IsabellaScrapbook3

=**With the Samanas**= As an attempt to feel what Siddhartha felt on his journey of self realization my choice was to give up Netflix- that would be all movies and TV shows that I have access to.

**The First Days**
My (somewhat bad) habit is to do homework and watch a TV show; this staves off the headache that inevitably comes while I do homework. In absence of the distraction from homework, it took me far longer than it should have to write out my history homework, and when that was done I made no attempt at the rest of my work. I found a join.me (Screen sharing site) hosted by Sycha, an amazing artist, and sat and watched her draw while chatting to other viewers until around 11pm. A similar thing happened the next day, rather than write out all the solving for my math homework I wrote the answers and found Sycha's join.me again- Mr.Daly didn't check the homework, but if he had he'd have found a half sheet of paper with around 40 answers scribbled on it and nothing more. I was breaking routine, and for me that break was "a temporary escape from the torment of Self" (Hesse, 17).

**Partway Through**
It was the weekend when I was partway done with my self-deprivation, and where normally I'd be sleeping after a long nigh of drawing while watching Netflix shows I was instead wide awake and using an AK47 to kill some virtual people- hello Black Ops, a game I generally would not be playing. I spent at least two hours playing that, they switched over to Skyrim (killing the vampires) for some time before getting dragged off by my parents. That night I was up until 3am watching join.me hosted by WISH, my friend/ emotional sister as she drew. I consequently woke up at 12pm the following day and took around four hours to outline a very short section of my history textbook, twice as long as it should have taken. The next Monday, day 5, I was fairly tired and pretty much floated through school with little care, for "all [was} not worth a passing glance" (14), and my only goal was to get home and complete my Skyrim quest line.

[[image:http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_WFekPLJVZOw/TVBzw0AQZ0I/AAAAAAAAASA/HyzmWegRK_E/s1600/join.me.jpg width="327" height="221" align="left"]]**The End**
My last day consisted of little homework and much watching of WISH's join.me. I also found out how to use (or abuse) my computer's microphone, and began talking to the computer and recording myself- essentially talking to myself. In all I o not feel the experience benefited me, I merely filled the space left by the somewhat useful watching of Netflix with the far more harmful playing of video games and watching join.mes. I suppose to be perfect I could not do any of these there things but, as Siddhartha said, "I have no desire to walk on water" (24). My only goal is to do homework efficiently so that I can do fun stuff without feeling guilty- if I need Netflix to do that then so be it. =**Awakening**=

**The Quote**
Siddhartha reached awakening after seeing the Buddha in his grove and realizing that he had been neglecting something: Himself. Based on the following quote, I drew what I pictured his awakening as. "Here was blue, here was yellow, here was green, sky and river, woods and mountains, all beautiful, all mysterious and enchanting, and in the midst of it, he, Siddhartha, the awakened one, on the way to himself.

**[[image:IsabellaAY Pic1 Sidd.png width="520" height="393" align="left"]]The Image**
Shown to the left. Digital version should show, if its the handdrawn one something is wrong.

**Analysis**
When I pictured this, I saw it as his old world drowning in colors, and "this feeling completely overwhelmed him" (37). There was mountains, a river, the blue sky, the green trees, and "all mysterious and enchanting" (39). And amongst all the colors that he never truly saw "he, Siddhartha, the awakened one" (39) stood with only himself, "like a star in the heavens" (41). I drew in the picture the beauties he saw, and each color, and in the midst of them Siddhartha, the shining star. The colorless lies he once saw were washed with colors as he awakened, and he could see the each thing was separated, as the grand design intends, including himself, a person who should not be cowered or run from because he is part of the world. Up in the top corner is the grove, without color.

=**Kamala**= =**Samsara**=
 * Name:** Kamala
 * Location:** The Pleasure Grove
 * Eyes:** Dark chocolate brown
 * Hair:** Black
 * About me:** Beautiful as a flower, with purest colors, my physic is as lovely as that of a royal lady and my clothing shows me a grand. I am a wealthy as only those most beautiful can be, and shall not be swayed by another beauty. I desire only for a game, not for true love in it, and can deliver sweetness in exchange for an equal payment from my mouth, "a freshly cut fig" (54). Unlike many other women, I can be clever, I can master my prey, I hide knowledge in my beauty.
 * Hobbies/ Profession:** As a courtesan I do not welcome all, for only those truly able to practice love without fooling oneself by it and one who has those gift[[image:http://people.brandeis.edu/%7Ewilson/DW-Design/Siddhartha_Page_2_files/Siddhartha252.jpg align="right"]]s worthy of me available to their pocket may be welcomed to my grove. I give love as a gift for those of worth, for "it can never be stolen" (55), it is what I have to grant those who give to me. I live from this possession, and from it gain items of beauty and gifts of joy.
 * Looking for:** A man who courts me must have "fine clothes, fine shoes, and money in [his] purse" (54). They must be willing and able to give pleasures for the ones I give to them, to be servant to no other. Their words should be said in a beautiful voice in a beautiful way, and eyes that speak with the mouth, a handsome man as a whole.

**My Daily Routine**
1. Wake up 2. Eat 3. Get on the bus 4. Go to class 5. Lunch 6. Continue going to classes- post apocalypse style 7. Do homework

**Quote from Siddhartha**
"Enveloped by comfortable circumstances, Siddhartha hardly noticed their passing. He had become rich. He had long possessed a house of his own and his own servants, and a garden at the outskirts of town, by the river" (75)

**Analysis:**
Despite the overall routine of my life, I feel more like the days go longer, not that they are "hardly [noticeable in] their passing" (75). I wake up fairly early on weekdays, around 6am, shower, then have time to myself, in which I draw or complete homework I made the mistake of not completing prior. After about 7am I leave my room, my sister is at this point getting out to catch her bus. I eat something and pack my lunch, and at 7:40am I pack up all my stuff and start walking to the bus with my brother. A lengthy near hour later I arrive at school, and rather than attempted some social life I go to my first class and wait until it starts. First block is never a good block, I either lack any people I can communicate or they have been seated in the far corner from me. I continue my school day into my language class, Spanish where there is a general air of "I don't care" in the room- yet for some reason I still really wish to learn it- and English. During this period I have lunch, always a nightmare, or after it there is CHAT, likely the savior of my existence. While the entry of the third period should be like a hump, where after I am happier because its closer to the end of the day, it is not true. On blue days, when I enter MESA, it feels like the day has just started because the other classes are trivial, but on red days I have two lengthy periods of doing nothing significant because in one we do all our learning in textbook outlines and the other is an exploratory, where we explore how to do the same thing we've done 10 other times- and people still don't get it. I'm always relived to get home, for I give myself an hour before homework to draw, play video games, or something else that doesn't involve paper and pencil. Then I do my homework, though with my laptops inches away in case I feel like giving up. I normally get to draw more after this, until 10:30pm when I go to sleep. I doubt this routine is the best, but as a student its hard to avoid any school related parts and I'm indefinitely glad that I made the choice not to join any sort of club or sport that would take up even more time, and which I would relate to school taking over my life. I'm positive this is samsara, but is there really a way to escape it? Siddhartha couldn't, for at the river he started a new cycle, just not one so sickening.

=**The River**= media type="youtube" key="BwSft8zNaS0" height="315" width="560"

**Song: "Leave the Past Behind" by Fates Warning**
"Leave the past behind (1s) The long road lies ahead (2s) Bury your pride and say goodbye (3s) Leave the past behind" (4s)
 * Lyrics:**

"'I am not going anywhere. I am only on the way.'" (93) "'I was a rich man, but I am no longer and what I will be tomorrow I do not know." (94)
 * Quote from the text:**

This section of the book is him changing his life, choosing a new fate and "leaving the past behind" (Fates Warning, 1s). He is working to rid himself of samsara, and moving with the river for "what [he] will be tomorrow [he] does not know" (94), he's ridding himself of this idea of a set path and goal and just going with the flow. Like in the song, he is ridding himself of the past to continue on the way, pushing onward to make a new path and he chooses that he should be as the river in this property.
 * Analysis:**

media type="youtube" key="k0lIcsYSXd8" height="315" width="420"

**Song: "The River" by the Tea Party**
"I pass by the sins, left by a different man, (5s) The tides brought them here, cast by a different hand." (6s)
 * Lyrics:**

"The past now seemed to him to be covered by a veil." (90)
 * Quote from the text:**

The samsara and dark past he had in the town are "left by a different man" (The Tea Party, 5s) as he continues on his way in life, starting anew by the river where he begins to remember his goals. Those goals had been lost in the gambling and business, but this was now "covered by a veil" (90) to allow him to forget those cursed moments. This song really relates to the part where he is just finding Om and his new beginning, and he is breaking away from the town. But all those reckless gambles were now "cast by a different hand" (6s), and the river could wash them away and him to his new home.
 * Analysis:**

media type="youtube" key="wXcdYBh3hgg" height="315" width="420"

**Song: "Bring Me to Life" by Evanescence**
"Without a thought, without a voice, without a soul (7s) don't let me die here" (8s)
 * Lyrics:**

"(Wake me up) Wake me up inside (9s) (I can’t wake up) Wake me up inside (10s) (Save me) call my name and save me from the dark (11s) (Wake me up) bid my blood to run (12s) (I can’t wake up) before I come undone (13s) (Save me) save me from the nothing I’ve become" (14s)

"When the sound of Om reached Siddhatha's ears, his slumbering soul suddenly awakened." (89)
 * Quote from the text:**

After so long in samsara, Siddhartha felt it, and in his dream he knew that bird was him. When he realized this, he didn't want to die, he packed and prepared to go, feeling as if he was "without a soul" (Evanescence, 7s). Along side the river, "the sound of Om reached Siddhartha's ears" (89) and "before [he came] undone" (13s), he was able to be free of the cycle he had lived in. He then continued on, finding his home by the river that saved him and gave him a new start for the second time, for "his slumbering soul [was] awakened" (89).
 * Analysis:**

=Om= media type="custom" key="21517646"