What's Everybuggy Reading: Sam
Bringing the Rain to Kapiti Plain
by Verna Aardema
Dial Books for Young Readers, 1981
You read in this month’s Spider about how Jamari stopped the storm and volcano from destroying his town with the steady beat of his djembe (jim-bay) drum. We buggies (well, except Thistle) wish we could stop the cold weather, but even our warmest thoughts and Spider’s frantic drumming can’t keep winter away forever. In this book, Ki-pat controls the weather by bringing the rain to his home in the Kapiti Plains.
Ki-pat is a boy, but he stands on one leg like a big bird while he keeps watch over his herd. He starts to notice that the grass is brown and dead and his cows are hungry and thirsty because it hasn’t rained for a really long time. Ki-pat decides to take matters into his own hands—he makes a bow and arrow out of a stick, some leather, and an eagle feather. Then he shoots the cloud and—KA-BOOM!— rain and thunder pour out onto the plains.
I already knew that rain is caused by the condensation of moisture in the atmosphere, but I had no idea that you could speed the process along by busting a cloud with an arrow! I guess I need to study my water cycle chart. . . .
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