Week 11, Reading Diary B, Krishna

This is the second half of the reading for Sister Nivedita's book "Cradle Tales" about Krishna.

Return to Mathura

• Kansa the Tyrant invites Krishna and Bolarama to fight in a tournament
• Krishna and Bolarama fight all the wrestlers and win
• Krishna grabs Kansa and kills him and all his brothers
• Krisna and Bolarama reunite with their mother and father

Charioteer of Arjuna

• This is the story of Arjuna and Krishna
• Krishna becomes Arjuna's friend
• Helps Arjuna defeat the Kuravas Brothers

The Lament of Ghandari

• Duryodhana's mother comes forth to grieve
• asks Krishna and curses him at the same time
• Krishna thanks her and tells her the truth she already knows

The Doom of the Vrishnis

• This is a story where the rumor of a kingdoms end actually causes the end
• the curse of Duryodhana's mother comes true
• Krishna leaves to the forest and never returns again

Krishna and Arjuna

Week 11, Reading Diary A, Krishna

This week I'm reading from Sister Nivedita's book "Cradle Tales" and the tales she has written about Krishna.

The Birth of Krishna

• krishna is the twelfth child of Vasudeva and Devaki, prisoners of the king.
• Krishna is switched at birth with a farmers daughter

The Divine Childhood

• Krishna has great strength
• kills many demons
• has strange skills like turning rice into jewels

Krishna in the Forest

• All the commoners have love for Krishna
• Krishna likes to play games with the Gopis
• Krishna kills more demons

The Dilemma of Brahma

• Brahma tests Krishna to see if he is god or human = definitely divine

The Serpent Kaliya

• Poison lake of Kaliya
• Krishna brings his friends back to life with his tears
• banishes Kaliya from the lake

The Lifting of the Mountain

• Krishna says worship of Indra is an old custom
• Indra gets mad and sends down a torrent of rain
• Krishna picks up mountain and shelters the town

Krishna

Week 10, Famous Last Words

Well this week I only had time for the second reading, which was much shorter than the first.  Something that I’ve noticed and from Claire’s posts I see that she has too, there seems to be a rather gendered view on the Indian Epics.  The stories I’ve read about women have always been about them as a wife,  as a mother, or something similar and less spectacular.  The only power they seem to have in their lives is how to take themselves away from their husbands by dying such as Sati and Sita, both married to powerful men, both giving their bodily forms up for their husbands.

This week I don’t really think I wrote anything spectacular.  I have neither the time nor the patience to sit down and allow the words to come flowing from my brain, through my hands, and onto paper or computer.  I generally don’t even have time to do the extra-credit work, but this week I got a little pep in my step and so now I’m doing extra-credit, which seems to be my best work this week.  I actually tried to sit down and do a little fantasy writing as a relaxation exercise, but I couldn’t get my head into it because I always feel the pressure of homework lingering over my head.  I always have this sneaky feeling that I’m forgetting to do something and even when I’m not in school I feel it too!

Well I’m only in three classes this semester and frankly it’s been really hard of late to leave my happy little home, drive the hour to get to class, and then actually attend class.  That’s one of the reasons I love this class so much, I don’t have to worry about my attendance.  I just do the homework; do the projects, all in my chair in my front room while watching something like Property Brothers or Fixer Upper.  So therefore I find it hard to show up to class and even harder to get my mind going for these classes where it seems like I’m studying the same things over and over again.  I guess I’m a lot less focused than I use to be.  Also it’s really hard to come up with an ethical essay and I think it’ll be really hard to come up with a fifteen page paper on one!

Something that I’ve noticed on Facebook here recently is the issue about the police officer arresting the young woman at the high school when she failed to comply with the teachers.  I think it’s complete crap he was fired, I think it’s complete crap that he was even called into the classroom in the first place, and I think the whole situation is complete crap.  Yes the girl was distressed from the loss of her mother and grandmother, but that does not give her the right to strike a police officer and ignore school policies and teachers.  She should not have resisted at all when the police officer tried to remove her from the room and he did not throw her.  Anyone who has tried to throw someone from that angle knows exactly how impossible that is.  The whole situation is completely out of context, and should never have happened if the teachers had taken the appropriate steps in the first place.  A police officer should not have been fired over this.  She was 17-18 years old and she knows how she is suppose to act. The End.

police officer

Week 10, Reading Feedback

Okay so this week I chose Sister Nivedita's stories about Shiva from her books "Myths of the Hindus and Buddhists" and "Cradle Tales".  Out of these I actually only read a partial part of the first one and all of the second book.  I felt really intimidated by the amount of stories in the "Myths" book which is why I didn't read it as well, I felt like it was hard to get it in all in one day.

One thing I noticed was that in the story "Tiger-footed" the characters name was never mentioned, neither was the real name of the place where he sought worship to Shiva, I think these are important so I actually looked it up and ended up doing my storytelling piece on it.

I think one of the biggest problems I had with these readings was the format, I have sort of bad eyes and it was hard to read in the format of a book that's online.  I end up having to zoom way in and then it's not like flipping through an actual book, and you never know how long a story is unless you just click through to the end first.  I like knowing how many pages I'm going to read.  I like the format of Project Gutenberg the best.

tiger

Week 10, Storytelling, Tiger-footed

Kaal was born in a small cottage, barely kept up against the ravages of time, located near the banks of a once beautiful river.  In this time, modern amenities rarely still worked and the fitted clothing of the old ones was wearing thin and gave way to the rougher homespun clothing of the new generation.  The sprawling cities were covered in the overgrown and untrimmed plants, and the concrete roads were all cracked and uneven.  Smoke clung to the clouds and the rain, when it came, was often very acidic.

Kaal was born strong and his mind beheld great wisdom, even for a person so young as he.  He used his young years and energy to learn the ways of his father, the local sage.  He meditated for long hours, and in the early hours of the morning he presented flowers to the shrine that was located on the roof.  During the great shortage, many people turned to Shiva for hope and worship, he was the great answer.  A simple god that was not only the creator, but also the destroyer, he controlled their destinies.  With this worship people hoped that the Earth would once again have clear skies, beautiful fields, and sweet rivers and oceans that ran clear and clean.

Kaal devoted himself to this god and spent all his waking hours learning more about him and when finally he learned all that his father knew he asked, “Father, I wish with all my heart to worship Shiva in the purest way possible, but I am distracted here. There are too many people and I am young, where can I go to worship the great god?”

His father was so proud of Kaal and, with that pride, prepared him for a journey to the pool of light. A place untouched by time and people, the best place to worship Shiva.  So Kaal left his people and his little cottage and came to the greatest place left on Earth and each day he would lay flowers in the waters of the pool and keep it clean from pollution and secret from other humans.  Unfortunately Kaal was not as supremely happy as he thought he should be, but he couldn’t help but think that there were better flowers for the pool that he couldn’t reach with his own hands. 

He prayed every day to Shiva, continued to lavish the pool of light, and asked again and again to be granted the ability to provide Shiva with the best flowers.  Then one day he woke up and realized he was changed.  His hands had turned into claws, his eyesight was six times stronger, and his feet became more powerful like those of a tiger.  With these new abilities he without flaw gathered the best flowers for Shiva and continued to worship him unfaltering the rest of his days.

tiger

Author’s note:

While I didn’t mention this story in my reading diary, however I found it interesting in labeling the saints of Shiva.  This saint was called “Tiger-footed” due to Shiva granting him a boon so that he could reach the best flowers for Shiva’s pond.  The story is much the same and Kaal’s name is really much longer, it is “Pulikaalmuni.”  This was from Sister Nivedita’s book “Myths of the Hindus and Buddhists.”  I wanted to use the setting of a slightly post-apocalyptic world to change it up a little bit and give it a little more interest.

Week 10, Reading Diary A, Shiva

This week, following the reading guide that I made for myself, I read Nivedita's Cradle Tales on Shiva.

Shiva, The Great God.
This story really describes how Shiva looks, the beggar in simple clothes holding his beggar bowl and trident.  He is in eternal meditation up on his mountain peak in the Himalayas with his one possession , his old bull, Nandi.  His role as the creator and the destroyer, two sides of one stone. He welcomes the disabled, crippled, hunchback, and he wears the rejected snakes upon his neck.

Sati, The Perfect Wife.
This is another version of the story of Sati, Shiva's wife.  This one was quite different from Devee's version because in this one, Shiva offends Duksha before he is married to Sati and when Sati marries Shiva, Duksha tells her to never return.  However she does return for the worship party and kills herself in shame of her father, which is much the same.  Vishnu saves the world by chopping up Sati's corpse so that Shiva would return to his deep meditations.

The Tale of Uma Himavutee.

This is the tale of Sati reborn.  Sati is reborn as the princess Uma daughter of the great king of the himalayas, whose love for Shiva is why Uma chose him as her father.  Uma was very beautiful and once again thought only of Shiva for her husband.  The gods even tried to help her in that the god Love shot Shiva with an arrow infused with love and desire.  But Uma's beauty alone could not make the great god forget Sati and therefore she went to a hermitage, wore simple clothing, and ate little food and with this sacrifice Shiva finally came for her.

Shiva

Storytelling Week 9, Sakuntala

Sakuntala’s house was a small two bedroom cottage, it was surrounded by a lush garden full of many-colored flowers that just gushed with fragrance.  Small animals seemed to appear within the small spaces between the plants, undisturbed by the fast paced city that was only five miles from Sakuntala’s front door.  This was a peaceful place; the house was of a sturdy build made decades before, that was obviously meant to house Sakuntala and her young boy.

I loved visiting this place not just for the appeal to the eye, but because I felt Sakuntala had become a good friend of mine.  I met her not long after she had given birth to her son and since then I had visited her twice a week to help her with her son.  It didn’t take long for me to learn her story and wonder at how happy she was despite it.  How could any man forget her?  She’s so beautiful and she just seems to emit a glow from within that sparkles in her eyes and her smile.  It’s unfathomable that any man, no matter his status, could forget Sakuntala!

She had told me how when she was eight months through her pregnancy she had gone to find her husband.  That when she and her adopted mother had found him, he denied their life together; he denied knowing anything of her, he wouldn’t acknowledge their marriage, their love, nor their not long in coming child.  Now it seemed like she waited for him, as if she thought that one day he would magically remember that he had married her, that they had a child together.

However the child concerned me.  Although he was young, he ran around like a dervish and it seemed as though he could speak to the animals he encountered and that they understood him.  I took him for walks when I came to give Sakuntala a break and when we walked he would greet the birds, squirrels, and rabbits, but then he would also greet the wolves hiding in the dark corners and the tigers in the low-lying branches of the trees.  He never failed to boggle my mind!

It was on one of these walks that I met a man whose eyes were only for the child, I could see the recognition in those eyes.  He was a handsome and powerfully built man with dark hair and a dark complexion.  I knew exactly who this man was the moment I met him and I allowed him to play with the child when we walked together and when it was time Sakuntala’s son and I took the man to meet Sakuntala.  When he saw her he fell at her feet and that glow that radiated from her seemed to grow somehow and I could not but be happy that he husband had finally remembered her.  That somehow the magic really did exist!

At her feet, Sakuntala’s husband cried out to her, “My love, my angel!  How could you ever find it in you to forgive me?! How could I have ever forgotten you?!  These last four years I have searched for you! Only the thought that you were still out here kept me alive because I am dead without you!”  His shoulders heaved with great broken sobs and the gracious and beautiful pulled him up off his knees and embraced him as I knew only she could.

“My love, I gave myself to you and I am forever yours.  I would have waited for you my whole life if that is what was necessary.  I knew that one day your memory of us would return and it has.  Now let us live the rest of our lives together and rejoice in the love that we have!”

***

This was the last time I ever saw Sakuntala alone.  She and her husband left the little cottage and he took her to his people and showed her the love that she deserved.  It wasn’t until years later that Sakuntala and her husband returned to the quiet of that lush garden and small quarters so that they could peacefully retire together for the rest of their lives.

Sakuntala

Author’s note:

I really wanted to show Sakuntala’s story from another person’s eyes to really show how graciously she accepted her fate.  I’m sort of a romantic and I ‘d like to think that someone who really loves me would wait for me for as long as I need.  I didn’t really pick an era or anything but I made it a little more modern with the wording. I wanted to remain fairly vague so that the focus was really on the story and not on the setting.

Bibliography:

"Sakuntala" by Sunity Devee, from Nine Ideal Indian Women (1919). Web Source: Indian Epics: Reading Guides.

Week 9, Reading Diary A: Sakuntala

I read another part of Sunity Devee's book "Nine Ideal Indian Women"  this chapter was titled "Sakuntala".

This chapter is about the birth and life of Sakuntala who was conceived deceitfully between a fairy from the heavens and a mooni named Vishwamitra.  When Sakuntala was born her mother left her in the forest and she was raised by birds and eventually given to the mooni Kanva and his sister who adopted Sakuntala.  Sakuntala was raised as a hermits daughter and she learned to talk to the animals and grow the flowers that grew by their home.  One day the Maharaja Dashmanta came strolling by her garden while hunting for deer and saw Sakuntala working in her garden, he approached her and they fell in love.  He spent time with her at her home and then married her and impregnated her.  Then not too soon after he left to go back to rule his kingdom.

While dreaming of her new husband, Sakuntala was so distracted that she ignored a hungry hermit and he cursed her that the person she was dreaming of would forget her.  So Dashmanta forgot her, he never sent an escort to bring her to his palace.  Then eight months later as she is nearing her son's due date she and some of her family travel to Dashmanta's palace and confront him and he again says he does not know her or remember her.

Four years go by and by now Dashmanta remembers his wife but cannot find her.  Then one day he finds his son in a clearing playing with a tiger cub and follows him back to his mother Sakuntala.  They reunite and become one of those happily ever after couples.

Sakuntala

Week 8 Reading Plan

Alright so far I like the way the readings have played out and I'd really like to to learn about different Indian Epics so as to really give myself a more solid base in Indian mythology with more sources.  So far I've read some of the stories by Sunity Devee and I would really like to finish her book Nine Ideal Indian Women however I only have one set of women left to read on this.  I would also like to get a look at some of the other gods and goddesses within the world of the Ramayana and Mahabarta

Week 9:  For this week I will be finishing the Sunity Devee book "Nine Ideal Indian Women" which is a free online source. This includes the stories of two women Shakuntala and Shaibya.

Week 10: I'll use this week to start expanding my knowledge of the gods, this week will be on Shiva using Sister Nivedita's books "Myths of the Hindus and Buddhists" and "Cradle Tales".

Week 11: This week I will learn more about Krishna using Sister Nivedita's book "Cradle Tales".

Week 12:  This week I will continue my education of Krishna and the Indian gods with the reading of Cox's book "Tales of Krishna and the Gods".

Week 13 and 14:  These last two weeks I think I would like to browse through the comics on hold at the Bizzel library, most specifically on the gods and goddesses.  These comics are the Amar Chitra Katha readings.

Amar Chitra Katha

Week 8: looking back: reflections

Alright so I gotta admit that I think this class is really cool and has worked really well for my schedule and has also helped push me to write way more than I normally get to during school.  It's been really nice to read everyones projects and really get to see what people are interested in, because you can always tell how a person is by what they write about!
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One of my favorite projects that I've seen here lately is Claire's project "Hello, When am I?".  I think it's a great story and for me it really piqued my interest with the whole time travel, wormhole to another time bit that she throws in there.  I think it's a great way to get the reader interested and fits with the growing popularity of such shows now a days!  So thank you Claire for a great read!

Overall I think what I've noticed the most through the stories of the Ramayana and the Mahabharata are the inequalities between men and women. I know it's sort of a broken record, but women really had no choice!  Sita enveloped herself in the Earth when her husband doubted her for her loyalty to him and Draupadi married five brothers and had children by all of them, how confusing!  I can't imagine what life was really like when these epics came into existence!

So I generally work on my homework for this class every day when I get home from work and my other classes and that's hard because number one, I don't have any days off to myself, and second it's really hard to work on a class everyday! I get off at six every day and that means I really only have about four good hours to work with, plus cook supper, plus interact with my boyfriend! It's crazy. but I do it to myself!

Storytelling Week 7, Sati

Sati and Mahadeva

Sati sat on the floor of her room, one room among many in her father’s large mansion, looking through photos of her sisters.  Each of her beautiful sisters stood beside their god-like husbands and they seemed to fit so well together.  Her father had arranged these marriages to gain fame, power, and respect and in the process had made her sisters into very happy and carefree wives.  However, now it was Sita’s turn to marry and this time she would choose, she would marry the most powerful man in the world.  She would marry Mahadeva, this man was a simple man without wealth, instead he held immense power in his hands.  He had the ability to create and destroy anything, they called him the “creator”.  Sita had chosen this man when she was young, despite his power, he was also known for his focus, his meditation, and his spirituality.  It was rumored that he even possessed a hidden third eye, with which he could see the future. 

Her father opposed the marriage because it would not bring him any more wealth and would not bring his daughter the happiness and ability to be carefree like wealth would. However, in the end he had to let her marry him because she refused everyone else. 

Soon she left that luxurious room in her father’s mansion for the small cottage that Mahadeva had for her.  There she was happy, so happy.  She sang to the birds while she threw them rice, she sang to the deer so that they would come out from the woods, and she sang to the flowers to bloom in the sunshine.  She and Mahadeva were complete opposites and in this they were perfect. He was strong and large, she small and sweet.  Together their hearts beat as one and they meditated together out on the peak underneath a shade tree, they were perfect together.  However her father was still angry at Sati for choosing Mahadeva and was angry at Mahadeva for being penniless and without wealth.  Therefore he came up with a plan to shame Mahadeva and Sati, he would throw an immense party and would send a messenger to tell Sati and Mahadeva that they were not invited!

Maharaja Prajapati made all the arrangements, he ensured he invited all of his daughters and their powerful husbands, he invited CEO’s and world leaders, he invited everyone except his youngest, Sati, and her husband.  When her husband told her that she was not invited, she insisted that she had to go anyways, she said, “The invitation is merely a formality, of course I’m invited!  Please allow me to go! Please my love!  I only wish to go to show them my pride in being married to you!” 

Mahadeva of course could not go against his wife’s wishes so he had his only car brought around and sent her on her way with two of his men to accompany her.  Along the way she encountered Kubera, a man of great wealth, and his wife.  As friends of Mahadeva they stopped Sati in order to dress her in fine silks, flowers, and jewels. She no longer looked poor.

It was like this that she entered her father’s parties and she outshone all of her beautiful sisters and their wealthy husbands.  She outshone everyone and everyone noticed, her father most of all.  He was enraged with her presence and he let her know in front of everyone assembled there.  He scolded her for coming uninvited, he scolded her for marrying Mahadeva, and he scolded her for coming without her husband like a proper wife would.  Sati bowed her head at her father’s torrential outburst and remained silent until it ended, the she raised her head to her father and with angry, hurt eyes she cursed him, “I am so ashamed to be the daughter of one who only knows the worth of a man by his wealth, therefore I curse you father to look like the animal you are!” 

Like magic the king’s head was replaced with that of a goat and all he could do was bleat his outrage, because goats cannot speak the human languages.  Then Sati fell to the floor and yelled, “I am ashamed to have been the daughter of an animal and as such I cannot bare this life knowing that I was born from a father like the Maharaja Prajapati!”  Then and there her soul fled from her body and her life was gone.  Sati no longer belonged to this world and Mahadeva felt it and knew this would happen, and when it did he flew into a rage and vowed that he would destroy the world.  A world without Sati was no world at all!

However Mahadeva could not complete his vow because her sisters, who wished to save the world, hired a pilot named Vishnu to spread Sati’s ashes all over the world in holy places.  By this act his rage was slighted and he became sorrowful and went to sit beneath his shade tree on the peak of the Himalayas by himself.  He meditated for days at a time in order to touch the essence of Sati’s soul and when he finally did he felt finally at peace for his love was with him always and forever.

Author's note

I really liked the story of Sati and her want to marry the most powerful man despite the fact that he owned nothing of his own.  That she alone understood that he was the one who held the most power in this world.  So I decided to retell it in a slightly modern setting but with the original story as the focus.