Archive for the ‘Oasis of Klima’ Category
Oasis of Klima is back!
Saturday, September 24th, 2016
A caravan of merchants of the Southern Trade Alliance has made the way to the Oasis of Klima again. The path was lost for a long time.
In the distance, below, perhaps five pasangs away, in the hot, concave, white salt bleakness, like a vast, white, shallow bowl, pasangs wide, there were compounds, low, white buildings of mud brick, plastered. There were many of them. They were hard to see in the distance, in the light, but I could make them out.
«Klima, »said Hamid.
Most salt at Klima is white, but certain of the mines deliver red salt, red from ferrous oxide in its composition, which is called the Red Salt of Kasra, after its port of embarkation, at the juncture of the Upper and Lower Fayeen.
“For twenty days had we marched. Some thought it a hundred. Many had lost count. More than two hundred and fifty men had been originally in the salt chain. I did not know how many now trekked with the march. The chain was now much heavier than it had been, for it, even with several sections removed, was carried by far fewer men. To be a salt slave, it is said, one must be strong. Only the strong, it is said, reach Klima.”
WHERE DOES THE GLORIUS EMPIRE OF AR EXIST?
Tuesday, November 18th, 2014
The House of Yuroki Caravan approaching the Oasis of Klima
WHERE DOES THE GLORIUS EMPIRE OF AR EXIST? ~ 400 Years in the Future
By Teal Razor
In Port Olni, for the most part, the dwellers go about their tasks in a placid but cautious manner. Well, for the most part, except when sex starved slaves obtain a construction crew to erect an impromptu dance pit in the dead center of the commons. This was the scene last week in the commons of Port Olni.
Passersby were taken aback by this construction zone. Curiously though, the passersby did not report this behavior to a warrior, a magistrate, or the Ubarate. I speculated that those who passed by did not inform the authorities because they thought it was another project by the architectural firm, Buildem & Pray. After all it had all the earmarks of one of their construction sites; rubble, cement dust, and puddles of water everywhere.
So, no one suspected that a slave was actually the contractor. The pit, though, was fabricated so shoddily that there was a hole in the sand of the pit near the perimeter. When the slave/construction manager hopped in the pit to show a visiting physician some new moves she had learned, the hole proved to be a hindrance to her footfalls. At a couple of points in the dance she fell face first into the hole. I had never seen such a movement in any Gorean dance I had learned at the Gorean Dance Academy.
That no punishment was accorded the slave for causing this architectural flaw in the commons is the biggest puzzle of all. After the dance, the slave just walked away casually. Later a warrior saw the mess in the commons and ordered it cleared immediately. He asked around to see if he could learn who was responsible for this monstrosity of a dance pit. Funny, no one was able to identify the “perp” since no one thought a slave would do such a thing and chalked it up to the architectural firm of Buildem & Pray. No one would question THEIR doings in the commons. I think if anyone passing would have stopped to ascertain what was going on, the slave would have been apprehended quickly with a public whipping to follow.
This unquestioning of a questionable act was the forerunner of further aberrant behavior of the Citizens of Port Olni. I tried to figure out why last week, all the citizens believed that the Glorious Empire of Ar raided Port Olni.
The citizens even went so far as to claim injury and capture from the raiders who swooped down from the Glorious Empire of Ar. The peculiar thing about this raid was that it did not take place.
But, you could not reassure the citizens of this fact. The citizens brandished their swords and whacked away at invisible raiders before them.
And yet, for a raid that did not take place, the citizens thought it was real. Women hid, babies cried, alarms were sounded and the bridge raised. Warriors were seen tying themselves in binds, shouting to the thin air that they would kill the sleen from the Glorious Empire of Ar.
I came upon the aftermath of this raid to see people actually standing around discussing it. I felt like I was in a time warp because the Glorious Empire of Ar … does not exist. If it exists somewhere in the future we do not know. I mean, when was the last time a haruspex gazed into the entrails of a giani and said… “By golly, the Glorious Empire of Ar exists in the future. In fact, 400 years in the future.” No one has done this to anyone’s knowledge and yet Port Olni was deluded into thinking the Glorious Empire of Ar existed and they were in fact being raided by The Glorious Empire of Ar.
If the Glorious Empire of Ar does not exist and if by chance it will exist in the future, then in order to raid Port Olni, the raiders from that Glorious Empire would have had to use a time machine. Time machines do not exist, therefore the Glorious Empire of Ar was not in Olni.
I pondered this mass hysteria and decided to check the water supply to see if someone had infused a mind altering drug in the cisterns. I drank it, as a test, hoping I could see things that were not there. It did not happen. I was as sober as a magistrate after drinking a bota full of the stuff. I sniffed the air for some malicious gas that could be floating around. Gas has been known to cause ill effects on the sniffee’s. No gas was detected by me. Just the plain ole clean air of Port Olni.
I then had a bright idea that maybe the city had ingested Sa tarna grains contaminated with ergot. I rushed to the bakery and ate some mouthfuls of the grain hoping for a psychedelic effect. The only thing I received was a stomach ache.
This is a puzzle that one cannot solve. It did leave collateral damage in Olni with cuts, bruises, and headaches. They are still talking about it and all I can think of is…why?
Meeting of the Southern Trade Alliance – Brundisium
ASK TEAL ~ Dubious Advice to Goreans
By Teal Razor
DEAR TEAL:
I am a warrior and in my city I have noticed a steady increase in gambling. I myself like to throw an ostrakan into a basket to judge the way a game will go or not but I am not talking of this casual type of gambling. I have been seeing a more pervasive and insidious game being played where two men are drinking in the tavern. One brings out a pair of dice and tells the other…”I want to cut your head off. I want you to roll the dice and if you roll a number higher than mine, I will not cut your head off. But, if the number you roll is lower than the one I throw, you lose your head. So lets do that to pass the time.” I have seen men agree to this, the dice are thrown and inevitably a head will roll onto the tavern floor accompanied by much blood.
Three of my brother warriors were involved in such nonsense last week. One of them wound up without a right arm, which makes him useless to his caste, another had a dagger stuck in his belly and may not make it, the last was carved up like a vulo on a spit and died. This vice is spreading even to the kennels. Slaves are starting to throw dice to see who will clean up the bosk pens and they even throw the dice to find out how many lashes with a quirt that the first girl will administer.
Free women in the commons have stopped conversing so that they can roll dice on the table. They prearrange with another free woman that if they roll a higher number, that person can kill the slave of the other. If the other woman rolls higher, she gets to impale the other woman’s slave.
How can this madness go on and what can I do to stop it.
DEAR LEAVING LAS VEGAS:
Madness is an apt word for what you are experiencing. What you relate is a chilling tale of life being determined by a role of the dice. I mean what does that say for the participants, that they are at a loss for words to work out their differences, that they are so bored out of their minds that they chose not to speak but grunt to one another? I think you are right to rant about this “unspeakable” behavior. I am wondering what you really can do about this. It is a risky business to get between a person and his vice, especially of the vice of gambling.
If you think about it, you could become the object of their wrath and instead of their betting on one another, they could bet who could be next to run you through with a sword. This would be bad for your health.
I really believe that you should look for another city to make your Home Stone. Find a city where the citizens are articulate and have developed the habit of reading. It is doubtful that you will find “dice rollers” in your new city. The sound of soft chatter will be heard instead of the blood curdling screams of those who lose their limbs to a bet.
From the VOICE OF GOR v.4 Issue 182
PAGA, PAGA, PAGA ~ Festival in Sulport
Tuesday, May 13th, 2014
Picture: Oasis of Klima, Tahari desert
By Teal Razor, slave of Captain Siri Emerald Jr., Sulport
PAGA, PAGA, PAGA ~ Festival in Sulport
This weekend, merrymaking was at its best in Sulport. I am still recovering from the copious bowls of paga my Master fed me. I try to stay away from paga drinking. It seems one bowl is enough to cause me to shed what little clothing I have on and dance on table tops. One could say slaves should be doing these actions on a daily basis, well the dancing on tables part at least.
Sulport was awash not only in paga barrels, but revelers of all types willing to quaff the brew that was offered in tents set up around the city. Sulport was built with the word “par-tay” in mind. To be sure the buildings are neoclassical in fabrication but the arrangement of broad stone set plazas that surround them offer perfect places to set up festive booths and rides. Sulport took on the air of an earth carnival.
I was taken by my Master to one plaza that contained many venues. The first that attracted my attention was a kissing booth. I was quick to stand behind its counter and pucker up for the lips of my Master. I also looked around for any stray lips that wanted kissing but only free women were in the vicinity. After the smooching was over, he walked around to each tented and gaily decorated booth and examined them closely. I was especially taken with the candy booth. As luck would have it I was the recipient of a large honey candy which I commenced eating. Once my head is in candy, nothing much matters. A point that is well taken with my Master and he used the occasion of my zombie-like behavior to feed me the first of the paga bowls.
With my head reeling from the alcohol I continued to follow my Master around the fair. Our next stop was the snake charming basket. I looked in it to see an ugly ost. My Master picked up a flute and started playing and thumping the ground in front of the disgusting, wriggling, scaly thing. It popped its head out and started hissing at which point I backed off. I went to the revolving swings nearby and hopped on. Sucking on the candy was the only thing that saved me from displaying the contents of my stomach since the paga made me woozy and the action of the merry-go-round swings intensified the paga’s effect. After a while the feeling passed and my Master hopped on the swings also. He shoved his sandal up my butt from behind which caused us both to laugh.
Our next venue was the puppet show booth which was not manned at that moment. I called over to a kajira I have made acquaintance with by the name of Kayla. I was told she was going to put on a puppet show, which would have been highly amusing but, her Master, impatient with the slowness of the preparations, dragged her off so that he could swill from the flowing spigot of the paga barrel. This fact annoyed me but her Master got his comeuppance of a sort when he volunteered to be the dunkee in the dunk tank. I begged my Master to purchase me some projectiles to hurl at the bull’s eye target. He obliged me and I stood on the marker with stone in hand ready to pitch it at the destination which would cause Kayla’s Master to fall into the tank. The Priest-Kings were with me as I hit the mark on the first try and into the tank went Master Lorr Tren. I walked away smirking, satisfied that if I could not be privileged to see his girl’s puppet show, at least he was cold and wet because of my accurate throw.
After another ahn, my Master left to take a nap after he had downed a few bowls of paga himself. He bought me a honey pop and a nice piece of spiced and dried bosk meat. I was in tarsk heaven. Kneeling in the plaza, eating, and observing the free and slaves at their festivities was a pleasant pass time.
I was startled when a tarn and rider landed rather abruptly in the middle of this paga fest. The rider was hooded. His eyes scowling. He inquired about a dance competition that he was sure would be taking place at the Paga Festival. I informed him rather brightly that it would be starting in 2 ahn. A nearby slave got rather close to the tarn’s beak and was warned off by the cantankerous man who rode it. I was far enough away and called out to see if it would be permissible to throw a piece of candy to the tarn. The rider let fly a series of epithets which I countered with the supposition that he had arisen on the wrong side of the furs that morning.
Not wanting to be inhospitable, I asked him if it would not be more pleasant for him to come down off his high tarn and let me serve him paga and sweet meats while he was waiting for the dancers. This lead to further malevolent and inflammatory language from the tarnsman. He threatened in a loud voice to kill all the inhabitants of Sulport, raze the city, and bind all the slaves and sell them at auction in Port Kar. This ridiculous bellowing was heard by a free woman who was passing by. She demanded to know if the tarn rider was wanting to start a war.
Without warning the one man army atop the tarn instructed his bird to kill and devour me. I was alert for this one. After he called me a smart mouth slave I knew he was not to be cajoled in any way shape or form and arose to my feet and started backing away. It was a good thing I did. The tarn grazed my buttocks with it’s massive beak causing a nasty bruise. I ran for the apartments of my Master, the idiot on tarnback in pursuit. I reached safety and ventured out after a few ehn to see if he was still around. I glanced up to see if I could see the bird and noticed in the distance the tarn and its obnoxious rider sitting on the roof of the inn. They seemed to be awaiting the return of the prey, namely me.
I went back in and started cooking for my Master and vowed not to venture out for the rest of the day. My Master thought the bruise on my ass was from an overzealous paga drinker and I did not elaborate on its origins. Let sleeping sleens lie is a motto that has saved my bruised ass on many an occasion.
From the NEW VOICE OF GOR v.4 Issue 158
Oasis of Klima, new member of the true Southern Trade Alliance
Thursday, November 14th, 2013
Re-Opening of the HoY Bank in the Oasis of Klima
Monday, August 15th, 2011
The House of Yuroki Bank – which is working under licence from of the city of Landa – re-opened the branch of the bank in the Oasis of Klima.
House of Yuroki Bank Branch in Klima
Wednesday, February 9th, 2011
The House of Yuroki Bank – which is working under licence from of the city of Besnitt – opened a new branch in the Oasis of Klima. Drakkon and Coban, merchants of Klima, have been hired as bankers. Yuroki’s younger brother Raschid (picture) runs the bank.
Picture below: Bank owner Yuroki talking with his brother Raschid
