The Boy and the Apple Tree

I am going to share with you a short story which i had presented for the course of English for self expression with the aid of some simple drawings. We were given limited time for the story telling which cannot exceed 4 minutes. So i found a story here and the length of this story is just nice.

A long time ago, there was a huge apple tree.
A little boy loved to come and play around it every day.
He climbed to the treetop, ate the apples, took a nap under the shadow...

He loved the tree and the tree loved to play and talk with him.
Time went by...the little boy had grown up, he had grown into a teenager.
And he no longer played around the tree every day.

One day, the boy came back to the tree and he looked sad.
"Come and play with me,” the tree asked the boy.
"I am no longer a kid, I do not play around trees anymore" The boy replied.
"I want toys. I need money to buy them. Can you give me some money?"
"Sorry, but I do not have money...
But you can pick all my apples and sell them. So, you will have money."
The boy was so excited.
He grabbed all the apples on the tree and left happily.
The boy never came back after he picked the apples.
The tree was sad.

One day, the boy who now turned into a man returned to the tree
And the tree was excited "Come and talk to me, I feel lonely" the tree said.
"I do not have time for that. I have to work for my family.
We need a house for shelter. Can you help me? "
" Sorry, I do not have any house. But you can chop off my branches
To build your house."
So the man cut all the branches of the tree and left happily.
The tree was glad to see him happy but the man never came back since then.
The tree was again lonely and sad.

One hot summer day,
The man returned and the tree was delighted.
"Can we have a little chat?" the tree said.
"I am getting old. I want to go sailing to relax myself. Can you give me a boat?" asked the man.
"Use my trunk to build your boat. You can sail far away and be happy."
So the man cut the tree trunk to make a boat.
He went sailing and never showed up for a long time.

Finally, the man returned after many years and he is now an old man.

"Sorry, my boy. But I do not have anything for you anymore.

No more apples for you..." The tree said sadly.

"No problem, I do not have any teeth to bite" The man replied.

"No more trunk for you to climb on"

"I am too old for that now" the man said.

"I really cannot give you anything...

The only thing left is my dying root,”

The tree said with tears.

"I do not need much now, just a place to rest.

I am tired after all these years" the man replied.

"Good! Old tree roots are the best place to lean on and rest,

Come, come sit down with me and rest."

The man sat down and the tree was glad and smiled with tears...

-The End-

The boy/man/old man actually represents us and the apple tree represents our parents. The message which this story is trying to deliver is that most parents ("all" is not really that appropriate) will give their children unconditional love and they do not want much in return. But when children grow up, they will leave their parents to persue their dreams and to live their own lives. Parents long for their children to return to their side and accompany them but they rarely will mention about it. So the story is sad but true.

The lecturer was supposed to be giving us the marks for this presentation but then she did not. I guess she must have forgotten and non of us reminded her either ^^" Never mind, I will know it sooner or later ~