Nick and the Mango-Eating Piglet and Other Animal Stories
by
Book Cover & Preview Text
The Summer Carnival was fun time for all the mice colonies in a ten-mile area. It was a celebration the first Sunday of June every year and there was fun for everyone. It took place at the López tobacco barn. After 9:00 in the morning the whole López family was out for the whole day, giving the mice enough time for their celebration. Before leaving, Nick López put Micifuz inside the house and only Ricardo the dog stayed out to watch the farm. Ricardo was a good friend of the mice and the Summer Carnival was welcomed by him every year. The mice always made a point of inviting him to participate.
There were games for the older mice, such as dominos, bingo, and Parcheesi; ping pong, baseball, and other games for the small mice; and dancing and music for the young ones.
There were two special contests at the Carnival: the Dance Contest and the Mango Contest. The Dance Contest chose a different dance every year. Sometimes it was rumba or cha-cha-cha. This year it was the mambo.
But the star of the Carnival was the Mango Contest. It was the same every year. Six big mangoes of practically the same size were placed at the center of the barn side by side. Six teams of young mice were chosen to eat the mangoes in thirty minutes. The team that finished eating the mango first was the winner. The captain of the winning team had the privilege of choosing the Mango Queen who would preside over the Carnival and rule for a day.
The previous year there were six mice on each team, but since the mangoes were of good size, they could not finish eating them in thirty minutes. This year they decided to increase the number of mice to ten per team for the mangoes were specially large. Even though the mangoes were almost exactly the same size, nobody could predict the size of the stone inside, so luck had a role in the contest. There was more to eat in a small stone and less to eat in a large one.
The mango contest opened the event and the mambo contest followed it after the crowning of the Mango Queen.
At 9:00 a.m. sharp, the six teams began eating the huge mangoes. Pepe was the captain of the López farm team, but his mango had a very small stone and they could only finish in second place. The team of the Rodriguez farm won the contest and its captain, Ferdy, was asked to choose the Mango Queen and start the mambo contest by dancing with her. From the stage, Ferdy announced that Rosie Mouse was his choice for Mango Queen. The sweet little miss got on the stage and was crowned with a lovely crown by Old Raggedy Mouse. After a few bows and cheers from the crowd and some barking from Ricardo, Rosie Mouse took Ferdy's hand to go from the stage and start the mambo contest. But to her surprise, Ferdy fainted. He had eaten so much mango so fast that he became sick. All efforts to put him on his four paws again were of no use. Ferdy was out of the game all day.
Rosie turned to Pepe, who was the captain of the second place team and invited him to dance with her. But to her surprise, Pepe was not in better shape than Ferdy was.
The truth was that the mangoes were so big that practically all the sixty members of the six teams had eaten too much, too fast.
Formats
Book Details
About the Book
This book is a collection of ten animal stories from Cuba. Since children from all parts of the world love animals, we hope American children receive them with the same enthusiasm as Hispanic children have.
About the Author
Dr. Graciela F. Beecher came to the United States in 1961 after the Bay of Pigs invasion. She established her residence in Fort Wayne, Indiana, where she worked first as a college professor of language and literature, and later as the executive director of the educational agency she founded.
Semi-retired, she now works as Spanish correspondent for Today's Catholic, Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend, and is also a feature writer for several magazines and newspapers in New York, Maryland, and Indiana.
She was quite active in politics and women's issues. She was for many years the President of the National Association of Cuban-American Women, the Cuban-American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, and the National Federation of Cuban-American Republican Women. She can be contacted by e-mail at: Gbee172271@aol.com.