Béu : Chapter 7

..... The Calendar

The béu calendar is interesting. Definitely interesting. A 73 day period is called a dói. 5 x 73 => 365.

The phases of the moon are totally ignored in the béu system of keeping count of the time.

The first day of the dói is nelauja followed by hija, then auja lozoja celaija and then aiva etc. etc. all the way upto kiʔoka.

The days to the right are workdays (saipito) while the days to the left are days off work (saifuje). Each month has a special festival (hinta) associated with it. These festivals are held in the three day period comprising lozoga, celaiga, helauga. The five "months" are named after the 5 planets that are visible to the naked eye. The 5 big festivals that occur every year are also named after these planets.

mercury	ʔoli	Month 1	doiʔoli	Xmas... on 21,22,23 Dec	hinʔoli
venus	pwè	Month 2	doipwe	festival on 4,5,6 Mar	himpwe
mars	gú	Month 3	doigu	festival on 16,17,18 May	hiŋgu
jupiter	gamazu	Month 4	doigamazu	festival on 28,29,30 July	hiŋgamazu
saturn	yika	Month 5	doiyika	festival on 9,10,11 Oct	hinyika

hinʔoli ... This is the most important festival of the year. It celebrates the starting of a fresh year. It celebrates the stop of the sun getting weaker. It is centred on the family and friends that you are living amongst. Even though eating and drinking are involved in all the five festivals, this festival has the most looked-forward-to feasts.

himpwe ... People gather at various regional centres to compete and spectate in various music and poetry competitions. Sky lanterns are usually released on the last day of this festival. On the first two days of the festival, what is called the "fire walk" is performed. This is to promote social solidarity. Each locality comprising up to 400 people build a fire in some open ground. These people are divided into 2 sections. One section to walk and one section to receive walkers. The walkers are further divided into groups. Each group is assigned another fire to visit and they set of in single file. Each of them carries a torch (a brand) ignited from the home fire. Upon arriving at the fire that they have been assigned (involving a walk of, maybe, 5 or 6 miles) they throw their brand into the fire as their hosts sing the "fire song". After that the visitors are offered much drinks and snacks by their hosts. There is considerable competition between the various localities to be the most generous host. The routes that people must go have been chosen previously by a central committee, but the destination is only revealed to the walkers just before they set out. On the second day the same thing happens but the two sections, the walkers and the receivers of the walkers, swap over rolls.

hiŋgu ... It is usual to get together with old friends around this time and many parties are held. Friends that live some distance away are given special consideration. Often journeys are undertaken to meet up with old acquainances. Also there is a big exchange of letters at this time. The most important happenings of the last year are stated in these letters along with hopes and plans for the coming year.

hiŋgamazu ... This festival is all about outdoor competitions and sporting events. It is a little like a cross between the Olympics games and the highland games. People gather at various regional centres to compete and spectate in various team and individual competitions. However care is taken that no regional centre becomes too popular and people are discouraged from competing at centres other than their local one. Also at this festival, a "fire walk" is done, just the same as at the "himpwe" festival.

hinyika ... Family that live some distance away are given special consideration. Often journeys are undertaken for family visits and ancestors ashboxes are visited if convenient. This is the second most important festival of the year. People often take extra time off work to travel, or to entertain guests. Fireworks are let of for a 2 hour period on the night of helauga. This is one of the few occasions where fireworks are allowed.

By the way, when a year changes, it doesn't change between months, it changes between lozoga and celaiga.

Every 4 years an extra day is added to the year. The doiʔoli gets a helauca.

béu also has a 128 year cycle. This circle is called ombatoze. There is a animal associated with every year of the ombatoze.

These animals are ;-

wolf	weasel/ermine/stoat/mink	bullfinch	badger
whale	opossum	albatross	beautiful armadillo
giant anteater	lynx	eagle	cricket/grasshopper/locust
reindeer	springbok	dove	gnu/wildebeest
spider	Steller's sea cow	seagull	gorilla
horse	scorpion	raven/crow	python
rhino	yak	Kookaburra	porcupine ?
butterfly	triceratops	penguin	koala
polar bear	manta-ray	hornbill	raccoon
crocodile/alligator	wolverine	pelican	zebra
bee	warthog	peacock	capybara
bat	bear	crane/stork/heron	hedgehog
frog	lama	woodpecker	gemsbok
musk ox	chameleon	hawk	cheetah
lion	frill-necked lizard	toucan	okapi
dolphin	aardvark	ostrich	T-rex
kangaroo	hyena	duck	driprotodon(wombat)
shark	cobra	kingfisher	gaur
dragonfly	mole	moa	chimpanzee
turtle/tortoise	N.A. bison	black skimmer	panda
jaguar	snail	cormorant/shag	Cape buffalo
rabbit	colossal squid	vulture	glyptodon/doedicurus
beetle	seal	falcon	pangolin
megatherium	woolly mammoth	flamingo	baboon
elk/moose	squirrel	blue bird of paradise	lobster
tiger	gecko	grouse	seahorse
jackal/fox	octopus	swan	lemur
elephant	swordfish	parrot	auroch
giraffe	ant	puffin	iguana
mouse	crab	swift	mongoose/meerkat
smilodon	giant beaver	owl	mantis
camel	goat	hummingbird	walrus

Each of these animals above is a toze, which can be translated as "token", "icon" or "totem ". omba means a circle or cycle. So you can see where the name for the 128 year period comes from.

The very last helauca of every ombatoze is dropped.

ombatoze is sometimes translated as "life", "generation" or "century"

xxx means a 4 year period. It also means "calendar".

The start of time

Year 2000 had 365.242,192,65 days

Every year is shorter than the last by 0.000,000,061,4 days

By adding one day every 4 years we get a 365.25 day year

If we then drop one day every ombatoze we get a 365.242,187,5 day year (actually very close to the actual year length)

Before 2084, the actual year will be bigger than the calendar year – after 2084 the actual year will be smaller than the calendar year

For this reason midnight, 22 Dec 2083 is designated the fulcrum of the whole system. That day will be time zero.

At the moment we are in negative time.

..

The cremation oval

Actually called "sky gate/door" in béu.

Below is shown a typical cremation oval. Typically they are placed in a wilderness area, maybe near the parish boundary. The platform is about 1.5 m high with steps all around. It has the shape of an oval, usually with the two sharp curves cut off. In the two foci we have two objects.

On the east side we have the kilo. It is a structure about 1.7 m high (standing on a plinth about .2 m high), which is in the shape of the Gherkin in London. Metal bands can be seen on its surface. Multifaceted with each facet made of a pink glass. It has a silver ball on top, about 15 inch in diameter.

On the west side we have the ulgu. It is a structure about 1.7 m high (standing on a plinth about .2 m high), which is in the opposite shape from the Gherkin in London. Metal bands can be seen on its surface. Multifaceted with each facet made of a purple/mauve glass. It has a golden ball on top, about 15 inch in diameter (its top side is jet black).

Six poles (called jomo) can be seen on the oval. These must be changed to suit every cremation. After a cremation they are left as they are, until the next cremation. I have named them NM (north middle), NW (north west), SW (south west), SM (south middle), SE (south east) and NE (north east).

These jomo can have 1 of 4 types of head (shown below). From L => R, I have named these the empty head, single head, double head and multiple head.

A jomo is about 5 m high. The second and third tops are about 1.3 m high. The diameter of the 4th top is 2.1 m although on occasions this must be increased.

The jomo are made of varnished wood and are square in cross-section, 25 cm at the bottom, narrowing to 21 cm at the top. The 2 middle tops (see below) can be constructed from anything. However they should look solid and all faces should glow in the dark (not necessarily at the edges). The single and double heads gradually tapper to a point. They are square in cross-section, all the way to the point.

Basically the choice of head reflects the descendants that the deceased left behind. If the deceased had no living descendants at the time of death, then all the jomo have empty heads. This is a greyish/white sphere.

If the deceased has living descendants then the NM jomo will have a single head. This head represents the oldest child (legally recognised child). If the first born was male, this head will be orientated out of the oval, if female into the oval.

The second oldest child is also represented by a single head. If this child was male, the next empty jomo in a clockwise direction from the NM one receives a single head. If this child was female, the next empty jomo in a anti-clockwise direction thom the NM one receives a single head.

And so you do with the third, fourth, fifth and sixth child . If there are only six children, then yellow bunting is drapped from the "elbow" of the head representing the six child. If this child was female, yellow bunting is drapped from the "elbow" of the head, if this child was male blue bunting is draped.

If there were seven children, then the last head placed should be a double head. Yellow or blue bunting being drapped from the "elbows" depending upon the sex of the last two children born.

If there were eight or more children born to the deceased, then the last head placed should be a multiple head. Yellow or blue bunting being drapped equip-distantly around the rim of the head to represent the sex of these children. In exceptional circumstances (when many, many children produced), the diameter of the multiple head has to be enlarged.

If any of these children have predeceased the deceased, then red bunting is draped from the "elbow" of the head representing them (if the elbow already has another colour of bunting, then the red bunting is intermixed with the yellow or blue bunting).

So now we have sorted out what heads we want and we have given the NM jomo head an orientation.

Now we give the other single heads an orientation (the double head is always orientated, so that you can see it best from where the deceased's head is). The multiple head has no orientation : it can spin.

The orientation of the other single heads depend upon the difference between the birthday of the first child and the child represented by that jomo. Here are two example to explain the system ...

1) The second oldest child is male. His birthday is exactly 4 months after the first born's. His head will be orientated 150 degrees anti-clockwise with respect to the first born's.

2) The tird oldest child is female. Her birthday is exactly 1 month after the first born's. Her head will be orientated 30 degrees clockwise with respect to the first born's. Note that male is anti-clockwise and female is clockwise.

Now we come to the tilting of the jomo. All jomo with a single head are tilted. The maximum tilt (that is the maximum deviation from the vertical is 30 degrees.

To work out the tilt for every jomo we first must work out the "Index" for the deceased. The index is some amount between 0 and 1. The index is got from the graph above. The horizontal axis is age and the high of the plotted line at the age in which the deceased died, determines his index.

The plotted line is can be plotted (by using a certain formula) when A, B, C and D are known. A is a constant (minus 9 months). B and C and D can be determined from the last 12 years of parish records. (By the way there are two graphs, one for each sex. And A and B and C are sex dependant.

Assuming the deceased is a male ...

B = the average age over the past 12 years in which the boys(young men) "mastered the laws".

C = the average age over the past 12 years in which the males married plus 18 years.

D = the average age of death for males over the past 12 years. No deaths that occur before "C", contribute to this average.

If the deceased is female, we determine our graph using the same formula, but now we have ...

B = the average age over the past 12 years in which the girls(young women) "mastered the laws".

C = the average age over the past 12 years in which the females married plus 30 years.

D = the average age of death for females over the past 12 years. No deaths that occur before "C", contribute to this average.

OK so now we have worked out the index for the deceased. Now each post with a single head is assigned a random number between 0 and 1.

The tilt of a post = Index x Random number x 30 degrees.

So this tilt is applied to the relevant post. The tilt follows the orientation of the head.

As can be imagined, every cremation involves a bit of work to have all the jomo at the correct orientation and tilt.

The followers of the béu-way believe that it is their duty to the ones they interact with, to assure that these "around-ones" are free from pain, free from want, and free from a spoilt/marrd heart. When one is asleep you are free from these things. Also in death ... hence béu-way followers do not believe that it should be a time of grief when somebody close to you dies.

..

The sky garden

After the body has been cremated, the ashes are put in a box and interred in the "sky garden". The sky garden takes the form of many wide "walkways" dug in the ground. From above it looks like a maze. The "ash boxes" are interred in either side of the walkways. There are four rows of these "ash boxes" deposited in each side.

A sky garden is ideally built on a gentle slope (in the Northern hemisphere, preferably south-facing to get the sun). It can be either built up from the ground or excavated into the earth.

The walkways are arranged in a sort of maze, so as to densely cover a piece of ground.

Although not absolutely necessary, most sky gardens have water running through them.

Below is a cut-away of a typical walkway. The bit in the centre (called "stream-work" in béu) has seats built into it. And also small flower beds. The inter-walkway walls support miniature trees or bushes. There is good drainage under the walkway. Mosses and small plants grow on the vertical surfaces. All in all, a sky garden is a very beautiful place, a place that should induce peace of mind to the people that wander its walkways or sit and ponder life.

The trick in designing a sky garden is too get the minimum slope needed to make this water flow. Ideally it should flow through all the walkways (not always possible). This is why a gentle slope is the best place to locate a sky garden.

The sky gardens are well looked after. They are an ideal place to visit if you want a bit of peace and quiet.

Over the hole in which the ash boxes are interred is placed a nice granite plaque with details of the life of the deceased. An image of the deceased at their prime is included. (With modern technology, people are now making in possible for visitors to see a multimedia presentation about the life of the deceased, this can be activated from a sensor in the plaque).

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Béu : Chapter 7

Contents

..... The Calendar

The cremation oval

The sky garden

Index

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