December's the last month of the year, and Christmas is a holiday! Christmas Day is December 25th, while Christmas Eve is on December 24th. You celebrate by giving each other gifts! Though lots of people treat Christmas Eve as their big date night, so it's also a romantic holiday.
Kids get the most excited for it, but adults can have fun too. There are all sorts of activities, like viewing illuminations, eating Christmas cake, and singing Christmas songs! ๐ถ
As for Santa, he's sort of a mythical character. The story goes that there's a white-bearded man who delivers presents to children from his magic sleigh. He wears a red suit, just like that figurine is wearing. If a child asks where their present came from, their mom and dad might say, "Santa delivered it!"
[No, he isn't bothering to mention the religious aspect. That has no significance to him! Tatsumi could explain it better than he could.]
[ a romantic holiday... it's all coming together. ]
so this fat man in a red suit travels the entire world to give children presents? and he does it all on one day? he must have a considerable level of spiritual energy to be able to use distance shortening arrays with such frequency. even for a ghost king such as myself, to travel such distances would be taxing on my reserves of qi.
According to the legend, yes! But that's just a story for kids to enjoy, sort of like a fairytale. There's no *real* Santa. Just friendly impersonators, and parents who love their children!
[Though given that he's met a god from Norse mythology here, among other unlikely characters, perhaps he shouldn't be saying that with such confidence. That might just inspire the resort to kidnap the real Santa next.]
That's how we do things, anyway. Christmas is celebrated differently in other places. I know one person here said he didn't have anything called Christmas back home, but he did have something called "Kleinmas!" Apparently that's a month-long holiday similar to Christmas.
You don't have any holidays that end in -mas, do you? What about New Year's? Do you celebrate that, or do all the years blend together when you're immortal?
[ well that's disappointing. hua cheng had thought he must be a powerful being indeed, and now he's hearing santa isn't even real! ]
no, yes, yes, no.
holidays and traditions vary somewhat between the realms, but in xianle and in the realm of the dead we have no holidays ending in "-mas." we do celebrate the coming of the new year, but i am beginning to understand that the yearly calendar as i know it is different from this place.
time passes the same way for an immortal as it does for a mortal, just for longer. i remember every one of my eight centuries of life.
We use a solar calendar back home. So do most other places. We only started using one midway through the 19th century, so some holidays are still tied to the lunar calendar. But New Year's Day is always January 1st, and Christmas Eve is always the 24th!
It was almost the New Year when I got kidnapped here, actually. But in the resort, it was late February, so they had all these Valentine's decorations still hanging.
I'm guessing you don't know what Valentine's Day is, either, though. Or do you?
i do not. or, perhaps i do, by experience here in the resort if not by name... it has now been a full year since my arrival, if my calculation is correct. what is valentine's day?
Sorry to hear it. It hasn't been quite that long for me, but it's getting close. And that's an upsetting thought.
But as for Valentine's, that's another romantic holiday! A day for celebrating love! โฅ๏ธ๐๐น๐ People might give flowers or chocolates to their loved ones. Then there's another day called White Day where men give back chocolate to girls, or so I've heard. But as idols, Valentine's is mainly a day for sending love to our fans.
Valentine's decorations are usually pink and red, with lots of hearts, and it's celebrated on February 14th. So if you're still here then, you'll probably see what I mean.
so valentine's day is for girls to give men chocolate... and white day is for men to give girls chocolate. and what do you do if you're married to another man?
[ not that it matters, since xie lian is gone, but as a matter of curiosity... ]
i remember something like that, a long time ago. the time that many of the new arrivals found themselves married to each other, no? is that a normal celebration of valentine's day?
It does sound old-fashioned, doesn't it? But times are changing. They say even men can give chocolate on Valentine's Day if they want to now. And people can also give chocolate to friends. Or co-workers!
And that last thing is NOT a normal Valentine's celebration. There is such a thing as mock weddings, but those are strictly voluntary! And most people's idea of "wedding season" is June, not February. That's when wedding-themed jobs come in for us idols. Jun-kun went to something called a "bridegroom training camp" as part of a job once!
But of course he didn't really come back to married to anyone. *That* would've been a problem.
[This is probably just confusing Hua Cheng further. Idol life is weird.]
Which isn't very romantic. But it *does* give us job opportunities. There's probably some superstition that goes into it, too. And the temperatures are definitely more pleasant in June than in February!
And that training camp was really just an excuse to show idols like Jun-kun doing cute, fanservicey things. Like delivering their own love confessions! And since it was a "training camp," it meant they could travel and go sightseeing.
Things did get a bit strange, though. It got turned into a competition with teams, and one of the challenges had Jun-kun tied to a pillar. If his partner didn't slice a wedding cake in time, a bomb would go off and he'd explode!
Or at least that's what they said on TV. Fortunately nothing of the sort happened, and Jun-kun is safe and sound! ๐
...i think that your culture and mine have different ideas of what constitutes wedding rites
there was no cake at mine. although i think gege would have been happy if there was ๅ
we wore traditional robes and performed the rites, bowing to each other and his parents and the heavens, and then we ate the ceremonial foods and drank the ceremonial wine and it was done.
Some people still get married in traditional clothes. It's just that those western-style weddings, where the groom wears a suit and the bride wears a white dress, caught on like wildfire. So when us idols get hired for wedding-themed jobs, that's usually the image they're going for.
Cakes is popular at all sorts of weddings, though. And sometimes the cake is cut using a sword!
That's something you'd both enjoy, too, isn't it? Cutting a big white cake together, using your trusty sword~
[Though not while it's still dripping with the blood of their enemies, hopefully.]
e-ming being my sword, of course. it cares for gege nearly as much as i do, irritating creature. i'm sure it would jump at the chance to cut cake with him.
i'll suggest it to the both of them, if i remember it when i return home.
"talk" is the wrong word to describe what it can do... it is a spiritual weapon, forged from my body. it can communicate with me, but it has no language or words with which to speak
I'm not sure how you forge a sword from your body. But I'm guessing the answer is "magic!"
And I understand a little bit, anyway. You don't always need words to communicate. Sometimes you just need to project the right aura, using your body language, your eyes, and your dazzling smile~ โจ
[A sword wouldn't have any of those things, tho...]
i cut my right eye out, and i used my magic to create a sword forged from my own flesh and blood, so that it will forever be bound to me and me alone
[ and for that reason, technically, e-ming does have an eye... ]
as such:
[ he sends a drawing of e-ming, a much rougher sketch than the link but it should at least give hiyori an idea what the scimitar and its eye look like! ]
[HORRIFIED... The sketch doesn't make it any better either, though he might be glad it's a sketch and not a real photo of a sword with an actual human eyeball stuck to it.]
[ sometimes... hua cheng says things forgetting how horrifying they sound to mortals. ]
yes, terribly, but i had no choice. i was acting in defense of a group of humans being threatened by monsters... it was either that or let them meet their dooms.
my husband loves humankind and would have wanted me to protect them, so i did. it's why i wear the eyepatch.
[He doesn't want to picture any eyeballs being stabbed out!! Urgh!!
But then, is it really a surprise that an immortal ghost king who fought so many battles would've lost an eye at some point? It isn't, truly.]
I just thought you lost it in battle. But I guess technically you still did.
I don't fully understand, but you sound valiant! So it's a very good thing humanity had you on their side. And this goes without saying, but I hope you're able to reunite with your husband and your trusty sword soon.
Though now I'm less sure about cutting a wedding cake with your sword. What if it got frosting in its eye?
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
i have additional questions. who is santa, and what is christmas? is december the ice month of the year?
no subject
December's the last month of the year, and Christmas is a holiday! Christmas Day is December 25th, while Christmas Eve is on December 24th. You celebrate by giving each other gifts! Though lots of people treat Christmas Eve as their big date night, so it's also a romantic holiday.
Kids get the most excited for it, but adults can have fun too. There are all sorts of activities, like viewing illuminations, eating Christmas cake, and singing Christmas songs! ๐ถ
As for Santa, he's sort of a mythical character. The story goes that there's a white-bearded man who delivers presents to children from his magic sleigh. He wears a red suit, just like that figurine is wearing. If a child asks where their present came from, their mom and dad might say, "Santa delivered it!"
[No, he isn't bothering to mention the religious aspect. That has no significance to him! Tatsumi could explain it better than he could.]
no subject
so this fat man in a red suit travels the entire world to give children presents? and he does it all on one day? he must have a considerable level of spiritual energy to be able to use distance shortening arrays with such frequency. even for a ghost king such as myself, to travel such distances would be taxing on my reserves of qi.
no subject
[Though given that he's met a god from Norse mythology here, among other unlikely characters, perhaps he shouldn't be saying that with such confidence. That might just inspire the resort to kidnap the real Santa next.]
That's how we do things, anyway. Christmas is celebrated differently in other places. I know one person here said he didn't have anything called Christmas back home, but he did have something called "Kleinmas!" Apparently that's a month-long holiday similar to Christmas.
You don't have any holidays that end in -mas, do you? What about New Year's? Do you celebrate that, or do all the years blend together when you're immortal?
1/2
[ well that's disappointing. hua cheng had thought he must be a powerful being indeed, and now he's hearing santa isn't even real! ]
no, yes, yes, no.
holidays and traditions vary somewhat between the realms, but in xianle and in the realm of the dead we have no holidays ending in "-mas." we do celebrate the coming of the new year, but i am beginning to understand that the yearly calendar as i know it is different from this place.
time passes the same way for an immortal as it does for a mortal, just for longer. i remember every one of my eight centuries of life.
2/2
ah, well, not exactly life. you understand.
no subject
When you say you use a different yearly calendar, do you mean a lunar calendar?
no subject
no subject
We use a solar calendar back home. So do most other places. We only started using one midway through the 19th century, so some holidays are still tied to the lunar calendar. But New Year's Day is always January 1st, and Christmas Eve is always the 24th!
It was almost the New Year when I got kidnapped here, actually. But in the resort, it was late February, so they had all these Valentine's decorations still hanging.
I'm guessing you don't know what Valentine's Day is, either, though. Or do you?
no subject
no subject
But as for Valentine's, that's another romantic holiday! A day for celebrating love! โฅ๏ธ๐๐น๐ People might give flowers or chocolates to their loved ones. Then there's another day called White Day where men give back chocolate to girls, or so I've heard. But as idols, Valentine's is mainly a day for sending love to our fans.
Valentine's decorations are usually pink and red, with lots of hearts, and it's celebrated on February 14th. So if you're still here then, you'll probably see what I mean.
no subject
[ not that it matters, since xie lian is gone, but as a matter of curiosity... ]
i remember something like that, a long time ago. the time that many of the new arrivals found themselves married to each other, no? is that a normal celebration of valentine's day?
no subject
It does sound old-fashioned, doesn't it? But times are changing. They say even men can give chocolate on Valentine's Day if they want to now. And people can also give chocolate to friends. Or co-workers!
And that last thing is NOT a normal Valentine's celebration. There is such a thing as mock weddings, but those are strictly voluntary! And most people's idea of "wedding season" is June, not February. That's when wedding-themed jobs come in for us idols. Jun-kun went to something called a "bridegroom training camp" as part of a job once!
But of course he didn't really come back to married to anyone. *That* would've been a problem.
[This is probably just confusing Hua Cheng further. Idol life is weird.]
no subject
why does a wedding need a season? and what manner of bridegroom training would an idol need if he did not intend to marry?
no subject
Which isn't very romantic. But it *does* give us job opportunities. There's probably some superstition that goes into it, too. And the temperatures are definitely more pleasant in June than in February!
And that training camp was really just an excuse to show idols like Jun-kun doing cute, fanservicey things. Like delivering their own love confessions! And since it was a "training camp," it meant they could travel and go sightseeing.
Things did get a bit strange, though. It got turned into a competition with teams, and one of the challenges had Jun-kun tied to a pillar. If his partner didn't slice a wedding cake in time, a bomb would go off and he'd explode!
Or at least that's what they said on TV. Fortunately nothing of the sort happened, and Jun-kun is safe and sound! ๐
[... yep. Idol life is very weird.]
no subject
there was no cake at mine. although i think gege would have been happy if there was ๅ
we wore traditional robes and performed the rites, bowing to each other and his parents and the heavens, and then we ate the ceremonial foods and drank the ceremonial wine and it was done.
not much training required of us!
no subject
Cakes is popular at all sorts of weddings, though. And sometimes the cake is cut using a sword!
That's something you'd both enjoy, too, isn't it? Cutting a big white cake together, using your trusty sword~
[Though not while it's still dripping with the blood of their enemies, hopefully.]
no subject
e-ming being my sword, of course. it cares for gege nearly as much as i do, irritating creature. i'm sure it would jump at the chance to cut cake with him.
i'll suggest it to the both of them, if i remember it when i return home.
no subject
[........ wait.]
Does this mean your sword can talk to you?
no subject
no subject
And I understand a little bit, anyway. You don't always need words to communicate. Sometimes you just need to project the right aura, using your body language, your eyes, and your dazzling smile~ โจ
[A sword wouldn't have any of those things, tho...]
no subject
[ and for that reason, technically, e-ming does have an eye... ]
as such:
[ he sends a drawing of e-ming, a much rougher sketch than the link but it should at least give hiyori an idea what the scimitar and its eye look like! ]
no subject
[HORRIFIED... The sketch doesn't make it any better either, though he might be glad it's a sketch and not a real photo of a sword with an actual human eyeball stuck to it.]
That sounds horrible! Didn't it hurt?
no subject
yes, terribly, but i had no choice. i was acting in defense of a group of humans being threatened by monsters... it was either that or let them meet their dooms.
my husband loves humankind and would have wanted me to protect them, so i did. it's why i wear the eyepatch.
no subject
But then, is it really a surprise that an immortal ghost king who fought so many battles would've lost an eye at some point? It isn't, truly.]
I just thought you lost it in battle. But I guess technically you still did.
I don't fully understand, but you sound valiant! So it's a very good thing humanity had you on their side. And this goes without saying, but I hope you're able to reunite with your husband and your trusty sword soon.
Though now I'm less sure about cutting a wedding cake with your sword. What if it got frosting in its eye?
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)