The Greedy Tortoise
In Nigeria, the tortoise is an animal that is used to teach a lot of moral lessons. He is usually depicted as smart, wise and very cunning. There is almost no story in Nigeria about animals that doesn't involve the tortoise in some way. He is either a good or bad character, but what people agree on is that the tortoise always has something up his sleeves.
Now, the tortoise in today's story is known as Ijapa. Ijapa had two close friends, Adiye and Ewure. Ijapa and his friends liked to party but the funny thing was, they weren't aware that the other was friends with Ijapa. Ijapa liked being the center of attention and didn't want his friends to focus on anyone but him. This eventually led to a problem. You see, on that fateful morning, both Adiye and Ewure had come to visit Ijapa at his house but they came at different times. They had both come to invite Ijapa to their house for a party. This normally will have been a good thing for Ijapa but there was a problem. Their party was occurring on the same day at the same time and they had both invited Ijapa to be their guest of honor.
So, Ijapa devised a plan. He would start the day at Adiye's party venue which was closer to his house. He would stay there for a bit and then head to Ewure's party. He planned it this way, so that by the time he gets to Ewure's house, they would have finished cooking and he would eat and then he would go back to Adiye's party, where he would also eat. In this way, he reasoned that he would enjoy the delicacies of both parties.
On the day of the party, he set off for Adiye's house but when he got there, they had not started the preparations at all. He tried to hurry up everything but it was taking too long. He had to excuse himself to make off for Ewure's house. He said his goodbyes and informed them that he would be back very soon. Ijapa made for Ewure's house and eventually got there. But the preparations in Ewure's house were not done too and so he tried to hurry up the preparations there too. He spent a long time there and left there quite late because they still weren't done.
He got back to Adiye's house to find that they were cleaning up. The party was already done and everybody had gone home. When he inquired about his food, he was told that they had shared all the food for the party guests. Now very hungry, he started off again for Ewure's house. Unfortunately, when he got there, he found a similar scenario. At the end of the day, instead of losing on one end, he lost on both ends due to his greed.