Epics of India Fall 2020

Heading southwards through the forest after leaving the subterranean passage, the Pandavas and Queen Kunti must stay strong, but only Bhima is cut out for this type of work. The forest is filled with creatures who crave human flesh like reptiles, man-eating asuras, and large rakshasas that are built like a professional linebackers. The group becomes fatigued except for Bhima, so he stays extremely attentive to keep everyone protected. After some time, they finally find a good place to settle for the night and get some rest. Bhima knows that they must eat to regain energy for the next day's journey. So, he instructs Arjuna to watch over the group while he gathers some recourses for the next day. Bhima wants to make this trip quick and quiet because he knows rakshasa's can smell human flesh. As Bhima continues his journey for recourses, he notices a beautiful woman tied to a tree. The woman has blue eyes with long and wavy blonde hair. As a reaction, Bhima immediately jogged towa

 My favorite story from Part B of the Public Domain Edition of the Mahabharata would be the House of Fire, and Bhima and Hidimba.  The Pandavas along with Queen Kunti, their mother, arrived at Varanavata. They thought highly of the place because of the boujee and expensive things there like the furniture and tapestries. Although, Prince Yudhishthira realized that the entire place was covered in oil. Then, he also realized that the ceilings were made of wood, a material that catches fire easily. He told his mother that he thinks Prince Duryodhana wants to burn them alive. Prince Vidura came up with the idea of digging a passageway from the palace at Varanavata to the outside forest to escape from the burning house. Prince Vidura sent a miner, who distracted the guards to peacefully and calmly enter the palace. There he dug the passage from the palace to safe place outside in the forest. The miner would work overnight and he would hide his working site using wooden planks. The miner sent

Vyasa is the author of the Mahabharata. Brahama sent a god, Ganesha, to be his scribe and write down Vyasa's words. The story also introduced several characters like Vyasa's disciple, Vaishampayana, Janamejaya, king of Hastinapura. Janamejaya was Arjuna's great grandson. Arjuna was one of the five Pandu brothers, which were all grandsons of Vyasa, the author of the Mahabharata.  The birth of Vyasa started with the king of Chedi, Uparichara. He was extremely religious and the gods feared him because they thought he was after their power. The gods gifted him a crystal car, a vehicle that flies through the sky.  During spring season, he was flying through the sky and some of his personal semen fell into a river. A female fish swallowed the semen and gave birth a boy and a girl. The boy was kept by the king of Chedi, Uparichara, and the girl was left to the fisherman's wife. The girl's name is Satyavati. Her foster father was a ferryman on the river of Yamuna. Satyavati

100 word story: Life is like Ice A brilliant student at a prestigious medical school threw his writing pen across the room and angrily cleared his desk with one swing across the fine wood. He was frustrated and depleted. The student didn't know if he could do another two years of medical school. After realizing that he just went through a mini-tantrum, he decided to get a drink at a local bar. The student was staring at his cranberry vodka at the bar countertop. He realized that ice eventually melts. He began to think deeper. He realized that life is like ice; enjoy it and make the best of it before it melts.  6 word story: Mirrors Mirrors were made to be motivational.  Sources: No sources were used. I kept writing different microfiction stories until I wrote something I genuinely liked.  Author's Note: I sat in front of my open laptop screen until I came up with an idea for a story. I was drinking a to-go beverage of water from Olive Garden during the process. I finished my dr

 On a rainy day, Puzzles, a bar on the North End of Sri Lanka, was experiencing the slower end of a business day. The bartenders have just been sitting around drinking desi daru's. A desi daru is a popular modern drink found in India made of molasses.  As the bartenders were taking a drink of their freshly made beverage, a middle-aged man walks in soaked. The bartenders look at each other in awe because of the condition the man was in. The middle-aged man walks into the bars and takes a seat at the countertop. He asks the bartenders, "what is that drink that puts such joy on your face?" The bartenders say to the man, "This is a desi daru. We were having a slow day so we thought we should keep ourselves busy." The middle-aged man says, "I could definitely use a drink that could help me settle down." "No worries. Do you want to start a tab or close it?" says the bartender. The gentleman wanted to keep the bar tab open. He tells the bartender, &

Part A ended with Rama asking for Sita's forgiveness after doing a funeral pyre in fire with the God of Fire, Agni. Then, Rama and Sita leave in a Pushpaka, a flying chariot.  At the same time, the narrators plot consists of Nina leaving India to New York for a week. Dave Stays in India. Furthermore, Dave actually breaks off the relationship with Nina through email while she is in New York. She was in distraught because of the situation.  The Ramayana plot continues as Sita tells Rama that she is pregnant. At the same time, a dhobi, a laundry man, physically abuses his wife with accusations that she was unloyal. He also compares his wife to Sita.  Due to the laundry man's accusation and comparison to Sita, Rama commands his brother Lakshmana to take Sita to the forest and leave her there. He decides to do this because he has to keep his high end reputation.  Sita once again sings the Blues while crying Lakshmana takes her to the forest.  Sita thinks that because of all the trag

 For this weeks reading, I decided to watch Sita Sings the Blues by Nina Paley from Youtube.  The story is told by a narrator that is deciding whether the Ramayana is true or not. There is also a story within the movie about Nina and her boyfriend, Dave.  The story starts with talk about King Dasharatha's life.  He has three wives and four sons just like the Public Domain Edition of Ramayana.  Queen Kaikeyi, a wife of King Dasharatha, makes Dasharatha exile Rama. Dasharatha dies from grief.  Sita is a simp over Rama and goes into exile as well, regardless of the Rama's warning of the rakshasas.  The narrators begin to talk about the story of how Ravana stole Sita. Many people say Ravana was a good king, but people also compare him to Mogambo, a Hindi film villain.  A short legend told about Ravana right after this was about Ravana playing the veena (lute) for Shiva with his intestines since he was so devoted to Shiva himself. The string broke while playing a song, so he used h

Visitors, you can find my Project Portfolio here . Thank you for visiting and commenting!   This image shows Dasaratha saying goodbye to Rama after he's been banished for fourteen years. The image was found in the image library for MLLL-4993, but can be found at the San Diego Museum of Art. 

 For my Story Laboratory this week I decided to watch TedEd Videos.  The most interesting video I watched was How to use a semicolon by Emma Bryce.  I decided to choose this specific assignment for Story Laboratory because it would be extremely useful for this class. The semicolon is a punctuation mark that is "stronger than a comma and less final than a period," according to Emma Bryce. It has particular and major tasks. The first one is to make a sentence filled with many commas more clear, thus clarifying ideas.A semicolon separates ideas, but also builds connections between them because they all relate to the same main thing.The second task of the semicolon is to tie together independent clauses, which are sentences that can stand on their own. Semicolons make these short independent clauses look and sound better because once again, they are related in some way. If a paper was written using simple independent clauses then the writing would be perceived as monotonous. Acc

 Part D starts with the creation of Rama's bridge.  Rama knew he would need to cross the ocean in an attempt to reach Lanka after Hanuman leaped there using his superpowers. He began to perform sacrifices to get the attention of the God of Ocean. None of the sacrifices worked. Angrily, he began to shoot arrows with his bow and celestial weapons into the water. The sea got angry as well and darkness came about with lightning and thunder. Rama threatened to dry up the sea. After these numerous attempts, God of the Ocean rose above the water telling Rama to find help from Nala, son of Vishwakarman, the divine artisan, to help innovate a bridge that would let everyone across. The God vanished back into the waters immediately. A green body, Nala, assisted by his workmen, made rocky islands between the land they are on and Lanka. The bridge is now called "Rama's Bridge."  Now that Lanka is accessible to Rama, it was time for his next step towards his beloved Sita. The earth

 The story of the Ramayana continues as Rama is still exiled and is traveling with Lakshmana.  As strangers in an unusual territory, Rama and Lakshmana were approached by a Hanuman disguised as a beggar. Sugriva and Hanuman wanting to find out who the strangers were on their territory and what their reason is for coming. After Hanuman asked them questions, neither Rama or his brother gave a response. The beggar ended up revealing himself as Hanuman. Hanuman convinced Rama and his brother of his identity and took them all to Sugriva after Rama explained to him what they were doing in the Lake Country. After Rama explains to Hanuman his recent events, Hanuman begins to explain Sugriva's story as well. He also lost his wife and lost his kingdom to a brother.  More on Sugriva's story.  Vali and Sugriva are in battle with an Enemy. The enemy ran into a cave and Vali instructed Sugriva to stay at the mouth of the Cave until his return. Sugriva did just that for an entire year. Sugriv

Of the listed articles from Week 2, I chose to read Seven Ways to Crush Self-Doubt in Creative Work by John Spencer. This article is about guiding the audience through self-doubt. John Spencer says, "self-doubt is a part of doing something really difficult that you care about deeply." I agree with John's statement. Self-doubt comes into someones mentality when they don't want to fail at something they'd like to be successful with. John really ties this together with his second method, to abandon perfectionism. We need to value the learning aspect of everything as well. As John says, self-doubt can crush confidence. Of the seven ways listed to crush self-doubt, my favorite one was to abandon perfectionism. People fear imperfection. This can cause someone to avoid progression and quit the task because it isn't perfect. Reading this article is beneficial in this course because writing is intricate. It takes time for someone to write the "perfect" story

 The topic I chose to write my Storybook over is Rama. I am not quite sure which storyline I'll be choosing, but I've found a few stories with Rama included.  The first story I read and chose for my Storybook is  Dasharatha: The Story of Rama's Father . The story is about Dasharatha, Rama's father, and how Rama came about. Rama's mother is Kaushalya. It all starts when a young aged Dasharatha kills a young boy while hunting during the night time. The young boy's parents curse Dasharatha for the accident and say, "Your son too shall be parted from you, and you shall die grieving for him. One day, in the middle of battle, one of Dasharatha's wive's saved his life. He promised Kaikeyi two wishes whenever she wanted them. After some ritual sacrifices, Dasharatha had three sons from three different wives. He had Rama from Kaushalya, Bharata from Kaikeyi, and Lakshmana and Shatrughna from Sumitra. All three wives and Dasharatha knew that Rama was the best

This story can now be found on my Portfolio:  https://sites.google.com/view/ramabyajh/story-1 Therapist: Hello Bharata, My name is Mrs. Krishna. Welcome home to my new office here in India. My assistants have repeatedly told me that you must speak to me, urgently. So Mr. Bharata, how can this therapy session be of help? Bharata: I have been through a scandal, Mrs. Krishna. I've been working so hard to make the name of my own and the name of my family worthy. I just don't know what to do at this point. I have never dealt with such shame.  Therapist: Well, Mr. Bharata. Let us take this step by step. Explaining your situation to me can help me help you. So Bharata, what is going on between your family that has left you utterly so disturbed? Bharata: It all started when I left for Ayodhya to the kingdom of the Kaikeyas with the rajah Ashwapati. I knew my father's days were coming to an end. An entire seven nights passed until I reached back home. As soon as I stepped a foot int

 For Part B of the reading for Week 3, I have decided to take notes over Bharata's Return. Dasharatha has passed away from age and Rama is in exile. Rama is still not in his hermitage because of Bharata's mother, Kaikeyi. She used her two wishes to make Bharata king and not Rama.  Arriving to Ayodhya, Bharata was told that Dasharatha has passed away and that Rama was exiled. Bharata was not content to hear the news and he began to cry on the floor. His mother, Kaikeyi, told him that he should not grief. Bharata was confused on the presence of Rama. Kaikeyi told him the entire story of what happened. She said that she did what she did for her son and that he should not sorrow because he is now the ruler.  Bharata still was not content with the news. Essentially, he questioned the importance of being a ruler if he lost his father and his older brother.  Bharata had mixed feelings over his mother now. He didn't want to take her life because he knew Rama would not have wanted h

 Reading notes over Part A of Week 3 Reading:  Dasharatha was king of Koshala and father of Rama. There is also Mithila who is ruled by Janaka, the father of Sita. The article tells a great description of Koshala in "King Dasharatha." Dasharatha is powerful and has two family priests, Vashishtha and Vamadeva. Dasharatha also has three queens: Kaushalya, Kaikeyi, and Sumitra. The Gods gift Dasharatha four sons after he does a horse sacrifice. Of the four kids that were born from the wives of his own, Rama was the most gifted. Rama is actually a human avatar who is actually Vishnu, a god. This was done this way because Ravana cannot be defeated by gods, but only human or a monkey. Vishvamitra asks for the help of Dasharatha's sons, Rama and Laskshmana, to battle against demons who are disturbing the priests. This was the start of their manhood. In a dark and suspenseful setting, Rama and his brother cut the ears and nose off of a rakshasan woman, Thataka. The priests then d

Once upon a time a young man named Ezra learned the biggest lesson of his life.  Ezra is a smart man who utilizes his incredible skill of being discrete. He can get away with just about anything that comes to mind. His other complementary skill is being remarkably casual with any person he encounters. Ezra is intricate with his conversations. His charm was telling people what they wanted to hear. Throughout years, he noticed this unique glamour to his character and mastered it.  Ezra also had another remarkable skill. He was an excellent shoplifter. Ezra would go to the mall every other Saturday of the week. Knowing it was the busiest day of the week, Ezra would casually come across a few stores and pick up a few items. In fact, to keep it even more casual, Ezra liked to interact with the store workers. His thought process was that the open book in the room is the most trustworthy. You can more or less think about it as being the hidden in plain sight. He wanted to make sure workers en