Many, many years ago the earth was completely flat. Like a dish. And above her hung the sky, flat as the lid of a dish.
There was only a very small gap between heaven and earth, so little space that only tiny people and animals, no larger than termites, could live there.
The rains did not fall because they would drown and carry away these little creatures.
The trees were very low, like blades of grass.
In those distant times, in one of the villages there lived a brave hunter and tribal leader named Yondi.
One day he was hunting far from home and lay down to rest near a small spring. Yondi was very smart and noticed that weak and sick animals come to this source, drink from it and become healthy and strong.
The hunter plunged into the spring and felt that his muscles became like stone, and his fatigue disappeared.
Yondi looked into the water, and there, at the bottom of the spring, lay a stick, which the magical water had made hard and durable. Yondi took a stick and once again plunged into a wonderful source, which he called the source of the future.
The hunter came out of the water and began to grow higher and higher. The stick also kept getting bigger.
Yondi hit his head on the vault of heaven, grabbed a magic stick, tensed up and began to use it to move the sky higher and higher, until he himself became like people today.
The hunter even strained himself and threw the sky far upward, to where it is now. And along with the sky, the sun, month and stars flew up.
Water from the source of the future also rose up towards the sun, turned into clouds, and beneficial rain began to flow from them.
The magic water watered the earth and all the people, animals, trees and grass, and everything began to grow until it became like it is now. Many springs gushed out of the ground. They connected and became rivers and seas.
A rainbow sparkled in the sky with bright colors. Suddenly it broke into thousands and thousands of pieces. These pieces turned into wonderful colorful birds.
All the people began to dance and praise the great hunter Yondi, who had moved the sky so far away. The animals also rejoiced and danced, and the kangaroo jumped so much that he forgot how to walk, and since then he has only been jumping.
And the stupid ostrich got scared, started running - and ran until his legs became as strong as they are now.
And some animals slept through the entire miracle. They were too lazy to get up. This is how sloths appeared on earth.
Moving aside the sky, Yondi began to look for his stick, with which he propped up the arch of heaven. He looked, and this stick bent and became a boomerang.
Since then, Australians have revered the boomerang... After all, it helped people grow up and not crawl on the ground like ants.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru