain place and proceeded to steal all of Ta^'m 's fish and ran home.

Poor Ta^'m realized what had happened, began to cry and did not want to return home for fear of being whipped. Suddenly a fairy appeared and upon discovering what had happened, told the poor girl to look into her own basket. There Ta^'m discovered a golden fish. The fairy told her to take her fish home, put it in a well and fed it three times a day.

The stepmother spied on Ta^'m, discovered the fish in the well, so ordered Ta^'m to go fetch some water at a distant spring and managed to kill the golden fish. When Ta^'m discovered that her fish had been cooked and eaten, she was devastated. Once again, the fairy reappeared and comforted her and advised her to find the bones of the fish and buried them. With the help of a hen, she did exactly what she had been told and soon afterwards she started to receive gold and jewelry and beautiful things.

When it was time for the Autumn Festival, the wicked woman purposely mixed two types of black and green beans together and ordered Ta^'m to sort them out. "You may not leave until you finish your work", said the stepmother who then put on the most beautiful garments and left with her younger daughter. Ta^'m once again started to pray to her fairy who appeared at once and magically turned the little flies into sparrows who

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