Week 6 Reading Diary A: More from the Ramayana

p. 219-270


In this week's reading A, I read a lot more about Hanuman's leap to Lanka than I learned in the previous reading. For this week, I will most likely write about Hanuman this week but I'm not sure which part of his story I will focus on - when he rests on the mountain who had stollen the other mountain's wings and was hiding from Indra, or when Sinhika tries to stop him from reaching Lanka and he flies into her body and crushes her heart before flying back out of her body through her ear, or when he finally gets to Lanka and and has to fight Lanka personally to get through the gates and Lanka realized he was the fulfillment of a curse. Perhaps I will write about all of them from his perspective with his journey as a whole, or perhaps I will pick one of the three and write about it from someone else's perspective - like focus on the mountain's back story and just briefly connect it to Hanuman at all. We learn a lot more about Hanuman's stay in Lanka in Buck's version of the Ramayana than we learned in Narayan's version. In it we get many more details about his visit with Sita as well as his destruction of Lanka. We also learn more about Hanuman's trip back to Sugriva and Rama.

Image source: Hanuman and Sita in the ashoka grove

Comment Wall

Please leave your comments here:

Week 5 Famous Last Words

This week, or really yesterday, has been worse than any I could possibly imagine. My grandmother, who has been estranged from our family for over a decade, is in the hospital dying of bone and lung cancer. She can't have chemotherapy, because that's what put her into the hospital to begin with and what has made her health (already a precarious thing) decline so rapidly. They were going to move her home for hospice comfort care, but have actually decided not to move her because she couldn't survive the trip, so it's only a short matter of time before we have to say goodbye for good. Also, she's not very lucid, is sedated and restrained most of the time so that she doesn't pull her tubes out, and is generally uncomfortable and in pain when she is awake (which has only happened once while I was there on Sunday). Then, yesterday my mother called to tell me that night before last she had to take our cat to the vet and have him put down because he had gotten a blood clot in his lungs and was partially paralyzed and having trouble breathing. Then, last night, my other grandmother (who I spend every summer with and is in my picture for my introduction thing) had to take our best horse, our only stud, and the best and friendliest and sweetest stud you will ever meet, to the vet because he had ripped off his horse shoe and that had taken most of his hoof with it so he was bleeding profusely. The vet ended up not being able to do anything and had to put him down. So, it's been a hell of a week and it's only Wednesday. On a good note, I found out this week that I get to go to Africa this summer to study abroad! I've set up a link to the page that describes my trip as well as lets people donate to help fund it on the right side of my blog page. I hope you all have had a better week than me and I hope that my next week goes better!

Image Information: Personal photo of Pepper taken February 2015. 

Week 5 Storytelling: Narayan and Garuda

     This is the story of how Garuda became the mount of Narayana, though it has quite a story that leads up to it. Once upon a time the gods granted a man named Kashyapa a huge favor. Kashyapa really wanted kids so he worshiped the gods and they gave him two seeds to feed to his two wives. His wives were pretty nice people up until this time, though one was a little more vain and prone to queenly behavior. This wife's name was Kadru, and the name of the nicer wife was Vinata. So Kashyapa fed the seeds to his wives and they became pregnant, just as the gods predicted they would. Vinata's seed split into two eggs and she eventually had two sons. Her eggs took a really long time to hatch, however, and she became worried so she decided to open one. Her son Aruna was in the egg and he told her that he hadn't been quite ready to hatch yet and that she should wait to open the other egg for another five hundred years.

     Kadru's seed, on the other hand, split into one thousand and she gave birth to a whole slew of eggs who later were born and became known as the naga race. Kadru then thought that she was even better than Vinata because of the number of children she gave birth to and that her children hatched so much quicker than Vinata's did, so she tricked Vinata into losing a bet and becoming her slave. When her son Garuda was born five hundred years later, he found out about why his mother was a slave to Kadru and asked what ransom would be needed to free her. Kadru and the nagas decided to ask for the elixir of life from Indra's palace.

     After a fierce battle involving Garuda swallowing up and spitting out thousands of rivers to quench the fires of the guards to Indra's palace, Garuda stole the elixir of immortality and continued on his journey back to Kadru and the nagas. Even though he had the elixir of immortality, he didn't drink from it during his journey to give it to his mother's enslavers. Before he gets to back to them, however, he meets Narayana, who grants him immortality because he is so impressed with the lengths he has gone to in order to save his mother from captivity. As repayment for immortality, Garuda offered to be Narayan's mount. Garuda then got Kadru to free his mother forever by presenting her with the elixir, but when she was out of the room, Indra stole it back before she was able to drink it.

Image Source: Wikipedia. Vishnu on Garuda.
Author's note: The only changes I made to this story were to elaborate on why one woman would have made the other woman her slave and why Narayan would have given anyone immortality, everything else is basically the same as it was in the original story, just told from an omniscient point of view so that you can see the motives of the people. 
Bibliography: Buck, William (1976). Ramayana: King Rama's Way.

Week 5 Reading Diary B - Sita gets stolen again

Once again, Ravana manages to convince Maricha to help him capture Sita, so he turns into a golden deer and lures Rama away. Before he dies after being shot, he calls out for help in Rama's voice, luring Lakshmana away and leaving Sita alone to be captured. Once at the palace, we learn more about why Ravana can't rape women anymore - he raped the wrong woman once upon a time and a curse was laid upon him that would make his heads explode if he did it again. Rama and Lakshmana return to find Jatayu dying and set off after Sita and Ravana. We learn more about why Rama decides to be friends with Sugriva in this version of the story - Savari tells them to before joining her husband Matanga in death. We also learn more about the monkey's origins and about Hanuman trying to reach for the sun/mango and why Hanuman can take different forms. We also learn about Vali (the monkey king) and the buffalo and why Vali and Sugriva are at odds.

Image source: Hanuman and the sun (thinking it is a mango)

Week 5 Reading Diary A: Continuing the Ramayana

This week we're reading pages 110-161. This reading begins with Bharata returning to find his father dead, then following Rama into the forest and takes his sandals back to wait for Rama's exile to end. My favorite story from this reading that I will probably use for my storytelling is the story about Kashyapa's two wives and their children. Kashyapa really wants kids so he worships the gods and they give him two seeds to feed to his wives. Vinata's seed split in two and she gave birth to two sons. Kadru's seed splits into 1000 and she gives birth to the naga race. Kadru thinks she's better than Vinata because of the number of children she has so she tricks Vinata into losing a bet and becoming her slave. When her son Garuda is born and grown and finds out about why his mother is a slave to Kadru, he asks what ransom is needed to free her. Kadru and the nagas want the elixir of life from Indra's palace so Garuda steals it from him and brings it to them. Before he gets to them he meets Narayana, who grants him immortality. As repayment for immortality, he offers to be Narayan's mount. Garuda tricks Vinata into freeing his mother forever in the end. After this, Virhada tries to abduct Sita and Surpanakha propositions Rama, tries to kill Sita, and is mutilated and flees. Rama defeats the army of 14000 that she sends after him, and Surpanakha starts Ravana's obsession with Sita by telling him all about her and Rama and begging for his help.

Image Source: Wikipedia. Vishnu on Garuda.

Week 4 Reading Diary A: A New Beginning with the Ramayana

So this retelling of Rama's story starts out by telling how the original author, Valmiki, got involved in the story. In this beginning, Sita is being exiled, though she doesn't yet know it. This part of the story wasn't part of Narayan's Ramayana though, so it's new to me. Valmiki is unhappy in the world because cruel things happen, including a bird in love getting killed even though it had little to no meat on it. Brahma comes to visit him and tells him this sadness has made him a poet and he needs to use that to write Rama's story which will defeat time. Valmiki composed the Ramayana and taught it to Rama and Sita's twin sons (who were living in his hermitage after Sita's exhile). When they were old enough they sang it at Rama's yearly get together in the forest and Rama came and listened.

This time, we get to see the very beginning of the story instead of just Rama's birth. We start off with Dasaratha offering sacrifice to get sons, just like last time, but this time it then shifts to Indra and Brahma discussing the problem of Ravana after the battle in heaven. They come up with a solution: Rama. 

This is my favorite part because we get to see much more detail about the backstory and the gods in this version. 

Image Source: Dasaratha announces the birth of his four sons. 

Famous Last Words Week 3

This week has been crazy and awful and not so bad and okay, etc. You see, I ran out of the medication that I'm supposed to always take at the end of last week and the pharmacy couldn't fill it over the weekend because they needed to get a refill order and the doctor's office was closed. So I was without them for three days, which made my life completely crazy because coming off meds and then going back on them makes your emotional stability a wreck. I missed a few assignments in this class and a quiz in another class and an assignment in a third class, which all sucked, but at least for this class I can make it up.

This week sucked in general, but one of the cool things that happened after I was back on my meds was that I got to meet my new patient for my psychology capstone class. For that class, we are assigned a patient at Griffin Memorial Hospital for the whole semester to be a companion to and learn more about mental illness, but my first patient got discharged so I needed a new one. My new patient is awesome, though I can't tell you much about them due to confidentiality. They are super friendly and nice and talk a lot and I think we are going to get along really well for the duration of the semester.

Another good thing I did was to get several canvases from Ross with inspirational quotes on them and hang them up in my room (which I've lived in for a year and half and have never decorated) and I also rearranged my furniture so that hopefully will improve my outlook on life. The biggest point of joy in my life, though, is my dog Lily, who is entirely too adorable most of the time (though earlier this week she did poop on my floor - which is strange since she's been house trained for over a year) and just shows so much joy and excitement at just being alive that it's nice to see and strive to be like that. Anyways, I hope everyone else had a better week than I did and I hope that I have a better week next week!

Image Information: Personal Photo of my dog Lily from 12/5/14

Week 3 Project: Getting Organized

Lessons Learned in the Ramayana: Styles Brainstorm

Topic: I am going to write my storybook over four lessons that were learned in the Ramayana. The first lesson will be that true love is worth all the risks (which ties into my previous storybook because she was deciding whether or not to risk going against everything she believed in to no longer be lonely). This lesson will be taught with Rama and Sita's love story, unless I find a better one between now and then. The next lesson will be not to follow what someone else says is the right thing to do blindly, rather think for yourself whether or not it is right. This lesson will be told with Thataka's story, because I wrote a storytelling blog post from her point of view and got really into it with how Rama just does what his mentor says and kills her without even thinking about it. The third lesson will be that everybody makes mistakes, even Rama. This lesson will be told with another of Rama's thoughtless killings - the monkey king. I (and others if I understand Narayan correctly) don't believe that Rama acted justly here and hope to point that out to others, but also to lessen the harshness of it by putting it in the light of "everyone makes mistakes" and that it's okay to make mistakes because even the greats do it. The last lesson (if I make it this far) will be that wrongdoing never ends well for the wrongdoer. This lesson will be told through the story of Ravana stealing Sita and later dying because he wouldn't admit that he had done wrong and give her back.

Bibliography: Narayan, R. K. (1972) The Ramayana.

Possible Styles:

Bedtime Stories: This is most likely the format I will go with for my storybook. I want my previous character to be teaching her children how to live a good life through these stories. In this scenario, the storyteller will either be her just retelling stories that happened in the Ramayana, or her telling them as if she lived them like she did in the last storybook.

Ready for Bed? 

Image Source for me; Image Original Source

Animals as Storytellers: This is also something I might be interested in doing. If I have my character telling the stories to her child as if she had lived them, then I am probably going to make her an animal observer in the stories. Or, she might be an animal in one and a more vital character in another since the people in the Ramayana are so long lived, but I kind of doubt it, I think if she's an animal in the first one she will stay that same animal through all of them. 

Diary Style: Rather than have my main character telling the stories to her child while she is a child, I might have her child be all grown up and going through her mother's things after she has passed away. Her mother's things would include a set of diaries that told all about her fabulous encounters before she died. If you'll remember, my character didn't expect to live another lifetime after this one, she expected to settle down with her true love and live out her days with him and end her days just as Io did, with her family on this planet. 

Family Therapy: Maybe my character's daughter is a headstrong teenager who doesn't understand anything her mother tries to tell her, so they all go to therapy and these stories either come from the therapist (who is obviously very enamored of the lessons in Indian tales), or my character tells them to the therapist and her daughter at the same time to try to explain where she's coming from.