The Girl and the Pumpkin
Zulu folktale · izinganekwane
Kwesukasukela. A woman had a daughter she dearly loved, but the child was wilful. One day the mother went to work in the distant fields and warned her daughter to stay close to home and not to wander. Yet the girl, restless and disobedient, set off across the veld to play and to gather wild things.
In her wandering she came upon a fine large pumpkin, or in some tellings a wild fruit or strange object, growing where none should be. Delighted, she carried it home, not knowing it belonged to the cannibals, the amazimu, or that it was a thing of enchantment. That night, or as she carried it, the pumpkin began to speak and to roll after her, calling out and threatening her, for it was no ordinary pumpkin but a trap of the ogres who meant to follow her home and devour the family.
Terrified, the girl fled, and the speaking pumpkin pursued her, rolling and singing its menacing song. Only by reaching her mother, or by the cleverness of an old woman or a wise relative who knew how to destroy the thing, was the girl saved, and the danger that her disobedience had drawn upon the household was at last driven off. The mother's warning, ignored, had nearly cost them all their lives. Cosu cosu, iyaphela.
The lesson: Heed the warnings of your elders; idle disobedience and taking what is not yours can invite hidden danger into the home.