riverviewlogs | introductory mingle: FLOWER FESTIVAL

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introductory mingle: FLOWER FESTIVAL

who: everyone in Riverview!
what: Introductory Log and Flower Festival Celebration
when: April 2nd - April 15th
where: In several different locations in the downtown area of the Inhabited City.
warnings: please put any necessary warnings in the subject lines

flower festival

In the days leading up to April 2nd, residents new and old may notice advertising around the city, everywhere from digital screens to paper flyers pasted on blank walls, all advertising an upcoming holiday: The Flower Festival. Celebrating springtime, beauty, joy, and togetherness, the festival heavily features floral themes and dancing. The advertising mentions that on April 10th, a paid holiday, there will be a Blossom Picnic, as well as lists of various public dances at clubs or other open venues, and adult raves.

a celebration of spring

The Flower Festival's main event is the Blossom Picnic on April 10th, but it also features traditions of sharing food and drink, and dancing that span over the course of the whole two weeks. There are a large variety of events going on throughout the city, from dancing lessons in any wide variety of traditional dances, to old-fashioned sock hops, to adult raves complete with mild party drugs. Feel free to use the prompts below or create your own event at any point during the festival, and if your character creates an event and hosts it in a top-level, you can submit that thread for extra bonus points.

i. blossom picnic

The main event that kicks off the second week of the Flower Festival is the Blossom Picnic on April 10th. A relaxed and low-key event, it draws several thousand people every year to the spacious Riverview Central Park, where there is a generous lawn lined with various blossoming trees, and families, found families, lovers, and groups of friends are encouraged to lay out a picnic blanket and share food. There will be live bands playing (but not loudly enough to distract from conversation and peacefully watching the petals flutter in the wind), a variety of demonstrations of traditional cultural dances from many different realities and planets, and a ton of ice cream vendors. This is an excellent festival not only for celebrating togetherness with the people who are already important, but for mingling and making new friends.

Characters may either pack their own lunches or they can purchase pre-packed Blossom Festival lunches. Stores and street markets are carrying a wide variety of specialty food that is only available at this time of year - predominantly pastries, an assortment of types of candies, and ice cream treats all in various floral flavors, as well as a sort of ambrosia salad based around a sweet rose-flavored cream and a native fruit that is bright green and tastes like a combination of peach and citrus.

ii. dancing lessons

Starting on April 2nd, there will be dancing lessons offered almost everywhere you look! From partner dances to group dances to line dances; sexy and sensual or innocent and childlike - almost any type of dance you can imagine is represented, from any reality or planet that has people in Riverview Quarantine.

Additionally, the Riverview Central Community Center has multiple rooms blocked off so anyone who knows a dance from home can teach it to others in their community - sharing is caring, after all. Characters are welcome to block off one of these rooms and offer lessons in any dance they happen to know from home (and these sorts of thread starters would be eligible for the mingle AC Point bonus)!

iii. flower festival dancing

This is pretty simply what it says on the tin - in almost every club, community center, or other public space, there will be dancing at almost all hours of the day or night, formal and informal. Musicians bring out their instruments and play in the street for demonstrations of cultural dances and music at the same time as clubs are offering VIP cover charges for exclusive dances, and you can find anything in between.

There are also many low-cover-charge raves that allow under-18s so younger characters can stay up all night and dance like crazy. The legal drinking age in Riverview Quarantine is 14, and so anyone over 14 can enter and indulge in a few drinks, dancing, and playing tag with a non-intoxicating version of the colored powder featured at the adult raves. There is copious amounts of security on site to ensure that everyone is safe, as well as nurses and off-duty police officers to offer advice or care for anyone who overindulges out of lack of experience.

Grab a partner, a group of friends, or just cruise and mingle the various dancing events.

Characters may also notice that most of the street markets and clothing shops are offering clothing that features floral patterns, flowers as accessories, and that show a lot of skin - for men, women, and anyone in between!

iv. adult raves

Advertised on flyers and digital screens around the city, made to pop as if they were under blacklight, is a series of adult raves that are happening in various large empty warehouse spaces around the city, including one that is listed as the danger rave and hosted in an abandoned factory outside the inhabited city walls. With bouncers at the door to ensure that anyone entering is 18+, the raves are comfortably adult in nature. Clothing is optional, showing skin is encouraged, and there are a lot of neatly tucked away spaces for attendees to get some time alone with one or more than one person, as well as spaces intended for orgies. The atmosphere is sex-positive and non-judgemental, open to any orientation or preference, with various forms of protection available for free, however, to ensure that everyone plays safe there are sober security teams out en masse at all premises to oversee the events.

(CW: DRUG USE) In each location, there is one specific room where attendees can enter, and dance or play tag with brightly colored powder that contains small amounts of a legal party drug commonly available in Riverview, which is absorbed through the skin. Not much more intoxicating than having a few beers, the effects of the drug are a pleasant low-key buzzing euphoria, positive sensitivity to touch, a heightening of desires for intimacy, and a mild lowering of inhibitions. Once a character has been hit with the powder, the color lingers on the skin so other attendees can know who has partaken, but once the powder makes contact with a surface it deactivates, meaning that partakers can safely dance with non-partakers without sharing the intoxicating effects.

Please be sure to warn in subject lines for any threads involving drug use. And remember, there is always security to intervene and make sure everyone is safe.

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 at the Flower Festival, feel free to write it up!

visual inspiration

click on thumbnails for larger view

Credit: third image by Steve Goad; other images found on uncredited on Pinterest or Google images - please let the mod know if you find credit!

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Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[He'll actually understand this guy's lack of want for physical touch, and it's with a gruff sound that he'll let out when he's bumped into by someone. Again.

Fortunately for Shigeru, being knocked into has become irritatingly common since the dancing first began, either due to people trying to get past him or from people trying to get him to dance, too.

So when he turns his head to glare down at the guy when he apologises, it's with a note of confusion.]

...What's that? [Why is he holding up--

This guy can't talk? That would explain the need to hold up his phone instead of speaking. Also, no, it's definitely not hot. At least not to someone dead. It's fine...]

....

I'll let it go this time. Only because you had the decency to apologise.

[ Whoo that was close! But Shigeru is grateful for the warning that Gabe gives and in return gives a sheepish smile. Thank you friend for being understanding! ]

You don't like dancing either? I'm not too fond of it myself. It's too...close really.

[ His face looks a little forlorn though as he says that. He'd like to dance and it looks fun, but obviously it's a bit...too much for him right now. ]

Are you another new arrival?

No. I don't. I hate crowds, and I hate the noise, on top of it.

[His tone is irritated at best, but if he has to talk to someone, not having to hear them chatter on is probably the best way to go about it.

He has absolutely no interest in 'playing nice' and 'making merry' with this crowd. He was only here to make sure no fights broke out, and that was about it.]

....You could say that. Yes. I'm not new to the concept of being dimensionally tossed around, but new to being stuck on one planet instead of travelling around? Yes.

[Being aboard the Eluvio was a trip.]

[ Shigeru nods in complete understanding. He gets you Reaper, he gets you, but for very different reasons. ]

So you've experienced something like this before?!

[ Look at him getting all curious and wide eyed. ]

That's amazing! But I'm guessing it from another place not directly linked to here, right?

[it's a pain in the ass to explain, but... it's not like Shigeru is asking personal questions. It's a general idea, so sharing it isn't half as irritating as explaining his appearance would be.

So Shigeru continues to get a pass, for now.]

...Yes.

I was ... I'll use the term 'spirited away' to a giant space fleet called The Eluvio.

I spent over three months trapped out in space due to it, before winding up here when there was ... errors on the ship that got us trapped on a strange planet called Bajikan.
Don't know what happened to end up here, but the crew always talked about space-time anomalies happening, so I suppose it was only a matter of time.

[ Wow that sounds so supernatural and scifish he'd have a hard time believing it, if you know, it hadn't happened to him. So he just nods and types something to Reaper to read again. ]

That's very interesting. They're probably not directly linked, but I never even considered technology like this existing before. The fact that not one but two different groups of people having it is an amazing coincidence.

[ He kinda wishes it wasn't so sudden but what can you do. He's more or less settled into a good routine here for now, and he's getting better with crowds and sharing a space with people. ]

I'm Shigeru Miyata by the way! It's nice to meet you! [ Despite how you're dressed you don't seem so bad Reaper. Shigeru wasn't sure when he first bumped into him but...he doesn't seem so bad?! ]

[Hah. He'd be inclined to say the same thing, honestly. But after being pulled around twice, he's started being pretty chill with believing almost anything. It's a dangerous place to be, honestly.]

Coincidence. Maybe. Or just people fucking around with technology that they shouldn't.

[That was his opinion. After all, people loved playing god in situations like these. They could do anything for the sake of science at the end of the day.]

... Reaper.

[He seems to take forever to answer on that last bit. He's still not exactly friendly, nowhere near offering the same 'nice to meet you' back, but. The other chose topics that were hard to argue or growl about. So playing nice wasn't so much the chore it usually was. Lucky Shigeru.]

[ Shigeru probably thinks it's the latter as he nods with a thoughtful expression. His expression only gets more so when the other gives his name. ]

Reaper then! It's nice to meet you! What sort of world are you from?

[...There it is. Smalltalk, interest in something that any normal people both stuck in the same situation would be in.

He can feel his teeth set behind his mask, and he doesn't spare the other a glance.]

Doesn't really matter. Not going back to it. So talking about it is pointless.

[Friendly.]

Oh! Well if you don't want to. I'm missing my home a little bit. But here people don't look at me like I'm a monster, so that's something that's taken getting used to.

[ He shows his phone with a dour expression on his face. Shigeru can't help but wonder what happened to make Reaper or anyone that way. Even if he wasn't treated the best back at home he still misses it. But that's far too personal an issue to ask someone he's just met. ]

Maybe here can be something like a second home then! It doesn't seem like such a bad place after all.

[He reads that first message, and then he gives the guy an incredulous look that won't be seen from behind his mask. A monster? The fuck is wrong with people to look at a kid like this and think something like that?

He almost feels insulted.]

What, just because you don't talk like a normal fucking person, they see you as a monster?

[Jumping to conclusions, of course.]

[ Shigeru hunches his shoulders and looks away nodding but also typing something as well to Reaper. ]

There's that, and it's also because of what I am. In my world we're all...sort of ostracized for being Phrobiests.

[ People feared them and yet used them for their own convenience and safety. ]

['Phrobiests'. It was a term that Reaper neither recognised or has even heard before. He should just ask straight out what the hell that meant, but instead:]

Going to hazard a guess and say that it has nothing to do with being pro-yogurt.

[Sometimes he's funny. Even if his tone doesn't carry this joke half as well as it should.]

[ Well it does get a smile out of Shigeru at least. No he is not a probiotic nor is he pro-yogurt, Reaper. ]

It's someone who has powers that are...linked to their phobia.

[ And here he looks a little awkward. ] Mine is...mysophobia.

[ He'll just fiddle with his phone after Reaper reads that. His gloved hands are probably indicative to his ailment but maybe not?! ]

[Mysophobia. He wasn't any great bastion of knowledge, but he was well-read enough to recognise that phobia at least. It probably helps that it's a common one, and not something strange and obscure.]

...

Makes a person wonder what kind of powers you can get from being terrified of germs.

[Because seriously...]

[ Well it is a good question and one that many people have asked about back home. He'll respond again and hold up his answer for Reaper to read. ]

I can breakdown and reform things at their smallest atomic level. It's...very good for medical purposes since we can reform limbs and organs. Most of us are...doctors in my world for that reason.

[Immediate discomfort, honestly. He shifts a little to get a better look at this kid, squinting at him from under the hollows of his mask. Teeth set, arms crossing.]

...It sounds sketchy, if you ask me. Useful, in its own ways. Dangerous, on another.

No wonder people are terrified of you. You could break down someone's heart with just a thought, couldn't you?

[ Shigeru just hunches his shoulders and looks down at the ground for a second or two. It's pretty obvious his expression is hurt mingled with acceptance. ]

I could. But I would never do something like that!

'Would never'. Out of morals, or out of fear of further prosecution?

[He can think of dozens of ways this power could be used--not all of them for good.]

Whatever your answer is, I'd hardly judge you.

Both of course. I would never do something that cruel to anyone, even if they are persecuting my kind. That won't help matters at all anyway.

[ He's far too kind to be living in the world he's living in, honestly. But Shigeru couldn't bring himself to abuse his powers in such a manner. ]

I can think of a few ways how it might 'help matters', if you're in danger.

[Going to give him a serious look he won't see under the hollows of his mask. You can almost feel the cruel grin.]

If anything, you might have a power that can best anyone elses' in a fight. No better self defense than making someone's arm turn into dust.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

introductory mingle: FLOWER FESTIVAL

absolutely no promises

:C

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