Tomie received fan mail from around the world. Third grade students at Davy College in Cajamarca in the Andes of Peru wrote in 2009 with their ideas for a story called “Big Anthony Disobeys Again.”
Yajaira and Rosa’s story idea (abridged) was: “Strega Nona had a maid called Big Anthony who helped her to do the house chores. Strega Nona told him not to touch the flying carpet. The flying carpet takes you to a magic place called Happyland. There you can see a fairy, a castle and you can become a princess.
“Strega Nona sings a special song to make the flying carpet fly. To come back home, Strega Nona sings a different song, and then claps three times. One day Big Anthony saw Strega Nona singing the songs, but he didn’t see her clapping three times.
“The next day he told everybody about the flying carpet and all the people laughed at him. His twelfth girlfriend called Cecilia told him, ‘It’s over!’ He was sad.
“The other day he took the flying carpet, he sang the song and the carpet started to fly. He went to Happyland. One hour later he wanted to stop the flying carpet and go back home. He sang the song, but he didn’t do the three claps so the carpet got crazy and Big Anthony thought that he was going to fall down.
“When Strega Nona came back she noticed that Big Anthony disappeared so she knew that he disobeyed her again. To solve the problem, she went back to look for Big Anthony in Happyland.
“The consequence for Big Anthony was to be the employee of Happyland for five years without being allowed to go back to town to see his girlfriend number twelve called Cecilia.”
That was the abridged version. What to say about “Girlfriend Number Twelve called Cecilia?” (Bob)
Pray for Peace, Justice, and Equality
