Week 12 Story: Battle with Khara

As the battle around him, Rama looked around him and instantly spotted Khara. Khara was sitting on a horse riding into the battle swinging left and right. He was slicing Rama’s men to bits. Rama decided that was enough and turned around. 

He looked at Sita and said, “I do not know where this battle will go but you must go and be safe. I will come find you at the castle. Now hurry!”

Sita looked at him and nodded, then proceeded to run back into the castle and had the guards barricade the door.  Rama then put on his helmet and got on his horse and charged down the hill towards Khara.

As he neared Khara he yelled, “We are going to finish this Khara!”

He then proceeded to jump off his horse and tackle Khara to the ground. Khara and Rama both rose quickly to their feet and drew their weapons.  Khara struck right and left swinging widly while Rama tried to parry each blow. Unfortunately, he missed a few and was struck twice, once on his arm and another on his leg drawing a lot of blood. 

Rama grimaced and yelled, “You got lucky, Khara. Now it’s my turn!”

Rama lunged and started slashing left, right, up and down. He never swung the same way twice so that it would confuse Khara about where he was going. He landed a multitude of hits and after swinging he looked at Khara.

Khara could not believe what had just happened. He thought he had this battle won but as he looked down he saw blood gushing from the cuts on his body and fell to his knees.

He cried out, “Rama, strike me down if you must in hate, but know killing me will never bring back the ones you lost.”

Rama was about to swing his sword down to behead Khara when he realized he was right. 

He stopped himself short of beheading him and said, “Today, Khara, I spare your life and you now are indebted to me. Whenever I call on you or your army you must answer the call.”

Khara looked started and nodded in agreement. Now since the battle was finally over after 15 long grueling days, Rama raced back to the castle and was reunited with Sita.  From that day on word of his mercy spread throughout the land.

Rama. (1816)

Na. Source: Wikicommons

Author's Notes: 

I wanted this story to go a different direction than the original. In the original one Rama sent a flaming arrow and destroyed Khara. With this one I wanted it to drag out a while but instead of Khara dying, he was spared.  I think it is more impressive to show mercy to people who don't deserve it than to kill.

Bibliography: Gibbs, Laura. Battle with Khara. Battle with Khara

Reading Notes Part B: Battle with Khara

For Part B I decided to choose the story Battle with Khara. I actually liked that this story did let us know what had happened in the story before it so that way I wouldn’t be lost. There really is not a whole lot of positive things to say about this story because it is rather short.  What I will say I like is that Rama does protect the ones he loves and defeats his enemy.

I hate how short the battle is. Why not make the battle between the main two people last longer than shooting a flaming arrow? When I read that line I was thinking, “That’s really the whole battle?” There needs to be more sustenance so that way anyone who reads this story can feel like they aren’t wasting their time. I just do not understand who a story that has led up to a big confrontation can end in such a little fight. Heck, it was not even a fight, all Rama did was fire a flaming arrow and catch Khara on fire, where’s the fun in reading that sentence. This story was such a letdown. Sometimes short stories are ok but in this case a longer one would have been preferred because it lacks a powerful punch.  I thought judging by the title of the story it would have to do more with Khara than with Rama and boy was I wrong. It seems weird that Indians don’t have their stories focus on bad guys but just on the good. If we got to know more about the bad guys and why they were doing what they were doing then the story would flow smoother. At first I thought I was going to write my story on part A but now I have a strong feeling I will focus on this one.

Rama Fighting Demons (1916)

Chitra Ramayana. Source: Wikicommons

Bibliography: Gibbs, Laura. Battle with Khara. Battle with Khara

Reading Notes: Part A Rama Goes into Exile

For Part A I decided to read about Rama going into exile.  I thought that this was a great story. It showed how loyal everyone was to Rama, not only that but that his wife was going to share in the punishment that he was facing.  The loyalty that follows Rama is strong, with the fact that his brother and wife are insisting on doing his punishment with him. What I really enjoyed was that, at the end of the story, even though he had been banished he promised to come back and honor the person who banished him.  Like, who does that, because I know if I came back from banishment I would want to see the person who sent me away die and I wouldn’t stop until they were hurting or dead.  I guess this why everyone thinks that Rama is a just and equal god.

One thing I was wondering is that if he is so powerful and mighty, why doesn’t he just destroy the people who put him into exile? I wonder if it is because he is showing the rest of his nation that he is just like everyone else and that not even he is above reproach? There is really not a lot to dislike with this story.  Rama knows that he has done something wrong, even though we aren’t told what if we haven’t read the stories before, and he takes his lumps like a man.  The only thing that I wished this storied included was a brief summary of what happened in the story before it so that we knew why Rama was being exiled again.  Overall, I felt this story was a great one and very strongly written. I think I might end up writing my Week 12 story on this.

                                  Rama and Sita. (September 17, 2013)

                                        Myknow3. Source: Wikipedia

Bibliography: Gibbs, Laura. Rama Goes into Exile. Rama Goes Into Exile

Week 11 Story: The Stupid Monkeys

Backstory

A long time ago there lived a group of three monkey friends named John, Chester, and Ray. They were known around the monkey village as the three stooges.  The reasoning for this nickname is because they could never complete a task they were given without screwing it up.  The most recent job that they had messed up was bringing back wood to the village so they could roast their bananas. Instead of bringing back wood, they pretended to sword fight and ended up breaking the sticks into tiny pieces that could not sustain fire. Ever since they were young they were the outcasts of the society and no one paid any attention to them.  Lal the other monkeys thought they were just failures but unbeknownst to them, they strategically did that so that they wouldn’t have to be counted on to do anything important. That is how they wanted to live their life.

Bananas and Freedom

One day they were walking along the trees and noticed a huge cache of bananas just hanging in a tree.  They all looked at each other and decided that that if they brought it back to the village that they would be considered heroes and treated as such.  They also agreed that if they were able to do that then they probably wouldn’t have to ever do any other task that the village asked of them.  So, John climbed to right above the bananas and started to pick each off one the bundle connected to the tree.  He started throwing them to Chester and Ray who started to have a competition to see who could catch and then carry the most bananas. Eventually, the tree was picked clean and they proceeded to make their way back to their village. When they arrived and all the other monkeys saw all the food they carried, they went wild.  They were going crazy over having an abundance on bananas to eat.  John, Chester, and Ray were proclaimed hero’s and from that day on they were never asked to do anything for the village.  They proceeded to live their life and be lazy for the rest of their days.

Three Monkeys. (No date)

iirliinnaa. Source: Pixabay

Author’s Note:
I wanted to make this story a little bit longer than the original.  I wanted to monkey’s to be lazy yet cunning not just lazy. It made sense to have to have them just want to live their lives and no be counted on. Having the three friends always mess up the tasks they are given was a cunning ploy by them to not have to do work.  It is the sign of intelligence, especially when they realize if they bring the bananas back they won’t have to do another task for the village.

Bibliography: Babbitt, Ellen. The Stupid Monkeys. The Stupid Monkeys

Reading Notes Part B: How the Monkey Saved His Troop

Since I complained so much about how Monkeys were treated as idiots and buffoons in the world, I decided to read a story that talks about how a monkey saves his troops.  What I love about this story is that it is showing monkeys off in a good light finally.  The monkey does not seem stupid or lazy.  This monkey is able to help the chief save his men from being destroyed by the enemy by finding out what they are doing and where they are planning to attack. I like that the monkey is given a large task and is able to succeed in that task. It seems that this is not the first time the monkey has been asked to help humans out. It seems he/ she is very good at his/her job. What I love about this animal is that it seems to have no hesitation when I comes to helping out humans. This shows how selfless the monkey really is.

One thing that I am wondering about is why are humans relying on animals to help them survive? I wonder if that is because they view animals as gods and that by having them in their stories as saviors then they will be rewarded? In past stories we see animals talking and that makes me wonder why the monkey and the king are not talking together. It just makes the monkey seem primitive but that it knows exactly what the king is saying.  That makes no sense at all. If an animal cannot speak then there is no way it should understand what humans are asking it. Overall, I think the story is pretty good, but it does have some flaws in it like any story typically would. I might consider writing my story about this but I am not sure how I would change it.

Archers. (May 22, 1918)

Joseph Fawcett. Source: Wikicommons

Bibliography: Babbitt, Ellen. How the Monkey Saved His Troop. How the Monkey Saved His Troop

Reading Notes Part A: The Stupid Monkeys

For Part A reading I focused on the story of the The Stupid Monkeys. I actually really enjoyed this story because it holds to true to how people view monkeys.  Monkeys are often thought about as not being the smartest animal on the planet and what they do with their daily live as boring.  Often in media Monkeys are depicted as dumb and incompetent and that is exactly what this story does with the monkeys.  It is funny to see that stories way back in the day have the exact same thoughts on how monkeys should be portrayed the people in this day and age do. Monkeys aren’t always known for being the most intelligent creatures and I am interested to know why. The rest of the stories in this section are quite entertaining and maybe next time I will focus on them.

What I was various about is why are monkeys always made to be looked at as the village idiots? It seems in some media and cultures they are regarded as wise so why do we make them look dumb? If I were to write a story I’d flip it and make the humans look like the dumb ones and the animals the wisest. What I didn’t like about this story as well is the fact that it was rather short. When you get to the climax of the story all the Monkeys did was pull up trees and they ended up dead.  That doesn’t really seem to make the monkeys stupid just not careful. Overall, I thought that this story was really lacking when it came to make the monkeys look stupid. I think what the story did, was in fact make sure that everyone is careful when doing a tsk because if they aren’t then there could be consequences, like killing a tree.

Monkey. (May 23, 2018)

Thomas Shahan. Source: Wikicommons

Bibliography: Babitt, Ellen. The Stupid Monkeys. The Stupid Monkeys

Week 10 Story: The Monkey and the Crocodile

There once was a young crocodile named Marty. He was the runt of his family and his older brothers always made fun of him because he could never seem to bring dinner home to the family.  On top of that there was also this monkey that lived up the bank that constantly made fun of Marty and made him feel inadequate. 

One day Marty’s mom, Dorothy, called him over and said, “Marty, I need you to go out and get dinner for us, your brothers and father are away hunting for gazelle.”

Marty replied, “Mom, what should I hunt for?”

His mom replied, “Just enough to feed us hunny.”

Marty then wagged his tale and went off in search of food for them.  Along the way up the bank to where the deer where he heard a voice call out to him.

“There goes that little runt, Marty. Says he is a crocodile but can never catch anything.”

Marty looked up and there was Damon, the wise cracker of the monkey’s, laughing at him. Marty grew mad just thinking about all the times Damon had called the other animals to laugh at Marty when he couldn’t secure dinner for the family.

 An idea formed in Marty’s head he thought, “If I pretend like i am giving up on hunting and pretend to cry maybe I can lure Damon down and we can eat him for dinner.”

After Marty had formulated this plan he proceeded to act it out.

He cried to Damon, “you are right, I am the worst hunter, so I give up! You win Damon, are you happy!”

Damon, upon hearing this, was shocked because he did not think that crocodiles would take jokes so seriously. He then proceeded to sing down to the lowest branch of the tree that he was in and looked at Marty.

He said, “We are just messing with you Marty, but if you want to give up why not just live on land. I’m sure the other animals will have use for a crocodile that can’t hunt.”

He then proceeded to laugh loudly and as he roared his head back he noticed that Marty winked at him.

He thought, “That is odd, why is Marty winkiiiiinnnngggg…”

Marty jumped out of the water and snatched Damon out of the tree as Damon was deep in thought.  With one powerful bite Damon was dead, no longer able to taunt and heckle Marty. When Marty returned home his father, brothers, and mother were all there.  Once they saw that Marty had Damon in his jaws they cheered for Marty had finally become one of them. That night a grand feast was held with the family heaping praise on Marty for killing the most annoying monkey in the jungle.

Monkey. (December 4, 2015)

Saidkarimail. Source: Wikicommons

Authors Note: 

I wanted to change up this story. In the original the monkey gets the best of the crocodile.  With this one I wanted the crocodile to turn the table on the monkey and get the last laugh.  I think having Marty being bullied by the monkey makes everyone feel for him and want him to finally get a kill.  This story isn’t as long as ones that I usually post because I want this one to be short, sweet, and to the point. It is serendipitous that that kill would be the Monkey. The lesson of the story is that karma will come around and bite you on the butt.

Bibliography: Babbitt, Ellen. The Monkey and the Crocodile. The Monkey and the Crocodile.