Preston's Epic Blog

I was pretty upset from the death of Bhima's son, Ghatotkacha. The Ramayana mentioned rakshasas a couple of times, but in the Mahabharata, they play a huge role in the war against the Kauravas. Arjuna, being one of the 5 Pandava brothers, was who Karna had planned to use his mighty spear weapon against. It was special because it could only be used once, and if a direct hit, would fatally injure someone. However, Karna was forced to use this godly weapon against Ghatotkacha, so we can see how much of a warrior he really is to represent in this epic. He reminds me of Hanuman in the Ramayana, because he's a loyal character that holds an immense amount of power and without him much of what the Pandavas are able to accomplish wouldn't be possible without him. I also remember reading about Ghatotkacha earlier this semester from a storybook, and from there had that tie to him. There's a bit of revenge later in this section when Arjuna kills Karna. This wasn't so satisfying...

 Arjuna finally rejoined his brothers in the wilderness. They were gathering weapons all of this time. These weapons were spectacular, and Duryodhana had heard about the brothers magnificent successes in the forest, but this still didn't worry him. He was still a ruler and still had the upper hand by not being banished to the wilderness. This kind of reminds me of typical society these days. Especially when talking about socioeconomic status in America since the Civil War and and Reconstruction Era. While there was all are thought to be free and equal in this day and age, no one can forget about the upper hand the majority of Americans have on minorities because of in a way being "banished" like the Pandavas were in the Mahabharata. The Pandavas return to civilization, but as the banishment said, they were to return on their 12th year in disguise and remain in that disguise for another full year. If they were discovered on that 13th year, then they would be exiled all ove...