Finding Yonder

When the spring is cold, where do robins go?
- Fiest

posted by Lisa @ 1:55 PM

It's reaching the point in term when I'm starting to hate my life. It's getting harder each day to get up out of bed in the morning, and the desire to procrastinate is nearly irresistable. In one sense time stands still, because the flow of work is never ending. In another sense it moves to fast, because the due dates come steadily closer and closer.

Only a little more than four weeks till the end of term. But the amount of work I have to do inbetween is mind boggling.

posted by Lisa @ 5:17 PM

We're curently studying The Mahabharata, the longest epic in the world. It spans 18 volumes (luckily we only have to read the first). It's eastern philosophy, and heavily rooted in Hiduism. It also paints a picture of Indian culture and tradition.

I'm writing an essay about the position of women within the book. I'm finding it extremely facisnating, mainly because I did not find what I expected to.

I expected the Mahabharata to be a text degrading women. And in many ways it is - in one instance, the gods give a favour to a woman who they like and turn her into a man. Wives are also supposed to burn themselves along with their husband's body if he dies before her. There is a double standard, and there is definite inequality.

There is one story, though, where a poor beggar girl gives a tounge lashing to a king. She makes an extremely eloquent speech about truths and values and virtues. She tells the king exactlly what he should do, the gods side with her, and the king accepts what this woman has to say. This story does not coincide with the my previous assumptions of the text.

As I started to look through the rest of the book, I found many more instances that say that women have value and should be respected. They are never to be killed, and they have their own rights to their bodies (except when her "season" has come, at which point she has to concieve a child). There was one story about five warrior brothers who take their mother along on their twelve year trip, and she walked ahead and led their group. Though they stand behind their husbands and they serve, these women are by no means puppets. They are intelligent and articulate. I think that it takes just as much strength to be able to serve with no thought of reward as it does to be the breadwinner of a family. You have to use all your skills for others, yet you have to check your ego and attitude. No men in the text could do that.

I am very surprised at what I found in this text. They are telling us that women, though beneath men, have value. You can take it one step further and apply it to society: how do we look at those that are beneath our social class? The homeless, the drug addicts, the people who do the undesirable jobs like picking up litter - we tend to judge these people by what they are rather than who they are.


Who would have thought it would all be in a book of eastern philosophy...

posted by Lisa @ 1:56 PM

The final verdict for my lastest essay is in: I got 9% higher than my last one. That's TWO, count 'em, TWO letter grades.

I also found out that a test I thought I had tomorrow isn't till Friday. AND I did very well on a french lab.

Take THAT, school. I win.

posted by Lisa @ 4:08 PM