Never come between a man and his sandals. These are the words that Rama assumed were told to every young child growing up, as his father told him, his father's father told his father, and so on.
But apparently not.
"Sita! Sita!" Rama screams for his wife.
"What's wrong, Rama?" Sita asks."Did a jealous enemy try to kill you again?"
"No, Sita, worse. My sandals have been stolen. How am I supposed to walk around with bare feet? You know I have thin skinned feet!"
Sita, not believing Rama, begins searching for the sandals. On the forest floor, where Sita generally finds Rama's sandals every other time they've been 'stolen', she finds a note. The note reads: "You will never see these sandals again. They are mine." Sita immediately rushes the note over to Rama, who is still frantically looking for his sandals, hoping maybe he just misplaced them.
"I found a note!" Sita tells Rama.
Rama snatches the piece of paper out of Sita's hands. Rama reads the note with a stone look on his face. He recognizes something. This isn't just anybody's handwriting, this is the writing of the most notorious rakshasa on the planet...Burlish. A ten foot tall reptilian humanoid being who lives in the Ganges river, Burlish is feared by all of those who know of his existence.
Rama has dealt with Burlish before. Long before Rama met his wife Sita, he was a lonely man. Walking from village to village, scavenging. One day as he was getting a drink of water, he saw a pair of sandals next to the water. Rama saw nobody around, so he assumed they had been forgotten. On the bottom of the sandals was written "victim #425: He fought hard." He thought this was weird, but he took the sandals anyway. Rama puts them on and quickly realizes they are the most comfortable sandals he has ever worn. Suddenly, Rama hears a loud voice come from a figure in the water.
"Where are my sandals?!"
Burlish spotted Rama on the edge of the river, wearing the sandals. He had heard stories about him, but he didn't think he really existed. Rama began to run. He had a head start due to Burlish being in the water. Rama buries himself in bushes and dirt under a tree. Burlish runs past him, not noticing him. Rama makes the conclusion that Burlish keeps souvenirs of the people he has defeated. Rama continues his journey in his comfortable sandals.
Rama thought that would be the last time he ever had to deal with Burlish. He was wrong. He wanted those sandals back. They were the best pair he ever owned.
"Oh, well." Sita said. "You will have other sandals."
"No." Rama said. "I need those sandals. Burlish doesn't deserve them anyway. He had to defeat a hopeless person to get these!"
Sita sighs.
Rama sets off to the Ganges river. He knew Burlish would be there with the sandals. He would reach the river by the next morning.
Author's note: One thing that stood out to me was the sandals in the Ramayana that were used to represent Rama. Based on that, I decided to make a story that involved Rama and sandals.
