Reading Notes: The Life of Buddha, Part B

Continue to part A, part B of The Life of Buddha by Andre Ferdinand Herold tells about the process when Prince Siddhartha left his home to become a monk and finally became Buddha.

Buddha Status. Picture from Indiamart

Prince Siddhartha and his horse Kanthaka with his guards left the capital and entered deep into the forest. Right here, Siddhartha made careful recommendation to the guard about his reason to leave and gave him the necklace for proof. Prince Siddhartha then exchanged his gorgeous cloths with the hunter and continued to find his belief of "true law" (Siddhartha the Hermit)

He lived and learned the doctrine of Arata Karama for a long time. But then he realized that it is not his "true law" that he had been looking for. This law of Arara Karama required people to live a suffering life. They supposed to get hungry, thirsty, suffered from cold and hot. He left the law since he understood that to persecute himself is not a deliverance.

Time passed, and that day Siddhartha enlightened himself. He sweared that unless he had attained the supreme knowledge to deliverance, he shall not move for any reason. And he crossed his legs and meditated under the Tree of Knowledge.

Reading Notes: The Life of Buddha, Part A

This week, I find myself interested in Buddhism culture, therefore, i choose to read The Life of Buddha, written by Andre Ferdinand Herold. This reading unit tells a story of  how Siddhartha awaken as a Buddha.
In Maya's dream, Maya, a wife of King Suddhodana, saw a six tusks elephant entered her womb, gave a signal of her pregnant. And months passed, Prince Siddhartha was born in a beautiful day under a special tree.
Growth up, Prince Siddhartha appears to have more omnipotence. He first realized life contains much of sufferings and painful. He saw farmers who work really hard under the burning hot weather in Siddhartha's First Meditation. He saw among those richest, youngest, strongest people in the city a poorest,weakness and oldest man in his first encounter. In the next two more encounters, the Price saw a sickness man who was so desperate, and latter he also saw a corpse.
He decided he should do something to bring people out of the miserable.

Buddha's Meditation. Source: Petrotime

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Three main characters in Tam Cam.

 Pictures by Soha

Instead of choosing the cartoon versions, i choose the characters on the recent movie, Tam Cam: An Untold Story, for more specific depicting the personalities of each character.

Cam - the stepsister of Tam

The Step-mother

Tam

Week 4 Story: Mother-in-law and daughter in law

Author's Note: Mother and Daughter-in-law is always a subject in movies, but it also appeared in reality, at least in Viet Nam. To exploit the conflict of Venus (mother-in law) and Psyche (daughter-in -law) in the serie of Cupid and Psyche, which is created from a Roman novel, The Golden Ass written by Apuleius and translated by Tony Kline, I make up a new version of its, which happens in a modern society instead of mythological history.

The original version of Cupid and Psyche, Venus (Cupid's mother) are not satisfied with Psyche (Cupid's wife). Therefore Venus tried to stop this relationship by setting obstacles to Psyche. Follow the motif of Cinderella, Venus mixed the grains together and made her daugher-in-law to separate them piece to piece. She ordered Psyche to collect the gold wool from those wild and crucial sheeps, commanded her to collect  the divine water and brought to the underground where it could be transformed into a Jar of Beauty. Venus believed that Psyche couldn't done these job, but surprisingly she did with the help of others. Psyche then became a goddess and married Cupid under the witness of Jupiter. They lived happily ever after.

This is the picture in a Vietnamese movie, "mother and daughter-in-law". The picture depicts the contradictory story of mother and daugher in law.

Source: Thanh Nien

In this new version, the daughter-in-law, let calls her P, and her mother-in -law, V, will experience a different ending, which i believe are more sadness, but also depicts a true choice of a modern girl and in a modern society.
Assume the context appears in Viet Nam, a big city, where P marries a rich guy, and lives together with her husband's mother, V.

..................................

- "If you are my daughter-in-law, then you should quit your job to be able to take care of your husband and the whole family. Furthermore, it is costly to hire a maid. It is better to save money. Don't you think so?"

====
- "If you insists on taking that job, i do have a little request." The woman pause a while.

- "Yes, mom. Please tell me. I am listening to you."

- "Because you live in this house, so you should follow the rules here. No matter what you do, triple time a day you have to return home to eat with family. You don't have to prepare the meal at noonday, i will do it for you, but not the breakfast and the dining meal. That means you have to wake up at 5am and return home at 5pm in order to prepare the meals."

-" Mom, you know i am busy at work. I am a reporter, whenever it is a news, i have to go. I can wake up early but it is unable for me to be back at 5pm. You can ask my husband, he is also a reporter, so he will understand me."

- "I don't care. He is a man, but you the women. You can't compare like that."
And Mrs. V says again as the atmosphere becomes strain and tense.
-"Need to say more? "
=====

The old woman sits on the dining- table, sets her foot on the chair, inclines her head, looks scrutiny to the girl as she is busy to clean the floor. The woman says with an arrogant voice:

-"P, take a wet clout to wipe the floor."

- "Yes, but i just watered the floor before. I think it is fine to dry with a clout, Mom." P gently replies.

- "Well, you have to listen to me. I am your mother, not you. How the house can be clean if you do like that? Stand up and soak the clout. No more talking!"

-"Yes, mom. "

V is so hostile, yet, mumble something. While P  easy and willing to follow her order, soak the clout and clean the floor. Mrs. V sits there and waits until P done her job.

- "Now, go ahead a use the dry clout to clean one more time so it will dry."

- "Mother, it is very hot today so just leaves it there, i will open the fan so it will dry fast. Don't worry!"

One more time, mrs. V looks daggers at her.

- "Why everytime i told you something you always argues with me? You're rude. "

One again P is docile to do the job, but a little bit sufferings. Mrs. V still mumbles. A minutes latter, her son returns home after works. The widow welcomes warmly.

- "You got home early today, sweetie? Are you hungry? Let's eat. Here, sit here." As Mrs. V said, she reached the chair next to her and asks her son repeatedly without letting the boy say anything. V gentle and exuberance. "Wait a minute, i set the table for you."

-" P, what are you doing out there? Your husband had returned home. Come and prepare the dining meal for him. You want him starving to death, don't you?". Mrs. V changes her tune 360 degree toward P. So fierce and so loud.

- "I am coming, mom. V still so gently responded."

Mrs. V starts to palaver to her son about his wife without  caring about P.

- "You should teach your wife. She is so impudent and impertinent. No matter what i say, she always try to contradicting me. I am your mother. I don't want her to ride over you."

- "Mother, my wife is young and know nothing. Can you teach her step by step?"

P heard all the conversation and feels disappointed. She is young but she knows what is right and wrong. She did all the job perfect but just not the ways her mother-in-law like. Speaking directly, Mrs. V have never like her before and doesn't want P to marry his son.

- "Mother and you can eat first. I am not feel right so i take a rest. I will eat later."

-" What's happen? Are you ok?"The husband raises his voice. Yet, his mother stops him.

- "Just ignore her. She will eat whenever she feels hungry.  There no need to worry about her."


=====
Several days later, P returns to her nature mother's home.  She know that she can't be happy if Mrs. V keep treating her badly like that, and her husband do nothing for her except unilateral listen to his mother.
If the son is a prince, the daughter is also a princess of her parent.

Reading Notes: Cupid And Psyche, Part B

Continuing the story of Cupid and Psyche of Apuleius, the old woman told the girl-prisoner how Psyche found her husband- Cupid while Venus desperately seeked her. Venus summoned everyone to find her with a reward.

In the meanwhile, Psyche, on her way to find her husband, met two great Goddesses: Ceres and Juno (Apuleius: Psyche's Prayer). Although they could not help her because they all had relationship with Venus, they gave her advise not to confront Venus.

However, Venus still found her and gave her three difficult tasks. Of course, Psyche finished all the tasks with the help of the ants, the reed and the eagle. First task was to separate the grains into different piles. Second task was to collect the gold wool from the anger sheeps. And the third was to collect a Stygian water (the third task).

When Venus felt into sleep because opening the jar of beauty, Cupid found her and waken her up. Jupiter helped Cupid by letting Psyche became a goddess, and the marriage between these two would last forever (The Wedding Feast)

Cupid and Psyche wedding with the present of Jupiter. 

Source: Arthiver

Reading Notes: Cupid and Psyche, Part A

Last week, i read a story from Biblical Unit. So, this week the Crystal Ball for Classical Unit picked a random story of Cupid and Psyche Unit written by Apuleius and translated by Tony Kline.

This is a kind of  a story within a story, in which an old woman narratives to a girl about the story of Cupid and Psyche to alleviate her pain from being kidnapped. 

In the Psyche's Beauty and  the Anger of Venus, the youngest girl in the family, Psyche, is beauty as the Goddess Venus. Her reputation overcomes oceans and realms and communicates to Venus. As Venus's jealous aroused, she ordered her Son, Cupid, to teach Psyche a lesson by burning her passion of her marriage.

Psyche honored by the People by Giordano. Source: MILL

Cupid becomes her mysterious husband. They live in a luxury palace hidden deep down in the forest, behind the hill. He only appears when nightfall and leave at dawn. Psyche never saw his face then.

Her two sisters jealous of her lucky. They incite Psyche to reveal his face. Psyche finally can't restrain herself. In Psyche's Husband revealed, , Cupid fly away from Psyche because of her transgression.

Feedback Strategies: Feedforward

If you come from Eastern culture, you might understand more thoroughly what i say here soon. I am sorry for using the word "Eastern" loosely because not every father or mother from Eastern culture have this characteristic. That is, hope that their babies group up to be doctors (Doctor is the most dreamy job ever). To do that, they force their babies learning from a very young age (since the babies can't speak fluent Vietnamese, the parents bring them to school for English).

Children are expected to be exceptionally good in many nature courses such as math, physic, chemistry...  and are expected to have good grade, which mean A and above, not A-. When they got lower grade, their parents would questioned why and  plus penalties. They might have not to play that night or they would be spank instead.

I am lucky since my parents are not like that, but they were still expected me have a good grade. I admitted that i cheated sometimes then so that i could bring home a paper with A+ on. At that time, not only me, but my friends either be spanked or be praised like "She's good at math", "she will be accepted to the University" (It is hard to pass the exam to learn in a university in Vietnam though). I would rather choose to be praise.

A praise either encourage people or cause pressure on them. In A Troubling Side Effects of Praises, Youki Terada says that overuse praises causing pressure on children and therefore makes they willing to cheat. In this case, instead of feedback, feedforward became a useful tools.

In the article Try Feedforward instead of Feedback of  Marshall Goldsmith, Feedforward is considered the suggestion for future, not criticize for the past. My parent never spanked me, but shouted at me when i got lower grade. However, they brought back the math problems that i got them wrong and asked why i did this but not that. Therefore, i am so thankful for those who points out my mistakes and show me directions.

I found this picture very familiar to what i said above, "Why did you do this, but not that?" Pointing this out can help a person fixes the mistake and also provide guidance for future steps.

Picture from Moving Writer.

If you want to know more about parent's expectation for the kids in Eastern culture, you might want to read the book, Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother written by Amy Chua. A real story of raising kids.