Storytelling Wk 9: Epic Twitter

@NotYourAverageRiver

Lil Miss Ganges!

Source Wiki commons

1,756,998 followers

3 following

@YoKingShantanu 
Hey @NotYourAverageRiver, I saw you earlier down by the Ganges. You were lookin' fine. I will give you loads of money if you go ahead and marry me. Deal?!

@YoKingShantanu
Yo @NotYourAverageRiver , I promise to not check your texts or tweet history if we get married. I won't call you when you're out clubbin'

@YoKingShantanu
I still haven't heard back on my offer. I'll send you a gold elephant. @NotYourAverageRiver

@NotYourAverageRiver
I accept your offer. See you around. Love you lots ;)

@NotYourAverageRiver 
I had a child born today. It's swimming with the fishes.

@LilRiverBaby1
@NotYourAverageRiver that was soooooo cold of you to toss me in that river. I'm going to unfollow you. Did you see what she did to me, @YoKingShantanu? I need you to come fish me out.

@LilRiverBaby1
You took a selfie after tossing me into the river?! @NotYourAverageRiver

@LilRiverBaby1
I'm glad to have company and all, but did you really have to cast all seven of us into a river? Hit up the broskis with a follow though! @LilRiverBaby2 @LilRiverBaby3 @LilRiverBaby4 @LilRiverBaby5 @LilRiverBaby6 @RiverBabythaCreator


@YoKingShantanu
I got a call from some of my "high up" buddies. They're saying you sent @RiverBabythaCreator to them, too? C'mon. @NotYourAverage River, that's horrible

@RiverBabyThaCreator
I mean, I'm just a little baby and all, but @NotYourAverageRiver must have a reason for all of this. Maybe you can talk to her, dad. @YoKingShantanu

@YoKingShantanu
I know I said I wouldn't question you or nothin' but we need to talk. Message me back @NotYourAverageRiver

@NotYourAverageRiver
I cast those babies into the river for all of their past sins. Don't worry though, this one's a keeper! @Bhishma4real

@NotYourAverageRiver
 Those babies were eight Vasus cursed by Vasishtha, himself. If anything, I did them a favor by freeing them from this mortal realm! #NotSorry

@NotYourAverageRiver
@YoKingShantanu it's been real and all but I've got to go #brokenpromises #loveyanot

@YoKingShantanu
That's cool @NotYourAverageRiver, at least I have my son to raise. Can't wait until he can throw a football! #NFLready @Bhishma4real

@Bhishma4real
Sorry, dad, but I think I'm going with mom. #priorities @NotYourAverageRiver

@YoKingShantanu
K @Bhisma4real

@Bhishma4real
It's not your fault @YoKingShantanu, I just have some things to work out with old man Vashistha. He and mom go way back. It could be worse. You're still the king!

@YoKingShantanu
Can't get Michael Bolton's, "How Am I Supposed to Live Without You?" out of my head. #np

@YoKingShantanu has made his tweets private.

Author's Note:

This was a Twitter synopsis (although I did not always adhere to the 140 character limit) of the opening story in the Mahabharata. In the story, King Shantanu (I've also read Santanu) sees a beautiful woman on the banks of the Ganges. This happens to be Ganga. She agrees to marry him only if he agrees to one condition: he is to never question her actions. Ganga proceeds to have seven children and subsequently drowns each one in the river. Upon the birth of the eighth child, Shantanu cannot hold back any more and confronts Ganga. Ganga finally explains that these "Vasus" had been cursed by Brahma, and by killing the children she is lifting the curse from them upon one year of birth. Since their agreement had been broken, Ganga then leaves with the baby. The baby goes on to be raised by Vashistha.


I tried my best to format this exchange at the very beginning of the Mahabharata to make it look like Twitter. I hope everyone can decipher who is talking to whom, but the gist is the bold is for the person posting each tweet. I tried to make the deaths of the babies being cast into the rivers more lighthearted and mystical. I know I didn't get to put much content in the story, but the twitter formatting actually uses up a ton of words and characters.

• Narayan, R. K. (1978). The Mahabharata.

After it all - Storytelling Week 9

The war was over now. The Pandavas are back.  The soldiers could be seen hugging their wives and children next to the fire place. Life was perfect, unless you happened to see the wives and children who no longer had someone to hug. They spent this evening clinging to each other, just hoping that war would never have to happen again.

The Pandavas, as happy as they were, knew it would be no easy task to face the King and his wife the upcoming day. The royal family lost every single one of their century of sons. The King's wife Gandhari had little flecks of each of her children in her eyes, and with each of her inconsiderable tears came also a little of each son back to life for a mere instant. This was clearly a time of sorrow despite the victory.



The King's words escaped, "Where is Bhima? I request the presence of his neck in my grasp." The King began to whirlwind with his fists in hopes he could land one square blow onto the man responsible for the death of so many he loved. Bhima watched from a distance, feeling cowardly because he kept himself away from the violently-swinging King. The king began to call out, "I know you are in here, Bhima." The tension in the room began to peak.  His assistant, acknowledging the seriousness of the situation, fetched a fine iron cast of Bhima, knowing that the statue would certainly evoke feelings that could hopefully relieve the king.

The King embraced the cast, giving it all the crushing force that he could muster with his once fine-tuned body. The cast began to wane under the grip of the King, and eventually gave in to the might of his force. By the time the sight-less King laid the cast to rest, it was hardly recognizable as Bhima any longer.

Bhima watched all of this in his own tomb of somber regret, laying himself face down on the lounge in the next room over. He knew what transpired had to happen, but regardless, he was reconciled in knowing that his iron likeness could be used to heal the old king.

This is approximately what Bhima's expression would have been. Source: Link

Author's Note:
I was running pretty dry for this week, so the point of this story was to include more details on this exchange between the King, Kishna, Bhima, and his statue. I'm not sure why Bhima felt that he had to stay in the King's presence, but I think it was somewhat due to guilt.

Narayan, R. K. (1978). The Mahabharata.

Reading Diary A: Week 9

Shantanu

• Kuru king of Hastinapura. Descendant of the race of Bharata.
• Falls in love with the beautiful Ganges river woman, although they agree to never question her actions. It is only after the 8th son is about to be drowned that he questions her.
• The children were "vasus" or cursed by Vasishtha. The first 7 were drowned to be freed from the mortal world into heaven, but the 8th was sentenced to living out life as a great man, but also must remain celibate.
• I know reincarnation is a thing, but punishing 7 babies for stealing a cow in another life seems harsh. I don''t care how beautiful my wife is, or how proper of a wife she is, you're not going to get away with drowning babies.
• It's unclear to me why some get "freed". Was their punishment only to live 1 year of life as a baby? Or did she feel bad about the terrible life they would live if they grew up?
• Shantanu loves those water ladies, now falling in love with the daughter of a fisherman
• I knew an Indian student at OU named Satya, although I'm pretty sure his full name had at least 3x as many characters as Satya. I think he was a computer science major, for what it's worth

Pandavas and Kauravas

• The moral of these stories should be "Don't mess with animals, because they could belong to gods or even be a god". If you can't go out and shoot a deer, in fear that it may be a celestial being, what can you do? People gotta eat.
• The gods in these stories can be so meddlesome and fickle. The celestial deer is clearly distraught over his own death and thus stops a man from ever being able to make love ever again. That's cruel.

Bhima

• Our first encounter with a rakshasa. This demon falls in love with Bhima, much like Ravana's sister, but instead has a child with her. Ravana's sister would be so proud!
• I also just realized that Bhima kills one rakshasa, so he definitely knows how dangerous they are, and then he marries another. Sounds like a good plan.