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

navigation

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ jyn doesn't actually like the beach. maybe she will one day, but she mostly only ventures down during holidays where she can't avoid the free stuff at the beach. the allure, of course, is the word free. and since the river festival is all about community, jyn takes the opportunity to help one (1) person who actually seems to have the same end goal as she does.

which finds jyn holding out an empty tupperware container to skye, gesturing at her barbecue. ]

So you can get more.

[ jyn's own bag is already filled with a couple full containers of the delicious food and she's definitely going back for thirds and fourths, but she can share one box for someone else to reap the benefits of not having to cook for a few days.

she was ill prepared last year but now she has a system. ]

( dear universe, thank you. skye's been mentally cursing herself for the better part of an hour for forgetting the homeless kid's number one rule to free-for-alls and all-you-care-to-enjoy buffet: bring your own containers. the proffered tupperware could very well be made of gold for all that skye's expression lights up like a kid at christmas. )

Um. ( she's so eloquent when she's excited. ) Thank you?

( cue the immediate action plan of figuring out exactly what's worth hoarding in her small fridge. carbs aren't worth bothering, hamburgers don't reheat well, hot dogs are disgusting on all orbiting bodies... but there are plenty of other options much more suitable for storage. )

I so owe you a drink for that. I can't believe I didn't think to bring them. ( a beat. ) I'm Skye, by the way.

[ ugh skye don't make her be polite and have manners. ]

Jyn.

[ she doesn't shift awkwardly, but there is an air of unsocial cat to her. there is a reason she has five whole friends and it's because they made her be their friend. it wasn't her social skills. ]

Best part about these festivals. All the leftovers you can eat if you think ahead.

I wish I could say this was the first community barbecue I've stocked my fridge from.

( but, you know, it's obviously not, just judging from the way she expertly combs through the platter of cured meats and cheeses. )

What's been good? ( she's eying a container of something that looks like brisket, but you never know with these moon people. ) Anything to avoid?

The stringy meat, [ jyn says immediately. a beat. ] To avoid.

[ she studies the spread again and gestures to the space version of falafel. ] Those are good and they keep well.

[ there's also some beef on a stick and twice baked potatoes with chicken and cheese and a chicken and rice casserole. that one is in a dish that looks ready to freeze and jyn has genuinely been debating taking the whole casserole and just sprinting home. she's fast! ] That freezes well.

[ so x-nay on the space brisket, then. guess it'll have to be the falafel. skye lets her attention shift for the time being, carefully scooping up as many as she can and tetris-ing them into the container. maximum returns or something, yada yada.

as for jyn and the apparently very interesting (and yet very untouched) casserole on the far end of the table... ]

How pissed do you think people would be if we just took the whole damn thing? I mean, we could bring the dish back, so...

[ skye is on jyn's level and she is feeling it. what a moment, finding your food insecure soulmate. sorry cassian, you have been replaced by a cute girl. ]

All we'd need is a distraction...

[ her eyebrows lift and even if she doesn't smile, her expression softens into something playful. ]

Oh, is that all?

[ fuck it. she might not have her gauntlets, but she can manage a small distraction every now and again without dying on the spot. jyn will just have to deal with the fact that her arms are being weighed down by impromptu deposits of basically everything skye was carrying... because that's the only way she can casually duck under the table. like that's a normal thing to do.

anyway. a little superpowered gesturing, and the sound of a banquet table (and all its weight) clattering to the ground across the way will hopefully be enough of a distraction to fit the bill. looks like people sure are running over, in any case. ]

Where to?

[ WELL now jyn has even more food and cannot possibly carry the casserole so she trusts skye to pick it up -- a trust which comes surprisingly naturally to a person who doesn't trust easily, but orphans stick together and she knows, deep in her soul, that skye is also an orphan. they have a code. ]

This way.

[ and she is just going to lead skye to jim's house so they can divvy up the food on his front steps. he will not stop her, he is effectively her big brother. ]

[ of course skye carries the casserole. she damn near cradles it the entire length of the damn quarantine, clutching the wannabe pyrex to her chest until they're on the doorstep of somebody's house. it's a nice little house. probably not this girl's, though, because she looks like she lives in a tiny shoebox.

there's just a vibe, okay. it's the orphan girl vibe, and they're soulmates now. ]

Crusty bits or middle? I'm a crust girl myself, but I can share.

Middle. [ said like obviously. how excellent that they can divvy it up so easily though. it would be easier to just cut it right in half but now that they have time to sit, who needs easy. ]

I'll get a spatula.

[ jim has one by the grill so she ducks around back and darts back with one of those big ass grill spatulas, holding it out for skye while she unearths another empty tupperware from her bag. ] You can keep the pan.

[ the spatula is comically large, and when she tries to use it skye resembles a knight trying to wield a flattened sword, but she's trying here. jyn will just have to forgive her if the middle bits get a little squashed in the transferring from container to tupperware. ]

I'd pretend I was going to bring it back, but I think we both know I'm not going to.

[ it's not like there's a name written on a piece of tape adhered to the bottom or anything. besides, tape can be ripped off. it probably already was. maybe it fell off in their run. who knows!!! ]

There's a whole clearing out holiday sometime. We're doing them a favor, taking one more thing off their hands.

[ and now they have that excuse to buy the new, nice pan they could never justify because they had a perfectly good one at home. honestly, it's a service that skye and jyn are performing. they're helping. ]

monthly mingle: RIVER FESTIVAL

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