Once upon a time there lived a poor boy in the middle of a poor village. One day he was playing with a bouncy ball. When he was bouncing it, it fell into the kettle in which he was boiling tea. He waited for the tea to boil and then poured it into his cup. When all the tea was poured out from the pot the only thing left was a chunk of rubber. He tipped it out onto his paper, which he was writing a book report on, and it took away all the writing when he rubbed it off the paper.

Every day since then, when he makes his tea, he drops a bouncy ball into the boiling kettle, makes an eraser and sells it to one of his friends at school.

Now he has made quite a bit of money so his family will be able to live comfortably for the rest of their lives.

The Moon was not always so far away, it actually use to be very close to the Earth--so close that it used to get in the way of the trees and the animals. The trees and animals used to get very mad at the moon. But the only reason that the moon was so close was because he got lonely and he liked the animals.

One day the animals got so mad that they pushed the moon all the way back into space.

The moon still lives in space and he isn't that lonely because he has a whole bunch of new friends that he calls stars.

Once upon a time, there lived a group of old crocodiles. They lived near an oasis in the middle of a big barren desert. They were all very quiet and peaceful with the exception of Mani, a young teenage croc.

Mani was a very selfish little crocodile and never obeyed his parents' orders. One day he felt very hungry and decided to try and catch a bird for lunch. So in the late afternoon when all the other crocodiles were asleep he went around to look for a bird to fill his stomach.

At last Mani found what he was looking for. He grabbed a stone in his mouth and threw it up at the little creature. The bird flew away in panic and landed on a cactus branch nearby. Mani followed the bird and crept up behind it. Luckily for Mani, the bird stood perched on the lowest branch of an enormous cactus plant.

Mani opened his mouth and slammed it shut on the little bird but carelessly bit the branch off the cactus. All the spines got caught in his jaw. He tried desperately to pull them out but they were stuck fast.

Now you know why crocodiles have sharp teeth and I can tell you this, even up till this day, little Mani has never again even tried to harm a little bird.

A long, long, long time ago, when there weren't any people, there lived an elephant near a lake. He was much thinner than an elephant which lives now, and he was also lighter. But the differences between him and the elephants now weren't just that. He had wings. Big, white wings which he could fly the sky with.

One day he was having a lovely flight up in the sky and found a horse on the ground. He flew down to him and asked, "Look, I've got these wonderful wings to fly the sky. I can go wherever I want to. Aren't you bored just staying on the ground?"

Then the horse said "No, not really. I love living on the ground. On the ground, I've got plenty of things to eat and I can drink water whenever I want to." And he ran away.

The elephant thought"Hmmmmm. Maybe he is right. I will live on the ground from now on."

So he started to live on the ground and ate many foods. Because there were many delicious foods on the ground, every day he ate more than he used to and also more than he should have been eating. So he became fatter and fatter, but he never stopped eating.

After a few weeks living on the ground he suddenly wanted to fly up to the sky. So he moved his wings and tried to go up to the sky. But because he had eaten too much, he was very, very heavy and could only go 5 cm high. He tried harder and harder and went up 10 cm, 15 cm, 20 cm, 25 cm, but when he went up 30 cm high his wings couldn't hold his weight any more and broke off.

So that's why elephants don't have wings.

Once upon a time, a cat couldn't see anything in the night. Cat and Mouse were disliked by everyone, because Cat was lazy and Mouse stole food from everyone.

One day, one mouse ate the cat's food when the cat was sleeping in the night. This cat got angry and tried to catch this mouse, but he couldnŐt see anything in the night.

The next day he went to the god and consulted him. The god who was also having trouble with the mouse answered "If you always catch mice, I will make you able to see, even in the dark."

Since then, cats have been chasing mice and have been able to walk, even in the night.

A long time ago there were only four people living on the island of Ireland. A king, who was called The Emerald King, and then three men. The three men decided to make everything on the island to suit the king. They took three steps to complete this task.

The first was that one of them went and interviewed the king and asked him what he liked the most in the world. He said that he loved cakes the best out of everything in the world. So the three men went out and started to make everything in the world into the shape of a cake.

Around three years later they had completed the whole task and they went and brought the king around the island to show him all the cake shaped things. The king was very happy but they knew something was wrong with the king. So they asked him what the matter was.

He answered by saying. "This is all so wonderful. But since the three years ago when you asked me what I liked best in the world my favourite thing has changed to teddybears."

The three men were very upset and muddled. They didn't know what they should do. Then one of the men had the best idea in the world. He said that they should make the island into the shape of a teddybear. It has taken them years to complete the task and up until this day when you walk on the cliffs of Ireland you can stil see them carving out the shape.