THE NEIGHBOURHOOD: A SHORT RHYMING PLAY

If you've read my Litter Bugs, you know already that I think children, however young and especially in cities, need to be taught the consequences of littering. We live in a very crowded country and the debris we create must be safely discarded. Human beings create a lot of waste. If we are not responsible with it, we run the risk of slowly suffocating our planet to an inevitable death.

I wrote this rhyme-cum-play for performance at a Calcutta school as a puppet show. The junior school children and teachers did a fantastic job of the production. The rap number was outstanding!

COPYRIGHT: Ranee Kaur Banerjee

Cast of Characters:

Dumdum Duck
Fried Fish
Otto Octopus
Droopy Dog
Minkie Monkey
Spindly Spider
Polly Parrot
Papa People
Mamma People
Pouty People
Peppy People

Scene One: The Neighbourhood

Fried: Good Morning, Dumdum
Dumdum: Hello, Droopy
Droopy: How are you, Polly?
Polly: Hi, Otto,
Otto: Hi, Minkie
Minkie: Ooh, Spindly! You scared me.
Spindly: Here comes Droopy.
Now our neighbourhood is complete.

All Together, dancing and singing:

Chorus:
Welcome to our neighbourhood
Clean and fresh,
Happy and good

Solo:
Tall, short, jumpy, stinky or crawly

Chorus:
We’re true friends—yes, we are—surely

Rap:
We live together
Without any bother
Help each other
Like sister and brother
We fight
We yell
But most of all
We gel
We take care
Of our habitat
Tree, land, pond—wherever it’s at
‘Cos its our hood, our hood, our hood, our hood-hood-hood-hood-hood


Song solo:
We clean up what we dirty
We keep our houses pretty
We take just what we can use
Wasting, we don’t excuse—
Chorus:
Because we love our neighbourhood
Clean and fresh
Happy and good


Scene 2: The People Picnic
A beautiful day—Enter the People family with picnic accoutrements: a checked bed sheet, a picnic hamper, bottle of coke, packets of chips and chocolates and a Frisbee

Peppy People: Yippee!! Yippee!! Hooray!!
It’s such a beautiful day today!

Pouty People: A picnic, what a bore—
Why couldn’t we eat indoor?

Mamma People: Oh, Pouty, breathe the air
In our city, where
Can you smell the gifts of nature?
So clean, so fresh, so clear?

Papa People: And look at the beauty around
The water, the sky, the ground
The green and blue and brown
Come on, dear, drop the frown

Pouty People: The sun’s too hot, the water’s too cold
All this grass smells of mould
The air makes me sneeze
So can I please,
Go home if I may?
Eeeek! A spider!! Make it go away!!!
Kill it!! Kill it!!

Peppy People: In a minute!! (Peppy tries to stamp Spindly but Spindly
scurries away)


Mamma People: Settle down, children, come let’s eat
Sandwiches, chips, juice—what a treat!
When your stomach’s full, go play
Enjoy this beautiful, glorious day
(The family eats. It throws
the plates, napkins and wrappers under the tree.)

Papa People: Hey, Peppy, let’s have a contest
You, Pouty or I, let’s see who’s best
Who can throw a stone farther—
Farthest away into the water. (Father and children start throwing stones into the water. Dumdum is hit on the head. “Oww” he says as he sinks. “Fried” swims around Dumdum worriedly and Otto tries to hold the injured duck up.)
Pouty People: Look, a monkey! A monkey on that tree!!
I want that monkey—that monkey is for me—
(she goes to the tree
and shakes it violently.
Minkie and Polly hold on to the branches for dear life. Droopy comes up and starts barking at them.)
Peppy People: Oh, go away! Bad dog! Bad dog!
Or I’ll hit you with this log
(he picks up a branch from the ground and waves it around)

Mamma People Peppy, come back here, please
Lord knows what disease
That dog’s body carries
Probably worms or rabies—

Papa People OK gang, we’ve had enough fun
It’s time to run
Back home to the city
What a pity!
(the family begins to pack up their things. They leave the litter strewn on the ground and Mamma People starts picking flowers and leaves to take with her)

Scene Three: The Animals’ Revenge
The animals have seen the People family trash their habitat and hurt their friends. They are now very angry and decide to teach the people a lesson they won’t forget in a hurry.

Octo comes up to the surface of the pond with Dumdum and Fried sitting on his head and throws his tentacles around Peppy’s neck. Peppy screams: “A Monster! A Monster!! Save Me” At the same time, Minkie and Polly start throwing nuts and stones at the family from the tree. “It’s raining stones!” Pouty squeals. Then Spindly slowly begins to climb up Mamma People’s leg and she freezes in shock and begins to shake and tremble. All this while, Droopy barks and growls and snarls threateningly to scare the People family even more.

The people are petrified. Suddenly, Polly flies down from the tree and screeches loudly:

“Clean up our home and make it look like before
You keep your own house clean, I’m sure--
And we don’t go
Dirtying your door
So why must you spoil our habitat
With your litter full of this and that?

And how dare you hurt our friends?
You have to make amends
They haven’t hurt you in any way
SO WHY MUST YOU SPOIL THEIR DAY?

Scene Four: The People make amends

The people are ashamed and apologize. They shake hands with all the animals and clean up the trash as the animals clap. Then all the puppets hold hands and sing:

There’s no reason why
You and I
Can’t live together in harmony

We’re all animals together
We’re all born from one mother
If we harm one another
We’ll all smother
And die.

So there’s every reason why
You and I
Must live together in harmony

Because we’re all connected
We’re all links in a chain
We’re all related
Like the sea, the cloud and the rain

If one link breaks
The Tree of Life shakes
And if the Tree should die
So will you and I

So it’s simple, really
All of us—We
Must live together in harmony.

Rap:
We have to live together
Without any bother
Have to help each other
Like sister and brother
We can fight
We can yell
But remember y’all
We have to gel
We have to take care
Of our habitat
City, sky, land—wherever it’s at
‘Cos its our hood, our hood, our hood, our hood-hood-hood-hood-hood

THE END