riverviewlogs | monthly mingle: RIVER FESTIVAL

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

river festival

In the days leading up to August 1st, residents new and old will notice preparations beginning, a flurry of activity getting the city ready for the upcoming celebration: The River Festival. This holiday is in celebration of the river and the life that it gives to the city, as well as the heat of summer and forming bonds with friends, family, and romantic partners. The celebrations are marked by a community-wide cleanup of the docks and beaches along the river - particularly important considering the recent flooding that's left the banks of the river littered with debris - as well as beachfront cookouts and parties (both private and city sponsored) and beach sports tournaments happening on either open stretches of beach or in special clothing-optional beaches, all capped off with fireworks displays each weekend in August.

a celebration of the river and togetherness

Following the hedonism of Carnivale, it's time for something a little more low-key and relaxing. The River Festival happens every year in August, and is geared toward community building through cleaning up the beaches and docks along the river and then using all that freshly cleaned beach to gather on. During the month of August, there are various lightly-themed government-sponsored beach cookouts and parties geared toward family, romantic dates, or casual all-ages get-togethers for meeting new friends; there are also a few more racy parties at clothing-optional beaches around the city. Many private residents also take this time to gather together friends and family, and have cookouts on the beach with all the typical trappings of the beach barbecue. There are also various casual sports tournaments sponsored by community centers, gyms, and sports teams in the city, featuring prizes ranging from notoriety to sports equipment to big bucks. Every weekend, there are beautiful fireworks displays and free concerts. This year, the River Festival has been chosen for the unveiling of a new water park in the City, with free or heavily discounted tickets during August!

i. cleaning up

The holiday starts off on a note that is just a bit more sombre than the rest of the season, with the cleanup efforts following the recent flooding blending into the usual tradition of cleaning up beaches and docks along the river. The cleanup is a group effort, with every citizen who is physically able pitching in to comb the beaches, where they pick up fallen tree limbs, garbage, and anything else that's accumulated during the winter and spring, and then raking the beaches to make them clean and ready to use. The cleanup of the docks is similar, with residents sweeping and hosing them down where necessary. This year, there are a lot of repairs to be made to beachfront structures that might've been damaged by flooding and the traffic along the riverbanks from the heroes that participated in the rescue of cult hostages, so if anyone has some carpentry or building skills, those would definitely come in handy.

This is meant to be a community building effort, so many businesses in the area, more well-to-do private citizens, and the government have pitched in funding to provide lunches, cold drinks, coffee or tea, and snacks to anyone who's helping out with the cleanup efforts. All in all, the cleanup has a very friendly, welcoming vibe.

ii. beach activities

The main traditions of the River Festival involve cookouts and beach parties. Each weekend in August, the government as well as various corporations and businesses in the city, will be providing funds for large beach gatherings. On these days, there will be booths set up offering wares and freebies from various businesses around the city that have helped fund the party, large swaths of cleared beach where residents can don a swimsuit and catch some rays or swim in the river, massive barbecue setups to provide partygoers with all the standard barbecue fare, beach sports tournaments, dancing and musical performances, and fireworks displays (see prompts below).

The holiday isn't just about these big parties, though - many residents arrange their own barbecues, cookouts, beach camping trips, beach bonfires, and other riverside gatherings and outings. Many riverfront businesses offer discounts on services such as canoe or kayak rentals to go out paddling on the river, jetski or motorboat rentals for tubing, wakeboarding, or waterskiing, or mounts to take romantic rides in the surf. Additionally, there is an adults-only section of the beach where any of these activities can be done in the nude in a clothing-optional setting, including the big city-sponsored parties.

If your character is good at playing a particular sport that could, conceivably, be played on a beach, chances are that during the month of August, a tournament will be set up for them to participate in. The tournaments are pretty standard, generally sponsored by community centers, sports clubs and teams, gyms, and other organizations and businesses in the city, with various levels of specialization, and levels of skill or competitiveness. The prizes also vary, with everything from plain old bragging rights to sports equipment or passes to gyms and community centers, to large lump sums of cash money. Definitely worth it, for characters with a love for sport. Oh, and a lot of these tournaments are happening on the adults-only clothing-optional beaches, for those grown-up sports fans who like a bit of an extra challenge.

iii. fireworks and music

Each weekend throughout the month of August, there will be evening performances all along the beach. Not as extensive as the musical performances during Carnivale, the performances are geared more toward dancing than true concerts, with areas roped off on both on the regular and adults-only clothing-optional beaches for dancing and mingling (acts will switch off between the two areas so both areas get both performances).

Player-characters who are musical artists, DJs, or otherwise perform are free to set up shop around this party and panhandle or put on free performances for publicity.

After the sun goes down, boats will head out into the water carrying a variety of fireworks, and there will be a beautiful display of exploding color in the sky for residents to watch and enjoy. The fireworks are highly advanced, incorporating old-fashioned gunpowder as well as modern technology that result in really beautiful displays that can take the breath away!

iv. waterpark

This year, there's an extra little bit of fun being thrown into the River Festival - the grand opening of a new waterpark! It's quite the park, set near the river with a scenic view, and featuring all sorts of amazing rides, from waterslides that are catered to all ages and levels of thrill seeking, tube rides that are almost like a rollercoaster on water, a pool where customers can faux-surf, funnel rides, side-by-side racing slides, a lazy river, and almost anything else you can imagine. Besides the rides, there are also a wide variety of swimming pools for kids and adults - wave pools, lap pools, splash pools - and an equally wide variety of hot tubs featuring various minerals (and some aromatherapy) for relaxing, invigoration, and other effects.

Some of the hot tubs are in a clothing-optional adult area, where there are some normal pools and some clearly-labelled pools contain elements that increase arousal or desire, or simply affection to encourage some closer bonding!

v. roommates or wildcard

Feel free to use this prompt to meet new roommates, for the purpose of getting to know each other, or hit up one of the mod-posted prompts for each Communal Floor. Or if you have an idea for a prompt that isn't in this list, set during the River Festival, feel free to write it up!

visual inspiration

click on thumbnails for larger view

Credit: image i: credit unknown; image ii: Albert Ramon Puig; image iii: Claudio Pilia; image iv: Alan Philips

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Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Growing up in the environment she did, Gyda was no stranger to seeing blood and serious injuries. Her parents wished to protect her, but they couldn't and didn't entirely shield her as some more modern parents did to their children.

Even so, seeing how the metal actually bit into his skin caused her to flinch just slightly. "But this works better than a prosthetic, clearly. This moves just like a flesh and blood arm, not something artificial." She frowned, another question on her lips, but knowing it was a delicate one. "Is it alright to ask what happened?"

"Sure, kid. It was a long time ago. I have special powers. Abilities. Whatever you want to call them. Some people add destiny and prophecies to certain people--I was one of those types. So an attempt was made on my life when I was a baby.

They put this techno-organic virus into my body and it started to spread. Once it covers the whole body, it's hard to remove. The affected person loses control of their own body and self-control and turn into a body of living metal. As an infant it probably would have just killed me." Cable starts stacking wooden planks, pausing for just long enough to give Gyda a glance.

"My powers basically keep the metal from spreading through my whole body..and no, it isn't contagious."

"That sounds like a story from home," She said once he was done. "The sagas are full of people who are marked from birth to become something more than human."

And so there are always those trying to stop them. "Does your name Cable have to do with your ability? It sounds like it should-anyone with something that marks them out will usually have it as their name."

"Basically. Got a few names based off of a few different things. This one just happens to be one of the simpler ones." Very perceptive of Gyda to put that together.

The mutant wasn't surprised; kids could be sharper than they were given credit for. They even proved him wrong. On occasion.

"I'm told my brother earned the name 'Ironside', because the first time he went into battle, even against heavily armed men, he didn't have a scratch on him." Her father told her the story first when she asked about her family.

"Ivar is called Boneless because his bones break easily." This was said because it was true, not for her mocking him. "But he bears the name with pride because in battle he's all the more vicious."

Such stories and names weren't uncommon in her world-to even earn such a name meant earning a history worth remembering.

"Sounds about right." Cable basically agrees with the point Gyda is getting across to him. "I have other names, too. Some I haven't been called in a long time. 'Cable' works. Not as long-winded or self-important as the others."

"Living for a long time will do that." She said, partially teasing. He was an old man even by her time, and certainly with his status as a warrior that was nothing to laugh at, but even so she couldn't help tease him for it.

Besides, something about him reminded her of her father, and thoughts of his loss was still painful.

Cable made an amused sort of sound; a gruff one. Just another reminder that kids could be sharp--some more than others. It reminded him of Hope waiting back in that separate timeline that the pair were in. Couldn't even really call it 'home'.

At least, Hope never did. Not seriously, anyway. "Sometimes I feel like I've seen it all by now." In a way, he sort of has. All sorts of things from all different kinds of times.

"Do you have a family back home?" A personal question yes, but everyone was a stranger here, and a man of Cable's age had to have a history outside of combat.

She lent some markers to another worker.

"I do, yes. Depending on what time I'm in, I'll have more than usual--or none at all." Cable didn't mind answering the question, as Gyda didn't strike him as the sort to cause any real problem for him.

For others? Who knew. "My father is usually around somewhere. Same for my daughter, Hope."

She frowned, trying to think it over. While her reading was more extensive than when she first started, but even she had a hard time figuring how this was possible.

"How does that work? Are you a sort of time traveler?"

People thought the stories of the gods were confusing.

"Take out the 'sort of' part and yeah, I am. Done a lot of time traveling in my life." Cable pauses long enough to give Gyda another little tidbit about himself. "I'm from the far off future of Earth. A bad one..but I've helped make it better for others time and time again."

A circular saw floats up and over to the stacks of marked wood while Cable moves closer to Gyda. He takes to a knee as the saw starts up, the mutant feeling tempted to say the rest of what wants inside Gyda's head. Instead he shouts over the saw. Just to be sure that seeing the saw move like it was wasn't already bothering her.

"Even at the risk of myself." Or at the risk of losing the trust of loved ones--friend, family, or other.

"Nearly everyone here is from a far off future in Earth, from where I'm standing." From what they told her, it was the 8th century where she was from, so any time in the 2000s was way ahead of hers.

She kept back when he turned on the tool, not wanting to risk loosing a limb or worse.

"Are you one they considered 'gifted'?" Not a god or even kin to them, so they told her, but she still had a time believing it. How else could people have such gifts.

"That's the nice way of putting it, yeah. Probably the best way to put it too. I try not to rely on it as much as others. Sometimes..." Cable trails off, leaving his thought for Gyda to either piece together and understand, or let it fall to the wind itself.

The saw whirs in the background behind them, Cable standing in a way that made it clear he was between the girl and the buzzing blade. "I imagine a lot of this is strange to you. Some things more than the people, maybe."

monthly mingle: RIVER FESTIVAL

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