Row, Row, Row Your Boat...

Pages 82-95 of Siddhartha are made up of the chapter "The Ferryman". This is the story of how Siddhartha returns from a land of abundance and riches, and changes once again as he goes back home. He meets a ferryman called Vasudeva who takes him across the river. 

It seems as though Siddhartha (I'm going to refer to him as Sid from now on) is in love with this river. It's the same one that he crossed while traveling with the Samanas. But I'm confident that he has a good reason for this. In page 82 Sid says "How he loved this river, how it enchanted him , how gratefull he was to it." I believe that the reasin for this is that it symbolizes the change he took with the Samanas. 

But his love for the river isn't only physical. He also wants to be in it all the time, like when he asks the ferryman if he could be the new ferryman. He really wanted to be in this river the rest of his life. 

Two Indian Dudes Brought Together

Siddhartha isn't exactly what I'd call a "hero".  Most heros save people and fight evil, but as far as I'm concerned, Siddhartha is just an old man that walks around talking to people and preaching. He doesn't exactly "fight" for what he wants. He just does his best and meanders around peacefully and calmly. And for this reason, I can relate him to Gandhi, the Hindu leader. And before you say that Gandhi isn't a hero either, I would like to remind you that he was the liberator and the role model of millions of people, so I also hold him in the same light as Batman, for example.

Both of them are what I like to call "peaceful warriors". They fight for something without having to actually fight. This, I believe, is even harder than fighting. Because having the power to have thousands of people follow, support and listen to you is greater than having the ability to massacre your opponents in my eyes. They both have quite grand beginnings. Siddhartha was the son of a Brahmin, one of India's richest group, and Mahatma was a world-renowned lawyer who was used to be treated like a god. 

One thing I really admire about both of these individuals is that they have the ability to rid themselves of all their possessions and even go further than that. They regularly fast as well as inflict pain on them selves with the purpose of purifying their souls. To me these are the signs of a pure and well rounded human being. 

The only thing that I can criticize about Siddhartha (and praise Gandhi) is the lack of a mustache. All great men, as far as I'm concerned, have a mustache to show off to the world. Einstein, Martin Luther King jr, Abraham Lincoln, Jesus, and the list goes on. 

Words With Meanings. Sorta.

1. Without possessions: (52)

2. Business (55)

3. People (57)

4. Illustrious (59)

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Word Picasso

Excellent (45)

Verse (47)

Require (49)

Rich House (51)

Servant (53)

The Word Illustrator

Beautiful (pg 32):                                                      

   









Born: (33)

Alone (34)

See (38)

Beautiful (43)

Two Gods Equals One

Throughout the second chapter of Siddhartha, I noticed some blatant similarities to the Bible. First of all, let's talk about some of the obvious ones. Maybe the one that pops out at you the most is how the  author compares Buddha to Jesus. How his "words and breath are sufficient to heal the afflicted..." and how "Many go their way to seek the wise man". This whole thing seems pretty similar to how the King of the Jews travelled around the Middle East curing people and performing miracles, with a horde of followers behind him. And the way that some people talked trash behind both their backs says that whoever wrote Siddhartha clearly was inspired by Sir Jesus of Nazareth.

I was drinking some water while reading, and when I was nearing the end I was chuckling a bit, because of all the similarities. But when I read the last sentence, and the book says "you would have soon learned how to walk on water", some liquid came out of my nose, I'm not going to lie.

Throughout the read (which was very puzzling btw) I couldn't help feeling curious about the Buddha. He seems very cryptic and interesting. When our main character tells Govinda that he didn't want to meet Gotama, I wanted to give him a pat on the back. With a baseball bat.