# Hanuman Crosses the Sea to Lanka

> With a 150-year-old verse translation of the Ramayana open on the table, Mira and Kannan follow Hanuman’s leap across the sea and his search of Lanka, and sort what the text says from later retellings.

- Show: [Banyan Stories (Ages 9–15)](https://www.banyanstories.com/ages-9-15/), ages 9–15, English
- Page: https://www.banyanstories.com/ages-9-15/episodes/hanuman-leaps-to-lanka/
- Audio: https://media.banyanstories.com/media/ep-109/explorer/e148a1c76bc07c8b1eedbd426324358ab83bcd265a8c250406fa8e8c26dfc67a/201cf836abc4b540f2add5288b877a3a500f362f61b0a1f688bb833f4ac762a6.mp3 (11 min)
- Published: 2026-10-02
- Scare level: 2 of 5. A tense-sounding sea crossing and a brief unexplained house noise, both handled calmly and resolved; no violence or graphic detail.
- Content note: Mira and Kannan are fictional framing characters; The ocean-helper fragment is flagged as thin evidence and the helper is never named; The later bridge crossing is kept distinct from Hanuman's solo leap.

## Transcript

Each passage is labelled with the evidence behind it; “Fictional scene” marks the story itself.

Rain tapped against the kitchen window on a grey Saturday afternoon, and the radiator ticked as it warmed. Mira had spread her notes across the table: sticky flags in three colours, a pencil behind one ear, and a library copy of a very old English verse translation of the Ramayan. Across from her, Kannan was drawing a monkey in mid-air above a wavy blue line, tongue poking out in concentration. Mira had promised their grandmother she would prepare a proper telling of Hanuman's leap to Lanka for the family gathering. She wanted to get it right. Getting it right mattered to her more than she liked to admit. *(Fictional scene)*

'You look like a detective,' said Kannan, not looking up from his drawing. 'I kind of am,' said Mira. 'Everybody remembers this story a little differently. Some people add details, and some details come from other tellings. So I'm trying to separate what this particular translation actually says from what I just assume it says.' Kannan held up his picture. 'Mine says the monkey has a cape.' 'Does the book say that?' 'No.' 'Then that's your artistic choice,' said Mira, grinning. 'Which is totally fine, as long as we both know it's a choice. That's the rule of the table today. Facts from the page, creativity labelled as creativity.' *(Fictional scene)*

Mira began with the timeline, because she knew mixing it up was the easiest mistake to make. 'In the story this translation follows, Hanuman visited Lanka before Rama's army arrived. A footnote tells us that, and it fits with how the book is arranged. Later, the army reaches the shore, and Rama wonders how they will ever cross the flood. That later crossing is a separate event, and it is made by bridge. So there are two different journeys over the water: Hanuman's early visit, and the army's later crossing. They are not the same trip, and they do not happen the same way. Tonight, we only follow the first.' *(Supported)*

She turned off the overhead light and lit the small deepam by the window, the way her grandmother did when stories were told. The flame leaned, then stood up straight. 'Close your eyes for a second,' she said. 'Picture the shoreline at dusk. Cold wind, foam at the edge, and a horizon with no end in sight. Nobody in the world has measured how far it is, and nobody has any good reason to think that one person could cross it in a single jump.' Kannan opened one eye. 'But he does.' 'He does,' said Mira. 'And the really interesting thing is how the book lets us know it was extraordinary.' *(Fictional scene)*

'The book does not just announce it,' Mira continued. 'It lets someone else say it. In a speech to the Rakshas lords, Vibhishan asks who had ever dared to imagine the exploit Hanuman achieved. He describes it as springing across the fearful sea, which he calls the king of the tributary rivers. Then he turns the lesson toward his listeners. He urges the lords to be wise in time, and not to look down on Rama's matchless power. In Griffith's translation, the leap is presented as a bold deed that astonished even the people of Lanka themselves. This is a retelling of a summary of that passage, so I'll keep my wording close to that.' *(Supported)*

'So the people on the other side were impressed?' said Kannan. 'That's a clever way to tell it,' Mira said. 'Think about it. If I say, I ran really fast, you might not believe me. But if my whole class says, nobody even imagined she could do that, then you really know it was something. Storytellers have used that trick for thousands of years. They show a deed by showing how it surprised the people who watched it.' Kannan leaned back in his chair. 'Okay, that is sneaky and smart.' 'Sneaky and smart,' Mira agreed. 'But the speech also carries a warning: be wise, do not underestimate. Which is a very good idea in a lot of situations.' *(Fictional scene)*

For a moment, neither of them said anything. The rain had changed from tapping to a long, steady hush. Mira found herself imagining the middle of the journey, far from either shore, where the water stretches in every direction and the sky looks as large as the sea. She imagined the sound: wind, and wave, and nothing else. She imagined the loneliness of that, and the stubbornness it would take to keep going. It was a good thing to imagine, she thought, because courage often looks exactly like that: not a loud moment, but a long stretch of staying with something hard. Kannan reached across the table and moved the lamp a little closer to her notes. *(Fictional scene)*

Mira flipped a sticky flag. 'Now here is the piece I have to be careful about,' she said. 'This translation includes a brief fragment saying that someone rose from the ocean's sheltering breast so that Hanuman might stay and rest during his journey. That is everything the passage gives us. It does not name the helper, and it does not describe what happened next. My notes call this plausible but unproven, and my confidence is low. It suggests there may have been a pause on the way, offered by someone out of the water, but I would want to check the full text before telling it as a scene.' *(Plausible, not proven)*

'Wait, so who was it?' asked Kannan. 'A sea creature? A spirit? A mountain?' Mira shook her head. 'You see, that is exactly the temptation. Lots of people have a favourite answer, and maybe those answers are found in other tellings. But the fragment in my book doesn't say, so I'm not going to say either. If I fill in the blank, then someone in the family will repeat it as if it came from the text, and the mistake would travel.' Kannan sighed dramatically. 'Detective rules are annoying.' 'They are,' said Mira. 'But they let people trust us. And I can say, honestly, I don't know, and here is where the page stops. That is a perfectly good thing to say.' *(Fictional scene)*

Mira drew a little diagram on the back of Kannan's drawing, with his permission, using two arrows. 'This arrow is Hanuman's early visit,' she said. 'He crosses the sea on his own, before Rama's army has even arrived. This second arrow is later. The army comes to the shore, Rama wonders how to cross the flood, and the crossing is by bridge. In the story this translation follows, those are two separate events. If someone tells you Hanuman leapt and then the army also leapt, or that the bridge was how Hanuman first went, you can gently point back to the order. His solo journey comes first, and the bridge belongs to the later crossing.' *(Supported)*

A sudden thump came from somewhere upstairs. Kannan froze with his crayon in mid-air. He had never liked sounds in the house that nobody could explain, and this one landed right in the middle of the quiet. Mira held up one finger, listened, and counted silently. The thump came again, softer, followed by a rolling sound, and then a very small meow. Mira let out a laugh. 'It's the cat,' she said. 'She's knocked a pencil case off the bed again.' Kannan's whole body unclenched. 'That cat,' he said, 'needs a bell.' They both laughed until the tension was gone, and the rain seemed to laugh along with them. *(Fictional scene)*

'Hey,' said Mira, once she had caught her breath, 'it's normal to get startled by a noise when you're thinking about big, dramatic things. Your brain is just being careful. And being careful isn't the same as being afraid. You noticed something, you paused, and then we checked together. That's exactly the right way to handle it.' Kannan nodded. 'And the story isn't scary, right? It's just big.' 'Right,' said Mira. 'It's about astonishing courage, and a few honest gaps in the page. Nothing in it needs to keep you up at night. If anything ever does, we can pause the story, or stop it, or talk about it. Always.' *(Fictional scene)*

Kannan got up and refilled their cups of milk tea, being very careful not to spill. He set Mira's down beside her notes. 'Can I ask you something?' he said. 'Why does it matter so much to you? Getting every detail exactly right?' Mira turned her pencil over in her fingers. For a while she didn't answer. 'I think,' she said slowly, 'because I'm scared of letting everybody down. If I tell it wrong, and Grandma notices, or someone's cousin knows better, I feel like I've failed them.' She looked up at the deepam. 'But I'm starting to think being honest about what I know and don't know is a better way to be careful than pretending to be perfect.' *(Fictional scene)*

'That sounds like a Hanuman kind of thing,' said Kannan. Mira raised an eyebrow. 'How so?' 'Well, he didn't know how the whole trip would go. He just went. And the speech says nobody even dared to imagine it.' Mira smiled. 'You're right. Courage doesn't mean knowing everything ahead of time. It means moving forward, with a clear heart, even with gaps.' 'And a cape,' said Kannan. 'No cape,' said Mira. 'Not in this translation.' 'In mine,' said Kannan, and he held up the drawing. Mira laughed, and picked up her pencil, and wrote in the margin of her notes: tell it honestly, tell it warmly, label the guesses. *(Fictional scene)*

Before you go, here is a question to talk about with whoever is listening beside you. Mira had to decide between telling a smooth story with filled-in blanks, or an honest one with a few mysteries left open. Which would you rather hear, and why? Have you ever been in a situation where it was braver to say, I'm not sure, than to pretend you knew? And what is something big that you once thought nobody could do, that turned out to be possible? Take a few minutes and share your answers. Every family tells these stories a little differently, and that is part of what makes them yours. *(Fictional scene)*

The rain had thinned to a few last drops by the time Mira closed her notebook. The deepam burned low and steady. Kannan had fallen asleep with his head on his arms, his crayon monkey still flying across its blue wave. Mira covered the drawing gently with a sheet of paper so it wouldn't smudge. She was ready now. She knew what the page said, she knew where it went quiet, and she knew which parts were hers to imagine. Thank you for listening, explorers. Be curious, be honest, and be brave in your own way. We'll meet you at the next story. *(Fictional scene)*

## Sources

- [The Ramayan of Valmiki (English verse translation, Internet Archive copy)](https://archive.org/details/india.history.resource.72963), Ralph T. H. Griffith (translator); Valmiki (original poet). Supported: In the story this translation follows, Hanuman visited Lanka before Rama's army arrived. The army's later crossing, after reaching the shore and wondering how to cross the flood, is a separate event and is by bridge.
- [The Ramayan of Valmiki (English verse translation, Internet Archive copy)](https://archive.org/details/india.history.resource.72963), Ralph T. H. Griffith (translator); Valmiki (original poet). Plausible, not proven: This translation includes a brief fragment saying someone rose from the ocean's sheltering breast so that Hanuman might stay and rest during his journey. The passage does not name the helper or give details.
- [The Ramayan of Valmiki (English verse translation, Internet Archive copy)](https://archive.org/details/india.history.resource.72963), Ralph T. H. Griffith (translator); Valmiki (original poet). Supported: In Griffith's translation, Vibhishan tells the Rakshas lords that no one had dared to imagine Hanuman's exploit of springing across the fearful sea, and urges them to be wise in time and not to look down on Rama's matchless power.