Re: CHAT: Temperature (was: I'm back!)

On Thu, 1 Aug 2002 19:13:41 EDT J Y S Czhang <czhang23@...> writes:
>     OBCONLANG/CULTURE: What are some idiomatic ways of describing
> absolutely
> miserable weather and what are some conventional and/or unusual
> concultural
> adaptions/survival tactics in regards to absolutely miserable
> climates?
>
---------------------------------------------------------------------~->
> Hanuman Zhang
> Avatar of Sun WuKong, a.k.a "Monkey", a.k.a. "the Monkey King,"
> a.k.a. "TricksterGod of the Glorious Anti-Imperialist Chinese
> Boxers"
-

How long has that "Glorious Anti-Imperialist" been in there?  i don't
remember it in the first few incarnations of that sig ;-)

But anyway...

this isn't really a direct weather thing, but more like how the weather
more subtly influences Rokbeigalmki society.  Because for most of their
history they've lived an ocean-nomadic
southern-hemisphere-near-the-equator existence, they need to protect
themselves from getting sunstroke much of the time.  So, they took to
wearing all kinds of head coverings, from woven straw hats to turban-like
and doorag (sp?) -like wraps.  But anyway, since covering your head
because of the sun shows respect to the overwhelming power of the sun to
affect you, the covering of one's head became a mark of respect in
general.  When a Rokbeigalmkidh meets someone for the first time, they
cover their head while exchanging introductions.  Head-covering is also
considered essential when interacting with leaders, performing rituals,
and praying.  It can also represent subtle shifts in attitude - for
instance, a storyteller sitting around with a group of children may cover
their head in order to highlight the important nature of something
they're saying.
Since it's annoying to be carrying around a hat everywhere, putting it on
and off, Rokbeigalmkidhm who for whatever reason don't cover their head
in general, or who don't happen to be wearing a hat at the moment, will
pull forwards the top edge of their cloak, and use that to cover their
head.  If any of you-all have seen pictures of Jews wearing a
prayer-shawl (talit / talet / tallis) that's pulled forwards to cover
their heads, it looks sort of like that.  Except that Rokbeigalmki cloaks
are generally more colorful, and don't have the "tzitzit" tassles on the
corners that Jewish prayer-shawls do.

Also, the Rokbeigalm have a concept known as |ngiirau| /n"ajrO/
(/n"/=uvular) which came up in the last relay before this now-ending one.
 Ngiirau is an appreciation and respect for the power and beauty inherent
in dangerous actions and forces - for example, natural disasters
generally have a high ngiirau factor.  This includes climactic/weather
occurances like tsunamis, thunderstorms, and hurricanes/monsoons.  Also
human-made occurances can be instilled with ngiirau - for instance,
that's how the Rokbeigalm explain (or would, if they had cars) why people
are drawn to look at car wrecks.  Less gory examples of ngiirau would be
someone climbing Mount Everest - ngiirau would be felt both for the
dangerous beauty and power of the mountain itself, as well as the courage
of the climber in facing it.


-Stephen (Steg)
 "there is darkness all around us;
  but if darkness *is*, and the darkness is of the forest,
  then the darkness must be good."
     ~ song of the BaMbuti in troubled times