Symbols: 

• In the short movie there are emotions symbolized by persons and their actions. Firstly, we saw that there was a woman thrown in the sea, which is a symbol of abandonment. Later, she was seen as the skeleton women which symbolizes the death, fear, and reincarnation. Secondly, there was a fishing scene which represents connection and entanglement in both literal and emotional ways. We also saw that the man was crying and at the end we saw the woman transformed back into human. That shows us the power of emotional healing. 

Characters: 

• As we see there were two characters shown in the short movie: the skeleton woman and the fisher. The woman was a terrifying figure at the beginning but later she transformed into a happy and loving human. Then there is Fisherman who is a curious person. Although he was terrified of the woman at first, he still helped her showing a way of compassion. 

Actions: 

• In the short movie, there were two important actions which tells us a lot about the movie’s main topic. One of them was the fisher pulling the woman from the sea. He was hungry and curious and when he pulled out the woman, he was terrified but still helped the woman. The second important action was the skeleton woman transforming into a human. She was abandoned but with the help of the fisher she transformed back into human. 

Attitudes Toward Death: 

• In the tale, death is not represented as the final destination but a part of a cycle. Death is treated as something mysterious and honourable, not as a scary symbol. 

Literal:  

• The meaning of the tale is that even though you are scared, sometimes emotions like empathy can be so strong that you will not even care about your fear. Moreover, a little help can lead an enormous difference in someone else’s life. 

Human Needs and Desires: Problems and Solutions 

• There were issues addressed like fear of unknown, but the fisherman overcome that fear with compassion and empathy. Another issue was the woman’s loneliness and abandonment but with the emotional help of the man she also overcomes that problem.  

 Morals and Values 

• The moral of the story was that true love involves seeing beyond the appearances. Moreover, even the most frightening situations can transform with compassion and empathy. 

Insights into Inuit Culture 

• We learn that they see life and death as a cycle of nature. They also have a deep respect for the spiritual world and the mysteries with itself. Furthermore, the tale shows that Inuit’s values endurance, transformation, and the importance of emotional bonds.  

The Irish story Tír na nÓg and the Japanese story Urashima Tarō may come from vastly diverse cultures, yet they are surprisingly alike by how much their stories have in common. Both chronicle a young man who travels to a fantastic kingdom and experiences time standing still, before coming home only to discover that the world has changed. Both are about universal human feelings. Love, yearning and the desire to be free of time itself. In Tír na nÓg, Oisín, son of Fionn MacCumhail, encounters Niamh, a princess from the Land of Eternal Youth. Then she asks him to leave with her and offers him a joyful and eternal youth. Oisín cannot turn down her offer, though his father is heartbroken. In Tír na nÓg, he lives happily for just a few short years. Even while he feels homesick Niamh gives Oisín a white horse and warns him to never again set foot on the soil of Ireland. But upon Oisín’s return, he discovers that neither his friends nor his family are there. Seeing a man trying to lift a stone, and making decisions to help him, he falls off the horse, hits the ground, and turns into an old man. On the surface, both stories convey a journey to an eternal heaven. But symbolically speaking, together they tell a deeper reality: happiness does not stretch out into the frozen eternity but is a channel along the riverbed of time and accompanying "loss". The object one is forbidden to attain - Pandora-style box in the Japanese story and unapproachable alien soil in the Irish legend - is a metaphor for human curiosity as well as a symbol of the pointlessness (or futility) of our efforts to tame that which we do not get to control. The two heroes’ transgression of the taboo is not a moral failure; but rather human instinct that we find it hard to escape when challenged by the “unknown” and the “eternity.” It is exactly the price they paid here that the most perfect paradise cannot keep up with “change” either - when that paradise is not in fleeing time, but in learning to orient oneself within the flow of time. These two stories are a cultural depiction of fate, life and freedom in the East and West. Urashima Tarō shows respect for order and silent acceptance of fate in the Japanese culture, while Tír na nÓg shows freedom, passion, and romance in the mindsets of Irish culture. Japan’s high uncertainty avoidance and power distance characterises Hofstede’s cultural dimension theory, where people value unity and stability in comparison with Ireland’s individualism, and feelings and adventure. Although they originate from two diverse cultures, both these two stories have the same life allegory: The quest for immortality is eventually met with ruin and loss. The fate of Oisín and Tarō, echoing across the continents, is a whisper to us: life isn’t precious because it never stops, it’s precious precisely because it goes on in finiteness; meaning isn’t found in the eternal immovability but in every now and then, because we can still breathe, feel and choose. 

Stories tend to stick around through the years. They do not just keep us entertained. They show us real things about life and what makes us human. The Irish story called The Children of Lir comes from one world. The Turkish myth about Şahmeran comes from another. Every culture has stories that is carried out by generations. Not because they are entertaining but because they teach us about life and humanity. The Irish tale “The Children of Lir” and the Turkish myth “Şahmeran” shares similar emotions although they come from diverse cultures. They both contain emotions like love, jealousy, transformation, and sacrifice. Even though the stories take place in different environments, both show how human emotions can cause a disaster. 

In “The Children of Lir,” After the king’s wife dies, he marries with a different woman called Aoife. At first, she seems nice and loving but later, she shows her real face. One day Aoife, the stepmom of the children, gets jealous of her stepchildren because the King shows love to the children more than he does to her. That envy pushes her to put a spell on them. Therefore, because of her jealousy, she transforms his children into swans by using dark magic and oblige them to wander across the lakes for nine hundred years. Eventually, they turn back into humans before their deaths. This story contains sorrow but also has strong emotions that can overcome the betrayal. Although the children transform into swans and lose their human forms there is some resilience in it too. The kids lose their human shapes. Their pure hearts stay intact. The love they share does not fade. That family tie holds firm despite the backstabbing.  

Şahmeran, the Turkish myth, tells a different story with similar emotions. Şahmeran, half-woman half-snake, lives hidden in an underground garden and holds a thousand years of wisdom. There is a rumour that Şahmeran’s head heals everything if you eat it. When a young man named Camsap founds her by accident, she decides to trust him because she falls in love with him. She tells him that he can go back where he lives but he should not tell her secret underground to anyone in any condition. But one day, the king needs Şahmeran to heal from his sickness and tells all the citizens to find where she lives. Then Camsap betrays Şahmeran and shares her secret place with the king and the king founds her and kills her. Though that betrayal leads her to death, she still forgives him and transfers her wisdom to humanity through him by allowing her own death. Now her sacrifice is a symbol of eternal knowledge and a reminder that sometimes wisdom can require loss and mercy. 

Both stories are filled with great emotions and contain physical transformation because of betrayal. In The Children of Lir, it is the pensiveness and loneliness of spending centuries as swans. In Şahmeran, the dominant feeling is that of hurt associated with the loss of trust: Şahmeran was betrayed by one whom she helped. Lir's tale focuses on long painful suffering, while Şahmeran's story reflects the sadness of being kind to the wrong person. In Lir, children transform into swans, and it symbolizes how love and innocence can change into betrayal and evil. In Şahmeran, death is the transformation of the spirit while her body ceases to exist, her wisdom becomes immortal. In the end, these myths drive home a key idea. Even the people you trust deepest might turn on you. Betrayal like that does not have to shape who you are though. Love can fight back. Loyalty holds strong. Compassion steps in to ease the tough spots. It brings sense that outlasts the ache. Each story delivers its own take on human feelings. They show how choices leave marks that do not fade.

Jiahang:  

Participating in this discussion on folk tales is like a pilgrimage through time and cultures. Initially, I thought it was merely an academic analysis of myths and legends. But when I compared "Tir Nan Og" and "Urashima Tarō” and discussed the cross-cultural resonance of different Irish stories with my companions, I utterly understood the profound power of folk tales as cultural genes. They are not just fantasies, but philosophical containers used by our ancestors to understand time, life, gains and losses, and the relationship between humans and nature. The most astonishing discovery was that, despite being geographically separated by thousands of miles, the stories of Ireland and Japan shared the core theme of "time distortion", revealing the common anxiety of humans about the brevity of life and the fleeting nature of beauty. This cross-cultural commonality made me realize that beneath the vast differences, human emotional foundations are so similar. 

Looking back, my way of participating in culture was more like a passive "consumer". During travels, I would take photos and take selfies; when reading, I often only focused on the entertainment value of the plot. I was accustomed to labelling and superficializing diverse cultures but rarely delving into their worldviews and emotional logic. For example, I might have only thought "Urashima Tarō" was an interesting fairy tale in the past, but through the comparative analysis in this project, I saw the seriousness of "taboos" in Japanese culture and the embodiment of the "wabi-sabi" spirit in it - the jade box given by the Dragon Palace is not just a simple punishment item, but the ultimate test of a promise, and it’s tragic ending is filled with deep sorrow. This deepening interpretation completely changed my perspective on other cultures. 

Looking to the future, I hope to transform myself from a "consumer" of culture to an active "dialogue partner" and "empathizer". I will no longer be satisfied with superficial understanding, but will actively apply the comparative research methods I learned in this study: when encountering a new cultural phenomenon, I will try to juxtapose it with known cultures, look for similarities and differences, and ask about their social and historical roots. Whether through literature, films, or daily interpersonal interactions, I will strive to set aside preconceptions, listen to the voices behind the stories, and understand the cultural codes that shape the behaviours and emotions of different ethnic groups. 

This project taught me that folk tales are bridges connecting the past and the present, as well as "us" and "them". They remind me that in today's increasingly globalized world, true cultural participation does not lie in how far one has travelled or how many cultures one has seen, but in whether one is willing and able to engage in deep, respectful understanding. This is a precious key that I will carry with me when I travel the world in the future.