introductory mingle: MEMORIA

[riverviewmod]

who: everyone in Riverview!
what: Introductory Log and Memoria Commemoration
when: May 1st - May 8th
where: Anywhere around the city.
warnings: please put any necessary warnings in the subject lines

memoria

In the days leading up to May 1st, residents new and old will notice preparations beginning, a flurry of activity getting the city ready for the upcoming celebration: Memoria. A more solemn celebration than Sampremi or the Flower Festival, Memoria is a week-long time of remembrance for those lost in the Great War and the epidemic that decimated Riverview Quarantine's population 10 years ago. Memoria traditions include lighting lanterns for the dead, telling stories about lost loved ones or lost homes, eating meals with loved ones, and a special gathering to send floating lanterns down the river in honor of those lost.

a solemn commemoration of those lost

While the main city-wide event associated with Memoria is the floating of lanterns down the river on the evening of May 8th, the holiday is generally seen as a time of reflection on and appreciation of things that have been lost - people, homes, cultures, and planets. It is also a celebration of the things that remain. Many locally-owned shops will host displays of culturally-significant food, and will hand out informational flyers sharing the unique customs of their own homeworlds. There is a heavy emphasis on sharing time with family, friends, and lovers, and anyone who is able to will cook meals or treats for loved ones, or at least purchase them something good to eat.

i. hanging lanterns

Throughout the entire week of Memoria, residents will be hanging lanterns around the city. Lanterns are generally placed in greater number in places of passage - streets, bridges, and all alongside the train lines are particularly well-decorated, as are any trees alongside paths, and most homes and businesses have a profusion of lanterns around their doors and windows. This tradition is twofold; some people believe that the lanterns are hung in these places in order to guide the spirits of the dead back to those who still love them, other people believe that the lanterns are to give light for living loved ones to find their doors in times of darkness...many people believe both.

No matter what your character might believe, you can be sure they will find themselves offered a lantern for free from various businesses or friendly citizens passing by, and invited to hang it before the sun sets, or they may be handed a bundle of lanterns and asked to help share them with others.

ii. sharing life

Throughout the city, characters will find groups of people gathering to share hot drinks and talk about their loved ones lost, their homes and planets, or their experiences during the Great War and the epidemic. Anyone who has lost someone, who has fought to survive, who is feeling cut off and homesick, is welcome to sit and share their story. If your character chooses to sit and to share their story, they will find that people will gather to listen, will generally be respectful of the telling, and may share their own similar experiences in return. This is an excellent time to air grief in an environment where most people understand and respect grief, and a good time to deepen the connections to others around you, to understand them better.

There is also a very large focus on cooking or purchasing meals or treats for loved ones during Memoria, with many people taking meals with everyone they care about during the week of the holiday. Some go the extra mile and will hand out baked goods (usually chocolate or cinnamon), packets of candy, or other little treats to acquaintances, especially if they would like to form a closer bond with them. This is a great time for characters to reach out to someone they would like to get to know better with a surprise treat!

iii. floating of the lanterns

On the evening of May 8th, just before sundown, many of the city's residents will head toward the banks of the river, where they will light lanterns in a wide variety of shapes, sizes, and colors, in honor of their dead loved ones. The types of lanterns vary wildly, based on personality (either of the person floating it or the person they are honoring), culture, and many other factors. Some lanterns are very simple, others are incredibly complex, but the one common feature they all have is that people write on the shades of them - they write about their feelings for their loved ones, their wishes for their relationships and friendships, a memory from childhood or home, or even just lines of poetry or lyrics from songs that express something they miss, or something that hurts them.

Once those emotions are written on the lanterns, the lanterns are set free, floating down the river in the darkening evening, in a cathartic gesture shared by most residents of the city. Waves of lantern floating will start around 7 pm and continue until the sun rises on the morning of May 9th.

iv. 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 Memoria, feel free to write it up!

visual inspiration

click on thumbnails for larger view

Credit: image i: glowconcepts, image ii: by trenchmaker, image iv: cherryorange; image iii: found uncredited on Pinterest - please let the mod know if you find credit!

navigation

Comments

[bone_idle]

[ Case worker. That's only a word he knows through his new job. Monster society ran things just a little bit differently, no formalized adoption, for instance.

Sans is... well, apparently he's drinking the remainder of the ketchup, but all he's doing is holding the mouth of the bottle to his teeth. On the list of weird things the kid's assuredly seen, this is probably nowhere near the top. ]

Hey, if they're as easygoing as you are, kid, guess I don't have to worry.

[ Lots of people might be upset to see their kid hanging with a skeleton.

That this is also in a bar doesn't actually occur to him, due to spending so much of his free time in one. Whoops. ]

Good t'hear. Don't think the last kid I met even had 'em.

[supersweet]

[ Jon swings his legs on the stool. He'd hardly call his parents "easy-going". His newer ones are still trying to do their best by him and Jon is trying to make it easier where he can, but he can't help doing things his own way. ]

There are monster kids?

[bone_idle]

[ Putting down his bottle, he flicks his hand lazily--and, as an afterthought, gets around to finally getting some of the ketchup off of them. Even uses the napkin like a civilized person. ]

Sure there are. Usually you can tell a kid right off, they always wear striped shirts.

[ Is that a cultural thing? ]

None in the zone, though. Heh heh, boy, would that complicate things.

[supersweet]

Why?

[ This is fascinating and Jon finds himself riveted, resting his fingers around the edge of the stool. Sans has his full attention. ]

What's the zone like? Are kids banned?

[bone_idle]

They just do. I dunno, some old story behind it, probably. Somethin' about circles keepin' kids safe. Sounds loopy.

[ Jon's piqued interest might have confused Sans, if he didn't immediately pick up on the fact that he'd used a word that most don't when talking about the area they occupy now. Perhaps because it feels more like a city than a quarantined encampment. ]

Heh heh heh, sorry, pal. I meant the quarantine zone. Where we are now.

Where I'm from, we called it the Underground. We'd been living under a mountain for, uh, longer than I've been alive. Plenty of kids there, just like any kingdom.

Pretty sure they would'a liked you.

[ But then, monsters tended to love quickly and earnestly, and their children were no different. ]

[supersweet]

[ The puns. Jon grins slightly at that. They put him at ease. ]

How come you lived under a mountain? Is it because it needs to be dark?

[ Are all monsters like vampires?? ]

[bone_idle]

[ Ok, definitely worth it for that smile. In the meantime, he's got another bite of burg once he's sure the kid isn't looking. Or blinks. ]

You might'a heard something like that. Monsters hidin' under your bed, in the closet?

[ Humans had all kinds of interesting things to say about monsters, like they didn't exist, like they weren't buried under a mountain for hundreds of years and entirely forgotten about by the people who put them there.

Not that he's sore about it or anything, he's just saying. Or... not saying, rather. ]

Ehh... you sure you wanna hear this story, kid? It's old. Real old. Older than this bag of bones.

[supersweet]

[ Jon shakes his head. Sure, it's mentioned in cartoons, but Jon is an outdoorsy child. He doesn't like sitting still and tends to daydream. And there's no way his parents would talk about monsters under his bed. Not when Jon has seen and fought real monstrous creatures. ]

Old doesn't make it bad. I wanna know!

[bone_idle]

Geez, hard to refuse that enthusiasm. Ok, kiddo.

[ Sans relents, though it doesn't seem like he was at all inclined to put up a fight in any case. Having made sure his phalanges are now about as clean as they'll get, he rests his cheekbone in the cup of one bony hand, propped up by his elbow on the edge of the bar. ]

Long, long time ago, humans and monsters lived together. Heard it was even pretty prosperous -- on both sides.

'Least, it was, until the humans got it in their heads that we wanted to hurt 'em, usin' powers they didn't have.

[supersweet]

[ Jon props his chin up with his hands and elbows. He loved stories like this. His father had told him many stories of his adventures. All suitable for Jon, of course. This story had the ring of truth. A story Jon could understand intuitively. ]

Yeah. People get scared about things they don't understand.