User:Poswob

Kuroras Ethnographical Questionnaire

Dr. Zahir’s Ethnographical Questionnaire was compiled by David Zahir to help in the description of concultures, and can be found in the files section of the Conculture group at Yahoo.

Questions of Place

Describe the geography of where your society calls home.

From their home city of Neripi, the Kurora people claim 97% of the territory on planet Teppala, but only have settled about 10% . Even of this, control is very weak outside the coastal strip. This page is intended to deal with the people who live in the five coastal nations, but because they have spread themselvse throughout the empire as explroers, some info deals with the other parts of the empire as well. I will call this Goga for now (Kuroras for "core") but will almost certainly change the name later on. This was a name that was actually used by the natives at some point, but was primarily intended to distinguish them politically from the much poorer areas of the empire rather than being a cultural designation.

Describe the climate your society deals with. How severe are their seasons?

The climate of the Coastal Strip is much milder than the Poswob cities to the east. Average winter temperatures range from about 38F at the northern extremity to 55F at the southwestern border with Tšabas, and summer temperatures range from about 51F to 65F respectively. However, like the US Pacific, the cool summers are for the immediate coast only and it is much warmer and drier inland. Even just a few miles from the beaches, temperatures of 100F (in the north) and 110F (in the south) are not uncommon.

What kinds of natural disasters has this society gotten used to?

There is not much scariness in nature here. There are no volcanoes, no major earthquakes, no hurricanes, no tornadoes, no blizzards, no sandstorms, no floods, and no mudslides. Even thunderstorms only happen once a year or so. The biggest threat that comes from weather is really the lack of storms (i.e. drought) that they otherwise depend on to grow vegetables. But even then, they're right on the coast and it's not hard to find fish in the ocean even when the weather is terrible. Nor would the people suffer from malnutrition if they were forced to live on fish for a year or two.

What are the most commonly-grown foods?

Despite the abundance of fish available to them, the Goga diet consists primarily of fruits and vegetables. Most of these are grown inland, where the climate is warmer and sunnier, and then imported into the cities which are just a day's journey away. The farmers who grow these foods generally are not as wealthy as the urban Gogas despite government subsidies.

What foods are considered exotic or expensive?

Tropical fruits which cannot be grown natively (except in greenhouses with great difficulty). The Goga people prefer to buy from the Poswobs rather than the southern limits of their own empire. This is for political reasons; the other Kuroras peoples are a threat to the Gogas; the Poswobs are not. Some people own greenhouses in which tropical fruits can be grown, but this is both expensive and delicate, since the glass can easily be smashed, ruining the entire year's crop in one minute.

Questions of Faith

What superstitions are common? What kinds of supernatural

events/beings do people fear?