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Week 3 Story: Dasharatha's Sons

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Author's note: This is an alternate retelling of Dasharatha's Sons by Donald A. Mackenzie. In this story, King Dasharatha does not yet have an heir, so he performs Ashwamedha (horse sacrifice) so that the gods will grant him an heir. Brahma, Vishnu, Shiva, Indra, and Maruts came down and promised the king that he will have four sons. Dasharatha's Sons , Donald A. Mackenzie King Steph Curry is desperate for a ring. The year is 2010 and although he has only been in the league for one year, he is desperate for a ring. Curry resolved to perform the secret ritual: tanking. He will purposely lose games so that the lottery gods will grant them a high draft pick, thus boosting the potential of getting a star basketball player. When he told the rest of his teammates, their faces lit up with joy. King Steph Curry, trying his best to lose basketball games Wikipedia Commons On the night of the full moon of the month of October, Curry and his team decided to tank. As was ...

Reading Notes: Ramayana Part B

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Bharata Returns , Donald A. Mackenzie Bharata was informed of his father's passing and was extremely upset. He wondered where Rama was and Kaikeyi told him that Rama was exiled and he was to be the new king. She also told him that she was the reason Rama got exiled. Bharata refused to sit on the throne and went to go retrieve Rama. Rama fighting the demons Wikipedia Commons Dasharatha's Funeral , Manmatha Nath Duth Bharata performs a funeral rite for Dasharatha Rama and Bharata , Donald A. Mackenzie Bharata tries to convince Rama to go back and become the king. Rama, however, said that he will respect his father's wishes even if he was tricked to do so. Therefore, he will stay exiled for 14 years. The Sandals , Donald A. Mackenzie Bharata gave Rama some really nice sandals that are the symbol of royalty. Anasuya , Romesh Dutt Sita talks about her birth story. This one was a little hard to read and understand again. Viradha , Manmatha Nath Dutt Vira...

Reading Notes: Ramayana Part A

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King Dasharatha , Donald A. Mackenzie: There were two kingdoms, Koshala and Mithila. Koshala was ruled by King Dasharatha, the father of Rama, and Mithila was ruled by King Janaka, the father of Sita. Dashratha, despite having everything in his palace (strong soldiers, priests, protection, prosperity), he was upset because he does not have a son. A compilation of Rama Wikipedia Commons Dasharatha's Sons , Donald A. Mackenzie Dasharatha performs Ashwamedha, a horse sacrifice, for the gods so that they can give him a boy. The sacrifice also required the wives to sit beside the horse and give portions of its body to the fire. The gods answered the ritual and promised that he would have four sons. Rama: Avatar of Vishnu , Donald A. Mackenzie A couple gods went to fight Ravana, so they consulted Vishnu. Vishnu then split himself into four which became the four sons of Dasharatha. Before he did, he told the gods that as a human, he will go fight Ravana and at that point the ...

Feedback Thoughts

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The two feedback articles I read were " A Simple 5-Second Habit to Rewire Your Harshly Self-Critical Brai n" and " How to Get Past Negativity Bias in Order to Hardwire Positive Experience. " The first article I read essentially talks about "rewiring" your brain. Instead of being so critical of yourself for any setback, just think of it like a minor setback and go back to what you were doing before. The important part, however, is making sure you congratulate yourself for going back to your task. Congratulating yourself for these small tasks leaves less room for being self-critical and can boost your self confidence. I actually agree with this a lot. As someone who beats themselves up for any small setback, reading something that can improve this flaw is really helpful. In the second article, it basically talks, similarly to the previous article, about rewiring your brain. This article, however, talks about rewiring your brain to not focus on the negatives ...

Indian Epics Topic Brainstorm

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Krisha the Hero: I am interested in this topic because the premise looks very interesting. A hero slaying demons appeals to me and I think it would make reading it very easy. Additionally, the premise is decently flexible to wear I can mold it to almost anything I want for the storybook. I don't have any prior knowledge but I would like to know exactly what types of demons he slay. The reason why is because I was thinking of doing a retelling of it in the form of iconic NBA playoff series, in which there are many times where an underdog has defeated an extremely strong team (the most recent example being the 2011 Dallas Mavericks vs Miami Heat series). This resource seems promising because it is a fast-paced retelling which allows me to fit it in terms of a 7 game playoff series, if needed. Arjuna and Krisha Wikipedia Epic Battles: Similar to Krisha the Hero, Epic Battles' premise is appealing to me. Since it is basically just a compilation of fights, it could b...

Week 2 Story: Goblin City

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Author's note: This is an alternate retelling of the "Goblin City" in terms of Jalen Hurts and the University of Alabama football team. Bibliography: " Goblin City " from The Giant Crab, and Other Tales from Old India by W.H.D. Rouse University of Alabama's Football Stadium flickr In the faraway city named Tuscaloosa, Alabama, a high school football recruit and some of his friends crash landed at an unknown location that some call the University of Alabama or Bama for short. The female goblin, named Nick Saban, and his staff of goblins wanted those football players so bad, especially the captain Jalen Hurts. Saban and his staff convinced Jalen and his friends to stay in Bama. To do so, he created an illusion of happiness and prosperity. All of the football players seemed so excited and Saban put thoughts of winning multiple championships in Jalen's mind. This convinced Jalen so he decided to stay. Jalen had a lot of success early on and was ...

Reading Notes 2: Week 2 Anthology

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Goblin City by W.H.D Rouse Summary: There is this city on this island called Creylon that was home to she-goblins also known as rakshasas (male) / rakshasis (female). They would kidnap male travelers and forced them to marry them and once the goblins were tired of their husbands, they would eat them. A ship of sailors crashed on the island one day and the goblins convinced them to marry them. The sailors agreed, thinking that they were normal humans. Each night though, the goblins would go to the prison where they kept their old husbands and eat them. The captain of the sailors noticed one night that his wife was gone and found that she was eating humans. That was when he realized that their wives were actually goblins so he told the other sailors but only some of them believed him. A fairy, who hated goblins, just happened to be in the area and decided to save the sailors. So she had her flying horse come pick the sailors up. All the sailors that believed in the captain climbed ont...