Banana Hunt <augh>
Adapted from "Little Monkey's Lost Bananas" by Long Leapsocheata and Youm Kosal. Licensed under CC BY 4.0.
Monkey has a great house, high in a tree. The naughty ape spends a lot of his time thinking about food. It seems like he is always hungry and always eating.
At breakfast time, he hunts around for the bunch of bananas he planned to eat. But they are nowhere to be found. He turns his house upside down, searching for the delicious fruit. There are things all over his floor now, but there is no sign of the bananas.
Monkey is worried. He calls out to a nearby honey bee collecting nectar from the flowers of the tree. 'Little bee, excuse me, but did you take my breakfast? I seem to be missing a bunch of bananas.' The honey bee laughs. 'I could not carry away a big bunch of bananas,' she says.
Monkey sees a snake then, coiled around a tree branch. 'Excuse me snake, but did you by any chance, happen to eat my breakfast bananas?' Monkey asks politely. The snake lets out a hissy laugh. 'I don't eat fruit, only little vermin like rats,' he says.
Monkey swings around his tree. He is fraught with worry. His tummy is clenching tightly with hunger. It is getting way past time for his breakfast.
He is so hungry now that he can't think. Little monkey's brain doesn't work well without something in their tummy. Monkey grits his teeth in frustration.
When he opens his eyes again, he catches sight of something yellow down on the grass below his tree. There is a trail of bananas leading away from it's trunk. That must be where the banana thief went!
At the end of the trail is a white rabbit having a picnic with a great big bunch of bananas. 'You stole my breakfast!' the monkey calls in a loud, angry voice.
'Oh, these are mine,' says the bunny, 'if you look over there, you will see that I grow my own bananas.' He doesn't seem at all worried by the monkey's accusation.
'It has been a very big harvest,' he says, 'here you go, have this bunch!' The rabbit ties the bunch to a vine for Monkey to pull up to his house.
'Thank you very much,' says Monkey, 'but I never found the bananas I lost.' The rabbit calmly tells him to try and remember everything he did the day before, and maybe he can recall what happened.
'Oh yes. You are right. I remember now!' Monkey exclaims. 'I got very hungry in the middle of the night, and had a midnight snack. I already ate my bananas!'