Can you feel the love tonight?

[highprofilerichkid]

Characters: EVERYBODY
Date: 14 February
Location: Anywhere
Situation: It's VALENTINE'S DAY! Flowers, candy, love notes, dancing, and dates... Maybe you don't have Valentine's Day on your world, but plenty of the foreigners do, and those who have found love on the turtle will be happy to tell you all about the holiday. Some of the more enthusiastic foreigners may even try to play matchmaker with their unattached fellows...
Warnings/Rating: Lovey-dovey nonsense, smooching, romance, and maybe people getting a little frisky. It is Valentine's Day, after all. Further warnings will be added if anything gets really steamy.



No plans for the big day? Feeling a little lost? Well, why don't you:

• Build a snowman together! Embrace your inner child.
• Give your lover a big box of... chocolate? Well, there's technically no chocolate in Keeliai, but maybe a kedan confectioner can whip you up something close enough. Or if you're feeling adventurous, you could go to a candy shop together and experiment with the local sweets.
• Go dancing and engage in some pan-galactic cultural exchange. Teach your partner one of the beloved dances of your home universe, like salsa, or the foxtrot, or the electric slide.
• Baby, it's cold outside. Maybe you should stay in for the day. Cook a meal together, light some candles, drink the most expensive alcohol you can afford, and take some time to appreciate each other's company. Nothing says "romance" more than fancy wine and a candlelit dinner for two.
• What better excuse to take a chance on romance? Ask out that person you've had your eye on.
• Set up your friend. You're satisfied with your relationship or lack thereof, but somebody you know is pining, so get out your bow and quiver and cupid wings and find them a potential sweetheart. What's the worst that can happen? Don't answer that.
• No date? Grab a friend and go out to a fancy dinner with each other to celebrate Singles Awareness Day. Platonic love is important too!

Comments

[raavashing]

Wan shook his head in a subdued manner and replied in a soft voice, "There weren't any festivals for anything like this in the city I grew up in. Or in any of the cities I visited after I was banished from it. We celebrated stuff like the Solstice and the New Year. A good spring after a hard winter. Things like that."

He relaxed a little as he spoke, enough to admit, "Actually, I'm not really sure what the point of Valentine's Day is. If people are in love, they shouldn't need a certain day of the year to show it."

[wrathfulkhan]

"Wasn't it something to do with a saint that was killed?" Gene offered. You're right, Gene, but now is not the time. "Anyway, it somehow turned into a celebration of romantic love. I'm not entirely sure how or why. It's just one of those tradition things, I think."

Pause.

"And an excuse to eat a lot of candy."

[lordhotman]

Zuko nodded his agreement with Wan. They didn't have anything like this in his world, not even in his time, and especially not in the Fire Nation.

Though Gene's comment brought on an obvious stare.

"You guys celebrate love because of a dead guy?"

That... was kinda weird.

[highprofilerichkid]

"Don't all saints have to get killed? I thought being a martyr was one of the prerequisites."

He shrugs at Zuko's question. "We celebrate a lot of stuff because of dead guys. One of the world's major religions is really into the whole dead-guy thing. Kinda weird when you think about it, actually." Also, there's cannibalism. Christianity is fun!

"Anyway, now we just eat a lot of candy. I don't even know what Saint Valentine died for."

[raavashing]

Wan looked from Gene to Tony. Then from Tony to Gene. There were a few things said just now that were not things he felt he could leave alone.

Cannibalism. Christianity. Saints. And how candy and celebrating love was tied into them.

He was going to start with what he hoped was the simplest question, "What's a saint and why do they have to be killed?"

the culturally-shenist muse has no idea what's going on. the religion-nerd mun is headdesking.

[wrathfulkhan]

Gene shrugs. "Don't ask me. Not my religion. Though I'm sure it has something to do with serving God, or...something." Astute. Guess who skipped World Religions class to go supervillaining? "I guess people don't like that. Or didn't. That religion kind of came out on top. Anyway, they're supposed to die and get a special reward in heaven for doing God's work. Probably."

[lordhotman]

Zuko is looking just about as clueless as Wan. You can probably tell by the blank look on his face.

"I don't get it," he says at last. And... that's it. There really isn't a whole lot of religion and stuff from their world. At least not in terms of a single God or anything like that. People do worship the spirits, but Zuko's never really been all that into it. That's more of an Avatar thing.

[highprofilerichkid]

"I don't get it either," Tony says, totally blasé about his religious ignorance. "Religion never makes much sense. But as long as I get candy out of it, I'm not complaining." Priorities.

"So, what are your... season festivals like?" Tony doesn't know anybody who celebrates holidays like the solstice in his world. That's, like, old-school pagan stuff.

[raavashing]

If worshiping spirits was an Avatar thing, it came long after Wan was an Avatar. He didn't understand any of the religion stuff.

But the solstice festivals, that was something he could talk about.

"Well, in the city I grew up in, most of our festivals were ones where everyone was supposed to show up in masks or barter for a mask at the festival. There would be food, people putting on plays, displays of brightly colored dancers, that sort of thing. They'd go all night and it was pretty fun."

[wrathfulkhan]

"I don't think anyone gets it, that's how religion works," Gene says.

He nods a little when Wan explains the season festival. "That sounds like fun, actually. And makes a lot more sense than some of the holidays people celebrate at home. Back where I come from, we have the Mid-Autumn Festival, among other things. It's about the harvest, and the moon."

Excuse the dumb icon. :V

[lordhotman]

"The Solstices are still a big deal in the Fire Nation. And we have festivals celebrating fire itself."

Like the Fire Days festival. That one had often been pushed on villages that the Fire Nation had been trying to conform. But well. We won't go into that part.