The Cookie Curse

(This is a twist in the story of Disney's Aladdin, written from the genie's perspective for a school project.)

Written by: Kashika Bharol

    A long time ago I was in a Chinese restaurant in Arabia eating my white rice. The waitress came up to me and gave me a fortune cookie.  I cracked the fortune cookie, which contained a note which was more like a message than a fortune. It said, "You will become a genie”. I regarded it as just a silly note. But when I got home and started to light the golden lamp my mother gave me for my birthday, Whoosh! I'm stuck in a lamp. So I practiced and practiced being a genie and granting wishes, waiting for someone to rub my lamp. Little did I know, that it would take hundreds of thousands of years.

    So it was a regular day, just like any other, and then I heard a rumble. Much like the one my stomach makes when I'm hungry, but louder. Once the rumbling stopped, the footsteps started. Then those stopped. I listened carefully to make sure that it was real. Pretty soon, everything started spinning. I was floating, but not in my lamp. I was in the outside world, where I had not been for a long time.

    I saw this man. He looked around the age of 17 or 18, but I had to introduce the rules first, before he could introduce himself. It's “Genie 101”. I always assumed that if someone found out they had a genie, that they would be excited. But not with this guy. He didn't believe me at all. To my surprise, he told me to “Prove it”. My blue head turned red and I felt steam leaving my ears. The man was questioning the power of a genie. Well, this was certainly off to a bad start. I decided to push that aside, and I told him the following rules:

1. No wishing for more wishes.

2. No wishing for people to come back from the dead.

3. No wishing for money.

    After I told the man the rules (which all genies were to explain to their masters according to the “Genie Rulebook”) he introduced himself to me, bearing the name Aladdin. I decided to do my big introduction, with the magical lights and everything. Aladdin was fascinated. After the intro was finished, Aladdin made his big first wish. His wish was not the best, though. Aladdin had wished for no rules. I wasn’t aware if that was possible or not, so despite being a “your wish is my command” genie, I disagreed in doing it. But since Aladdin got really angry at me, I had to grant his wish. Days passed on like this and Aladdin kept making many wishes, most of them to impress Princess Jasmine. Aladdin wished for gold, nice clothes, charm, and other things for himself, and a lot of things for Jasmine. He wished for dresses, gowns, shoes, pets, a flying carpet, and other material things, for Princess Jasmine. Princess Jasmine, in return, did not like Aladdin for who he was, but for the riches he had. Jasmine and Aladdin soon got to know each other a little more, and before they knew it, the princess’s father fixed the wedding date.

    It wasn’t long until the two were a married couple. However, after a month of their marriage, Princess Jasmine drugged Aladdin, kept his gold, riches, and gifts, and threw him out of the palace and into the gutter. It was me who stayed with Aladdin, and treated him as a brother. I put him in a nice, warm bed so that when he got up, Aladdin would not feel as rejected and sorrowful. But I guess that was not good enough for him, because Aladdin got all angry and started yelling at me. He did not see the good I had done for him. In fact, his anger caused me to get so furious, that I threw him back into the gutter. Aladdin then said that all of this was my fault, and then wished that I was gone. He didn’t realize that he had just spent his last wish. The only good that came from that experience was that I was back in my lamp, safe and sound. Aladdin was truly blinded by the princess’s love, which was fake. And I, the Genie, had experienced this all. Maybe this was fate, or a blessing, or even a curse, all started by one fortune cookie.