Week 4 Reading Diary: Sita Sings the Blues, continued

The first part of Sita Sings the Blues, Rama saves Sita from Ravana but then questions her purity. Sita then passes the test of purity and Rama accepts her back, asking her to forgive him. 

The second part of the film begins with dumb ole Dave breaking up with Nina by email after she moves to India for him and is currently in New York on a business trip. Dave tells her to stay in New York and to not come back to India. Complete jerk! She also calls him and begs him to have her back. This is a correlation with Sita requesting to prove her purity to Rama.

I really enjoyed Sita’s singing throughout the film. It was definitely entertaining and easy to follow. Sita drops a huge ball on Rama and tells him that she is pregnant. Apparently, people throughout the community are talking about Sita’s “unfaithfulness.” So Rama tells Lakshmana to take Sita into the forest and leave her there. This part is what really confuses me about the message of the story. I assume that it is to show how important your reputation is. I really have no idea, but I would love to find out if anyone else knows. I just feel so bad for Sita. She was completely faithful to Rama, and Rama just abandons her. I just do not understand. Rama eventually sees Sita again only this time with their twin boys. Sita proves, yet again, her purity to Rama by going back to the Earth’s womb.   

Narrator explains how Rama questions Sita's purity

Wikipedia

Author: Laura Gibbs

Sita Sings the Blues

Week 4 Reading Diary: Sita Sings the Blues

I really enjoy watching videos, so it was a lot of fun to get to watch a video for this weeks readings. I will admit, I just sat down and watched the entire video yesterday. The different version of Ramayana was quite interesting to say the least. I kept thinking of how long it had to take them to make that video. That must have taken a lot of time and effort from quite a bit of people. At first, I was confused on what all was going on. There were a lot of different stories within a story, type thing. But, the further I got into it, the easier it was to put it all together. I really liked how they started out with kind of a modern story and really just explained Ramayana in a way that everyday people (like me) really get and are actually interested in the story. When I first read Ramayana, I did not really know what the main idea or the message of the story was, and to be honest I am not entirely sure exactly what it is still or even if it has a message. I would be very curious to see what a Hindu believer had to say about Ramayana, for instance, if it had one overlying theme or many small messages and also if they thought it was a true series of events. I really liked how the narrators throughout the video were putting it into more modern thinking and most of the time quite comical, that was a funny addition that really tied the multiple stories together in the video. 

Sita Sings the Blues

Video based off of Ramayana, 

created by Nina Paley

Sita Sings the Blues

Author: Laura Gibbs

Week 3 Storytelling: Rama and Sita

The gods were all looking down. Just waiting and watching…

Wondering when they should intervene.

They had been watching for some time now. The gods wanted Ravana defeated. It was his time to go. They hated how demonic and evil he was, and to obtain order and equilibrium in the land, Ravana needed to go. There was just one problem, the gods could not defeat Ravana, it had to be a human. All of the gods came to gather in a great council to decide what they were going to do to seal the fate of Ravana.  After awhile of discussing, Vishnu stood up and said, “ I shall lesson myself to that of a human and defeat Ravana.”

“You do not have to do that!” Said all of the other gods, but Vishnu insisted on his claim.

You see, it was destined to be that Rama, or Vishnu, would defeat Ravana. It was always the plan.

However, Rama was on his last leg. Him and his brother Lakshamana were tied up and with arrows all through their bodies. Rama was an amazing warrior. He defeated so many creatures and demons to get up to this point of what he was born to do, defeat Ravana. He knew that killing Ravana would be the most difficult challenge he had faced on earth while being human, but he did not know if he was ever going to defeat him at this point. Rama knew that all the gods above were on his side, and Ravana capturing Sita gave him more drive to defeat Ravana than anything else. He loved Sita dearly and just wanted her back. So as Rama and his brother were lying there on the brink of death, the gods sent Garuda to save them. After Garuda revived Rama, his brother, and the other warriors, the gods sent more aid to help Rama. The army rallied back and Rama finally killed the evil Ravana!

Hanuman, Rama, and Lakshamana attacking Ravana

At last, Rama was reunited with Sita! Rama embraced his beautiful bride with open arms and a sweet embrace. Sita was so happy to see Rama but also very sad. She knew that Rama would have to go back up to the heavens and become a god again. She knew it was all in the plan, but she loved Rama so much and never wanted him to go.

One night, Sita woke up to an empty bed. She was devastated because she thought that Rama had left her for good. She wept all night in devastating despair. As she buried her face in her pillow, she felt a gentle hand on her back. She looked up to see a concerned Rama. Rama had gone to the council of the gods and told them that he was going to stay on earth, just to be with his beautiful bride. 

Author’s Note: This is based on Rama and Sita in Ramayana, but I wanted to add a little twist because the end of Ramayana is so sad. I wanted it to be a happy ending love story.

Ramayana PDE, Laura Gibbs, April 2014

Week 3 Reading Diary: Ramayana, continued

We last left off with Hanuman finding Sita after a search party was ordered to help Rama find his wife from Sugriva after Rama helped defeat Vali, Sugriva’s brother. Rama and his army try and rescue Sita from the terrible Ravana as Ravana tried to trick Sita into thinking that Rama had died. Sita was in so much despair by this that she wished for Ravana to kill her by her husband. Rama held a massive attack on Lanka. I can only imagine the scary illusion of monkeys crawling the city in hopes of rescuing Sita. For some reason the monkeys and Rama remind me of The Jungle Book. I have no idea why, but that is in my head. Indrajit, Ravana’s son, was a fierce warrior. He was magical and could turn invisible! He tied up Rama and Lakshmana, and they were left to die. Ravana smugly showed Sita this image of Rama and Lakshmana. I can only imagine what little hope she had left just came to a crushing halt after seeing that. However, Garuda came and saved Rama and Lakshmana and rallied the troops back!

Garuda

After this, Ravana tried to trick Rama into thinking that Sita was dead. Lakshmana kills Indrajit making Ravana furious but does not succeed in the deed. During the battles, Indra sends Matali, a charioteer, and Indra’s own chariot to help Rama in the fight. Rama finally defeats Ravana with the Brahma-weapon! But, Rama detests Sita because she has been away so long from him! Then, Sita demands that her honor be defended, only to eventually be exiled by Rama. This is definitely not how I thought it would end. This makes me so sad!

Author: Laura Gibbs

 Ramayana PDE

Week 3 Reading Diary: PDE Ramayana, continued

My immediate feelings when reading part C was deep empathy for poor Sugriva. Rama and him have a lot in common, so I felt like Rama could really relate to Sugriva with family members turning on him. I think that Hanuman would be a pretty cool friend. Hanuman can take shape of a monkey and carry people. Who does not want a friend like that? Sugriva’s brother, Vali, drove Sugriva away and took his wife after Vali battled a monster. Sugriva thought that the monster had killed him so he blocked the monster in, where Vali and the monster were fighting, but in reality, Vali defeated the monster and was blocked in because of Sugriva. After Vali got out, he was furious with Sugriva and thought that he did all that to take his kingdom away from him. Against Tara’s better judgment, Vali accepts Sugriva’s battle. Rama was the one that actually defeats Vali and Sugriva is now king and vows to help Rama find Sita since he is exiled and cannot enter into a city. Rama became furious with Sugriva because once he was happy with his wives and becoming king after Rama defeated his brother, he did not help Rama find Sita. (Sita was captured by Ravana. Ravana tried to persuade Rama to take him and leave Rama). So, Lakshmana went to Vali and threatens him if he does not fulfill his promise. So, Sugriva sends out four different search teams in search of Sita. Hanuman, the great friend and part of one of the search teams, finally finds Sita!

Vali and Sugriva fighting

Author: Laura Gibbs, PDE Ramayana