This story really started off with an intense introduction. Shantanu, ruler of Hastinapura, falls in love with a river goddess known as a river Ganga, who drowns her newborn babies because they are reincarnations of gods that must be punished (they stole some cows). However, she keeps the eighth baby who grows up to be Devavrata aka Bhishma. Shantanu finds another girl to marry, Satyavati (let's hope she's not crazy), but in order to marry her, Bhishma, his son, had to renounce his claim to the throne and the right to have sons. Bhishman then gets two new brothers from the marriage named Chitangada and Vichitravirya. The latter gets two wives, Ambika and Ambalika. I guess having children is really important to this family because once people start dying (like Vichitravirya did), people frantically start looking for bachelors to sleep with Ambika and Ambalika. Bhishma refuses to sleep with his dead brother's wives because he vowed to be celibate. Long story short, Ambika sleeps with Vyasa, son of Satyavati and Parashara, with her eyes closed so their son Dhritarashtra was born blind. Ambalika was so scared to sleep with Vyasa that she turns pale, so their son Pandu was born pale. Vyasa then sleeps with Ambalika's maid, who actually likes Vyasa. and their kid Vidura was born flawless. To keep things straight:
Dhritarashtra born blind (mother: Ambika).
Pandu born pale (mother: Ambalika).
Vidura born perfect (maid).
What is really sweet is that fact that Dhritarashtra's wife Gandhari covers her eyes so that she could be blind like her husband. On a funny note, Pandu is cursed to die having sex because he killed a deer while it was fornicating (lesson learned). Pandu has five sons - Yudhishthira, Bhima, Arjuna, Nakula, and Sahadeva - aka the Pandavas (he had some help form the gods since technically he can't reproduce or else he dies). The Pandavas reminds me of little crime-fighting pandas. Dhritarashtra has 100 sons called the Kauravas.
They train and fight together like a cool family of superheroes.
Nicole, your reading diary really helped me understand this better! I truly have the most trouble keeping the names straight while reading, so I think that I am going to start using your technique of labeling them with a description as you go in your reading diaries! I also particularly liked the part that you highlighted about Gandhari! How (strangely) sweet!
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