“Once upon a time, in a certain village, there were two friends who worked in business together. One man went out to catch frogs at night by lighting a lamp, while the other man specialized in selling oil to light lamps at dawn. Their house was built on a small riverside isle, separate from the village, to go to the village market, they had to cross a monkey bridge. Due to the single situation, the two men are also close. Once, because his old mother sold sick frogs but had no money for treatment, so he died, the oil salesman immediately spent money to help the funeral without any calculation, so he made the frog appreciate his friendship even more. sell oil. \
One night, while going to work, he caught frogs hearing a pitiful cry coming from a trap in the field. Curious, he opened it again, and discovered that two croaking birds and magpie were in the trap, because they were fighting to eat together, so they carelessly fell into the trap of humans. The two birds begged him to catch the frog to open the trap to spare him, and then promised to repay the favor. As a benevolent person, he caught frogs and then released them.
A few days later, two birds flew to his house to catch frogs to warn him of the impending disaster. They overheard two ghosts in the river talking to each other that they would pull the leg of the man to sell oil and he would catch frogs, let them die, and replace them so they could be reincarnated. Because these two ghosts have been dead for a long time, if they can't find a replacement within 7 days, they will be scattered by their souls and will not be reincarnated anymore. In addition, the ma da can only catch the two of you at dawn, when you sell oil to the market, and when you catch frogs home, because when the sun comes up they no longer have magic.
At first, he caught frogs as an excuse to tell him to sell oil, advised him to stay at home, take a week off, but the oil salesman didn't believe it, thinking it was superstitious nonsense, there are no ghosts in the world. devil. According to le le and bluff, he caught frogs making excuses for the day of worshiping his mother, calling him to sell oil over the house to party and drink, making him so drunk that the next morning he could not go to the market to sell. The other day, he used an excuse to go home to thank the oil salesman for his help, arrange a feast to eat and drink, and delay the crossing of the other bridge.
That day was the last day of the 7-day period of ghost hunting, because he was drunk for many days, so he forced the frog to oversleep. The oil salesman woke up early in the morning, realized he had quit trading for a few days, and quickly rushed to the market. Due to a hasty step over the craggy monkey bridge, he was turned by the ghosts to make the bridge slippery, so he fell into the water and died. He caught frogs because he was sorry for his friend, but because he was still afraid of ghosts, he had to wait a day before he dared to pick up his friend's body and do a funeral. Seeing their benefactor's heartache, le le and bumblebee also flew over, raising their voices as pitiful as funeral trumpets to say goodbye to a person who died unjustly."
After reading this fairy tale, perhaps everyone will understand why in the folk rhyme "Bac kim thang" there are 4 last sentences:
"Chú bán dầu, qua cầu mà té.
Chú bán ếch, ở lại làm chi.
Con le le đánh trống thổi kèn,
Con bìm bịp thổi tò tí te tò te."
In essence, it is to describe the fairy tale that upholds the friendship and nature of the ancients.
So the remaining problem lies in two sentences:
"Bắc kim thang, cà lang bí rợ
Cột qua kèo, là kèo qua cột."
In the first sentence, "tomato, sweet potato, pumpkin" refers to 3 types of tubers and fruits that have the same characteristics: vines, eggplants, sweet potatoes and squash. Especially with the word pumpkin, which is a pure word of the South, it is also said that the origin of this folk song is from the Southwest region.
NOTE: Are you passionate about listening to Vietnamese rap music? This story was turned into a song by Ricky Star - a Vietnamese rapper. Check it out if you like it: Bac Kim Thang
