fandomhigh | Pony Express: Friendship is Cultural Exchange! Wednesday, period 1

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Pony Express: Friendship is Cultural Exchange! Wednesday, period 1

"So we've seen a nice sized town," Pinkie said without so much as a 'howdy' for prologue, clearly anxious to get the class through the portal and into the land of ponies once again. "And we've seen a big city. Today I'm going to take you to a teeny tiny frontier town, settled by my friend Applejack's very extended Apple family!" She led the way through the portal into a dusty street in a fairly stereotypically wild west sort of desert town, complete with tumbleweeds and boardwalks and flapping saloon doors.

So, just to be clear, week one had involved a quaint sort of English village sort of place, week two was a bustling modern city, and week three was the wild west. And no, this class didn't involve time travel.

Pinkie waved excitedly as a pony wearing a vest and a cowboy hat (because herding was, in fact, a legit pony career path!) came trotting up. "Hiya, Braeburn!" Pinkie greeted. Braeburn doffed his hat and bowed a little.

"Well howdy, Pinkie! Pinkie's class! Welcome to Appleloosa, one of Equestria's premiere apple-farmin' communities!"

"And home of the very first pony-buffalo peace treaty!" Pinkie enthused. "Helped along just a little by the musical stylings of yooooours truly."

"Er," said Braeburn. "Sure."

"You see," Pinkie continued. "When my friends and I first came out to visit the Appleloosans, bringing along a new tree for their orchard, we were actually attacked by the local buffalo tribe before we could get here! It turned out that the buffalo were upset at the Appleloosans for setting up their apple orchard right in the middle of traditional buffalo stampeding grounds."

That's right, kids. You were in for a doozy of a colonialist metaphor.

"Fortunately, with the help of all of us from Ponyville and some deeeelicious apple pie, we were able to convince the ponies and buffalo that they should share the land equally, by building a stampeding path through the orchard. So now the ponies and the buffalo are bestest friends!"

Braeburn looked faintly uncomfortable. "Uh," he said. "Yeah, that sure is how that happened." He doffed his hat again to wipe sweat from his brow. "Chief Thunderhooves and his tribe come through every now and then through the orchard, and we make sure to have plenty of pies for 'em when they do."

"And every year on the anniversary of the treaty ponies and buffalo get together for a celebratory feast!" Pinkie said. "And an even more celebratory pie fight!"

"Wha --" Braeburn started, but was interrupted by a pie to the face.

"Eee!"

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Like the teacher just totally glossed over the whole bit where the ponies stole the shit out of that land they were now sharing.

Xanthippe Voorhees

Blue Sargent

Thorin

Edward Kenway

Kathy Li

Alluka Zoldyck

Alex Mack

Hanna Heller

Dipper Pines

Boggle at the wild west ponies wandering by.

Kathy had already been uncomfortable coming into town, considering the circumstances of her last trip into the Wild West. But then, hearing the story of how the ponies got their land--down to the fact that the buffalo had Native-sounding names and titles--had Kathy looking downright green.

Maybe she could explain to Pinkie how this was terribly wrong? With Tumblr?

Alluka did not understand what was wrong with what Pinkie had said, so she was definitely more interested in the pies.

But Kathy looked kinda funny...

"Kathy," Alluka said, peering up at her. "Don't you like pie?"

That was clearly the issue!

"Under normal circumstances, I do," Kathy agreed reluctantly. Because how did one explain colonialism to someone as sheltered as Alluka? "I'm just not feeling very well today."

You know. Since discovering what class today was really about and all.

"Ooooh," Alluka said understandingly, and then asked, "Does that mean you'll be sitting out the pie fight?"

"Oh yeah," Kathy said fervently. "I'm definitely not going to be doing that."

She nodded and, after a moment, her bunny nodded too.

"Would you keep my bunny safe for me while I play?" Alluka asked hopefully, feeling terribly clever. This way, Kathy would keep her bunny safe, and her bunny would make Kathy feel better.

Alluka always felt better with a toy to hug, after all.

Kathy could absolutely use a hug. "I'd be happy to," she assured Alluka, holding out her hands. "I'll take good care of them, promise."

She beamed at Kathy, hugged her bunny tight, and then offered it over.

"Pie is delicious, but not for toys," Alluka said wisely.

Unless it was for a tea party, and then Alluka was stealing all the pie anyway.

"Very true," Kathy said, nodding and accepting the bunny with appropriate solemnity. "I don't think the bunny would appreciate the pie anyway."

"Not like this," Alluka agreed. "Thank you, Kathy!"

"You're welcome, Alluka," Kathy said softly. "And thank you, too."

"I didn't do anything," Alluka insisted, beaming at Kathy. "But you're welcome."

See? Totally sneaky plan!

Kathy had to smile back. Alluka's grin was infectious. "Go have fun," she said. "I'm rooting for you. Bunny is, too."

Pie fight!

Alluka missed the meaning of the rest of the lecture entirely because a) pie and b) pie fiiight!

She bounced in place.

Because nothing says "important history lesson about peace" like an apple pie to the face!

Or maybe ask Braeburn why he looked so uncomfortable when Pinkie talked about singing.

Or ask where these buffalo friends of theirs were hanging out.

"Uhh..." Kathy wasn't sure how to say this. Or if it was even her place to say anything at all. But she very literally couldn't not. So she'd taken most of class to figure out what she was going to say. "Excuse me?"

That was as far as she'd gotten in the figuring out process.

"Hiya!" Pinkie said with a big smile. "What's up?"

"Umm...I have some questions about what happened here? With the buffalo, I mean," Kathy said, twisting her hair nervously. "How did the ponies come to be here?"

"They took the train."

This conversation might take awhile.

"Right, but..." This was not helping Kathy's composure any. "Okay, so why did they settle here?"

"Oh! I think it was because there's only so many places you can grow good apple trees."

"Okay, right," Kathy said. "And, so, when people came out here and settled down, who did they talk to about buying the land? Did they know about the buffalo stampeding through before they showed up?"

Pinkie tilted her head thoughtfully. "You know, I'm not sure if they knew about them. But nopony owns any land. You can own the stuff on it, but why would you buy dirt?"

"You'd be surprised," Kathy muttered, before continuing more loudly. "But if people are already using the land, isn't it, umm, a little rude to set up there?"

"Oh, yeah, totally, if you already know about it," Pinkie said. "Ground's around for everypony. If more than one pony needs it, you have to share."

"How did the ponies respond when the buffalo told them that this was their traditional, err, stampeding ground?"

"You know, I don't know," Pinkie admitted. "Whatever it was, it wasn't very nice. The buffalo were super angry by the time my friends and I showed up!"

"I just think that it seems very unfair that he ponies came here and planted an orchard and everything when there were people using it first," Kathy said, trying for the most tactful response.

"But the ponies didn't have anywhere else to plant their trees out here."

"Did they bother to find out if any, umm, pony else was using it first?" Kathy pressed. "Maybe if they'd spoken to Chief Thunderhooves first, there wouldn't have been a problem at all. Or they could have kept looking."

"Well -- I mean --" Pinkie was actively frowning now. It wasn't something she did well. "I -- they learned to share it! That's good, right?"

"You don't know that they needed to learn that, though," Kathy said. She tried to find a metaphor. "If they'd been asked first, they might have shared freely. But instead, they came home to find their traditional lands taken by peop--by ponies they didn't know and then when they protested, the ponies were really rude to them or something. That doesn't sound like it would put anypony in a sharing mood. How would you feel if someone, say, moved into your house while you were on Fandom, putting all their stuff in and saying it didn't belong to you anymore?"

No seriously, this episode is terrible. But it does come with Pinkie doing the can-can.

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Pony Express: Friendship is Cultural Exchange! Wednesday, period 1

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PIE FIGHT!

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OOC