Ghyll:Calends Gala

THIS ENTRY STILL VERY MUCH A WORK IN PROGRESS. KEEP YER MITTS OFF.

The Calends Galas, as the name implies, are galas surrounding key calendrical events. In particular, the Calends Galas, traditionally, occur twice a year. In previous years, when the country was primarily agragrian, the galas happened at the end of the harvest, and at the end of the planting. Now that the country is more industrialized, the final Varhookan of Baros, and the final Varhookan of Gomin, have been agreed upon for these events.

On the day of the gala, everything else stops. All businesses have the day off, Government offices and banks are all closed, and schools have the day off.

The Harvest Calends Gala is mostly a agricultural event, with contests for the best produce, best livestock, and many competitions of strength and craft making. The graphorn wrestling contest is always a popular favorite.

The Planting Calends Gala is a quieter event, focused more on artistic and literary endeavors, but also with contests involving cooking - cake-making contests, pie-eating contests, and wine and beer contests.

But the highlight of both galas comes just after sunset, when everyone gathers in the great central tent for the story-telling contest. From sundown to the early hours of the next morning, stories are told, with prizes being given in a variety of categories, including funniest, shortest, and scariest. The overall winner of the story contest is crowned the Author Laureat for the six months until the next gala.

Arariax was the Author Laureat for 9 years running, sometime between -260 and -250EC, and many think that he was driven to his self-imposed exile due to the negative effect that this was having on the contests: Nobody else thought they would ever have a chance to win, so the quality of storytelling was falling considerably.

Most of the well-known authors of the last 200 years have either won the calends gala story contest, or at least done very well in it.

These contests are also very important in the historical record of the nation, since for centuries it was at these events that the histories were told, and thus passed on to the younger generations. Unfortunately, with the advent of readily available printed books, this tradition has started to die out, and many of the old stories have all but passed from memory. Both the Cranee Historical Society and the Bureau of Forgotten Knowledge are watching this trend with great interest, if with somewhat differing goals in mind. And, indeed, there is a promising upsurge in interest in the old stories of late, with last year's Author Laureat being awarded to Mork Wasterson, a 87-year-old man, for telling of his experiences on the day of the Earthquake of Fijjit.

As he told the tale, it was as though we were there with him, and he was again just 13, running home from the Baleman as the trembling earth tried to toss him to the ground. (Folktown Records, special Gala report)