She says, "Oh, not my first and honored son, heir of all I possess!" She tells him to go get the Old Man with the Ladder. Speak your brother's name with reverence." Very slowly, out of breath, Chang says the name correctly. He repeats himself, but she still can't hear, responding, "Tiresome Child, what are you trying to say?" He replies, at the top of his lungs, "Honorable Mother! Chari Bari Rembo Tikki Tikki Pip Pip has fallen into the well!" She says back, "Unfortunate Son, surely the evil spirits have bewitched your tongue. Like the first time, she can't hear him because the stream is too loud. Chang goes to his mother and says that Tikki Tikki Tembo-no Sa Rembo-chari Bari Ruchi-pip Peri Pembo has fallen in the well. They stay away from the well for several months, but then there's there's a festival and they go to the well to eat their rice cakes, play around, and TTTSRBRPP falls in. The older brother goes to the mother and says, "Chang fell in the well." Initially, the stream is so loud that she can't hear him, but then he yells at her and the mother says, "That troublesome boy." TTTSRBRPP has to go get "The Old Man with the Ladder" (kind of a sad thing to be known for), who lowers the ladder into the well, climbs in, and brings the boy back out. The mother says not to play by the well because they will fall in, and they don't listen to her and Chang falls in. Again, I can't say whether or not this is accurate, as I don't know enough about ancient China, or this mythical place that the author has conjured up which she claims is equivalent. Unless the people were concerned (and knowledgeable) about sanitation, in which case they were much more advanced than ancient Europeans. Which seems a strange place to put a well, since clearly there is water right next to it. On the bank of the stream, there's an old well. According to the internet, "Chang" means "constant" or "often", but depending on the intonation, can mean a whole lot of things, including "long" and "great" (as in "The Great Wall of China"), so kind of the opposite of "Little." Anyhow, every morning their mother washes clothes at a stream by her house. The elder brother's name is "Tikki Tikki Tembo-no Sa Rembo-chari Bari Ruchi-pip Peri Pembo", which is not Chinese, but the book claims means "The most wonderful thing in the whole wide world," and the youngest is "Chang", which apparently is Chinese, but does not actually mean "Little" or "Nothing". The story is this: there are two brothers in "ancient China", where the first and oldest son traditionally has a very long name, and the second son has hardly any name at all because they don't really matter. Notwithstanding the possible racism, which I have to confess I was mostly unaware of due to my lack of education about other cultures (the illustrations made me think of Japan, but I didn't want to assume that China couldn't have similar art and clothing styles). Sheesh.I certainly don't want to read this to my two sons. What gives with this moral? The ONLY lesson all of China took from these near tragic mishaps is to give the first son - the one they actually care about - a short name, just like the second son? That seems of limited value, given their current one child policy, I must say. My favorite part is when Chang is trying to tell his mother that Tikki tikki tempo has fallen in the well for the third time, and he’s so distraught and out of breath that he says it like this: “Honorable Mother! Chari bari rembo tikki tikki - pip pip has fallen into the well!” When I read it aloud, I practically spit the “pip pip” out. So, when Chang falls in the well, there’s a bucket in there, why doesn’t Tikki tikki tempo-no sa rembo-chari bari ruchi-pip peri pembo just pull him up? Or have the parents taught them nothing except to avoid the well? If that’s the case, I’m not confident of their ability to discuss the importance of contraception when it’s time to have the birds and the bees conversation.Īnd shouldn’t they have done a little family style lessons learned session after Chang was fished out? “Listen, kids, if this ever happens again, just run right to the old guy with the ladder cuz that’s all I’m gonna be able to tell you to do.”
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