Week 6 Story: Fight for Democracy

Link to story in Portfolio: (Portblogio)

Dave Monett, the King of Kingdom Monett, has been seeing a lady who everybody thinks will be the future Queen. Her name is Nina, and she is obsessed with King Dave. She would do anything to please the King. One day, she receives a note from a messenger pigeon, with the news that King Dave is no longer interested and she can leave the Kingdom immediately or be forcefully removed by soldiers otherwise. She chooses to leave without force, but insist the soldiers to inform King Dave that he will be hearing from her shortly.

[10 years later.]

As the soldiers are preparing their weapons for battle, there are whispers of some unknown rebellion on the other side of the lake at the Kingdom of Dashartha. This causes confusion because the Dashartha family has been in power for thousands of years. Their current leader, King Dashartha has been the most ruthless one of all. It is a total dictatorship, and the civilians are treated as slaves. They either take the role of growing crops for the Kingdom's food, or battle as a soldier to protect. The soldiers of Kingdom Monett seem distracted, and this infuriates King Dave.

"THE NEXT PERSON TO SPEAK OF REBELLION, YOU WILL END UP IN THE BOTTOM OF THE LAKE" shouts King Dave from the top of his bannister. As he finishes his remarks, the Kingdom is washed in silence. From across the lake, everybody stares into the flames of the Kingdom of Dashartha. It is in total destruction. King Dave and his soldiers remain silent for a couple of minutes, until thunderous footsteps appear to be approaching. An army of thousands of soldiers are riding in from the distance. Everybody scrambles for their weapons, and get ready to battle.

The stampede stops at the gate, and only 6 people walk forward. King Dave notices Nina from the top of the castle, and walks out of the Kingdom to approach her and 5 others. It appears to be King Dashartha's four sons, Nina, and another boy. Nina begins to speak, "Dave, meet Brandon...Brandon Monett. He is to be the King after today. Once you are finally gone." King Dave is silenced in shock of his young son. Brandon walks towards his father, with a stare in his eyes. King Dave reaches out to hug him, only to find Brandon gouging a knife into his heart. King Dave drops to the ground.

King Dave did not know that Nina was pregnant when he broke up with her. And now, he is gone. Nina, Brandon, and King Dashartha's four sons overthrew both kingdoms and set a democracy for the people of both kingdoms, and became one united country.

Kingdom of Monett: (Wikipedia) 

Author's Note: I decided to combine two of the readings last week. The first one was about King Dashartha and his four sons. I also read about King Dave breaking up with Nina, and added the twist that she was pregnant with his son. I haven't combined two differnt kingdoms, or even two different families yet, and I thought it would be fun to do so. In the original story, Sita told Rama that she is pregnant, and this is what sparked my idea to change that to Nina for a more epic twist.

Bibliography: Sita Sings the Blues by Nina Paley (Link)

Research: I learned that Dashartha had three wives, which first made me think that he would not care about one too much. But after reading more about King Dashartha, I realized that he died in the night due to pain and misery of his separation with Rama. I did not include this in my story because I wanted him to seem dominant and feared. In my story he died due to the fire set by Nina and his four sons. (Link to research)

Reading Notes: Mahabharata, Part B

The dice game was by far my favorite reading we have done this semester. I am a big fan of gambling, and seeing it be incorporated into this indian epics course was really cool for me. Shakuni is playing a game of dice in Duryodhana's place, and Yudhishthira loses everything he owns. I am planning on changing the names of the characters because I think it is difficult to develop a story if you cannot pronounce the people's names with confidence. But centering a story around gambling will be very fun and interesting to do.

Bibliography: Mahabharata by R.K. Narayan (Link)

Game of Dice: (Wiki Commons) 

Reading Notes: Mahabharata, Part A

This week reading was really interesting. I think I am going to like this book better than the last one. I like to focus on characters and setting to develop around and Bhima killing a rakshasa really has me interested. The sister of the Rakshasa fell in love with Bhima, even though he killed her and I think this is a good spot to create a story. Bihma then battled with another rakshasa, and everybody is suprised he is able to beat him.

Bibliography: Mahabharata by R.K. Narayan (Link)

Rakshasa: (Wiki Commons)

Week 5 Planning: Kings and the Sons

I am going to combine my reading notes Part A and Part B for my story next week discussing the attempted rebellion of two kingdoms. I went two separate directions in both of my reading notes, but after brainstorming about it I think I have the plot that I want to do. In reading A I discussed King Dashartha having four sons who will ultimately grow to hate him and branch of into their own kingdoms. But after thought and also after part B reading, I want to combine the kings and combine the sons from both of my readings. Part B I focused on Dave breaking up with Nina, while he didn't know Nina was pregnant with his son. So my plan for next week is to go forward in time to where King Dave's sin has been born and have him cross paths with King Dashartha's four sons. They will form an alliance and plot against the two kingdoms under King Dashartha and King Dave. The two king will then catch wind of this information and have to form their own alliance. It will cause a dual kingdom rebellion inside the royal families, so like a combined civil war between two countries, which I think would be a fun angle to write a story about. I would have to come up with a way for the 5 combined sons to gather an army to defeat the Kings. I am thinking about having them talk in secret to the actual armies of the kingdom, telling them the news of a rebellion. This will also play into the fact that the kings find out the rumor of rebellion, by a loyal soldier telling them the news. I am excited for this upcoming story, and am planning on making some ad hoc changes.


Bibliography: Sita Sings the Blues by Nina Paley (Link)

The Alliance of the two Kings (Wikipedia)

Reading Notes: Sita Sings the Blues, Part B

When Dave broke up with Nina by email, I immediately thought this was a good plot to revolve around. This is one of the top things not to do when you break up, but Dave decides to do it anyways. Sita told Rama in the story that she is pregnant, but I think I am going to change that to Nina being pregnant to spark up the story. I might make Dave a King and Nina can't have children, but when he breaks up with her, she discloses she's pregnant with a boy (aka the heir to Dave's throne). This week I am going to focus on changing names from the original just to include a different aspect to my stories.

Bibliography: Sita Sings the Blues by Nina Paley (Link)

Dave Begging For Nina: (Wiki Commons)

Reading Notes: Sita Sings the Blues, Part A

This weeks reading was very interesting and I am excited to develop a story off of it. King Dashartha has three wives and four sons, making it a good family to develop a plot around. I am brainstorming about some family instances that could make the family turn against each other. It would be cool to have the four sons try to stake their claim to another kingdom by branching away from the family. I also like the idea of incorporating the half man half monkeys to draw some chaos to the story.

Bibliography: Sita Sings the Blues by Nina Paley (Link)

The Man Monkey (Wiki Commons)

Comment Wall

(Link to Portblogio)

Week 4 Story: The Battle for the King

The Kingdom of Daracus, has been ruled by the Newton family ever since inception. Throughout the years, the family has had no daughters. The road to the throne is to be the first born male in your generation, and your younger brothers will serve as your council. The current King, King Sugriva, has been the most intimidating King yet. He tried to kick all of his brothers except for his closest brother Cam off of his council. One the kingdom would no let him do that, his brothers started dying one by one. The whole kingdom knew that King Sugriva was behind this, but there was no evidence against him.

On a cold winter day when the snow was flying through the sky, the King's only brother and only member of the council died. He was so distraught and was on his knees weeping in front of his people. They saw this as a sign of weakness. They didn't accompany the sad King, and instead went back into their huts. King Sugriva, stayed outside his chambers for hours, crying over his dead brother's body. It was dead quite in the Daracus Castle, but noise started to escalate.

Fire started becoming visible inside the civilians huts. The King did not have the mental capacity at the moment to realize what was going on. Blades were being sharpened, and pitch forks were being brought out of the sheds. "ONE, TWO, GOO!" The people of the Daracus Kingdom sprinted out of their huts towards the vulnerable King. He grasped his two swords, and fought for his family name. King Sugriva was the greatest fighter in the north, and was showing his skills against his own people. He fought off about two dozen, leaving them dead on the ground next to his brother. Then the crowd started to overtake the fight.

The King went down and the people cheered. They no longer had their ruthless King overseeing them. The were free! The Newton family was finally gone, and the Kingdom continued happier than they ever have before.

Kingdom of Daracus: (Good Free Photos)

Author's Note:

I liked the reading about King Sugriva and thought I could make use of his vulnerability when his brother died. I also enjoyed the Battle of Rama and Ravana, so I decided to combine the two. Overthrowing a King is always exciting, especially when its done by the people themselves.

Bibliography: Narayan's Ramayana (Link)

Reading Notes: Ramayana, Part D

The Battle of Rama and Ravana caught my attention in Reading D. I like using a battle as a basis for my plot because of the variety of outcomes you can create. This part kind of reminds me of the "boss level" you play in video games because Agastya is trying to defeat this seemingly invincible enemy. I may expand the characters to a small army, but a one on one battle could be epic too. I enjoyed this reading and look forward to altering the plot to my own story.

Bibliography:  Narayan's Ramayana (Link)

Battle of Rama and Ravana: (Wiki Commons)

Reading Notes: Ramayana, Part C

This weeks reading was really interesting. I am excited to write a story relative to this reading. My favorite part about the readings is when there is a king character and that did not change this week with King Sugriva. His brother dies and it shows this dominate king weeping over his brothers death, showing a sign of weakness. By reading this I am starting to brainstorm ideas to overthrow his and create an enemy. I may incorporate some of my own characters to make another spin on the story.

Bibliography:  Narayan's Ramayana (Link)

King Sugriva: (Wiki Commons)

Feedback Strategies

Feedback is a big part of improvement. I always ask for feedback in anything I do. The two articles I read were Try Feedforward Instead of Feedback (Link) and Be a Mirrior (Link). I really like the term "feedforward" because it puts it into perspective of the purpose feedback is supposed to provide. The Be a Mirror article was cool because it incorporated the importance of the growth mindset.

Feedback: (pixabay)

Topic Research

I'm choosing epic battles for my topic because I think I can build around it well. There will be an abundant about of topics to talk about and various directions to go. Three stories are the Kurukshetra War (Link) and I plan to incorporate many dominant characters like Indra, The Thunder God (Link). I am excited to talk about all the different weapons that will be used in my stories as well (Link).

Kurukshetra War: (Wikipedia)

Week 3 Story: The Ten-Headed Curse

Link to full story in project: Portblogio

It was a musky crisp night in the river of the Ayodhya, and everything was quiet. There was no movement, no sounds, no ripples in the water. Moments later, thunderous footsteps are approaching fromm the distance. They move closer and closer and it turns out to be King Dasharatha. He is a dominant ruler with one flaw, he can have no children.

There is an ancient legend about a ten-headed monster who lives in the waters of the Ayodhya, but nobody has ever seen them with their own eyes...or at least made it out alive after seeing him. But this is what brings King Dasharatha to the Ayodhya, because according to the legend, if you survive a bite from the ten-headed monster, it will drastically change your life.

King Dasharatha brought his top soldiers with him to the river, just in case things turn for the worse. There is a total of ten men, searching by the banks and jabbing spears into the water. After days of searching, there is no monster to be found. Doubt begins to spread across the group of men, contemplating whether they should go back home to their families, but King Dasharatha has no family.

As they begin to walk away from King Dasharatha's orders, a head the size of a boulder slashes out of the water and takes a man underneath. Followed by another head, and then simultaneously seven more, taking out all of King Dasharatha's men. He stands there alone, quivering at the site of the ten-headed monster emerging from the water. The monster roars "YOU HAVE DEFIED ME BY BRINGING YOUR MEN...YOU SHALL NOW BE A CURSED KING." The monster bites off King Dasharatha's arm off, and declares that he shall now have twins, a boy and a girl. The King is thinking to himself that this is rather a gift than a curse. The monster than screeches, "THEY WILL SERVE ONE PURPOSE IN THEIR LIFE, TO BUILD AN ARMY OF THEIR OWN AND OVERTHROW YOU AND YOUR KINGDOM." The King begins to beg for mercy and weeps on his knees. The monster doesn't respond to these requests, grabs him by the hair and flings him back to his kingdom.

As the King lands in the courtyard of his castle, he has to explain to his men to prepare for the greatest war they have ever heard.

The End.

Ayodhya River: (Wikipedia)

Author's note:
I read Narayan's Ramayana this week, and it discussed the King and the ten-headed monster. It didn't develop off of the fact that the king couldn't have children so I made it a priority to incorporate that into my story. The ten-headed monster was a really cool character and I wanted to make him a dominant and feared character who serves a main role in my story.

Bibliography: Narayan's Ramayana (Link)

Reading Notes: The Ramayana, Part B

I'm thinking about making Dashartha's death a planned fake. This would provide a good plot twist and would be an interesting build off. It would be cool to see Bharata become a dominate king after he is unhappy being made it. Everybody loves power when they get the chance to have it, and maybe I'll make Bharata turn into a greedy evil king. Lakshamana's punishment to Sita is the excitement I have been waiting for. I think it makes the story more interesting when rivals are relentless against each other.

Bibliography: Narayan's Ramayana (Link)

Rama and Lakshama: (Wiki Commons)

Reading Notes: The Ramayana, Part A

I like the setting in the city of Ayodhya. I have already written a story that takes place in a river, so this will be a familiar place to develop a story. The fact that Dasharatha has no children is an interesting aspect to the plot. Maybe I could incorporate a child that he doesn't know about yet and later becomes his enemy. The ten headed rakshasa is a great element to the story and will be easy to build off of.

Bibliography: Narayan's Ramayana (Link)

Epics of India: (Wikipedia)

Feedback Thoughts

I am a big fan of feedback, positive and negative. They both serve different roles in the feedback process. Negative feedback is the most influential, because it is what you need to change in order to further improve your work. Positive feedback is also important, because this is what you're doing great at and what you need to continue doing. The two articles I read were 5 Tips For Taking Feedback Like a Champ and 8 Things to do When You Make a Mistake. These were two really great articles for feedback and I liked the numbering format of the steps. They put it really clear on the mindset you need to have when dealing with feedback, and the majority of it was in line with my beliefs about feedback.

Feedback: (Pixabay)

Topic Brainstorm

Indra, The Thunder God:
I wanted to include at least one God in my four topics, and this one interested me the most. I have no prior knowledge of Indian Epics, so all of this will be new to me. I would like to learn more about Indra's thunderbolt weapon and its capabilities (link). It will be interesting to see how the weapon plays in the stories and how I can develop a plot around it.

Supernatural Characters:
This topic popped out at me just from the title. I am fascinated in any sort of supernatural character of any kind. I am looking forward to learning about the different kinds of characters, especially the Rakshasa (link). Having these characters will be awesome to develop stories around.

Animal Characters:
Since I was fascinated in the supernatural characters, I thought it would be best to explore the animal characters as well. My favorite one to look into was Jambavan (link) the king of the bears. My first story revolved around a king of monkeys and a king of crocodiles, so I think I would be able to develop some good plots with these characters.

Epic Battles:
I'm sure this is a topic of interest for a lot of people in the class. "Epic Battles" just sounds like there is a lot to be written about and it can go in any direction. It was cool looking into the Kurukshetra War (link), as it was like a movie. The weapons of the warriors were also very appealing to me.

Rakshasa: (Wiki Commons)