Week 2 reading overview

After learning about the two different stories, I have decided to go with the Ramayana Public Domain Edition. I choose this one because it had lots of illustrations which I enjoy so that I can help visualize what is going on. I also really liked that this one was free and it had an audio which is narrated by our very own professor. Another pro was that it has lots of notes and is written by many authors. I like that because if it were one author and I did not enjoy their style of writing I would be stuck but this provides many different perspectives and styles which is great!

The first comic book I choose was Parashurama . This comic book is specifically about the sixth incarnation of vishnu. Incarnation in story books is always pretty interesting, so I wanted to see how the story would be played out especially since it was not the first time the character was incarnated. The front of the book was also very fascinating and looked really cool which helped persuade me to click and learn more. The second comic book I found is called the Sons of Rama. The subtitle was the "invincible twins". Although I do not have a twin, I have always thought my little brother was my twin. Growing up, him and I did everything together and people would always mistake us for twins. After clicking on it, these twins are maybe teens. They seem like children and they embark on this journey together. Pretty invincible to me, if they survive. The last comic was just something that sounded way out there. It is called Monkey Stories. The synopsis basically said the story of the monkeys who live in a mango grove and what happens when humans find mango fruit there. To me this may be like a folktale that parents tell children to teach them something. The subtitle is about wile and wisdom, which seems to prove my point.

As a student who is going into medicine and a person who is religious, there were two videos that stood out to me. The first was the Stages of Life. It talked about profession of a child to adulthood. This connects to medicine because it gives me a perspective about how a different culture analyzes progression and development. The other video about The Four Aims of Life is also interesting. I think a lot of times the world or people are searching for what is the meaning of life or what we should be seeking. This video talked about a perspective and had four aims of life. It reminded me a bit of Maslow's hierarchy of needs. The four aims of life video did not necessarily give an order but stated this is what we seek as humans. But, they did start at Maslow's first need and they progressed forward to the last one.

(Hanuman. Source: Blogspot)

This image really made me stop at just observe. There seems to be so much going on in this image. This creature is dressed in all gold, so it must be wealthy or maybe a god. It is looking down on these people who are way smaller than it and they don't seem to have emotion. The beast or god seems to be angry, especially with its mouth open and big sharp teeth. I also found it fascinating, that after typing the name of the painting or possible god, that it is very similar to human.