The Adventures of Tom Goblin
King George V School, Ethan Gomez, Fiction: Group 6
T
om Goblin, a journalist from London Times, lives in Oxford with his dog Harry and his
cousin Edward. One day Tom and Ed were in the basement looking through the old boxes
stacked in the corner. They find a strange wooden box with Chinese Zodiac animal’s
carvings.
Tom and Ed’s grandfather Bob was an explorer who travelled to Asia. They remember their
grandfather’s tales of strange lands, people speaking different language and eating strange foods.
Ed says “There are some treasures of gold in the box.” and he opens the box. There’s a smell of
dusty herbs, an old photograph of Grandpa Bob with a tribal man and a piece of silk cloth with
drawings that looks like a map.
“Oh no! What happened to the treasures?” said Ed. “Tom, It’s just a piece of old dusty cloth
with strange drawings.” Tom looks at the cloth with a flash light and says “Ed come and look at
this. It looks like a map of Mongolia and China.”
“What’s this marking? It looks like a cave. Maybe there’s a secret treasure?” said Ed looking
at the map. They go to the internet and look at Google Maps to find the location of the place. “Hey
look Ed; it’s a tribal village near Yumen, close to the Altun Mountains in the Gobi Desert. Tom
calls his friend Yang Lee who lives in Beijing for advice. Next day Tom and Ed pack their bags and
head for the airport to catch their flight to Beijing. They arrived at 7:00am at Beijing International
airport, tired from the long flight. Yang Lee is waiting with two cups of Starbucks coffee.
“Morning guys, hope you had a good flight. Hurry, we got to catch the 10:00am bus to Yumen.”
It’s a seven hour bus trip to Yumen and we should be there before sunset. They talk about their
jobs and family to pass time. Soon they all fall asleep. The bus reaches Yumen at 6:00pm and they
head for a small motel for the night. In the Gobi motel, when Ed opens his bag “Guys we have been
robbed. Someone’s stolen my mobile phone and camera, when we were sleeping in the bus.”
The next morning, they ask the reception to rent a car that will take them to the tribal village.
It takes about 4 hours to locate the village, which is near the Altun Mountains far away from the
city. They go to the village chief Urman, for help. The village chief doesn’t like strangers and tells
them to go away. But Yang Lee shows the chief the box with the photo and the map. The chief is
shocked and surprised to see the box and the photo. He remembers his old friend Bob who lived in
the village a long time ago. Urman tells Yang that Bob was a kind and helpful man who was also
the doctor in the village. The roots were used to make medicine for scorpion and snakes bites. A
long time ago when Urman and Bob were hunting in the mountains, Urman was bitten by a snake
and it was Bob who saves his life.
Ed whispers to Tom and Yang “Guys we can be rich if we take the roots to London.” Yang tells
Urman that Tom and Ed’s Grandfather died 5 years ago. Urman invites them to his house to have
dinner with his family. They had rice, roasted chicken and berries. Urman is a simple and kind
man and they feel that if they tell anyone in London about these roots, people will come and steal
them and destroy the environment of the village. They decide to bury their grandfather’s box in
Urman’s garden to keep Bobs secret safe with Yumen tribe. Urman is happy his friend Bob’s spirit
has finally come back home to the Yumen tribe. Tom and Ed say “Goodbye, grandpa we will miss
you always!”
Winner
