Béu : Chapter 5

The parish flags

béu country is divided into "parishes". These are rural communities of 10,000 -> 50,000 people (urban areas have are distinct from rural areas and have a very different administrative structure).

The parish boundaries follow geographical features, such as streams and ridges etc. However the shape of a parish approximates to a hexagon. In fact in a total featureless landscape it would be a hexagon.

The rim banners

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Each parish has 6 banner-rows along its boundaries. A banner-row consists of 17 banners about 10 m apart. Each banner is made from a pole about the girth of an adults arm or leg. Each pole is about 7.5 m high and the top 5 m of the pole has an orange banner. The cloth of the banner is about 1/3 m wide. When about half the original cloth has been weathered away the cloth should be replaced, best to do an entire banner-row at on time. These banner-rows are normally placed in prominent positions. They can be anywhere along a boundary, but it isn't considered good to have the gap too small or too big between any neighbouring banner-rows.

In sparsely populated areas you get what is called a super-parish. They are around 10 times the size of a normal parish (but their population falls within the 10,000 -> 50,000 limit). These super-parishes have 2 barrier-rows per side(that is 12 in total), and each banner-row has 19 banners. All these banner dimensions are about 15% to 20% bigger than normal.

The outer banners

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About 2/3 of the way out from the parish centre there are what are called the spoke banners arranged in banner-rows. There are 4 of these banner-rows and each has 11 banners. Again these are in prominent positions and/or well visible from roads. Again they should be quite spread out from each other.

Each of there banner-rows, instead of delineating the parish boundary, point towards the administrative centre of the parish, the toilido.

(For a super-parish there are 8 banner-rows with 13 banners each)

The inner banners

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About 1/3 of the way out from the parish centre there are what are called the spoke banners arranged in banner-rows. There are 3 of these banner-rows and each has 5 banners.

Again each of these banner-rows is pointing to the toilido.

(For a super-parish there are 5 banner-rows with 7 banners each)

The parish hall

Below is shown the plan of the parish hall. This is the administrative centre of the parish and the place where the banner-rows point to.

The red shape at the top of the plan is the water-fountain. It must have a red tiled roof. It is to provide clean drinking water to passers by and also a sheltered place to rest. It can take a variety of forms. Some are made very fancy and have a small "hanging garden" along their centre surrounded with pools filled with beautiful fish. There must be fresh water flowing, either continuous or on demand. Also there must be seating. There is also a small banner-row of 3 banners ... in line with the "water-hut" and on the side away from the toilido.

The word toilido literally means "building of the books". It actually only refers to the hexagonal building (not the centre tower). The whole complex is actually called "centre station".

The whole complex provides the following services ...

1) A clocktower

2) Public toilets

3) A post office

4) A library

5) Archives for public records

6) A place for the parish council to meet

7) Offices for the parish council members

The black part of the toilido is the main entrance.

You will notice to "huts" with half their roof red and half black. These are the "poster huts". These are sheltered billboards for posting important information. The red side is for official notices (that is for what the parish officers or the central government think should be posted). On the black side the general public can post whatever it wants. New notices are posted on the small "poster hut". After 9 days they are transferred to the larger "poster huts". In béu the adjective "red" can be used to refer to something pertaining to the government, and the adjective "black" to refer to something non-government.

The orange part of the toilido is a stage, or actually the roof over the stage. And the area in front of this stage is a fairly large green where people gather to see the various shows that are put on. There are various conserts put on by the parish members at regular times every year. Also occasionally you get wondering groups of "players" who put on a show.

Above is how the toilido looks from street level (the "hut" to the left is the "water hut").

The entrance has about 1.3 m of steps to climb. There are three arches at every entrance. The central one being slightly higher than the other two.

(I have probably drawn the building too high in the street level view). Usually tall stain glass windows on 4 sides of the toilido. There is always at least 2 storeys within the main part of the building, sometimes more. Also usually there is a separate storey in the roof (the triangular shapes seen on the plan view, are actually windows in the roof to provide light to this storey. These windows look onto the central courtyard.)

The centre of the hexagon has a pleasing garden. In the very centre is the base of the "clock tower".

The 2 kidney shaped building are public toilets. The one on the right for the use of men, the one on the left for the use of women.

Tables and chair for setting out for the various concerts are also kept in these buildings. These toilets are kept meticulously clean. In fact every parishioner must do a certain amount of duty at the toilets every year ... keeping them clean. No fit adult is exempt from this duty.

There is a single banner just outside each of these buildings ... on the opposite side from the stage.

The town clock

Every town has a clocktower and the clocktower has 4 faces, which are aligned with the cardinal directions. The street pattern is also so aligned : that is the four biggest streets radiate out from the clock in the cardinal directions.

Each face displaying a clock similar to the one below.

The above figure shows the time at exactly 6 in the morning. You notice that the main (hour hand) hand is pointing to the right : it starts from the horizontal. This hand sweeps out one revolution in 24 hours and it moves anti-clockwise

Notice that secondary (minute hand) starts from the vertical and sweeps out a revolution in 2 of our hours. It moves clockwise. And actually when it passes the main hand, there is a clever mechanism to stop it being hidden. It stops 3.75 minutes at one side of the main hand, and then moves directly (2 steps) to the other side of the main hand and stops there for 3.75 minutes. After that it does a step and waits 2.5 minutes, etc. etc. ... until it encounters the main hand again.

The red and the black arms do not move continuously but move in steps. The primary arm moves 3.75 degrees every 15 minutes, and the secondary arm moves 7.5 degrees every 2.5 minutes.

The clocktower is surmounted by a green conic roof (actually not really conic ... the roof slope decreases as you get nearer the bottom). Lighting from under the roof could be provided for each face. Either that or the faces could be illuminated from within at night. The faces are not exactly vertical but the top slightly overhangs the bottom.

There is never any numbering on the face.

The clock also emits sounds. Every 2 of our hours the clock makes a deep "boing" which reverberates for some time. Also from 6 in the morning to 6 at night, the clock emits a "boing" every 30 of our minutes. The first "boing" has no accompaniment. However the second "boing" is followed (well actually when the "boing" is only .67 % dissipated) by a "sharper" sound that dies down a lot quicker : "teen". The third "boing" has 2 "teen"s 0.72 seconds apart. The fourth has 3 "teen"s. The fifth one is back to the single "boing" and so it continues thru the day.

The secondary hand and the 36 diamonds should be ...

East face => white or even better, silver

North face => light blue

West face => green

South face => dark blue

(The drawing is a bit out in this respect).

The time of day

dé = day

The béu day begins at sunrise. 6 o'clock in the morning is called cuaju

The time of day is counted from cuaju. 24 hours is considered one unit. 8 o'clock in the morning would be called ajai (normally just called ajai, but cúa ajai or ajai yanfa might also be heard sometimes).

6 o'clock in the morning	cuaju
8 o'clock in the morning	ajai
10 o'clock in the morning	uvai
midday	ibai
2 o'clock in the afternoon	agai
4 o'clock in the afternoon	idai
6 o'clock in the evening	ulai
8 o'clock in the evening	icai
10 o'clock at night	ezai
midnight	okai
2 o'clock in the morning	apai
4 o'clock in the morning	atai

Just for example, let us now consider the time between 4 and 6 in the afternoon.

16:00 would be idai : 16:10 would be idaijau : 16:20 would be idaivau .... all the way up to .... 17:50 which would be idaitau

Now all these names have in common the element idai, hence the period from 4 o'clock to 6 o'clock is called idaia (the plural of idai). This is exactly the same as us calling the period from 1960 -> 1969, "the sixties".

The perion from 6 o'clock to 8 o'clock in the morning is called cuajua. This is a back formation. People noticed that the two hour period after the point in time ajai was called ajaia(etc. etc.) and so felt that the two hour period after the point in time cuaju should be called cuajua. By the way, all points of time between 6 a.m. and 8 a.m. MUST have an initial cuaju. For example "ten past six in the morning" would be cuaju ajau, "twenty past six" would be cuaju avau and so on.

If something happened in the period from 4 o'clock to 6 o'clock, it would be said to have happened idaia.pi

Usually you talk about points of time rather than periods of time. If you arrange to meet somebody at 2 o'clock morning, you would meet them apaiʔe.

But we refer to periods of time occasionally. If some action continued for 20 minutes, it will have continued nàn uvau, for 2 hours : nàn ajai (nàn means "a long time")

In English we divide the day up into hours, minutes and seconds. In béu they only have the yanfa. The yanfa is equivalent to 5 seconds. We would translate "moment" as in "just a moment" as yanfa also.

Index

1. Introduction to Béu
2. Béu : Chapter 1 : The Sounds
3. Béu : Chapter 2 : The Noun
4. Béu : Chapter 3 : The Verb
5. Béu : Chapter 4 : Adjective
6. Béu : Chapter 5 : Questions
7. Béu : Chapter 6 : Derivations
8. Béu : Chapter 7 : Way of Life 1
9. Béu : Chapter 8 : Way of life 2
10. Béu : Chapter 9 : Word Building
11. Béu : Chapter 10 : Gerund Phrase
12. Béu : Discarded Stuff
13. A statistical explanation for the counter-factual/past-tense conflation in conditional sentences