Hello, I’m Zawadi

I grew up on the evening porch of my grandmother’s house, where the old men sat on a stone bench and told stories to anyone who stopped. They told the same tales for fifty years and never told one the same way twice. I did not know then that I was learning how to write.

Now I collect those tales and the proverbs that go with them, and I write them down again in plain words for readers who never sat on that bench. I keep what matters, the turn of the tale and the lesson hidden in it, and I change what needs changing so a child or a grown-up today can hear it.

Every Saturday I send one tale or proverb, with a few lines on where it came from and how I told it. What I sell is what I use myself: story collections, a deck of proverb cards, read-aloud audio and two courses for people who want to retell a tale of their own.