A Traveler's Guide to Hyrule; Thursday, First Period [11/18].

[in_sidon_we_trust]

"I have exciting news for you, my prospective Hylian travelers!" Sidon announced, once class was ready to get underway for the day. "We have completed our unit exploring the different races of Hyrule! By now, wherever you should roam, you will do so with the confidence of the knowledge of whoever you may encounter, be they friend or foe! With the exception of some of the mightier monsters, such as the dreaded lynels, the horrible hinox, or the mighty talus, but we may save those for another day! For now, I'd like to turn our attention to the wide world of adventure that may await you when visiting my fair world!

"As you have come to realize, Hyrule is indeed a vast land, with a long and stories history, so you had better imagine that adventure waits around every turn! There are great and impressive ruins to explore, magnificent treasure to discover, ancient temples and magnificent landscapes. Why, how is one even supposed to know where one might begin?

"I had asked myself this very same question when considering what to cover next, and so I naturally turned to the people who would know best: fellow adventurers of Hyrule! And one common thread I noticed among all of them was that they all looked forward, wherever they roamed, to finding the Rumor Mill! What is the Rumor Mill, you may ask? And that would be an excellent question! Well, you see, the Rumor Mill is a series of journals kept all around the stables and other inns around Hyrule, kept by a mysterious investigative journalist who goes by the name of Traysi. Her exploiits are infamous! She does a bit of what I have been doing for this class, traveling the world and asking about stories and adventures to be had, and then recording them down for other adventurers to discover and maybe pursue. She even has a star ranking system to let the adventurers know if pursuing one rumor is truly worth their time! It is a remarkable task that is quite popular among travelers, even if only to read a little bit more about a certain area and see what might be interesting to check out!

"Now, of course, I couldn't very well bring the actual journals to you...they would be sorely missed! And they are written in Hylian, anyway, which I don't believe either of you would have much ease reading, unless you have quite the surprise tucked up your sleeves for me! But no matter! I have painstakingly spent the last week translating many of the Rumor Mills for you to read and examine, and then I would be absolutely dying to know which ones caught your eye and which ones you might consider pursuing should you be a true Hylian adventurer! And we can discuss the Rumors themselves, too, and how they reflect Hylian culture as a whole.

"I have copies for each of you," he said, now handing them the papers in his almost child-like blocky script, "so please, take some time, read through them, and then we'll discuss!"

World Mythology, Thursday, Period 3

[atreideslioness]

"This week we turn our eyes southward, to the world 'Down Under', or Australia," Ghanima began, distributing the handouts to the class as soon as everyone had arrived.

"Australian Aboriginal myths, also known as Dreamtime stories, Songlines or Aboriginal oral literature, are the stories traditionally performed by Aboriginal peoples within each of the language groups across Australia." "All such myths variously tell of significant truths within each Aboriginal groups' local landscape affectively layering the whole of the Australian continent's topography with cultural nuance and deeper meaning, effectively empowering selected audiences with the accumulated wisdom and knowledge of Australian Aboriginal ancestors back to time immemorial."

"Australian Aboriginal mythologies have been characterized as "at one and the same time fragments of a catechism, a liturgical manual, a history of civilization, a geography textbook, and to a much smaller extent a manual of cosmography".

"Now, there are over 400 distinct Aboriginal groups from across Australia, each distinguished from each other by unique names most often identifying the particular languages, dialects, or distinctive speech mannerisms. There are so many distinct Aboriginal groups, languages, beliefs and practices that it would not seem proper to attempt to characterize, under a single heading, the full range and diversity of all myths being variously and continuously told, developed, elaborated, performed, and experienced by members of each and every one to the groups across the whole of the continent," she said, continuing to pace the room. "Despite the daunting task of trying to catalog such an evolving mythology, The Encyclopaedia of Aboriginal Australia never-the-less observes: "One intriguing feature of Aboriginal Australian mythology is the mixture of diversity and similarity in myths across the entire continent.""

The traditions and lore of Australia's indigenous peoples belongs to what may be one of the oldest continuous culture on Earth, to my understanding, circa 50,000 years. Indigenous Australian peoples conceive of all things beginning with The Dreaming or Altjeringa, also called the Dreamtime, a sacred 'once upon a time', time out of time in which ancestral Totemic Spirit Beings formed The Creation." Ghanima smiled as she returned to the front of the class to sit on her desk. "Some of this may sound familiar by now, and while we could dedicate an entire semester to the power of the collective human unconscious, we unfortunately do not have the time."

"On your desks, you should now have four handouts regarding The Dreamtime, Songlines, and the Rainbow Serpent. Please read them over, and then we will discuss as a class."

Library, Thursday 11/18

[noonedecidesmyfate]

Of course Belle had taken a job in the library when she realized they were available. She got to spend more time surrounded by books and be paid for her time. She couldn't ask for much more than that.

She was settled at the desk for the moment with a book on astronomy that had leapt off a shelf into her hands and opened itself up to a section on eclipses. A little additional research had revealed there was meant to be a lunar eclipse very early tomorrow morning.

A few other books had followed her to the desk, just in case she might need to know more about the moon or the sun or eclipses or various other astronomical things.