Characters of Mahabharata: E

Ekalavya

The young prince of Nishada, son of Hiranyadhanus, is a well known character in Mahabharata for the guru dakshina he gave - his right thumb! 

It is said that after Dronacharya declined to take him as his student, Ekalavya learnt archery himself by making a clay idol of Dronacharya and accepting the idol as his Guru. When the Pandavas find a dog's mouth sewn up by arrows that neither harmed the dog nor let it bark, they and ultimately Dronacharya spot Ekalavya, and Dronacharya asks for his right thumb as Guru dakshina. Later, Ekalavya is killed by Lord Krishna in a battle.

There are two interesting perspectives for Ekalavya's guru bhakti. One, which glorifies Ekalavya, states that Dronacharya refused to accept him as a student as he belonged to lower caste and went on to get his right thumb as dakshina to make Arjuna, his dearest disciple the best archer in the world. 

The other perspective, though, reasons out the logic and hidden purpose for Dronacharya's act. It claims that Ekalavya's mastery in archery would not serve good purpose as he belonged to the tribal kingdom Nishada who weren't law-abiding. Also, exhibiting his skills on a dog was not considered acceptable behaviour.

What to name it?

Naming a post as 'I am back' makes sense only when you don't keep coming back umpteen times and give an excuse. But that's what am going to do in this post. Much as I hate to admit, looks like I won't stick to blogging if there isn't some commitment, like a blogathon I did this January. So, to DO IT NOW, I wanted to take part in a blogathon again but being me, I was lost in blogosphere searching for a marathon that suits me. So, i took matters in my own hands and decided to finish off the series on Mahabharata that I started a while back. And also to do some serious reading and reviewing. Yes, I can do it!

llama llama

At times, am scared I will change this blog into a mommy blog. But something is better than nothing, hee hee. And I have the bragging rights in this space ;-) 

It's all about the book llama llama - wakey wake by Anne Dewdney. Its a board book about a day in llama's life from waking up to getting dressed to starting a new day. I have been reading this book to my LO(13 months now) for a while and one day, I asked her to read it for me. And she surprised me by making a couple of actions from the book. Totally thrilled, I started reading out the book with simple actions that she can relate to and within few days, she can read out the entire book through actions.

Thinking about it, this simply reiterates the facts that I learnt from the internet and the book Baby Read-aloud basics. One, repetition is the key. Two, when reading a book to your baby, make it interactive. Make simple actions they can imitate and pause when reading, as if waiting for your baby to respond.

Take a peek into my LO's bookshelf on Goodreads here.

I'm back!

Well...Errr... Hmmm... OKAY, not talking about excuses for abandoning this blog, let me come straight to the post. Its not actually a proper post, its just a comeback. My LO is turning 1 in a few days and I hardly get any time for myself. It seems to me like I have been reading Fahrenheit by Ray Bradbury and Salt Sugar Fat by Micheal Moss forever.

On the brighter side, my daughter's affinity to books looks very positive. Whenever she feels like, she goes near the table where her books are kept and keeps shouting(errr communicating, I mean) that I read it with her. Mostly I have picture books and silly books(check out my LO's goodreads account!). She points to the images in the book and says 'Idhee' for everything which I believe is 'idhu' in tamil meaning 'this'. And yes, she wants me to put it book on the table once done. 

So, trying hard not to contemplate on the fact that without a commitment like a blogging marathon, my blog is dying slowly, let me hope that I will come back with atleast one post a week!

SouthAsian challenge and SheReadsSA

I have been reading a handful of books from Indireads and have mentioned in my previous post about the quality of writing and the stories. I just found about the SheReadsSA initiative and found it interesting and wanted to share. I found the bookmarks so adorable :)

Check out more about it @ http://www.indireads.com/shereads-south-asia/#!prettyPhoto 

Updated Reading Bingo

Here is my Reading BINGO updated,

Characters of Mahabharata: D

Dhritarashtra, Duryodhana, Dushsana:

Dhritarashtra, the doting father of Kauravas. One among those who could have changed Mahabharata, had he chosen to. The blind king, surely deserves respect for being an able king of Hastinapur and a brave warrior inspite of his blindness. 

Duryodhana, the eldest of the Kauravas and the successor to throne after his father takes repeated action to rule of Pandavas from the right to the throne in vain. Even after reaching a consensus, Duryodhana is envious of the Pandavas and with his uncle Shakuni's misleading invites Pandavas for a game of dice, paving way to the fateful Kurukshetra war. On the other hand, Duryodhana is not just depicted as a negative character. His friendship with Karna and his trust on his wife Banumathi get a mention as well!

Dushasana, the second of the Kauravas, devoted brother to Duryodhana and his ally in all plots against Pandavas. He was the one to have dragged Draupadi by her hair to the court and disrobe her. He was killed by Bhima in Kurukshetra as per his oath during Draupadi's humiliation. 

Drupad, Drishtadyumna, Draupadi

Drupad, King of Paanchal and father to Draupadi. A friend of Dronacharya during his gurukul days, had assured him half his kingdom but failed in his words quoting the difference in status. Hence Drona asked for defeating Drupad as his guru dakshina. Arjuna defeated Drupad and Aswathama became the king of half the kingdom, the rest of which was returned to Drupad. Drupad repaid his vengeance by begetting Drishtadyumna through a Yagna and eventually he became the one to kill Drona in the kurukshetra war.

Draupadi, the most sung female of Mahabharata and the most ill-fated one. She was the one to break many conventional rules like being married to five husbands, having a male friend(Krishna), rejecting a suitor(Karna) in her Swayamvar and much more. She lived both a nomadic life in exile as well as the queen of the most illustrious palace of the times. She had the presence of mind to question Yudhisthra's rights to put her at stake in the gamble and the courage to challenge the righteousness of the those present in the court. Her eventful life only justified her being a witness to the the happenings at Kurukshetra war through a boon by Sage Vyasa. 

Drona

Teacher of Pandavas and Kauravas. A doting father who took his son's side and thus the Kauravas' as against his favorite student Arjuna. A biased teacher who favoured Arjuna by asking for an unjust gurudakshina from Ekalavya.