Indian Epics Blog

There is a holy place that sits upon a mountain.  This mountain is not so tall that there are no trees on top, but the rocky terrain makes the ascent treacherous.  Due to the humidity of the area the mountain is often bathed in mist.  This holy place had often been used by ascetics to meditate.  At one time Vishnu sat atop the mountain in meditation.  He meditated so deeply that he became unaware of what happened in the world. Mahabali, a demon of ill-intent, set upon the world and conquered the heavens and the earth.  He had bested all the gods except Vishnu, who had not stopped meditating.  To celebrate his victory, Mahabali constructed a grand palace.  There he held court and ruled over both worlds.  All the gods, bitter from their defeat, rushed to Vishnu and begged him to defeat Mahabali. Vishnu objected to the task, as he did not want to violently overthrow the new dictator.  One of the gods suggested that he trick Mahabali....

Kaikeyi is one of the main antagonists to Rama for this section of the book.  She initially starts out praising Rama and expressing the love she feels for him as a stepmom, but ends up forcing Rama into exile for fourteen years.  Bharatha, the son of Kaikeyi, displays loyalty to Rama after he realizes that his mother engineered both Rama's exile and his succession of Dasaratha.  Dharatha attempts to reinstate Rama as king by chasing after him and attempting to make him King.  These actions show how beloved Rama is in the community.  The majority of the population even came to watch Rama and Bharatha argue over who would be king. The gods eventually step in because Rama's exile is integral to his mission.  He needs to defeat Ravana, so he journeys deep into the forest with Sita and Lakshmana.  While living in the forest Rama is confronted by Soorpanka, the sister of Ravana.  The first meeting underscores Rama's attractiveness, as Soorpanka immedi...

Rama is an interesting character.  He is the incarnation of the god, Vishnu. It is vaguely explained that Vishnu incarnated as a human because he sought to stop a demon and his army.  The other gods also took mortal form as both humans and monkeys.  Rama is portrayed as a young, attractive boy.  He is initially thrown into a coming of age story where he travels with a holy man to perform a sacrifice.  The holy man required him for protection, and Rama proved himself to be capable with a bow. He defeated enemies along the path to the sacred spot and fought off demons once the ritual had been commenced.  In these stories, the setting is often personified.  The Ganges river is personified as Ganga, mother earth.  Ganga has a duality in that she brings purification but also destruction. Another setting that is personified is a desert. This desert is personified as Thataka who is a former demigod who was turned into a demon by a saint for being viole...

I think mindset can have a huge impact on how one takes criticism, and whether they incorporate the criticism or reject/downplay it.  In A fixed mindset could be holding you back — here's how to change it they mention how growth mindset extends past school and into the workforce. This speaks to me as an aspiring engineer because I will constantly have to deal with new technology and adapt to changing environments.  Being able to implement criticism and do a better job makes you a better employee and reduces stress when dealing with similar problems. In When Your Toughest Conversations Are the Ones You Have with Yourself the author talks about how exceptionally driven people deal with a hypercritical inner voice. I think that kind of self doubt can be constructive, but it is also quite daunting to deal with.  If you can separate yourself from the self-criticism and understand it in a vacuum, then you might be able to apply it constructively to improve performance....

I am not one hundred percent sure about how this post is supposed to breakdown, so I will start with the part that is a little outside of the box. Flood Mythology: I think I could do a storybook about the flood mythology of India.  The Indus River Valley is bound to have produced flood mythology. I think that the flood story is something that connects many of the cultures on earth today. It is a common thread that links many civilizations.  I think it could be an interesting topic. Wikipedia Epic Battles :  I think this topic would be cool because it would allow me to learn about the Kshatriya caste. It is also an opportunity to learn about the Bhagavad-Gita. It is cool because it is mythological battles, so they have some interesting characters. Rakshasas: This is a topic that seems to have a lot of information and stories to pull from. I think the idea of man eating spirits is an interesting concept.  I would like to learn more about this concept and th...

Mr. monkey liked to eat. Often, he would climb trees and feast on the fruit.  He had tried many different types of fruit, and found it was not the type of fruit that mattered but the location of the tree.  Mr. monkey lived in land with widely varying terrain.  Some soil would be mostly clay, some would contain large amounts of sand, but some soil was quite loamy.  The best example of this soil sat on an island surrounded by marshland.  Mr. monkey used the fallen trees to make his way through the bog and across the water onto the island filled with fruit bearing trees.  This body of water was not uninhabited. In it lived an alligator who would watch the monkey pass to and from the island. He noticed that the monkey always walked across the trees which had fallen into the water.  Most of these trees barely resembled trees now and resembled logs with rough bark.  The alligator got an idea in his head to catch this monkey.  He often had b...

The Crocodile in the River . Vanarinda Jataka, in The Jataka: Volume 1 translated by Robert Chalmers. Story source The Bodhisatta, a monkey, is a very idealized character.  He has is described as being "big as a mare's foal and enormously strong."  The Bodhisatta can also jump quite far considering his size.  The Bodhisatta is also smart because he is able to discern that the crocodile is lurking beneath the water trying to catch him (although why he couldn't tell the difference between a crocodile and a rock I do not know).  The Bodhisatta is able to trick the crocodile into thinking a rock speaks, and then gets the crocodile to close his eyes, so that he can escape.  The Bodhisatta's character seems to revolve around him having these traits. The crocodile is assumed to be quite strong based on the fact that it is a crocodile.  The crocodile is juxtaposed against the monkey in intelligence.  The crocodile is tricked twice by the monkey but does no...

I have chosen to read P.K. Narayan's version of the Ramayana because a consistent style is very important in a narrative structure for me.  I think that it will prove easier to connect the different stories when they are all told with the same voice. Parashurama I chose Parashurama because the story of mistaken identity seemed very interesting. Also the dichotomy between the brahmin life and kshatriya attracted me. Parashurama.  Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya, Mumbai Mahiravana I chose Mahiravana because it not only seemed interesting, but it looked as though it had a lot of extra reading.  The extra reading seemed interesting because it is an opportunity to learn more than normal. A Brief History of Temples in India This seemed interesting because history gives great context to the stories and myths of a culture.  Much of the ancient world is filled with grand monuments to gods so knowing how Indian culture viewed spirituality and w...

Keys to Time Management. Source Time management has not been a huge issue for me yet in college.  I typically don't have trouble planning my time and knowing what needs to get done.  I have noticed this so far with this course.  It is not planning my time well that makes this course hard. It is my skill as a writer that limits my ability to effectively complete the assignments.  I find that it is not hard to start assignments; instead, I take far longer on a given assignment than I would like.  I typically do not procrastinate while working, e.g. my phone has never been a huge barrier to productivity, so I think the extra time arises from my lack of skill at putting my thoughts on paper.  I want to see myself improve at writing both the blog posts and the storybook pieces. I want the initial draft to take less time so I can spend quality time trying to rework sentences and correct grammar. I can already see that this class will be more time consuming t...

I view this class as an opportunity to become exposed to more web development tools.  I am already familiar with image editing tools like Photoshop (although I use GIMP because it is free).  I am however unfamiliar with the vast array of web development platforms.  I want to work on my aesthetic taste with regards to web development.  I also want to work on my skill at web development and get faster at finishing the assignments. GNU Image Manipulation Program. Source I really like the PBWorks used in this course.  It works really well and is well organized.  I like how easy it is to keep up with the the class assignments.

Before this semester, I had limited knowledge of this course.  During the orientation week, I learned how I would be spending my time for this course.  I am most excited for the reading aspect of this course.  I know little to nothing about Indian mythology and jumped at the opportunity to learn more. After taking Latin through middle and high school and learning both Greek and Roman mythology, I am excited to learn about Indian mythology. This is the first online class that I have taken, and I find it quite enjoyable being able to work on the class without having to go anywhere for a lecture. I look forward to the extra reading option because it is an opportunity to learn even more. Canvas is actually useful compare to D2L. My Screenshot.

Before watching the three videos, I had not heard of Carol Dweck, but I was familiar with the concept of failure as a great moment of learning.  I agree wholeheartedly with the goal of molding children into robust students, who not only bounce back from failure, but also attempt challenging new concepts. I do however have a couple issues with how some of the things she says.  First off, and this is one of the reasons that I do not like the TED talk format, she presents evidence for the efficacy of growth based learning such as the standardized test scores of a Harlem kindergarten class and the impressive school ranking increase of a Native American school near Seattle.  In regards to the kindergarten class she provides no evidence that the teaching method increased their scores relative to their peers. For the school near Seattle she provides no explanation as to what metric they used to determine which school was number one in that district. If the metric were standa...

Hi! I am John Sholeen.  I am a Junior studying petroleum engineering here at OU. I chose petroleum engineering because I wanted to work offshore.  This summer I will be working as a drilling intern in the Gulf of Mexico.   Although my classes were engaging last semester, I was more interested in the machine learning research I was doing.  Last semester I attempted to create and train a convolution neural network to accurately segment images.  I was moderately successful in my attempt.  The network I trained was able to accurately segment images from the training set, but it struggled when presented with new images.  Overall it was a good first step, and I am excited to continue this semester. Over the break I watched the first season of Counterpart , a Starz show starring J. K. Simmons. The dark atmosphere of the show engrossed me in the story and I couldn't stop watching.  The way the plot developed was unexpected and interesting. T...

The Book of Nabu Link  Although I am familiar with the Mesopotamian epic Gilgamesh , I am unfamiliar with most other Mesopotamian mythology.  I honestly don't know the distinction between Babylonian and Sumerian mythology, and I was surprised when the same names were being used.  The introduction gives a summary of the stories which is not so detailed that it spoils the plot.  IT makes you want to read more.  The author also does takes an interesting perspective.  The author speaks from the perspective of the Babylonian god of writing.  This stylistic choice seems cool and inventive and adds to the overall quality of the storybook.  The author did a good job of incorporating images into the storybook. Tales from the Underworld Link I initially thought the topic of the story was familiar to me based on the title.  I was expecting to read about an underworld relating to Greek mythology because the name Phoebe is also the name of a ti...

During the summer of my sophomore year of high school I visited Norway. There, I visited Preikestolen, Preacher's Rock, which is an outcrop along a fjord and sits about 2000 feet above the water. View of Preikestolen. Taken by me. Standing atop the outcrop was a fantastic experience. The fjord extend for a few miles northeast of the rock.   View of Preikestolen with fjord in background.  Author: Eduardo Manchon. Source: Wikipedia To get to the top of Preacher's Rock we hiked about two and a half miles and ascended around 1,200 feet. Once atop the rock the full expanse of the landscape amazed me.  It was one of the most awe inspiring moments I have ever experienced.

Testing my blog