Delicia Dagua, "Calling Departed Grandmothers to the Manioc Gardens."

I am going to tell you about this deer papaya. In former times, the deer was a person. One time, when the children had been left home alone, the deer arrived in the form of a person and said, “I’m your grandfather.” When the adults returned, the children said, “Grandfather came, Mom!” She answered, “Oh! How could your grandfather have come? Your grandfather is dead.” The children said, “No! Grandfather did come to visit us. He came to give us a papaya and then left.” “So what did the papaya he gave you look like?” their mother asked. They answered, “It was this fruit,” showing her a small wild papaya called “deer papaya.” “This one, this papaya.” It was this wild deer fruit that he had come to give his grandchildren. But when he gave them that papaya, it was not enough, because there were many grandchildren in that house. So he said to one of them, “Let’s go harvest more. There are many of this kind of papaya at my place.” Hearing this, the children said, “Yes! Let’s go with grandfather to gather some of those fruits he was talking about giving us.” So he went. When he went to his grandfather’s place, he saw a fishtail palm standing there, and when he arrived he saw that the brush around its base was cleared. The child looked around and wondered, “What is this?” Then he said, “Grandfather, you brought me here so you could pick papayas for me. Now where are they?” “Oh… son, they are over there in the garden. In the garden,” the grandfather said. The child looked for the garden and thought, “Where is it that he says the trees are cut down? There is no garden.” Wherever he looked, there was nothing. “But grandfather,” he said, “there is no garden. There is nothing here. Where is the papaya?” “Oh, okay,” the grandfather said. “Just wait a little while. I am going to take a nap first because I am sleepy.” So he lay down and fell asleep. Then the grandchild went off to look for the papaya. When he came back to the base of the palm tree, there was a deer lying there asleep. The child thought, “I wonder where my grandfather went. This is a deer. Where did my grandfather go?” The child began to search and cried out, “Grandpaaa!” At that moment the deer ran away. When the deer ran off, the child cried in the forest, “Grandpa! Grandpaaa!” The child began to cry, realizing that his grandfather had deceived him. Then he heard his grandfather’s voice say, “Why are you crying?” The child answered, “Grandfather, a deer just ran off that way!”