Week 6 Storytelling: Hidimbi Finds Love

Hidimbi was a rakshasa woman. She was able to transform herself and so she lived as a quite beautiful woman but something was missing from her life. She had been alone, trapped in a life that had no meaning. She stayed with her brother and although he was a horrible and evil rakshasa, she had no where else to go. Her brother was all that she had in the world.

Once day while sitting in the forest where they lived, her brother Hidimba smelled humans. She didn't like feasting on humans like her brother did but she knew that she had to go get them for her brother's dinner.

Walking into the forest, she saw a man. He was like nothing that she had ever seen before. He was beautiful and she knew immediately that she loved him. She wanted to approach him but was unable to move for a moment. She had never been in love before and she was confused by these feelings. She wanted to run to him and embrace him but she was too nervous to move.

Sensing that danger was not far behind, she knew that she had to make sure her new love wasn't going to be eaten by her brother. She could try to tell her brother how much she loved this man but it wouldn't make a difference. She knew that he would eat him nonetheless. He never really cared about her feelings anyways.

"Hello", she managed to say to the man. "My name is Hidimbi. I have to warn you of the danger that you are about to encounter. My brother is very hungry and he knows that you and your family are in this forest. I don't want anything to happen to you."

"I am Bhima and I will have you know that I fear no one. Let your brother try to find me and he will pay. I am not going to wake up my family just because of some rakshasa. They are tired and they are going to rest." the stranger replied.

Once she heard this mysterious man talk, she fell even more in love with him. He was so strong and so brave and she knew right then that he would be able to take her away from her horrible life. She wanted so badly to tell him right then that she was in love with him but she knew that it had to wait until he fought her brother. She had to make sure that he survived first and then she would confess to him.

She held back her emotions as she watched her new love fade into the distance as he went to search for her brother. She hoped he would come back. She needed him to come back. He just entered her life and she definitely wasn't ready for him to leave it just yet.

Hidimbi approaches Bhima in human form. Source: Wikimedia Commons

Author's note: I based this story off of Bhima and Hidimba. In the original story, Bhima and the rest of the Pandavas are in the forest. Hidimba, the rakshasa, smells them and sends his sister Hidimbi to go get them for him. He wants to eat them. When she does, she sees Bhima and falls in love with him. She tells him that she will be his servant and save him if he wakes his family. He refuses, saying that he won't wake his family up and that he is strong and not scared of her brother. He then fights Hidimba and defeats him. In my story, I kept the storyline the same. The only changes that I made were to focus more on how Hidimbi was feeling. I wanted to show her emotions.The rest of the story was told with Hidimbi as the main focus. I also wanted to give her a little bit more of a backstory of why she would be so willing to run off with the Pandavas and to marry Bhima. I made her feel like she was missing something in her life and that she had no one but her brother and that is why she stayed with him. She knew that he was evil but she had nowhere else to go.
Bibliography: Source. Indian Myth and Legend by Donald A. Mackenzie (1913).

Week 6: Reading Diary B:Mahabharata Online 41-60

For this week's reading, I chose Mahabharata Online: Public Domain Edition. These are some of my favorite stories.
Krishna's Visit: Draupadi is obviously angry at the whole situation. She thought that her husbands should have protected her and stood up for her but they did not. Yudhishthira spends much of this time trying to convince Draupadi to forgive him saying that non forgiving him would be a sin. This is ridiculous because Draupadi has every right to be mad. Her husband lost her in a gambling match and then sent her to exile in another. I'm pretty sure anyone would be mad in this situation.

 Riddles at the Lake: The Pandavas approached the water when they were thirsty. Four of them heard a voice that warned them that they must answer questions before they could drink the water. They did not listen and drank the water anyways and died. Yudhishthira was the only one who listened to the voice and he was forced to answer numerous riddles. He was able to survive though because he listened to the voice. Its a strange turn of events that Yudhishthira was the brother that wasn't smart enough to stop gambling and lost everything, yet he was the only brother that listened to the voice and didn't die.

Bhima and Kichaka: The Prince Kichaka tries to rape Draupadi but she is able to fight against him. When she tells others what happened, she gets laughed at because everyone fears Kichaka. She is able to tell Bhima and finally one of her husbands is able to defend her. They trick Prince Kichaka and convince him that Draupadi will finally be with him but instead he finds Bhima and Bhima kills him.

Draupadi bringing the tray of food to Prince Kichaka

Week 6: Reading Diary A:Mahabharata Online 21-40

For this week's reading, I chose Mahabharata Online: Public Domain Edition. These are some of my favorite stories.

Bhima and Hidimba: I really liked this story. A rakshasa woman named Hidimba approaches Bhima and wants him for a husband. She knows that her brother wants to eat them and she tries to save them. Bhima refuses to run and Hidimba's brother finds them and threatens to kill her but Bhima won't let him. I like how Bhima refuses to let the evil brother kill Hidimba even though he just met her. He shows his bravery and fights for her and his family.

The Story of Nalayani: This story shows how Nalayani became reincarnated as Drupadi and became the wife of five husbands. I like how she ended up with five husbands due to the fact that her original husband left her unsatisfied. She prayed for a husband five times and ended up with five husbands and her main concern was that she would be similar to a prostitute. She ended up asking for her virginity to be new to each husband.

Arjuna and Chitrangada: Chitra was raised to pretend to be a male. She seemed fairly content in this until she ran into Arjuna. As soon as she ran into Arjuna, she was no longer content with pretending and she immediately went home and put on all things feminine. She wore a dress and jewelry.

Maya's Palace: In this story, Duryodhana goes to the palace of the Pandavas and basically just embarrasses himself completely. He mistakes water for land and land for water. He mistakes open doors for closed one and closed doors for open ones. You actually begin to feel a little bad for him because he can't catch a break. The entire story involves his misunderstandings.

Duryodhana slips into water. Source: Wikipedia

Thoughts about Comments

I love that people comment on the storytellings that I do for this class. I think that it definitely helps. I do like it when people comment things that they like but it helps more when people mention the things that they didn't, but only if they offer suggestions on how they think that I can improve. Sometimes something just doesn't sound good but I don't know how to make it sound better and the comments really help me so I know what to improve on next time.

I hope that I am helping when I comment. I tend to try to focus on the positives of peoples' storytellings. I don't want to be too critical and most of the time there aren't that many errors in people's writings anyways so that makes it easier.

I loved this. Source: Disney Memes

Week 5: Reading Diary A:Mahabharata Online 1-20

For this week's reading, I chose Mahabharata Online: Public Domain Edition. These are some of my favorite stories.

King Shantanu and Satyavati: This story mentions the birth of Satyavati. She was born from the fish and was found by a fisherman. She had a fishy odor and so when  Parashara asked her to be the mother of his son and told her that he would take the fishy smell away from her, she agreed. The other condition was that she remained a virgin still. Vyasa was born and grew quickly into a man and wandered away from her. This story is quite confusing so I am very glad that it is repeated. I feel like it made more sense this time around.

Satyavati. Source: Wikimedia Commons

Pandu and His Wives: This tells the story of how Pandu is cursed. He shoots two deer that are having intercourse and it turns out that the deer is a Brahmin in deer form. The Brahmin was not angry that Pandu killed deer but he was angry that he killed them while they were engaged in sex. So the curse to Pandu is that when he is having sex with his wife, he will be killed so Pandu now has to remain celibate until he is ready to die.

Drona: This story mentions how Drona and Drupada were raised together. When Drona visits Drupada, Drupada is extremely rude to him. Drupada talks about how he is so far above Drona that Drona is not to call him a friend. Drupada takes it as an insult which is completely ridiculous because you shouldn't have to have equal statuses in order to be friends with someone. Drona didn't say a word, he just walked away. This story just angered me.

Week 4: Reading Diary B: The Divine Archer

This week I read the second half of the Divine Archer. These are some of my favorite stories from this reading.

Lanka on Fire: I love how much courage is shown from Hanuman even when Ravan was threatening to kill him. He even showed courage when they were going to set his tail on fire. He knew that this would work to his advantage. As they continued to add more oil and rags to his tail, his tail grew and grew and grew. Ravan didn't take this as a bad sign and they still set him on fire. Hanuman  ran through the city burning down place by place. He  was able to grab a token from Sita to take back to Rama. I really like this story because it shows how much Ravan doesn't think things through and it came back to destroy Lanka.

Sita's test with Fire: This story still makes me angry. Rama fought so many people so that he could rescue Sita and then he decides that she has to prove that she was faithful to him. The fire proves her innocence and only then does Rama decide that he is able to take her back.

Sita's Exile: Rama decides to send Sita into exile,even though she passed the test of fire, because all the people wouldn't stop gossiping about it. Rama turned away from the one that he loved all because of some gossip. He should have just accepted that Sita didn't do anything wrong and keep her with him.

Sita and the Twins: Sita has twins while in exile and once Rama realizes that the twins are his, he decides that he wants Sita back. Sita returns, but only to return back into the earth from which she came.

Valmiki with Lava and Kusha. Source: Wikimedia Commons

Week 4: Reading Diary A: The Divine Archer

For this week, I read the Divine Archer. These are some of my favorite parts in the story.

Birth of Dasaratha's Sons: The beginning of the story tells of how Rama's mother was able to see that he wasn't just an ordinary baby. He was able to change into something great and then he returned to being a baby. He was also such a kind and gentle person.

Rama and Sita: I still love how they fell in love at first sight. She prayed  for him and he dreamed of her. It is actually really romantic how they immediately knew that they were destined to be together. I also love how numerous times someone makes the comment of how the dark one, referring to Rama, would make a perfect husband for Sita. Everybody seemed to realize that they were meant to be together.

The Succession: Desaratha decides, when he sees a gray hair, that he should now have Rama take over as king. This angered Manthara and she convinces Kaikeyi that Bharat should be king instead of Rama. So far, most of the story has stayed pretty consistent with the first version of Ramayana that we have read. I look forward to see what the big differences, if any, there are to come.

Comparing this version to the Ramayana Online Public Domain Edition, I have to say that this version is a lot easier to read. I think it is much easier and I also like how the two stories are so similar. It helps me to understand and remember some of the things that I read in the first version. It is making much more sense now that I have two to compare to each other.

Screenshot found on Blog