The Girl Who Listens to Her Heart

The tale begins with a young Ethiopian girl named Aida. After her father passed away, her mother was always busy working and caring for the family’s basket weaving business. This left Aida and her sister Fana to take care of all the housework. However, Fana didn’t like to do chores and refused to help. She only cared about her beauty and was too preoccupied with looking at herself. Aida then took on the responsibility of cleaning and cooking for the family. She helped her mother weave baskets in her free time too. One day Aida finished her housework early, and went to the roof of the house to work on a beautifully woven basket with colorful threads. But suddenly, a gust of wind blew her basket off the roof and into a neighbor’s yard! "My father’s basket! I must go and find it!" "Please pardon my intrusion Āyatē, my basket fell from my roof and into your garden and I would like to retrieve it, if you don’t mind." "You may get your basket if you do some chores for me." Aida was not afraid of hard work, and she was happy to help the old woman. The old woman took her into the kitchen. …Aida did what the old woman told her and was given back the basket at the end. When she got home, she was very worried that her mother would be angry that she was late. But Fana and her mother didn’t know who the beautiful girl at the door was! "It’s me! Aida. Why don’t you recognize me?" "Aida?! How have you become so beautiful?" After Aida told them about the old woman and everything she was asked to do, Fana was eager to become beautiful too. She decided to go and do the same. She went home excited and knocked at the door. "Who are you? How can we help you?" "Mother, it’s me!" "Why are you so ugly? What did you do?" "Mother, I did all of it! I destroyed the kitchen, uprooted the garden, and I cut off all the hair of the old woman, exactly like I was told to do." "Aida! Can you explain this?" "I am sorry, Fana. That Āyatē did ask me to destroy her kitchen and garden and also to cut her hair - but I didn’t do those things. I listened to my heart instead, and I did what I believed was the right thing to do." Years later, after the old woman died, some people in the village plunged themselves in the pools and discovered the secret. It turned out that the pools made a person look on the outside the way they were on the inside. They remembered Aida – the girl who listened and understood the hearts of others. She showed her loving kindness and cared for those in need. Aida’s true beauty shines from within.