THE TIGER MOSQUITOES

MORAL
The story of "Tiger mosquitoes" is aiming at educating the children to kill the Tiger mosquitoes in order to prevent them from dengue fever. It also educates the children about the dengue fever caused by the Tiger mosquitoes. The way to get rid of them is to destroy places where they can live and lay their eggs. This story is also to raise the awareness for the parents of how to tidy up and to eliminate marshes, sewage effluent puddles, pastures, rain water puddles around their houses, particularly when their children are sick; the parents have to bring them to hospital immediately.

When the rainy season arrived, it rained everyday. There were many puddles everywhere. Leaders of Tiger mosquitoes flew to every place informing their members, “It’s now the time for us to increase our new members."

Tn-e' leaders of mosquitoes announced this from one area to the next. When they arrived in one village, they shouted to their members, "It's now the time for us to increase our new members." At that time, a small swarm of thin mosquitoes with long legs replied, "Here we nearly die of starvation because all villagers have eliminated marshes, sewage puddles, and slept in mosquito nets to prevent us from biting, so we are not able to lay our eggs."

One swarm leader said, "Never mind! Let's move to another place." A little later, all mosquitoes had a meeting in a village. The swarm leader told them about a good tactic and time to bite people. "You know," said a leader, “during the day time, people have never slept in the mosquito net, so bite them and absorb their blood until you are full."

"During the day time, we can hide in the messes or dark places. And when it is a good time, fly out to bite them, especially children, their soft flesh is really appetizing. Children never pay attention to us or hit us, so it's easy to suck their blood."

One day later, a child whose name was Phyrom, had a high temperature. The rash appeared on his skin and he lost his appetite. His mother, Aunt Soy, was very frightened, when her son was getting worse and worse; she took a small bunch of bananas to Neak Ta shrine. "May Neak Ta, who has preserved this area, help my son recover from his illness," she prayed, "and in return I'll offer a boiled chicken."The leader had not finished her words yet, a voice was interrupting her,” It sounds very delicious. Let's go." All mosquitoes scattered respectively for sucking human blood. And they took the chance to lay eggs and increase their new generations.

Aunt Soy prayed to Neak Ta again and again, while Phyrom's temperature was rising. Seeing this, his father, Uncle Som, hurried to carry his son to hospital. "Your son has got a dengue fever," the doctor said to Uncle Sam after examining the boy. "It's because of your carelessness, during the day time you've never had your son sleep safely in a mosquito net."

The doctor gave advice to Uncle Som "Your house may have a lot of mosquitoes. When you come back home, tidy up your house, especially the messes. Clean around the house and eliminate all puddles so that the Tiger mosquitoes cannot lay eggs. More than that, you have to clean the water jars, water reservoirs or any containers which may have water in very often, cover them all time when not in use and put abate in the water to prevent mosquitoes from breeding.

After listening to the doctor, uncle Som understood clearly about the cause and effect, and his son Phyrom was healed as well. His parents tidied up their house together, burying old water-filled properties and regularly cleaning their water jars. Moreover they educated their neighbors and villagers to follow them.

This time all mosquitoes are disappointed because they do not have a good chance as they did before. The mosquitoes leaders informed their members, "Everyone, we can't live here any longer," said one leader. "If we do, we'll definitely be starved to death; let's move to other areas." All these mosquitoes may go to your places, please practice the same ways as what Aunt Soy's family have done in order to kill these cruel tiger mosquitoes.

The End

ORIGIN OF THE MOSQUITOES

Shiva is the God that created all kinds of creature on earth. He created mosquitoes first. At that time, mosquitoes were bigger than vultures and they constantly flew around to look for humans as food anyone eaten by the mosquitoes had only their skeletons left.

Everyone was horrified. No one could find any way to protect themselves from mosquitoes so they took turns to be its prey every night from that day on. The person who knew his turn was approaching wept and lamented over his incoming death.
 

At that time, an intelligent millionaire's daughter felt so much pity for the villagers who took turns to be eaten by the mosquitoes that she decided to seek means to save them, otherwise, they all would be eaten by the mosquitoes. There would be no more people in the future.

With that thought, she went to meet her parents and said, "I would like to go with others to be eaten by the mosquitoes."

Having heard that, her parents became furious and responded," Why are you so stupid? People in this country try to escape death, while you foolishly want to die,"

In spite of her parents' responses, she 'still kept begging them to be a prey of the mosquitoes. Finding that their daughter was stubborn and did not listen to them. They became furious and said, “If you want to die and do not listen to us, get out of my sight!”

She was glad to hear that. Then she walked to where people were to be eaten by the mosquitoes and said, "If you all want to save your life, please follow me and you will definitely escape death."

"We all have to collect piles of dry leaves here. As soon as the mosquitoes fly closer to us, we will light the piles, and then it would generate smoke around us. And we shall stay in the middle of the fire circle so that the mosquitoes dare not fly across the fire to eat us."

Everyone understood her idea and agreed to follow her. When the night came, mosquitoes came as usual to eat people. The villagers sparked the flame and kept it burning, as instructed by the millionaire's daughter. Seeing that, the mosquitoes dared not across the fire to eat the people.

They talked among themselves, “If we are still as big as we are now, we would never be able to bite people for whenever they make fire; we cannot get close to them. Hence, we have to inform our creator Shiva and asked him to make us smaller so that we could furtively bite people. Never let the people see us, so it is easier for us [to bite them].”

Then the mosquitoes gathered together and flew to heaven to meet Shiva to ask him to make their bodies smaller. At that time, Shiva made the mosquitoes smaller, at the size they are today.

When they became smaller as they wished, the mosquitoes expressed their gratitude to Shiva and returned to the people world. And they wandered from one village to another to search for people to bite. However, people always swatted them with their hand causing some of them to die, while other was injured with broken wings and limbs. Therefore, the people felt relieved and happier.

The mosquitoes met again, "Now we suffer terribly because of the people. They swat us, and they would make our species extinct and we will never be able to bite them again. So we have to go to Shiva again so that he would make our mouths sharper like a needle. Hence, we could be quick in biting them and they would never know it." Then they gathered together and flew to ask Shiva to make their mouth sharper to make it easier to bite people.

Shiva responded, "Mosquitoes! The mouth I made for you is sharp enough. lf you want to bite people quicker, you should find yourself a stick to help beat it out. But you should know that people do have this stick, so you all just go back."

The mosquitoes flew back to the people's world, and they wandered around to look for people to bite everywhere day and night, using their wings as the mallet to beat the people and bite people quickly, as advised by Shiva.

- The END -