Long ago, near what is now the town of Kibuye, there lived a man named Ndaba. One day, Ndaba was in the forest searching for honey with some men from his village. As he was walking, he spied a rock with a great crack in it. Bees were buzzing in and out of the crack, so Ndaba decided to climb the rock to investigate. At the top, he saw that deep inside the rock there were enormous honeycombs dripping with honey.
Ndaba shouted to the other men, and then climbed down into the rock to investigate. When he reached the bottom, he began stuffing himself with honey using both hands. There was so much honey, the bees didn’t even bother him.
The rest of the honey seekers soon arrived, and they lowered down pots so Ndaba could fill them with honey. Ndaba started to fill the pots with honey, but the temptation was too great, and he continued to eat more honey than he put into the pots. Soon the other men outside the rock started to become impatient. They started yelling down to Ndaba, saying, “hurry up Ndaba, it is going to be dark soon!”
Ndaba paid them no mind, though, even when the men started shouting angry words at Ndaba. Nothing they could say would make him hurry. Finally, the furious men pulled up their empty pots and left Ndaba there in the rock. Ndaba was so engrossed in the honey that he didn’t notice when the other men had gone. When he finally had eaten his fill, he tried to climb back out of the rock, but the walls were too slippery. Try as he might, Ndaba could not find a way out of the rock, and to punish him for his greed the other men did not come back to help him out. Ndaba never did escape that rock, and eventually he died there at the bottom, next to the honeycombs, and to this day the place is called Ndaba’s Rock.
