[EVENT] Courtyard of Public Opinion

[ironwood]

Characters: ALL!
Date: January 10th
Location: Central Keeliai - Courtyard of Public Opinion
Situation: A meeting has been called to determine the status of the Foreigners in the city, including the upcoming and highly anticipated Shangpar race. The major NPC players can be approached, and Foreigners have a chance to make a case for their treatment within the city.
Warnings/Rating: Add warnings as needed.

The Courtyard of Public Opinion has been around since before Emperor Eshai's death, a relic of a time when all kedan would have preferred talking about their problems instead of fighting. Even now that the spell suppressing their true nature has been removed, none of the kedan want more trouble than Keeliai already has, especially where the Foreigners are concerned. Violence is frowned upon - though by no means forbidden - and while discussions can get heated, a disagreement will usually be taken outside the Courtyard before it comes to blows.

The Courtyard isn't any bigger than some of the open fountain areas in the Water Sector, and it isn't set up the way some of the Foreigners might imagine a political debate area to be set up. There’s no podium, no chairs apart from the stone benches too heavy to be moved, and no grand banners or archways. This is done deliberately; everyone is meant to have an equal voice in the Courtyard, so everyone is on level ground. Apart from the greenery, the stone paths, and the low stone walls surrounding the Courtyard, one could almost imagine it’s just another Market Day in an open square.

The kedan arrive early in large groups of eight or ten at a time, and they'll exhibit a wide variety of reactions to the Foreigners' arrival - everything from open disapproval and fear to a new and very cautious optimism.

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LINKS
Shangpar Races | Foreigner Status | Tu Yunxu - The Snakes | Zanru - The Metalworkers | Heojin - The Woodsmen | Milyn - Cherrywood Healer | Questions

OOC
There are six starters for various parts of the discussion, one specifically on the races, one on the Foreigners' overall status in Keeliai, and then one for each of the major NPCs. Characters are present for the entirety of the conversations listed below, and those who wish to input or engage on the first two topics should reply to them in the relevant comment, and the NPC comments are for directly speaking with that NPC or those in that group. The rest of the post is for Foreigners talking and organizing amongst themselves.

Comments

[forgediron]

For a very long moment Zanru regarded Stark. So he was listening after all; just not acknowledging. Zanru wasn't sure if it was a deliberate powerplay or just a sense of being over-focussed on what he wanted right now, or being over-focussed on the tech. The last, Zanru could understand; the second was young and selfish; the third was political in a way Zanru hated.

Zanru knew she was confrontational. That always made it a surprise when she didn't fight. Either it put people off-guard or it made them think they had some kind of hold over her. Pride. Stick in the grinder. "It's possible," she said, "but we can talk about that with the rest of the details later. Anything else?"

[highprofilerichkid]

"Great," Tony says, with graciousness that is somewhat forced, and relief that is somewhat less so. He's not going to get his hopes up, but... maybe this is a step in the right direction?

With the tech issue wrapped up, Tony returns to the original topic of discussion. "What does that mean for the foreigner racers? Are there still going to be restrictions on which of us can participate?"

[forgediron]

“You better believe it,” said Zanru, “and before you start spouting off about discrimination: Heojin’s got less imagination than pool-dwelling slug, so you can trust when he says that there are restrictions on kedan as well. It’s a matter of making the race fair. For kedan, that means restrictions by weight and shapeshifting skills. For you lot, it means restrictions by ability. Any changes are things we can discuss two years from now.”

[highprofilerichkid]

Not ideal, but at least the kedan have restrictions on them too. And nobody's speaking up against the foreigners participating at all, so that's a point to the foreigners, as far as Tony's concerned.

"That's... fair." He concedes. "Who's going to be deciding which foreigners can't race? We'll need to know soon, so the people who are allowed in can have time to raise the money."

[forgediron]

"The union put together to manage the race," said Zanru, "and those who raised the shangpari; they know the shangparis' constraints best. We'll leave a list of non-applicable Foreigners at that Hotel place you're all staying."

[highprofilerichkid]

"All right. We'll keep an eye out for it."

And that's about all he has to say on the matter. Except as a means to improve foreigner-kedan relations, the race itself isn't a top priority for him. He's more interested in hashing out the details of that potential contract. If somebody else wants to jump in and get down into the nitty-gritty race details, he'll leave that to them.