View our terms and conditions for use of our web site and our privacy policy. Visit Electric Scotland's Aois Community, our social networking site. Find our contact information and learn more about us. The Home Page of Electric Scotland ES Common Header Bar
This is where you'll find a comprehensive resource on Scottish accommodations. Electric Scotland's Article Service where you can both read articles and post your own. Beth's Newfangled Family Tree is a monthly publication giving genealogy advice as well as what's hapening on the Scottish Scene around the world. This is where you'll find around 300 books on Scottish history that we've published on the site. Our pages where you'll find books and articles about Robert Burns and his work. Gives you some information on the business scene in Scotland. This is where you can view Scottish events around the world and add your own. Learn about the history of Clans and Families of Scotland and the Scots-Irish. The personal site of Alastair McIntyre where he's posted his own mini biography as well as his travel journals. 5 volumes worth of biographies relating to Significant Scots. A weekly newsletter about the political scene in Scotland from the Scots Independent Newspaper. Lots of Scottish recipes along with contributions from our visitors. Play our collection of online games. 6 volume Gazetter on the place names of Scotland. This is our page for trying to give you advice on Genealogy. A FAQ where you go to get answers to frequently asked questions. Information and pictures about Historic places in Scotland such as castles and other properties. Main index page for our very large history section. Children resources including over 800 children's stories and lots of online and offline games. A bit of a catch-all page where you find loads of pages about music, haggis, scots language, culture, religion, humor and lots more. Our nature page where you can explore information on Scottish Wildlife, Plants, Flowers and lots more. Our weekly newsletters archive. Thousands of pictures of Scotland for you to enjoy. Loads of poetry and stories for you to enjoy with many contributions from visitors to our site. Our very own Webcard program which you can use to send online postcard to friends and relatives. Huge resources about the Scots Diaspora around the world and here is where you can find this information. A continually building information resource on the Scots-Irish who emigrated to Ulster and then onto many parts of the world, especially the USA. Create your own family tree with our special software. You can also import and export gedcom files. Our web-based scottish search engine which is a free resource for Scottish companies as well as Scottish organisations around the world. Current Scottish News headlines and links to Scottish news resources. A range of services, both big and small, that we currently offer. Our Tartan pages, giving you access to information on Tartans as well as tartan search engines. Sponsored by House of Tartan. Our travel section where we have loads of suggested tours of Scotland as well as old historic travel books. A wee collection of videos some of which we've produced ourselves. Learn about the last 100 pages we've added to our site which is updated daily.

Click here to get a Printer Friendly Page
 

Send Flowers

Children's Stories
by Margo Fallis
The Emerald Beads

Nataki spent her days making beads. Her papa brought home bags of stones and jewels and Nataki used her tools to make tiny holes in the middle so she could thread them together. When she finished making the beads, she gave them to all the women and girls in her village. There wasn't one female who didn't have beads around their neck. Even the baby girls wore beads.

Any beads that she had leftover, she took to the other villages to sell. Some people wanted the beads but didn't have money to pay for them. Instead they gave Nataki blankets and baskets and bags of coconut and fruit. Nataki didn't keep them for herself. She took them back to her village and shared them with everyone else.

One day Nataki's papa came to her. “Nataki, I am going into the jungle to find you some jewels and stones. I will be home tonight. Help your mama with the baby and you might have to do some cooking. Mama isn't feeling well today.” Papa gave Nataki a kiss on her forehead and left.

Nataki put her beads down and went to see if she could help her mama. All day long she carried her baby brother, Kimba, on her hip. She cooked the lentils and made bread. When Papa came home, Nataki was tired and didn't make any beads that day.

When the morning sun kissed her cheeks, she jumped up and ran to see if Kimba and Mama were all right. Both of them were sleeping.

Papa whispered to her, “I'll be home today. You can go and make your beads. I brought you back something very special.”

Nataki ran to her chair. The box of beads and all of her tools sat next to it. Sitting in the middle of the chair was a strand of emerald beads and a note.

“Dear Nataki,

This is a gift for you, a strand of emerald beads. You do so many nice things for others that I wanted to do something nice for you. Thank you for taking care of Mama and Kimba.”

Love, Papa”

Nataki slipped the string of emeralds around her neck. She felt so pretty and so special. That day she made a lot of beads from the new stones and jewels her papa had brought home for her. When she went to the village to give them away, every person noticed her new emerald beads. When Nataki told them her papa had made them for her, they all smiled and gave her a hug. Nataki was the happiest person in the whole village.

Return to Children's Stories