On my third sleepless night in a row,I started thinking of my childhood,and of bed time stories .I remebered vaguely some stories I used to hear from my parents and grandparents.In addition to the international,well known fairy tales,like little red riding hood,snow white,pinocchio,and the others,there were often a few local stories,mostly by my grandfather.I can not remember a whole story,since my grandfather died when I was only five years old,so the memories are from the mind of an even younger age.I was never able to determine ,wether these stories that I have heard,but never read ,if they were the fabrication of my family members minds,tailored especially for me and my siblings ears,or if they were famous arabic fairy tales.The international fairy tales are very well documented and illustrated in different beautiful versions and in all languages.My daughter has around 7 versions of little red's story.Then it hit me that maybe I should try and gather a few of the stories that we have heard,years ago,check if someone else has heard them and work on establishing a collection of these that may be ,one day,published.Only three vague stories pop to my mind right now,I will be sharing them in different posts,and I am asking for your help,too.If you can provide me with any of the stories you remember,please email them to me,with a little information about the person who used to tell them ,just to be able to relate to where these stories come from.Like for instance,my grandfather was syrian,and in his stories there were a lot of syrian references to foods like dibes and kishek(dried yoghurt,a little like jameed,only powdered and mixed with wheat ),and drinks like matteh(yerba tea),and I think it's important to mention such a detail.
So now,off to my first tale,which is not really a tale,it's rather a trick that my dad used to put me to sleep ,on the few nights that he wasn't working late,or when I was sick and sleeping in my parents bed:

-dad: shall I tell you the story of the oil jar?(a7keelek osset bree2 el zait?)
-me:yes
-dad:if you say yes and if you say no,I will tell you the story of the oil jar,so shall I tell you the story of the oil jar?(in olti aah w in olti la2 ra7 a7keelek osset bree2 el zait,a7keelek osset bree2 el zait)?
-me:yes,I said yes.
-dad:if you say yes and if you say no I will tell you the story of the oil jar.So shall I tell you the story of the oil jar?
-me,trying to be smart:no
-dad:if you say yes and if......

and so on and so forth,I guess it used to bore me enough to go to sleep ,and that was the wisdom behind it!

Has anyone ever heard of this bed-time tale,or something even similar?Do you have a story to share?Please take the time to write it before it all gets lost with time.It's part of our culture!

Till the next tale!