A Crab Catch Adventure!
It all started with bored Zingy and Pantera who went to rest by the riverside. Once they arrived, there was a villager who's name is Emmanuela, and she was washing clothes. As she asked for help, Zingy started jumping from rock to rock. Pantera nodded and flopped himself on a rock and started washing clothes. As he was nearly finished, he heard about 7 kids start yelling and 1 shouting okoto (crab). When he asked what they were doing , Emmanuela responded ' they are fetching crab, we call it okoto or koto' Pantera nodded and asked his sister if she wanted to help the children catch crab 🦀. She responded 'yes' and ran over to them and started figuring out how to help. Once Pantera finished he got up and ran over to see what was happening, Emmanuela followed close behind him. When he reached the spot there were 10 children - including Zingy- 6 with sticks, all poking them under, between, and around rocks. Zingy picked her stick in the air, revealing a white cube on the end and yelled to her brother ' look cassava fetches crab' Pantera looked around for a free stick with cassava, spotted one, picked it up, and mimicked what the children where doing. He waited. After 80 seconds of nothing he switched spots and heard his sister yell 'I got a crab!' he watched as kids jumped in her direction and reached under the rock to grab the crab. With no success they stood up and looked at the rock with disappointment. Still nothing touched Pantera's stick so he got up and decided to watch a little closer. He watched as a child sat with their stick poked under the rock. Suddenly her arm shot under the rock and grabbed something, then she yelped in pain as she pulled out her hand and realised a crab was attached to her hand and she began screaming as another child named elija jumped forward, grabbed the crab by the stomach and slapped it's eyes. Then it let go of the girls hand. Next he dropped it in a bucket and examined her hand. Pantera just shook his head and decided to walk deeper down the river. He found a nice group of rocks, squated on one and Stuck his stick in a small cave. This time he immediately felt something grab the cassava and started to pull the stick from the cave, but the crab had other plans it tried to pull the stick deeper into the mini cave but Pantera continued to try to pull it out. This tug of war continued for about 2.5 minutes. Then Pantera heard a small *snap* and the stick felt free so he pulled the stick from the cave, and realised that the cassava had a crab claw attached to it. As he blinked in astonishment, he decided to take the arm to the crab crew. Once they saw it they laughed so hard that there were tears in a few of their eyes. But Pantera just rolled his eyes and went back to where he found the crab, this time the children followed him along with his sister whose cassava had disappeared from the tip of her stick. When she told him that a crab stole her cassava, Pantera burst in to a pool of laughter and tears as his sister put her hands on her hips and said 'it's not funny' but he just continued laughing so she tried to slap him, but he just walked backwards and continued looking for crab to catch, found a nice spot and sat his stick there. A crab came but got away. After sometime he caught a small crab which scurried on to the cassava and went around the cassava like 3 times before it was caught. After that Emmanuela tried to make him hold the crab but he shook his head and walked backwards as she shoved it toward him. After that, both him and his sister kept finding crab, but the crabs would just steal their cassava or, play tug of war with the casava. Nzinga nearly caught a crab but a child had distracted her so the crab ran. After like 2 hours it was over, and before they went home, they looked at the bucket of crab- which was halfway full of crab. Then they left the river and headed home.
Children in the village catch crabs to have a better delicacy with their food, they put the crab in many different dishes to increase the flavor. With most staple food only being available during dry season, it's difficult to get anything more than the normal fufu, banku and bean dishes.
Help us provide agricultural guidance to the farmers of Akyeremanteng Village and more food options to the children in the school 💜💜😌