Ram Avatar!

The festival season has begun. It starts every year, with the festival of Rakhi which falls on the full moon day of the Sraavan (Monsoon) month (10th month of the Hindu calendar). This is the festival where the Sister ties a knot across the brother’s hand praying for his well-being and asking him for his protection.  Lots of stories of its significance and origins.

In our family, my brother was born on a Rakhi day. So, every year Rakhi is celebrated along with his birthday. And between my four girls and their 4 cousins that there were, the ceremony continued for a long time until we completed tying rakhi’s to all the boys.

After Rakhi, comes Ganesh Chaturthi,(festival of the Elephant God) which falls between august 20 and September 15, the fourth day of the waxing moon. This festival is celebrated with huge idols of Ganesh being installed on the streets in India. In Hyderabad this is a very big event. Schools are closed on Chaturthi and during the Visarjan( is when the idols of Ganesh are immersed in water, sending Ganesha back to his home on Mt Kailash, in the Himalayas). It is soon followed by Navratri Celebrations.

One of the greatest Hindu festivals, Navratri, Navratras, Navrathri or Durga Puja are the different names, different idols, and different manner of celebration, but the underlying theme remains the same. It is the celebration of Good over Evil; of the greatness and valor of Devi Durga; the Giver of Peace, Prosperity and Well being of the mortals.

The 9 nights festival of Navratri begins on the first day of Ashwina of the bright fortnight. Seeds are sown, sprouting is watched, the planets are consecrated, and on the 8th and 9th days, Goddess Durga, Vijayashtami and Mahanavami are worshipped.

There are a lot of activities that we see during this festival season. It could be Ras Garba or Kolu, ayudh puja. We are lucky to be part of these activities.  

The day after Navratri i.e. the 10th day after Ashwina, is Dusshera which celebrates the victory of Lord Rama over Ravana. Ravana is burnt in effigy, often giant dummies of Ravana stuffed with fireworks are shot with arrows until they blow up before a large, applauding audience.

So, this question suddenly struck in my mind, why was Rama born?. Rama is considered an avatar of Vishnu, the God who is the maintainer of the universe. Vishnu is supposed to have been born on the earth whenever there was trouble on earth. To kill evil and make sure good survives. But, as far as I knew, the only event that Rama took part in this avatar, was,  the war against Ravana.  There was no mention of any atrocities of Ravana, until Sita is kidnapped from the forest by Ravana, during their 14 year exile in the forest. Was Vishnu approached to take an avatar to get rid of Ravana? Nothing convincing there. All vague answers.

Ravana, according to legend, was the grandson of Pulastya, who is one of the mind-sons of Brahma. He was supposed to be renowned scholar who had a thorough knowledge of four Vedas and six upanishads. an exceptional player of Veena (Indian musical instrument). He was supposed to be the author Ravana Sanhita, a well regarded book on Hindu Astrology. He was known for his knowledge of Ayurveda and political science. He was known as Ravana Brahma, which indicated the nobility of his birth and the vastness of his knowledge. Even Rama did Ashwamedha Yagna after killing Ravana, as a penance for killing a Brahmin. Rama supposedly acknowledged the death of Ravana as a necessary evil.

Also, the description that one gets of Lanka, when Hanuman visits it during his search for Sita, is of a very affluent and green place. Golden domes, green forest, Asoka trees. He was a smart ruler.

His only known vice was his incredible appetite for Women, especially the pretty ones. Not that different from our ex-president, eh? Does this vice of his warrant an avatar of Vishnu?? Was he the only one that had committed this horrible sin? No other humans in this world guilty of this?!

There are a few legends where his womanizing started his downfall. The first incident was the attempt to molest the sage lady Vedavati who was doing penance to get Vishnu as her husband. To avoid Ravana’s forced capture, vedavati jumped into fire and later was reborn as Sita. The second was the actual molestation of Rambha (celestial dancer) who was betrothed to be married to Kubera’s (The brother of Indra, the lord of Devas) son. These two incidents, especially the second one angered Vishnu, who decided it was time to bring down the immortal and all too powerful king of Lanka. Kubera cursed Ravana to lose his head if he ever forced himself on any other woman. This is what supposedly saved Sita’s chastity during her time of captivity in Lanka.

To me, this avatar of Rama, doesn’t have much depth except to focus on the brotherly love, being an ideal son and showcase a gender biased society, if we consider the Agni Pariksha (nice article here) that Sita had to undergo. Ravana, wouldn’t have happened if Rama and Sita wouldn’t have gone to the forest.

He was supposed to be a great ruler, that his rule is referred to as Ram Rajya during which time, the people in his kingdom were supposed to be very happy and content.  All that seems fine, but some how, I cant digest that, to him, the irresponsible words of a Dhobi( a person who does laundry) seemed more important than, supporting his wife, than stand by her!  Just because, this Dhobi felt that Rama was wrong in bringing back Sita with him, Rama decided to leave Sita into the forest?! That too, stealthily, he got his brother to do it for him. A pregnant women (which they were not aware of at that time).  If that would have been his take all the way, then, why had he even decided to be a married man.  He was an avatar, couldn’t he have for seen this coming on Sita? Any way I try to reason with this, he ends up being the husband no women would desire.

Still, in spite of my doubts and feelings, I go ahead with telling the stories of Rama to my kids. We haven’t hit the point where we had to discuss his leaving his wife into the forest.  When they are mature enough to understand this epic story, at that time, I will let them judge this avatar for themselves. I am not going to influence their thoughts with mine. Maybe I am hypocrite, but, we cannot refute the fact that he was an ideal son to his parents,(problem was he was too idealist that he tortured himself). So, until that time, we will continue preparing for the Bal Ramayana that the kids of my friends and mine are taking part in and,  that my friend is wonderfully directing. The kids are so excited with their roles. It’s so great to see their fervor with which they rehearsed on the first day. 

Can’t wait to see the outcome of this little skit that will be presented on Diwali.  Until then, I would like to Wish a very happy Dusshera to my friends and family.

Please feel free to disagree with me here. Any other thoughts/comments, information are welcome on this topic. I would love to see more opinions flow on this topic.

Xenophobic Me! (Part 2)

Continuing with my earlier blog of my rantings on Xenophobia and myself and dealing with it…..I start of, reasoning why is it that Indians like me find it so hard to blend into the American Culture.  Why we are xenophobic even within our own country…?

Since most of us Indians immigrated to the USA after flying between continents' had become a common phenomenon. There was no stopping us from going back to our countries now and then, to get our dose of culture,  meet our families and re-experience the surroundings where we grew up in, to introduce all that to our children. In this quest for getting the best of  both the worlds, I think,  its taking us longer for people like me to fit into the common American lifestyle.

Being among different cultures is not new to Indians. Even among Indians there are such big cultural differences, huge cultural divides. One will find North Indians, South Indians, Delhites, UPites, Tamilians, Kanadigas, Gult’s(Telugu), Gujarati’s, Punjabi’s, Anglo Indians and so on..Among the 1600+ languages spoken in India and the countless dialects, the Indian Government has given an official recognition to 22 or so languages. People from different regions speak different languages and their culture is as diverse as their language and its script.. Even here, people tend to stick with people from their own regions/religions/languages/caste.

I belong to a mixed background with my parents belonging to both North and South India. So, growing up has been a confusing journey for me, trying to fit into both these cultures. Their dressing style, languages, food are so different. There were almost 4 languages between my parents and the place where they immigrated to, Hyderabad. So, they decided to speak Hindi at home to save us, kids from confusion. Maybe it has not helped us, learn either Punjabi or Marathi or Kannada or Telugu or Hindi properly(in the sense of Jack of all but Master of None) but, I’m able to talk and mix with a larger population of Indians,due to this exposure.  From popular magazines and articles, I now know that language pundits and pediatricians encourage parents with multilingual backgrounds to continue talking in all the secondary languages to the child.  The child will eventually develop better language skills and be multilingual.

Apart from the language, there’s another thing called caste in India. When we were shot questions by outsiders as kids, asking us what are we? (Yes! people take such liberties in India, especially with kids, maybe they didn’t dare to question that directly to my parents!)  I used to be so confused and speechless. Do they want to know what language we speak? or my religion or they want to know if we are Brahmans, or Kshatriya's, or Vaishyas or Shudras. I didn’t know. We didn’t speak all that at home. My parents didn't think it was important information to share with us. I was sure we were Hindus and we go to temple.  I would answer “Hindus and we speak Hindi.”
School was a very innocent period for me. By rule, we were required to talk in English at school, so, most of us at school were not interested in knowing what language your classmate spoke at home or what religion she belonged to. But, after school came college, I started to get aware of all this. Most of my knowledge of the different religions and sects and sub sects and castes came as big jolts. And I realized that there is actually a very big divide among people I live around,


When it came to marriage, people made sure their kids married into their own caste, otherwise, the family doesn’t accept the marriage, in some dire cases, the village would get against the couple and harass them. Even today, I read a news article of a suicide by a couple who were being harassed by their village for marrying outside their caste. They didn't see any way out of it.


Sometimes, the parents think that its in the best interest of their kids to marry within their own community so, their children can be well adjusted and there is another reason for this, among the business communities that I came to know, is to keep the wealth within the community (yeah! I never thought in those lines). To make matters worse to the next level, It was just not enough to be a Brahman to marry another Brahman, or Kshatriya, to marry another Kshatriya and so on..There are many more sub sects too.
We had our share of dealing with this when it was time for my parents to start looking for a match for me. Should it be a Punjabi guy or a guy from the South? Not wanting to get into this mess, I decided to go abroad for further studies and my parents seconded it and there I was in USA.


It is so true that marriages are made in Heaven. No, I couldn’t have chanced upon meeting Pavan in Tirupati when I visited the place during some of our pilgrimage trips, or during the time he came to Hyderabad on some of his trips. But, we did meet and where?! half way across the world from our homes. Luckily for me, Pavan came from a multilingual family too. So, being from a multilingual family was not an issue for his parents, then it was caste. Even if the castes were the same, there would be problems with the sub-caste and so on…there is no stopping at finding a reason to disagree, right!!. But then, it was the case of “Miya Biwi razi”, toh kya karega Kazi”, so with a little spice and drama, his family eventually accepted the situation and we got married.


It has taken me years to understand that there is a larger reason for the existence of such a divide among Hindus. At a higher level, its this. Every religion need to know its beginning, when it started. Same with Hinduism too, right!!. It is very difficult to trace the exact beginning of Hinduism,its founder(s), But, there have been many leaders in Hinduism who reformed and/or revived traditions thus breaking people into many sub-groups and consolidating them. Prominent among these scholars are the ones who defined the Vedanta Philosophy.


Vedanta is a Sanskrit word that means Veda-anta or Veda-end. Its used to describe the final part of the Vedas,  the texts that belonged to the end of the Vedic Period, called Upanishads. This school of thought was based on the combined interpretations of the three sacred sources called

1. Upanishads

2. Bhagavad-gita

3. Vedanta-sutra


These people who defined these philosophies were the acharya(s) meaning “one who teaches by example”. 


The important acharyas are
1. Sankara Acharya(780-812) CE He founded the Advaita School of philosophy. This philosophy saying that the nature of reality is non-dual(Advaita).  He asserted that there is only one ultimate thing in nature, and its God, every thing else was Maya or illusion. He also founded the 10 orders of sanyasa. He is also considered as the incarnation of Shiva by his followers. Shaivism's principles are associated with asceticism. Even Shiva is depicted as a yogi meditating in the Himalayas. Shaivism believes in avatars but, less pronunced than Vaishnavism. We have various avatars of Shiva, as Rudra (angry), Nataraja(God of Dance), Linga the symbol that represents "indivisible two-in-oneness of male and female, the passive space and active time from which all life originates"


2. Madhva Acharya,(1238-1317)AD. He founded the Dvaita School of Philosophy which asserts that the nature of reality is dual (Dvaita), meaning that this universe is comprised of two distinct principles, , namely God and everything else. His followers are the worshipers of Vishnu and his avatars. The dasha-avatar but, mainly Rama and Krishna.


3. Ramanuja Acharya (1017-1137)AD. He founded the Vishista Dvaita (qualified non-duality). For Ramanuja, 3 distinct things existed in the world, God, Soul and Matter. Without one the other could not exist.  as a unity they were Advaita(non-dual) yet, they were distinct in their essence. His followers are worshipers of Vishnu too.


Later Theologians, created many derivative interpretations like Dvaita-Advaita, and so on. There is such a huge divide among followers of each of these acharyas. A famous Kannada saying goes, “Even if chased by a tiger, a vaishnavite will not enter a temple of Shiva”.
Again, I almost digressed here. So, in the middle of this journey of mine to discover myself, make a career for myself, I find myself married to a person from a totally different brought up, in fact, a very orthodox brought up.  This should have made me very nervous. But, It was the opposite. I found him to be very culturally aware, practical, honest and A very social being. Always having this quest for more knowledge. His knowledge of Hinduism rubbed off on me too.  Our families are still trying to adjust with each other and, the kids are making this easier for them. They being of interest to both our families.


Now, that my kids are growing up in the USA, they will be imbibing in themselves, both the cultures of the west(from schools and friends and teachers) and east. We as parents will be doing our part of giving them knowledge of where they come from, their culture and at the same time, I'm looking forward to learning from them, the culture of America to become a part of the diversity in America,  I hope we will be able to lead our kids in a direction, where they will feel enriched with all this diversity that they are part of, rather than get confused with their identity.