Storytelling Week 5: The Ghost-Brahman

Once upon a time there was a Brahman. He had just married the love of his life. They had been dating each other for over five years and had finally decided to tie the knot. The Brahman had always supported his mother and now that he had married, there was an extra person to support. He told his mother and his new wife that he would have to travel to a far away place to earn some money for he did not have enough to continue the support. The Brahman told them that he would return in a couple of years whenever he had earned enough. Then he gave his mother all of the money he currently had and told her to take care of his wife. The next day he ventured off to a far away land in hopes that he would return full of wealth, but little did he know what was about to happen back at his home.

The next day a ghost came to his home. It was a ghost that looked exactly like the Brahman in every way.  His wife asked why he had returned from his journey so soon, and the ghost lied to her, saying that he decided it was more important to stay at home with family. The ghost had a hunch that no one knew that he was lying. This continued for many years and everyone believed that the ghost Brahman was in fact the real Brahman. His wife believed it, his mother believed it, and even the townspeople believed it.

A remake of the Ghostbusters' Logo. Found at: Deviant Art

After the real Brahman had earned enough money, he finally returned home. He was shocked when he got home and saw a ghost in his home in the place of him. The ghost told him to leave because no one would believe that he was the real Brahman. The Brahman knew exactly what to do though. He had been waiting for an opportunity to call some of his old friends. He picked up his phone and called the Ghostbusters. He had known them since he was but a young child. The Ghostbusters were a team of ghost chasers that knew how to capture ghosts forever. He gave them a call and they were there immediately with all of the necessary tools to hunt ghosts. They formulated a plan in order to capture the ghost of Brahman and then the time came to catch him. The Ghostbusters grabbed their vacuum cleaners and surrounded the ghost. These weren't any ordinary vacuums, but were specially modified in order to capture ghosts forever. The ghost had nowhere to go and was trapped. The Ghostbusters turned their vacuums to the maximum level and sucked the ghost into a safe storage container. The ghost of Brahman was no match for the Ghostbusters. Brahman happily paid the Ghostbusters and they were on their way. The real Brahman returned to his home and told his mother and wife exactly what had happened and that he really had been gone the last two years earning enough money to support them. They were shocked but happy to finally have the real Brahman back. While away, Brahman had earned quite a bit of money by buying and selling horses. He was one of the best used-horse salesmen in the world. He earned enough money for his mother and his wife to live very happily for the rest of their lives.

Author’s Note:

I wrote this story based upon The Ghost-Brahman. I kept the beginning of the story almost the exact same, but when the Brahman returned, the story took a turn. In the original story, Brahman went to the King and asked for help. Day after day the King told him to come back tomorrow. This is because the King was so baffled that even he did not know what to do. So eventually the King of the cowherds found a way to trick the ghost into showing that he was the real ghost. Instead of telling it that way, I decided to have him call the Ghostbusters. I thought this would add a little comedic effect to the story. In the original story, the King of the cowherds tricked the ghost into changing shapes to prove he was the real Brahman. Of course being able to change shapes proved that he was the ghost and when he changed shapes, the King captured him in a small container. The Ghostbusters instead used high-powered vacuums to capture the ghost. Ghostbusters has always been one of my favorite movies so I found a way to add it in to this story. I also added the part at the end where he made all of his money buying and selling horses. I thought this was a good way to add a little bit of detail to this story. I believe that detail is very important in stories, and a lot of mythology lacks detail. Overall this was a very odd story with the addition of the Ghostbusters, but odd stories are my specialty.

The original story can be found here: Folk-Tales of Bengal by the Rev. Lal Behari Day, with illustrations by Warwick Goble (1912).

Extra Reading Diary: Bengali Folktales

A Ghostly Wife: This is a story of a female ghost whom looks like a stereotypical white ghost. I really enjoy ghost stories so this story really caught my attention. My favorite character in this story was the ghost. I liked that it also had a happy ending, because ghost stories so often have bad endings.

A Story of Brahmadaitya: A Brahmadaitya is the ghost of a Brahman who dies unmarried. There was a certain tree in the outskirts of the village that was haunted, and it was hard to get anyone to go to the tree. The laird said that if someone would go cut a branch of the tree in the night, he would reward him or her with land. The ghosts cut the branch off for the man because the Brahmadaitya told them to. I liked that the Brahmadaitya kept helping the man in this story. It was a very happy story where the enemy, actually became the friend of the story and made a poor man wealthy.

The Origin of Rubies: There were four children, but the youngest always got everything. This made the other boys jealous. This youngest boy became very spoiled and never listened to anyone, even his mother. I really didn’t like the boy in this story because of that. He was a very rude child and very ungrateful of the things he got. I also didn’t like the queen because she picked favorites of her children.

Photo of a ruby. Web Source: Wikipedia

The Ghost who was Afraid of being Bagged: This is about a man that was told by his wife he wasn’t rich enough to be married to her. He set off and said he would never come back until he had enough money. He found a way to trick two ghosts into getting money and food for him. He told them that if they didn’t do it, he would bag them. This was a very smart man and because of it became very rich.

The Bald Wife: The story is about a man with two wives, one of which he loved more than the other. One of the wives had lice so the other shaved her hair off. He eventually began to love the other one more. I didn’t like this story all that much. I’ve realized in mythology there are a lot of stories about polygamy and death.

Reading Diary A: Bengali Folktales

The Evil Eye of Sani: A man, Sribatsa, was chosen to pick who was higher in rank, Sani or Lakshmi. Sani was the god of bad luck and Lakshmi was the goddess of good luck. He picked Lakshmi to be of higher rank, so Sani said he would keep his eye on him and give him bad luck. He kept having bad luck; he lost his mattress and his wife. Then he found a cow that could crap gold and it seemed his luck was turning around. Eventually he found his wife and the eye was no longer on him. I liked this story all right but it kind of dragged on for a while, and I didn’t think it was too exciting. Too many things happened too fast in my opinion.

The Boy whom Seven Mothers Suckled: Just based upon this title, this story seems like it could be very odd. This reminds me of another story about a half boy. That is because the seven ladies all couldn’t have kids, so he gave them all a peach that were supposed to make them be able to have kids. In this story, they all ate the whole peach. In the other story I read, one of the ladies only ate half of the peach. I did like this story a lot. It was pretty interesting all the way through till the end and kept me on my feet.

The Origin of Opium: This starts out with a man giving a mouse the power to speak. I found this odd but he did it out of kindness. The mouse asked to be changed into a cat so that cats would no longer hunt him. So the man changed him into a cat. He then asks to be changed to a dog for the same reason and then to an ape.  He kept changing and changing each time unsatisfied with what he became.  Eventually the mouse was turned into a queen, who eventually died. Where she died sprouted a tree, which had Opium. I thought this story was really good. I liked the way it ended and was honestly interested throughout the entire story. 

A man smoking Opium. Taken by John Hill (1979). Web Source: Wikipedia

The Ghost-Brahman: The Brahman said he was going away from his wife and mother for a couple of years to make some money to support them. The day he left, a ghost that looked exactly the same as him took over the house. When he returned, the King found a way to trick the ghost into leaving his house. I liked this story and it kept me very intrigued. It is a story that I had already read through research for a storybook, but I had to read it again because I liked it so much.