According to this report in The Daily Mail, UK, a real-life Rapunzel girl cut her hair for the first time to earn $ 5000 to give her family the fairytale home they always dreamed of.
Natasha Moraes de Andrade, 12, wept as her 1.6m mane was sheared for the first time ever. But now she says it has given her a new life. It’s given her the much-needed freedom to do what she wants.
Incident has shades of O Henry’s story “ Gift of the Magi”, don’t you think? Just in case you've forgotten the story, Della had such long and beautiful hair that “had the queen of Sheba lived in the flat across the airshaft, Della would have let her hair hang out the window some day to dry just to depreciate Her Majesty's jewels and gifts.” One day, she decides to sell her hair for $20 to gift a watch chain to her lover Jim, who at the exact moment is selling his watch to get money to buy ivory combs for her long hair.
Anyway, it’s good to hear that the real-life Rapunzel is happy that she’s cut her hair and is not regretting it.
The Gift of the Magi was in our supplementary texts! Poignant, although we didn't make much of it at that time :D
ReplyDeleteViky, yes. Story was very popular with English text books.
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