Princess Arjuna: Week 9 Story

Long ago in the land of Hastinapura, Queen Vichitravirya ruled with an iron fist. The Vichitravirya has two daughters, Pandu and her older daughter Dhritarashtra. After the queen passed away, the throne fell into Pandu, Vichitravirya's youngest daughter.  Queen Pandu has five daughters all with different husbands: Yudhisthira, Bhima, Arjuna, Nakula, and Sahadeva. People call them the Pandava sisters. After Queen Pandu passed away her sister, Dhritarashtra, assumed the throne. Dhritarashtra has one-hundred daughters, all known as the Kauravas with the eldest named Duryodhana.

Both the Pandavas and the Kauravas grew up together. But as they grew older, Duryodhana grew more and more resentful towards her cousins' beauty. When Duryodhana's own mother elected Yudhisthira as the heir to her throne, Duryodhana plans to ruin her cousins. Slowly, the Pandavas turn into nobodies after Duryodhana manipulated her mother into stripping their royal titles. As the Kaurava took over the whole kingdom, Duryodhana banishes the Pandavas into the basement.

One day, Hastinapura hears news of a prince in Panchala looking for a wife. The Panchalas invites every woman to a ball. One-hundred of the Kaurava sisters are thrilled and start planning on what to wear. They demand the most exquisite expensive gowns. The Pandava sisters hear the news as well and prepare for an opportunity for a better life. However, Arjuna thinks the whole idea is stupid but follows along to protect her sisters. 

Suitors from all around visit Panchala to meet prince Draupadi. The Kauravas meet the prince with Duryodhana insisting on a dance. As they are dancing, the Pandavas arrives while wearing gowns they sew on their own together. Prince Draupadi catches a glimpse of Arjuna. He almost trips and falls as he is in awe of Arjuna's beauty. All the attendees of the ball stare at the woman Prince Draupadi is struck by. Some are jealous, while others are simply curious. He excuses himself from Duryodhana and walks towards Arjuna, exciting her sisters. 

"It would give me the greatest pleasure if you would give me the honor of letting me lead you to your first dance," he asks.

And just like that, Arjuna fell for him. This is love at first sight. Arjuna marries the prince and moves into the Panchala palace with her family. Draupadi becomes king of Panchala with Arjuna as his queen, and they live happily ever after...or so they thought.

Crown (Source: CleanPNG)

Author's Note: I wanted to keep this story short and simple. This is only the first part of the whole story. In my version of this storytelling assignment, I decided to flip the genders of all the characters including the Pandavas, Kauravas, and even the Kings. I went the fairytale route in a cinderella manner. In the original story, there was a contest to win Draupadi. I turned this into a fairytale ball with a male Draupadi as the prince. I made the story straightforward and remove a lot of the other complicated features. The dynamics between the Pandavas and Kauravas really stood out to me when I first read the story so I wanted to integrate this as well, especially Duryodhana's jealousy. I chose to use jealousy towards the Pandava's beauty. I was inspired by simplifying this story after seeing mothers and fathers reading their kids' bedtime stories on a TV show.

Bibliography. The Indian Heroes: Mahabharata- The Princes of Elephant City by C. A. Kincaid (1921). Web source.