Saturday, February 10, 2007

Happily Ever After guide 2: Info on Chang E, Wu Gang and Pigsy

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO RASHIDAH AND ELIZABETH BANKS (Betty Brant in Spider-Man movies)

Continued from first part...
It turns out that after Cowherd and Weaving Girl eloped, they unwittingly started a trend. Chang'E the Moon Goddess and Pigsy decided to follow in their footsteps and elope. Alas, they were also caught and banished to Earth as human beings. The unhealthy trend of elopements raised many eyebrows in the Heavenly Court and some deities were displeased.


Chang'E was born into a poor family. Her name is Lu Yue, and people call her Ah Moon. As she lived her childhood in poverty, she is determined to become wealthy no matter what it takes, even to marry a rich man. She has no qualms stooping to unscrupulous means to attain her goal.


On the other hand, Pigsy becomes Master Zhu Wanjin, the son of a wealthy businessman. He is an extravagant spendthrift with a pompous attitude. Besides being in a relationship with Ah Moon where they are merely using each other, he falls in love with his only friend Tianqin.


The woodcutter Wu Gang has been secretly in love with Chang'e for a long time during his longterm exile on the moon, and is extremely worried about her banishment. The magpies reveal that Wu Gang was the one who instigated them to suggest elopement to Cowherd and Weaving Maiden. Elopement is a crime punishable by Heavenly laws. Thus, the Queen Mother gives Wu Gang the option to atone for his crime by doing good. He is to become her 'special agent', assigned with the task of protecting Cowherd and Weaving Maiden. In order to be able to meet Chang'e on Earth, he agrees to carry out this 'mission impossible' and becomes listed as one of the criminals wanted by Heavenly Guards.


Information on Chang'e:


According to legend, Chang'e and her husband Houyi were immortals living in heaven. One day, the ten sons of the Jade Emperor transformed into ten suns (no pun intended), causing the earth to scorch. Having failed to order his sons to stop ruining the earth, the Jade Emperor summoned Houyi for help. Houyi, using his legendary archery skills, shot down nine of the sons (rather reluctantly), but spared one son to be the sun. The Jade Emperor was obviously not pleased with Houyi's solution to save the earth: nine of his sons were dead as a result. As punishment, the Jade Emperor banished Houyi and Chang’e to live as mere mortals on earth.
Seeing that Chang'e felt extremely miserable over her loss of immortality, Houyi decided to journey on a long, perilous quest to find the pill of immortality so that the couple could be immortals again. At the end of his quest he met the Queen Mother of the West who agreed to give him the pill, but warned him that each person would only need half the pill to become immortal.
Houyi brought the pill home and stored it in a case. He warned Chang'e not to open the case and then left home for a while to go hunting. Like Pandora in Greek mythology, Chang'e became too curious: she opened up the case and found the pill just as Houyi was returning home. Nervous that Houyi would catch her discovering the contents of the case, she accidentally swallowed the entire pill. Chang'e started to float into the sky because of the overdose. Although Houyi wanted to shoot her in order to prevent her from floating further, he could not bear to aim the arrow at her. Chang'e kept on floating until she landed on the moon. While she became lonely on the moon without her husband, she did have company. A jade rabbit, who manufactured elixirs, also lived on the moon.



Information on Wu Gang:


Another companion of Chang'e was the woodcutter Wu Gang. The woodcutter offended the gods in his attempt to achieve immortality and was therefore banished on the moon. Wu Gang was allowed to leave the moon if he could cut down a cassia tree that grew there. The problem was that each time he chopped the tree, it heals itself instantly, and he never makes any progress. this effectively condemned Wu Gang to live on the moon for eternity. But Wu Gang didnt mind that at all, for he could get to see Chang'e every night ;-)


Information on Pigsy (Zhu Bajie):

Everyone should know this fella!! Pigsy was originally known as Tiānpéng Yuánshuǎi (天蓬元帅; lit. "Marshall of the Heavenly Canopy"), commander-in-chief of over 100,000 Heavenly troops. However, at a party organized for all the significant figures in Heaven, Tianpeng drank heavily and saw the Goddess of the Moon for the first time. Captivated by her beauty, the drunken Tianpeng attempted to get intimate with her, and the violated Chang'e reported this matter to the Jade Emperor. Tianpeng was given 1000 strokes of the staff before being exiled from Heaven and sent to be reincarnated on Earth, where by mishap he fell into a pig farm and was reborn as a half man, half pig monster known as Zhū Gāngliè ( the "steel-maned pig").
In the earlier portions of Journey to the West, Sun Wukong and Tripitaka come to the Gao village and discovered that the daughter of the village elder had been kidnapped and the abductor left a note demanding marriage. After some investigations, Wukong found out that Pigsy was the "villain" behind this. The beast fought with Wukong, but ended the fight when he learned that Wukong is a servant of Tripitaka. He then revealed that he had been recruited by Guanyin to join their pilgrimage and make atonements for his sins (those that had got him thrown out of Heaven, and the many he had racked up since). Ganglie was then renamed Zhu Wuneng or Zhu Bajie.
Like his fellow disciples, Bajie has supernatural powers and since he is a former general in Heaven he is not to be trifled with. He knows 36 transformations. Like his fellow disciple, Sha Wujing (Sandy), his combat skills underwater are superior to that of Wukong. The novel makes use of constant alchemical imagery and Bajie is most closely linked to the Wood element, as seen by another one of his nicknames, Mùmǔ (木母).
In some versions of the novel's end, most of Bajie's fellow pilgrims achieve enlightenment and become buddhas or arhats, but Bajie himself does not; although much improved, he is still too much a creature of his base desires. He is instead rewarded for his part in the pilgrimage's success with a job as "Cleanser of the Altars" and all the leftovers he can eat.
As a weapon he wields a jiǔchǐ-dīngpá, a nine-tooth (jiǔchǐ) iron muck-rake (dīngpá) from Heaven that weighs roughly 5,048 kilos (or roughly 11,129 pounds).

No comments: