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sages_of_chaos, characters from multiple fandoms are acting as advice columnists both to other characters and to real people. I’m playing three of the advisors: Sgt. Preston of the RCMP, John Constantine, and Detritus the troll. (The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, respectively.) One of the other characters, played by ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
kali921, is an ateva from C. J. Cherryh’s Foreigner novels. In a post in Preston’s journal, they’re RP’ing out a nice, polite little meeting over dinner in the Yukon circa 1899, and trying to explain their various societies and roles to each other. Jago, whose people have a near-biological need for structured authority, asked the following question:
"Your duty, Preston-ji*, is to both the people and the Queen. The Queen is the aiji**, nai-ma, and the Mounties are within her man'chi*** and serve her, throughout the Association, but also all the people within her association. And the Hudson Bay - the Company - may or may not be within her man'chi, nadi****? What happens, Preston-ji, when there is haronniin*****? When there is conflict between the man'chi of one and the man'chi of the other? And when the Queen and the people conflict?"
*-ji is roughly equivalent to addressing someone as ‘$NAME-san’
**aiji- leader, person in authority, liege-lord, Big Kahuna
***man’chi- sphere of authority, jurisdiction, organizational structure reporting to a single aiji
****nadi- mister, miss, sir, ma’am, etc.; polite without being as terribly formal as the repetition of ‘sir’ would be in the English language
*****haronniin- seriously bad mojo, loosely equiv. to the Pratchettonian concept of ‘Aagragaah’, which is the trollish word for the moment when the landslide is about to happen; generally the only way to defuse haronniin is to call in the Assassins Guild and have them take someone out before they drag everyone kicking and screaming into the Abyss
Preston’s answer required rather more time to write than I had previously thought, and considerably more Canadian history than I think most Americans ever get in school. Lord knows I don’t remember learning any of it. The long form:
Preston is trying valiantly to keep up with the ateva without either giving inaccurate information or breaking the flow of thought by asking for translations. Most of what she's said has come ... well, not clear, entirely, but clear enough for now by means of the context. He's still not sure what 'nadi' means, but it has the sound of some of the words the Yukon Indians use when addressing one another. 'Aiji' came across pretty well, and 'man'chi' too, but the terms are starting to come a little thickly now. He'll have to answer carefully, and cover as much as he can in the hopes of getting things right enough for her to understand.
"The Queen," he begins, "is the head of the government. When I joined the Mounties, I had to swear an oath of allegiance to her before I could make any other oath, or assume any other duties. When she dies, I'll have to make the oath over again, this time to her successor." He thinks for a bit. "If there is . . . if this 'haronniin' is what I think it is, then you're talking about a situation where the Queen's subjects are upset enough with her, or she with them, that there's a possibility of civil war. Am I right? That's happened in the past, to be honest with you. Not often here in Canada, because our representatives to England speak well for us, and the Governor-General usually does a good job as the Queen's representative to this country. We believe in resolving our differences as peaceably as we can, here... it hasn't always worked, but that's what we strive for. In my experience, the biggest cases of this 'haronniin' happen when people refuse to listen to the needs and grievances of other people."
He touches the part of the map that corresponds to the 'postage-stamp province'. "This part of Canada is called Manitoba," he says. "It was established by a man named Louis Riel. Riel was what we call a Métis, someone whose ancestry was partly Indian and partly White. He considered the Métis to be his people, and pleaded with the government to recognize their territory as a province and grant them the same rights and representation that other people in Canada had. The government ignored him, mostly because of people in power who didn't want to lose their own standing to people they saw as their inferiors."
He pauses a moment. "This isn't a part of our history that I'm very proud of, Jago-ji," he says quietly. "I don't think this series of events speaks very well for us at all, but you did want to know what happened when there was conflict. This is what happens when it's not resolved properly."
Preston turns back to the paper. "All this territory, here-" He indicates an area that doesn't correspond with much on the map at all, though it mostly falls within Manitoba and is largely associated with the Red River. "That territory used to belong to the Hudson's Bay Company. That's where Riel's people came from. Their ancestors were mostly Hudson's Bay men who married Indian women. When the Company transferred its lands over to the Canadian government, the Métis people created their own government instead. This was considered an act of rebellion, and a small war broke out. Riel's people captured the leaders, tried them, and executed them, but the Canadian government called Riel a traitor and banished him to America-" He taps the country to the south. "-for five years. When Riel came back, he stirred up his people in this part of the country, where a lot of them had moved." The finger falls on Saskatchewan this time. "They started talking about forming a new country, taking all of these lands with them..."
The lands he indicates are the same ones that were earlier pointed out as being in the North-West Mounted Police's protection.
"Those were bad years for everybody in that part of the country, but they were especially bad for Riel's people. The government was afraid that they would rise in armed rebellion, and so the Prime Minister, a man named John MacDonald, sent in the North-West Mounted Police. Riel and his people started fighting anyway, attacking forts and settlements, killing soldiers, teachers, and policemen. They fought for two months all over the western part of the country, but in the end Riel's people lost. He gave himself up to the Mounties in Regina, here."
His finger is on a spot in Saskatchewan, but his eyes flick for a single instant to the photograph of his parents. If Jago's eyes are on the paper, she might not even notice.
"He was tried for treason against the government and the Queen, found guilty, and hanged on November 16th, 1885. I was eleven years old at the time."
Preston reaches for his tea a moment, then realises Jago's must be getting cold. Offering her the pot, he says, "It could have been much worse, but it could have been much, much better. If people in the government had been willing to listen to what the Métis were asking for, it really wasn't all that different from what everyone else in Canada had. A lot of people suffered and died for no good reason. I was always taught that violence should be the last resort, that I should do everything in my power to strive for a peaceful, fair and honorable resolution to problems. This wasn't remotely fair or honorable, let alone peaceful. I like to think we've gotten better since then. Riel's territories are part of Canada now, and have the legal representation and rights they wanted, but..." He shakes his head. "The whole thing's a disgrace."
Although, really, after reading up on the material I needed to make the response, I could probably have answered much more simply:
“The years 1870 through 1885.”
sages_of_chaos, characters from multiple fandoms are acting as advice columnists both to other characters and to real people. I’m playing three of the advisors: Sgt. Preston of the RCMP, John Constantine, and Detritus the troll. (The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, respectively.) One of the other characters, played by kali921, is an ateva from C. J. Cherryh’s Foreigner novels. In a post in Preston’s journal, they’re RP’ing out a nice, polite little meeting over dinner in the Yukon circa 1899, and trying to explain their various societies and roles to each other. Jago, whose people have a near-biological need for structured authority, asked the following question:"Your duty, Preston-ji*, is to both the people and the Queen. The Queen is the aiji**, nai-ma, and the Mounties are within her man'chi*** and serve her, throughout the Association, but also all the people within her association. And the Hudson Bay - the Company - may or may not be within her man'chi, nadi****? What happens, Preston-ji, when there is haronniin*****? When there is conflict between the man'chi of one and the man'chi of the other? And when the Queen and the people conflict?"
*-ji is roughly equivalent to addressing someone as ‘$NAME-san’
**aiji- leader, person in authority, liege-lord, Big Kahuna
***man’chi- sphere of authority, jurisdiction, organizational structure reporting to a single aiji
****nadi- mister, miss, sir, ma’am, etc.; polite without being as terribly formal as the repetition of ‘sir’ would be in the English language
*****haronniin- seriously bad mojo, loosely equiv. to the Pratchettonian concept of ‘Aagragaah’, which is the trollish word for the moment when the landslide is about to happen; generally the only way to defuse haronniin is to call in the Assassins Guild and have them take someone out before they drag everyone kicking and screaming into the Abyss
Preston’s answer required rather more time to write than I had previously thought, and considerably more Canadian history than I think most Americans ever get in school. Lord knows I don’t remember learning any of it. The long form:
Preston is trying valiantly to keep up with the ateva without either giving inaccurate information or breaking the flow of thought by asking for translations. Most of what she's said has come ... well, not clear, entirely, but clear enough for now by means of the context. He's still not sure what 'nadi' means, but it has the sound of some of the words the Yukon Indians use when addressing one another. 'Aiji' came across pretty well, and 'man'chi' too, but the terms are starting to come a little thickly now. He'll have to answer carefully, and cover as much as he can in the hopes of getting things right enough for her to understand.
"The Queen," he begins, "is the head of the government. When I joined the Mounties, I had to swear an oath of allegiance to her before I could make any other oath, or assume any other duties. When she dies, I'll have to make the oath over again, this time to her successor." He thinks for a bit. "If there is . . . if this 'haronniin' is what I think it is, then you're talking about a situation where the Queen's subjects are upset enough with her, or she with them, that there's a possibility of civil war. Am I right? That's happened in the past, to be honest with you. Not often here in Canada, because our representatives to England speak well for us, and the Governor-General usually does a good job as the Queen's representative to this country. We believe in resolving our differences as peaceably as we can, here... it hasn't always worked, but that's what we strive for. In my experience, the biggest cases of this 'haronniin' happen when people refuse to listen to the needs and grievances of other people."
He touches the part of the map that corresponds to the 'postage-stamp province'. "This part of Canada is called Manitoba," he says. "It was established by a man named Louis Riel. Riel was what we call a Métis, someone whose ancestry was partly Indian and partly White. He considered the Métis to be his people, and pleaded with the government to recognize their territory as a province and grant them the same rights and representation that other people in Canada had. The government ignored him, mostly because of people in power who didn't want to lose their own standing to people they saw as their inferiors."
He pauses a moment. "This isn't a part of our history that I'm very proud of, Jago-ji," he says quietly. "I don't think this series of events speaks very well for us at all, but you did want to know what happened when there was conflict. This is what happens when it's not resolved properly."
Preston turns back to the paper. "All this territory, here-" He indicates an area that doesn't correspond with much on the map at all, though it mostly falls within Manitoba and is largely associated with the Red River. "That territory used to belong to the Hudson's Bay Company. That's where Riel's people came from. Their ancestors were mostly Hudson's Bay men who married Indian women. When the Company transferred its lands over to the Canadian government, the Métis people created their own government instead. This was considered an act of rebellion, and a small war broke out. Riel's people captured the leaders, tried them, and executed them, but the Canadian government called Riel a traitor and banished him to America-" He taps the country to the south. "-for five years. When Riel came back, he stirred up his people in this part of the country, where a lot of them had moved." The finger falls on Saskatchewan this time. "They started talking about forming a new country, taking all of these lands with them..."
The lands he indicates are the same ones that were earlier pointed out as being in the North-West Mounted Police's protection.
"Those were bad years for everybody in that part of the country, but they were especially bad for Riel's people. The government was afraid that they would rise in armed rebellion, and so the Prime Minister, a man named John MacDonald, sent in the North-West Mounted Police. Riel and his people started fighting anyway, attacking forts and settlements, killing soldiers, teachers, and policemen. They fought for two months all over the western part of the country, but in the end Riel's people lost. He gave himself up to the Mounties in Regina, here."
His finger is on a spot in Saskatchewan, but his eyes flick for a single instant to the photograph of his parents. If Jago's eyes are on the paper, she might not even notice.
"He was tried for treason against the government and the Queen, found guilty, and hanged on November 16th, 1885. I was eleven years old at the time."
Preston reaches for his tea a moment, then realises Jago's must be getting cold. Offering her the pot, he says, "It could have been much worse, but it could have been much, much better. If people in the government had been willing to listen to what the Métis were asking for, it really wasn't all that different from what everyone else in Canada had. A lot of people suffered and died for no good reason. I was always taught that violence should be the last resort, that I should do everything in my power to strive for a peaceful, fair and honorable resolution to problems. This wasn't remotely fair or honorable, let alone peaceful. I like to think we've gotten better since then. Riel's territories are part of Canada now, and have the legal representation and rights they wanted, but..." He shakes his head. "The whole thing's a disgrace."
Although, really, after reading up on the material I needed to make the response, I could probably have answered much more simply:
“The years 1870 through 1885.”
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no subject
Date: 2004-12-13 08:32 pm (UTC)one's assGoogle when necessary for on-the-fly roleplaying, eh?no subject
Date: 2004-12-13 05:03 pm (UTC)There were also Willam Lyon Mackenzie and Louis-Joseph Papineau; Riel's just a more dramatic figure, and no one likes Mackenzie because he was, you know, an anglophone, and we all know they never had unheard grievances.
((To be a total history geek:, my farm is near St. Albert and, before the city proper expanded that far, it had river-lots like the seigneuries. St. Albert and Portage la Prairie, Riel's hometown, are the only places in Canada where the river-lots weren't turned into sections. St. Albert is, to this day, very French (there are no pure francophones, but I hear French at church or in the grocery store) and very Catholic. The river-lot system is a much smarter method of parcelling up prairie land, in my opinion, but eh.))
no subject
Date: 2004-12-13 08:34 pm (UTC)I have so got to learn French.
no subject
Date: 2004-12-13 08:38 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-12-13 08:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-12-19 06:48 pm (UTC)(It disturbs me that LJ's spellchecker wants to replace 'Papineau' with one of Papillae, Popinjay, Pauline, or, bizarrely, Spine. Of course, said spellchecker also doesn't recognize 'lj'. Or 'spellchecker'. Or 'livejournal', even.)
no subject
Date: 2004-12-13 10:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-12-23 08:58 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-12-23 09:05 am (UTC)