The Ramayama is one of India’s central epics. It is not as long as the better-known Mahabharata (which is as long as the Iliad and the Odyssey together), but is still quite a complicated story, which extends geographically across the Indian subcontinent. Since the Ramayama plays partly in Hampi , and as I stumble upon it almost everywhere, here a very brief summary
Rama is the first born son of King Ayodha in the north of India and a reincarnation of Vishnu. His father, however, owes a favor to another one of his wifes and she requests to send Rama into exile, so her son can be king. Rama then goes with his wife Sita and his devoted brother Lakshman into exile and spends several years in the woods. One day the sister of the demon Ravana tries to enchant Rama. But she is not successful, Rama even cuts off her nose. Ravana could not stand this dishonour and abductes Sita with a lousy trick.
Rama and Lakshman head now on the search for Sita and end up in the monkey kingdom Kishkinda. This is the region around Hampi, where they then regulate royal conflicts between brothers, before they continue to search for Sita. With them on the road is now Hanuman – who has an army of monkeys, and later becomes known as apegod.
The latter is first sent forward to Lanka (where Sita is) to announce the upcoming help. He is captured there and during his liberation he quickly sets Lanka on fire. The liberation of Sita is initiated with the construction of a bridge to Lanka with the help of the monkey army commanded by Hanuman. Rama wins the succeeding war even if Laksman is wounded.
Then Rama regulates also in Lanka the conflict between the royal brothers, before Rama, Laksman and Sita can finally return home. Before the all embracing happy end, however, Sita must still undergo a trial by fire, because her honor would otherwise be in doubt.
Here in the south where I am, illustrations from the Ramayama can be found in many temples. Not that I am able to identify the different parts of the story on the sculptures. Also the guidebooks are not accurate enough for this. But sometimes there is a person on charge in the temples, who can gie at least rudimentary information about the contents of the sculptures in exchange for a “small gift”to give in exchange for a small “gift”. More rarely, I can also listen to a guided group (this especially when it comes toWestern groups are, but they are rare).
For this purpose the childrens books, with the most important stories come in handy. For 50 rupees (70 cents)I bought an illustrated children’s book, which summarizes the story of Rama. It is still surprisingly complicated, but really good to get a glance. There are also comics which retell the stories of gods and heroes. I am sure that I am going to buy more of those in the next few weeks….