My trials, tribulations, triumphs and more... - Arjuna.

Chapter 13: Life at Gurukul of Guru Dronacharya (continued) ...

The days at the ashram seemed to pass very fast, and in the initial phase of our training Guru Dron trained us in wielding various kinds of weapons such as bow, mace, spear, sword and so on and also made sure we were adept in wrestling too. And, his strict training meant, soon we all turned to be good at wielding all these various kinds of weapons. Also, Guru Dron made sure we learnt to train on fight on chariots as well.

I would like to recount some of the memorable times we spent at Acharya's ashram. As part of daily training routine, we used to attend the vedic and academic classes for one hour each and after that it was time to train with the bow from morning till afternoon. Since, the bow was considered to be the most decisive weapon in a war, so Acharya made sure we all become proficient in wielding the bow and put special emphasis on teaching various skills with the bow.

After the training with the bow till afternoon, we used to take lunch break and rest for a while and then resume the training. The training in the afternoon consisted of different kinds of weapons along with honing the chariot skills and wrestling. By evening, we used to become very tired by these intense training sessions and once those were over, go directly to the river and have a dip to relax our tired bodies and minds. After that, we spent sometime to discuss the skills learned that day and have some relaxing time with our brothers joking around. Then have early dinner and retire to bed as we used to wake up pretty early in the morning and needed sufficient sleep to undergo the intense training sessions.

Since, Yudhi bhai had vast knowledge of various puranas, we all used to request him to tell some interesting stories from various puranas before retiring to bed. Bhim bhai used to love hearing the stories related to Ramayan specially the ones related to Lord Hanuman. He used to idolize Lord Hanuman not only for his unbelievable strength but also for his steadfast devotion to Lord Ram. Sahadev used to love stories related to Nita Shastras (Scriptures related to Rule of Law), and Yudhi bhai used to pose questions to him on various cases during such times and almost on every occasion Sahadev used to come up with the correct solution to the problem. And, this gave great delight and pride to all of us to see the immense knowledge our little brother possessed. Coming to Nakul, nothing changed in his habits from childhood, he used to ask Yudhi bhai to tell stories where Kings/Princes did daring and dashing feats to win the hands of beautiful apsaras and princesses. Nakul never changed, the eternal romantic in him never ceased. I used to request Yudhi bhai to tell stories related to different avatars of Lord Vishnu, as I used to feel thrilled and experience some unknown bliss hearing awesome stories of Maha Vishnu. Yudhi bhai played the role of an ideal elder brother during this time, taking care of us and advising us in various situations. Only later on in life, did Yudhi bhai became very rigid in understanding the concepts of dharma and few times failed to grasp the subtleties of it and to respond properly to certain situations. Such failures in future, landed us in deep trouble and caused lot of physical pain which of course was nothing compared to the immense mental trauma we all went through.

We observed that during this period, the cracks in the relationship between us and our cousins widened and we no longer were on even talking terms. It looked like Duryodhan instructed all his brothers not to speak to us at all, and amongst all our cousins only Vikarna and Yuyutsu never bothered with those instructions and mingled and roamed with us freely. During this period, it was abundantly clear to our brothers apart from Yudhi bhai that Duryodhan will never believe in living harmoniously with us and will always be planning ways to eliminate us, so the path to him becoming King of Hastinapur in future would be clear. Bhim bhai had great foresight on these matters and always used to caution us when dealing with Duryodhan and warned us to always keep a watch on him. Bhim bhai already had experienced the cruel side of Duryodhan during our childhood, when he tried to get Bhim bhai killed by pushing him into the river when Bhim bhai was in unconscious state as a result of eating poisoned food served by Duryodhan.

Since, we brothers from our childhood were trained by our father Maharaj Pandu to lead a disciplined and dedicated life, so we naturally started to perform very well in our training sessions and started to outshine our cousins in every field by wide margin, and this seemed to cause feelings of jealousy and anger particularly in Duryodhan and Dushshasan. Yudi bhai excelled all the students in wielding of the spear, whereas Bhim bhai with his robust physique outshone everyone in wrestling but in mace fighting he found a tough competitor and almost equally adept fighter in Duryodhan. In fighting with sword Nakul became peerless and outperformed rest of the class. Whereas Sahadev excelled in chariot skills and fighting from the horse. I excelled all the students of the ashram in wielding of the bow which was my first love. Guru bhai Ashwathamma followed me closely in having the natural talent and skills in wielding of the bow. And, through the teachings of our Acharya, and the blessings of my late father I slowly started to excel in all kinds of weapons and also in fighting from horses, elephants, and on chariots. I always felt it was not just my levels of concentration and single-minded determination but also due to the 'kripa' of my Acharya and 'aashirwad' of my late father that I could excel in all types of warfare.

I would like to recount one interesting incident which happened during the initial phase of training at the ashram. Everyday, before starting of the training with the bow, as per Acharya's instruction we used to go the nearby river and have our pitchers filled with water and then return to the class. After that, Acharya used to impart knowledge of various mantras for invoking different kind of astras like varuna astra, vayu astra, agni astra, parvata astra and so on. During this routine I observed one strange happening, always found our Guru bhai Ashwatthama fill his pitcher and come first to the class before anyone else and thereby was already into the session and listening to the mantras taught by Acharya. I felt we were missing out in learning some finer points of the art due to this delay, since Acharya was already teaching Guru bhai when we came back after filling in our pitcher. When I observed keenly why this was happening, then to my surprise found it was due to the difference in the pitchers we all used. The one used by Guru bhai Ashwatthama, was a wide-mouthed pitcher wherein he could have the water filled in rapidly, whereas we were given narrow-mouthed pitcher so it took some extra time to have the water filled in. One day early in the morning, I was contemplating on how to overcome this issue and suddenly with some flash of inspiration, I got an idea and thanked my Guru in my heart. I realized learning mantras should not be merely a method of rote learning but they have to be applied in real life situations, so after gaining this insight I quickly recited mantra to invoke varuna astra and filled my pitcher in lightening fast time leaving behind even our Guru bhai Ashwatthama and came first to the class.

Later on when many people who came to know of this incident thought that it was due to Acharya Dron's partiality to our Guru bhai Ashwathamma which made Acharya devise this strategy, so that he could impart extra lessons and finer points to his son. But, that was not the case at all, it was our Acharya's unique test for us students, which was to make use of the knowledge of the mantras in practical scenarios and benefit from it rather than just become a parrot and rote it. Only I knew the immense happiness and pride seen on the face of my Guru when I came first to the class, on seeing me he rushed from his chair and embraced me warmly. He tapped my head gently and kissed my forehead and blessed me.