Yesterday I had a couple of girls from the evening class I taught last term over for the evening. We cooked dinner together (well, they did most of the cooking) and they told me some Chinese stories and legends. Just thought I'd share one of them with you (hope I remember it right). There are of course many versions of the same story, but here's the one I was told:

Once upon a time there was a cowherd boy called Niulang. The only thing that belonged to him in the whole world was his cow, who was not an ordinary cow at all but quite a magical one. (oo, magical cows right in the beginning!) One day the cow told him that the seven daughters of the Goddess of Heaven would be coming down to earth to bathe in the river. The cow suggested that he play a trick on them and run away with their clothes while the girls are in the river. And so he did. To get the clothes back, the girls decided the the youngest of them, Zhinu, would ask the boy for them.

The boy said that he would give the clothes back if the girl would marry him. And as Zhinu looked at him, she thought that Niulang seemed like a good man, and decided that she would accept the offer. So, the other sisters took their clothes and returned back to heaven, while Zhinu stayed back with the boy.

The couple settled down to a life on earth, and had two children, a girl and a boy. Time passed and the cow died, but before her death she said to Niulang to keep her skin and wear it when the need was the greatest, and he would get magical powers, too. One day, the Goddess of Heaven, who had been longing after her daughter, found out that she was living on earth. She became furious and descended down to earth, taking Zhinu away from Niulang and the children. At this point, Niulang remembered the advice of the cow, and put on the skin he had kept all these years. With this, he got the power to fly and so he grabbed the two children and the three of them flew after the women in pursuit. But the Goddess of Heaven would have none of it, so she took her hairpin out of her hair, and with it she tore the heavens in two, creating a river in the sky separating them from Niulang.

Niulang, devastated, sat on the other side of the river day and night, crying for his loved one. In the end, the Goddess took pity on him and promised that for one day each year, the lovers would be allowed to cross the river and meet. This day is the 7th day of the 7th month in the Chinese lunar calendar, a chinese "Valentine's Day", if you will. On this day, thousands of magpies will bearing twigs in the beaks will fly up to the sky and build a bridge for the two lovers.

And the heavenly river is of course the milky way, and there are two stars, one in the east and one in the west, that are Niulang and Zhinu.