uko was almost like all the other children in his village. He had ten fingers, ten toes, a mother, a father, and lived with them in a nipa hut. The only difference, really, was that his head was a coconut.

Not that anyone knew what a coconut was at the time—they didn’t exist yet. But it was very peculiar that he had such a round, round head. Not to mention a nose, a mouth, and one eye.

One day, when Buko was playing with the neighborhood children, he accidentally pushed another little boy into the stream. The little boy was very angry, because he lost the toy top that his mother had given him that morning, and he yelled at Buko something he had only heard his parents whisper when they thought they were alone at the dinner table:

“You’re an orphan, Buko!Your parents went to Obando to pray for a baby and they found you on the side of the road!”

None of the children knew what orphans were, or what Obando was exactly—they just knew it must have been very serious, if your parents had to pray for a baby and leave the house.

Buko’s single eye began to tear up. By then, another child had found the toy top and handed it back to the little boy, who instantly felt sorry, but it was too late. Everyone thought that an orphan was a little boy with a round, round head, not to mention a nose, a mouth, and one eye.

When Buko went home, he felt very sad. His mother gave him a cup of goat’s milk, but he refused, which was strange, because that was all he would ever eat. Buko sat in the windowsill and watched the orange sun float past the trees.

Buko’s mother did not mind her son’s strange little habits, which is fortunate for us. After all, she and her husband had gone to Obando to pray for a baby. They didn’t find him on the side of the road, but in time had him the same way all babies are born. They loved him—round, round head and all.

At the very moment that his mother went to put back the goat’s milk, a mosquito buzzed by Buko’s single eye. The little boy swatted at it—and accidentally fell out the window!

Buko’s mother heard his cry and rushed to the window—but there was no trace of her son, only a soft patch of brown earth. She and her husband searched under the house, in the garden, and near the stream, but it was fruitless. Suddenly, Buko’s mother had an idea: sprinkle goat’s milk on the ground.

“That way, he’ll come back when he’s hungry,” she declared. “Little boys are always hungry.”

Day after day, the parents dutifully sprinkled milk on the ground. In time, a tall, slender tree with pointed leaves grew from the soft brown earth. After seven years, the tree produced fruit. When you removed the husk, you saw a round, round fruit, with three holes that looked like a nose, a mouth, and one eye.

The mother was so happy to have so many children, that she named them all: Niyog, Lubi, Bagol, Silot, Ungut, and of course, Buko. And that is why we have so many names for the coconut today.

Buko is the winning entry to our Storytellers project. We will make a soundtrack to this story. Keep checking back to see and hear the progress.

When we started this little endeavour called Storytellers, we were very curious and a little bit anxious. Anxious to see if we would get any submissions. As EarnThis pointed out; we don’t have a massive audience (yet, we like to think). How many of you dabble in writing? What if no one sends us a story? And worse: what if we dislike all the stories we get?

We found out we had no reasons to worry. In the end we received 8 submissions and we, honestly, enjoyed reading all of them. So as a thank you to everyone who participated and helped us spread the word, here’s a picture of a wombat:

The hard part was to pick a winner. We knew the winning story had to be good both in content and style. But we also judged the stories on whether or not we saw enough cues for us to translate the text into music.

Two stories stood out in particular and we had a hard time deciding between them. Some heavy discussions followed, but we couldn’t get to an agreement. In the end, we had to decide by taking a vote. And with 3 to 1 votes we can declare the winner:

‘Buko’ by Amanda Andrei.

We will publish the story in a few days for your reading pleasure. So what’s next? The first thing we will do is dissect the story, so we have a clear analysis of what the structure of the song will be. Then we start writing. We will try to make the writing process very transparent, so you can follow our progress.