Ricki Tarr (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
rickitikitarr) wrote2015-05-12 10:09 pm
rickitikitarr) wrote2015-05-12 10:09 pm
5. voice
[Ricki has been passed over in this week's event- he isn't nearly trustworthy enough for the powers this week to have to begun to reflect his way. So, in the absence of any other mayhem or hysteria, it's been sort of a dragging week for him.
His answer had been to ensconce himself firmly in one of the library back rooms, and to tear his way voraciously through another shelf of the history section. Which leads, quite late one evening, to him activating his feed to explain, in the hushed tones most appropriate for the small hours of the night;]
Some time in the early 1600s in Japan, a young woman had a rather illicit relationship with a Chinese pirate lord. The unlikely pair had a son who they christened Zhèng Chénggōng.
[His accent is so adept as to be potentially noteworthy.]
Our story finds him in the waters between Xiamen and Taiwan. At that time, Xiamen was a young port city, whose traded goods included silver, imported from Spain into China. This trade route was a ripe target for local pirates, in particular, for some reason, the Dutch. They snuck their boats in among the myriad of little islands at the mouth of the Nine Dragons, the Mekong River, or Cửu Long, we called it, where I was growing up. Zhèng Chénggōng, also known as Koxinga, succeeded in fighting about the nastiest kind of warfare you can imagine, for that era. The battles were nasty, but eventually the Dutch fled Taiwan, and the man himself had accomplished this while embroiled in some of the ugliest dynastic struggle imaginable.
A Ming loyalist, he had narrowly survived his own father's terrible betrayal to the Qing family- which I believe, though I haven't been able to ascertain this as being completely true- ended with his father's imprisonment and the then-Emperor being thrown into a well. Zhèng established a small province in the South of Taiwan, where his family held the territory for a little over twenty years, until some business with an illegitimate heir resulted in too much political instability, and the little province was reabsorbed into Taiwan proper.
Oh, here it is- it is rumoured that Koxinga's death was the result of a sudden fit of madness. He had ordered his guards to execute his son. The young man had apparently had an affair with a wet-nurse... of some relative or another, it isn't specific, and when he was disobeyed, Koxinga flew into the sort of rage that could stop a man's heart. He was only thirty seven. That's what one source says; the other just bluntly states malaria.
There was a statue of Koxinga in Xiamen when I was there last, though it may very well be torn down by now. I remember seeing the stonework, but never being aware of the proper story.
[And, now he is, and so is anyone else up late and listening on this drowsy, slow-drifting spacey night.]
It was whispered to me then, somewhat illicitly, that the man had been raised by freed Muslim slaves, and may have practiced that faith in secret, though the books all mention Confucianism.
I do wonder.
[He always feels most imaginative during the very witching hour of night.]
His answer had been to ensconce himself firmly in one of the library back rooms, and to tear his way voraciously through another shelf of the history section. Which leads, quite late one evening, to him activating his feed to explain, in the hushed tones most appropriate for the small hours of the night;]
Some time in the early 1600s in Japan, a young woman had a rather illicit relationship with a Chinese pirate lord. The unlikely pair had a son who they christened Zhèng Chénggōng.
[His accent is so adept as to be potentially noteworthy.]
Our story finds him in the waters between Xiamen and Taiwan. At that time, Xiamen was a young port city, whose traded goods included silver, imported from Spain into China. This trade route was a ripe target for local pirates, in particular, for some reason, the Dutch. They snuck their boats in among the myriad of little islands at the mouth of the Nine Dragons, the Mekong River, or Cửu Long, we called it, where I was growing up. Zhèng Chénggōng, also known as Koxinga, succeeded in fighting about the nastiest kind of warfare you can imagine, for that era. The battles were nasty, but eventually the Dutch fled Taiwan, and the man himself had accomplished this while embroiled in some of the ugliest dynastic struggle imaginable.
A Ming loyalist, he had narrowly survived his own father's terrible betrayal to the Qing family- which I believe, though I haven't been able to ascertain this as being completely true- ended with his father's imprisonment and the then-Emperor being thrown into a well. Zhèng established a small province in the South of Taiwan, where his family held the territory for a little over twenty years, until some business with an illegitimate heir resulted in too much political instability, and the little province was reabsorbed into Taiwan proper.
Oh, here it is- it is rumoured that Koxinga's death was the result of a sudden fit of madness. He had ordered his guards to execute his son. The young man had apparently had an affair with a wet-nurse... of some relative or another, it isn't specific, and when he was disobeyed, Koxinga flew into the sort of rage that could stop a man's heart. He was only thirty seven. That's what one source says; the other just bluntly states malaria.
There was a statue of Koxinga in Xiamen when I was there last, though it may very well be torn down by now. I remember seeing the stonework, but never being aware of the proper story.
[And, now he is, and so is anyone else up late and listening on this drowsy, slow-drifting spacey night.]
It was whispered to me then, somewhat illicitly, that the man had been raised by freed Muslim slaves, and may have practiced that faith in secret, though the books all mention Confucianism.
I do wonder.
[He always feels most imaginative during the very witching hour of night.]
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[Not so little, though he knows his height guess is probably badly off, that he was much shorter back then and memory distorts these things.]
The Taiwanese apparently really don't care much for the Dutch.
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[He's grinning. It's obvious, even if Ricki can't see it.]
That sound like my kind of trade, but I was never all that popular.
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[He guesses, with a bit of a smile of his own, though not quite so obvious a one. He's still flipping pages, but backwards now, looking for more on the father.]
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[He's been there.]
Hammocks. It's not worth it.
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[His joints have become significantly less easygoing since those days.]
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Didn't know you'd been such a sailor. How this stack up for you, then? Just wondering -- coming at it from the prison side of things way I do must be all kind of different, I suppose.
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[And he's done both.]
The two have more in common with each other than either one does with the Barge.
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Oh? How so?
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[But thinking back, this is quite capturing it. He tries to put his finger on exactly what it was, and it comes, suddenly.]
No, really it was the routine. Waking up for your shift, the same meals at the same times, cooking duty, deck duty, long hours of boredom, games of cards in smudgy, low light, and listen to the captain or take a rifle barrel to the jaw.
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Never thought I'd say Jessup Correctional might have something to commend it, but I suppose every place do have its strong suits. I at least had me some reading material and a cell all to myself...
[He pauses, and though Ricki can't see him, a smile creeps into his voice.]
After the first time, anyway.
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[Admitting, readily.]
But it sure helps keep things in perspective. I only went the once.
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Can't deny what you saying about the routine, though. Especially finding the opposite up here, which is just fine by me.
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[He's not sure if that changes things.]
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[There's Horatio now, but. He never took his permanent warden all that seriously, but the temporary pairings, even less so.]
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[He's still working some of the finer points of the system out.]
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[He once would have been more respectful; but then, he had once respected the wardens a lot more than he does now. Now, there's a hint of bitterness in his tone. They're mostly foolish, he thinks -- just not all in the way of extra kindness.]
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[But he's switching to private, because no sense slamming them where they can see it.]
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But he lets Ricki change the setting without comment, anyway. He doesn't especially need them listening in.]
Altru-what now?
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[He explains, with a little shrug.]
The ones who just want to help.
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You think there many of those left?
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[He admits.]
I don't think any of them are cackling about what a wonderful opportunity they have to be in charge. I think they all believe that they're doing the right thing, and for the right reasons. Even the hard-bitten ones, who'll scoff and say they know they're no different from anyone else, there's a certain preachy overtone there- sanctimoniousness.
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You know ain't none of them like to be called Warden? I think it remind them that we ain't all just friends and family.
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