riverviewlogs | monthly mingle: CARNIVALE

Entry tags:

monthly mingle: CARNIVALE

who: everyone in Riverview!
what: monthly mingle: carnivale
when: the month of july
where: anywhere around the city
warnings: please put any necessary warnings in the subject lines

carnivale

In the days leading up to July 1st, residents new and old will notice preparations beginning, a flurry of activity getting the city ready for the upcoming celebration: Carnivale. This holiday is in celebration of music, and the onset of summer and warmer weather. The celebrations are marked by street parties, an extensive program of live musical performances, with two large parades on July 8th and July 9th.

celebrating music, and summer

After a couple of months of low-key or even solemn celebrations, it's time for Riverview Quarantine to throw a good, old-fashioned party. Carnivale is a city-wide festival that pretty much everyone gets into, and many residents take the entire week off so they can enjoy all the festivities. With events ranging from impromptu street parties, free live musical performances, food stands, themed club nights, adult lounges with kink shows, and topped off with two massive party parades, the holiday has a lot to offer for anyone who likes to sing, dance, and show some skin!

i. street parties and food

One of the staples of the Carnivale festival is the spontaneous street parties and food trucks and carts. It's not unusual during the holiday to turn a corner and run into a group of people dressed in bright colors and sequins having an impromptu party with a few drinks, and then be invited to join right in! Carnivale is a celebration of music as well as summer, so most shops and stalls will be blasting danceable music into the streets to facilitate these little street parties - it's considered a sign of good luck for the owner of a business if an impromptu Carnivale celebration starts up in front of their door.

Considering the proliferation of street parties and people out and about to celebrate the warmer weather, local business owners also take to the streets. Food carts, stands, and trucks pop up on almost every street corner offering a wide variety of food from savory treats to sweet desserts. Many of the carts are offering one free item to anyone dressed up for Carnivale - anything shimmery, shiny, or brightly colored will do!

ii. live musical performances

One of the major roads in the city center has been completely roped off for the entire week, and all along this street, various temporary stages have been set up, each with a nice hefty sound system. Volunteers hand out printed flyers, and digital boards are set up here and there with schedules of various performances that are all free to attend, ranging from well-known popular music artists to new up-and-comers or independent artists who are looking to make a name for themselves. This event is very widely advertised around the city, and is accepting entries until the very last minute.

So jump in and stomp around in a mosh pit or just dance around in the streets, let yourself get lost in the music and the summer heat!

Any player-characters who are musically inclined are more than welcome to assume their character was fit in for a performance, and can post up a top-level with a rundown of their performance to get bonus Activity Points for posting a mingle!

iii. carnivale parade and children's parade

The other main attraction of Carnivale week comes on the weekend of July 8th and 9th, which are paid holiday days for everyone in the city. There are two parades, the Carnivale Parade on July 8th, and the Children's Parade on July 9th.

Both parades will start out by City Hall and wind through downtown in a lazy pattern so everyone in the city has a chance to see them. There will be all sorts of floats, dancers, marching bands, with all sorts of clubs, businesses, and other organizations represented. Observers can expect great music, excellent dancing and marching shows, neat vehicles provided by classic car clubs, the fire, police, and Perimeter Guard. They can also expect a lot of party favors, whether it's a sparkly plastic beaded necklace, a fan to take the edge off the heat, candy, popsicles, a temporary tattoo, or any number of other little treats or toys to be tossed into the crowd.

The Carnivale Parade on Saturday has a more adult tone to it, and party favors thrown may be toys or gag gifts of a more adult nature suitable for older teens and grown-ups. The floats are more risqué and the people in the parade show more skin, dance more provocatively, and there are wet T-shirts, occasional flashing, and other things that might not be suitable for children. The theme is theatrical, big and showy, bright and colorful, sparkly and shiny, with loud music and lots of glitz and glamour.

Geared toward children and younger teens, the Children's Parade is on Sunday and generally more low-key, with more of a cartoony than glitzy theme. The Children's Parade will have more conservative floats, with bright colors, juggling and dancing, and mascot costumes. Party favors will lean more toward candy and temporary tattoos, rainbow pinwheels, and small toys. Keep an eye out for floats with pop performers and for popular cartoons in the city!

And make sure you wear your waterproof mascara - Carnivale and Children's Parade floats have a tendency of spraying or spritzing water, both in an unspoken competition to see who can make the biggest water-refraction rainbow in the air, and to keep observers cool in the new summer heat.

iv. adult: lounges

Thanks to the Carnivale tradition of showing as much skin as possible, some event organizers' minds have turned to topics of a more adult nature. In the evenings, residents may see clubs doing "lounge nights"; these adults-only events have bouncers IDing everyone at the door to ensure they're 18+. The themes may vary, from very specific niche themes like 'golden age superheroes' to broad themes like 'rainbows,' and each event is clearly marked as what it is - all-nude or clothing-optional, and can host events ranging from amateur to professional exotic dancing, food served off of nude bodies, anonymous masked hookups, or just provide a comfortable space where casual sex is encouraged with whoever happens to be around. Various legal substances can be found at these lounges, but nothing that would cause violation of consent, and every substance would be clearly labeled and have warnings to ensure that no one partakes unless they choose to. Please be sure to warn in the subject line for sexual content or drug use (since some mild party drugs are legal in Riverview).

v. roommates or wildcard

Feel free to use this prompt to set up headers for a communal floor, or threads open to roommates for the purpose of getting to know each other. Or if you have an idea for a prompt that isn't in this list, set during Carnivale, feel free to write it up!

visual inspiration

click on thumbnails for larger view

Credit: image i: Roger Patterson Jr.; image ii: Jie He; image iii: Aaron Walker; image iv: Lewis Monson

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[He blinks away the strange coding that appears briefly in his vision. Jim is asking him questions no one has before, because everyone's just used to a certain way of life]

Carl... he encourages me to make choices. But when I'm outside his home, I have to go only where androids are allowed to go.

You're... well, allowed to go wherever you feel like, here. [ For lack of a better word. ] You won't find yourself barred from entering any place that everyone else can go to.

[ And he won't have anyone here to tell him what to do, or when to do it. He'll have to figure it out on his own. ]

You're also very much encouraged to make your own choices. [ Speaking of— ] You wanna go for a walk?

[Markus just stares, too stunned by so much freedom to properly react. He grew used to it in Carl's house, but that was a small space with someone he trusted. Markus checks his current mission parameters, but they're still set on his latest order: "enjoy the festival"]

This festival is so full of color. I want to see if they have paint.

Ah! [ Jim grins and nods. ] They do, actually. Lots of it— mostly body paint, though. Come on, I'm sure we can find something.

[ He tilts his head, waiting for Markus to join him before heading down the street, looking around them and taking in the details of the festivities. He is admittedly more curious about Markus's own reaction, though, which is why he ends up looking back to the android more often than not. ]

[Any sort of paint will do. He keeps an eye out for any pedestrians so he doesn't disturb anyone and he maintains a distance from the food carts so they'll stop trying to feed him. A new objective, "find paint", has created itself.

But when he does find paint, he's at a loss again. The fact that it's body paint is fine. There are no androids here to take his payments. He looks to Jim for direction]

[ Jim finishes his own snack halfway through their walk, and turns his attention to finding some paint too. It's fairly easy, which he sort of expected, since most of the partiers have good portions of their bodies covered in paint by now.

He looks back to Markus, head tilting a little. He doesn't quite get the confusion, so he dips two of his fingers into the paint, swiping them across Markus's cheek. ] There. Like that.

[ Then he turns his head sideways, so Markus can do the same to him. ]

[There is a brief flash of red on his LED when Jim gets close. He's too accustomed to humans who aren't Carl attacking him to have it unlearned right away. But it seems he's only in danger of paint, and the color shifts to blue.

Markus finds a brush, his LED glowing yellow as he starts processing all the things he could paint. Carl's coaching comes back to him and he carefully starts to paint a small design on Jim's cheek.

When he's done, Jim's cheek looks a little cyberpunk with circuitry accenting the bone structure of his jaw and cheek]

[ In hindsight, it probably wasn't his smartest move to get that close without warning. He's starting to understand now what the different colors on his LED mean, though, so he'll pay more attention. For now he's just glad that Markus didn't move to defend himself against a perceived attack.

Jim stays as still as he can manage while Markus paints on his cheek. Once he's finished, he finds the nearest reflective surface to take a look. ]

Wow. That looks amazing. [ He glances at Markus. ] Do you paint often?

[He feels something warm and swelling inside him at that "wow". Similar, but not quite, to how it felt when Carl was in awe of his painting. But then, Markus hadn't been able to fully process Carl's reaction before Leo interrupted them]

This is the second time. Carl encouraged me to try it before.

That's brilliant. [ No one learns this fast. Being an android doubtlessly plays a role in it, but still. It's no less impressive to him. ]

You should definitely try it more often. Mine looks... poor, by comparison. [ He gestures to Markus's cheek. ] But I can try to do something a little better, if you're fine with it?

[It helps that ~~his dad~~ Carl is a talented artist, so Markus learned from being around and watching him. The praise gives him a strange reaction. A human would know it as pride, but Markus has no real reference for emotions.

Markus touches the smear on his cheek]

You can paint more.

[ Jim beams at the permission. Since he smudged blue paint across Markus's face, he adds a bit more to it, then finding himself a couple other colours, he starts painting a starry theme to the side of his face. It's not as good as Markus's painting, nor as precise, but Jim's happy with the mix of colors, and the way the LED will interact with the white stars speckled across the side of his face.

He also takes a little longer. But Markus doesn't complain, so he only stops once he's happy with the result. ] There.

[He stands perfectly still, which is easy to do when one does not need to breathe. Once it's done, he takes a look at Jim's handiwork. The starry theme is beautiful and the feelings Markus gets from it are strange.

He wasn't asked, but he gets the sense he's supposed to make some comment on it anyway]

I think I like it.

You think? [ He feigns a hurtful look, resting a hand over his heart. ] Ouch. That was my best work yet.

I'm not programmed with critical art analysis. But there is something... [His LED blinks yellow as he processes what he feels] Yes. I think I like it. And I know Carl would. I think he would be disappointed he hadn't thought to paint on me before.

[Has he talked about Carl in a fond tone often enough yet? The look on Markus's face might even be classified as "amusement" as he considers Carl's reaction to the paint on the android's face]

We don't have androids where I'm from, but there's one thing I learned with Dorian: androids don't do only what they're programmed to do.

[ The way he sees it, at least with Dorian, it's a good thing. He's engaging, insightful, wholesome. Jim probably wouldn't consider him a friend if he were just a machine offering programmed responses. ]

Tell me more about Carl?

[At first he thinks to correct Jim. The whole point of an android is to do what they're programmed to do, but then his eyes flicker to the circuits he painted on Jim's face. That skill was not in his program, and he'd fished the image from his "imagination" the way Carl coached him]

Carl Manfred is a famous painter in Detroit. He lost the use of his legs, which is how I came to live with him. Before I arrived here, he was the only human who spoke to me like I was more than a machine.

I was told I'll return to him just at the moment I left, but it's hard not to think about him. He would find inspiration to paint here with all this color and life.

[ And Jim would beg to differ. There is no point in programming an android that was designed to simply serve and do certain tasks to be able to feel, be self-aware, or like things. And yet, Dorian seems capable of all that— as does Markus. ]

I haven't heard of him. [ Not surprising. Different worlds, and all that. ] Maybe he'll come here too, you never know. But if he doesn't... well, you could find inspiration in his stead. Like... something to honor his memory. You do like painting, right?

[His lips move up when he thinks of Carl being here. Markus has to think for a moment when Jim suggests he paint in Carl's stead. Did he like painting?]

I don't know. I've only painted two things. [All right, technically three, but he was copying the first so it's not really the same.

The more he ponders this, the more he thinks back on all the things he did with Carl's encouragement]

I think I like a lot of things. Playing chess, learning about emotion and philosophy with books, music. And painting. I think I do like to paint.

[ It's fascinating to him, watching Markus's thought process, how he goes over certain bits of information, works things out on his own. He smiles a bit as he truly ponders Jim's question, then further adds to it with other things he likes. ]

That's amazing. [ To clarify, he adds. ] I like all those things, too. Though I will take all sorts of books— and I do more drawing and photography than painting.

[It isn't too surprising a human would like those things. Still, Markus looks like he's smiling]

Do you play speed chess?

I have, a couple times. Boring. [ He shoots Markus a cheeky grin. ] Won too fast.

[ He nods towards him. ] Ever heard of tridimensional chess?

[Speed chess is boring? He enjoyed it with Carl]

No. What is it like?

[ That's probably because Carl's good at it. Dumb Academy cadets were too easy to beat. But he's being a little unfair. He did enjoy it with Spock, for instance. ]

It's a type of chess where the squares are distributed onto separate platforms in different levels. It's pretty fun— I've actually built a couple of these boards here, so if you ever want to give it a try, I could teach you.

Yes. I would like to learn. [A pause. Then] Thank you.

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winscenario - 2018-07-14 23:11 (UTC) - Expand

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compartmentalise - 2018-07-14 23:31 (UTC) - Expand

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