Friday, May 29, 2009

Story Written with Video Conferencing Students

a frisbee, something you can throw, someone getting hit on the head with something, unconscious

snuggly

Russia, the Ural Mountains

A Russian guy, named Vladimir
A tourist radio salesman, named Funny.
A rabbit who talks, named Tibbar

Vladimir had been wanting to climb the treacherous Ural Mountains for all his life. When he was a little boy, his father had held him up to see the summits of the great mountains and said, “Some day you’ll climb those, son.”
His father had died almost eight years before, and Vladimir wanted to make sure he got to the summit of at least one mountain before he would pursue a normal job, which his mother was pestering him about.
Now he stood looking at the impressive snowy peaks, with a backpack filled with bottled water and trail mix. His pet hamster, Retsmah, was snuggled securely inside of his inner jacket pocket. He also carried one pair of snowshoes and a coil of rope.
He started climbing determinedly on the steepest--but shortest--path to the summit. It was hard work, and it felt as though the path was going straight up instead of at a slant.
“You get it easy, Retsmah,” Vladimir muttered.
He finally came to a non-snow covered area where he could sit down and eat some trail mix. He gave some hamster pellets to Retsmah and pulled out his own food bag when he heard the noise of great paws behind him. He jumped and turned. Behind him stood a huge white beast with ears sticking out of the top of its head.
A Yeti! Vladimir thought.
“Aieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!” he shrieked, and fell over in the snow as a result of his quick jump and shock.
“My goodness, humans do frighten easily,” the “Yeti” (Tibbar the rabbit) said in a bored voice.
“Yes they do--but not when they’re trying to sell you a radio, top-grade, stainless steel applications, one hundred and forty different channels, accessible everywhere--”
Now it was Tibbar’s turn to jump. Behind him stood a tall, strong man with a handlebar mustache, wearing an outlandish outfit of bright yellow pants with fluorescent green polka-dots and a purple shirt with red stripes.
“Who are you?” the rabbit sputtered.
“I’m Funny, radio salesman, at your service. As I was saying, the Model 1000 Radio has lots of excellent features, perfect for someone on-the-go like you. It fits on any window of your car, on your hand, in a bracelet, on your neck, in the pocket--” “Enough! I don’t want a radio!” Tibbar shouted.
“Oh, but you will, when you hear about this radio’s great capability to blast sounds everywhere! No one will be spared! Music you want to play will be played throughout the land because of this radio’s high-powered speakers and incredible ability to broadcast the sounds of the ancient dinosaurs. Here, I’ll show you.”
“No, you fool--” Tibbar shouted, but Funny had already started up the radio. Tibbar heard a great incoherent bellow from the radio. Vladimir jumped up, thinking that the Yeti was about to eat him from the dinosaur sounds, and ran for his life--up the mountain.
He ran so quickly, snowshoes, hamster, trail mix and all, that he reached the summit in no time flat. But then he turned around and saw a tall man in bright clothing in fast pursuit and fainted for the second time that day.
“Stainless steel applications!” he heard the man saying before he went unconscious. And it is still a tale told today of how Vladimir, hamster, snowshoes, and trail mix slid all the way down the Ural Mountains into the town of Ufa on the European side, and all because of a rabbit and a radio salesman.
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