Considering Africa is a continent with 54 different countries and over 3000 different ethnic groups, it really shouldn’t surprise people that there is no one set look for an African.
Afar people:
San people:
Amazigh people:
Oromo people:
Hausa people:
Masai people:
Edo people:
Wodaabe people:
These are just 8 of the over 3000 ethnic groups in Africa, and you can already see how beautiful and varied the people of Africa are.
It’s not really children, per se. Granted, I’m not fond of them being around, I don’t want one in my house or very often in my immediate presence, and I especiallydon’t like it if I have to watch one that can’t even talkcoherently let alone understand what I’m saying, but all this is because I have no patience and no strong maternal instincts to speak of.
If I’m out in public somewhere and a child looks at me, I will smile at it. If I see a video or gif of a child doing something adorable, I might coo and share it. I don’t actively go out of my way to upset children or even discuss them with most people.
But I hate with all my being the culture that surrounds the concept of children.
There’s an overwhelming societal expectation of a beuterused person that they must not only havechildren (usually multiple), but that they must desperately wantchildren, often to the exclusion of all else. It’s tied very much into the notion that everyone is supposed to get married and promptly produce offspring and put themselves neatly into heteronormative traditional gender roles so as to be a good adult and a “productive member of society.” Indeed, the mere presents of breasts and a presumed uterus is indicative that a person’s worth is whether or not they reproduce.
And it’s this idea that infests every conversation about health or future or family. It’s this concept that makes those of us who do not want children (especially biologically) have to constantly brace ourselves for potential arguments when we talk about any of these things.
It’s the reason I had to switch doctors when my first one kept insisting that “the ideal” was for me to “remain a virgin until marriage and then marry a virgin before having children.” It’s the reason people with vaginas require checkups for “reproductive health” to make sure everything is “functioning correctly for reproduction” instead of just to make sure things don’t hurt/aren’t infected/need attention. It’s the reason we see language used like “baby-making” for het sex with no stated reproductive intent, why the term “biological clock” is still exclusively used in regards to reproduction, and why there is an over-emphasis on pregnancy and reproduction language in sex (“baby goo,” “baby batter,” “gonna make a baby in you,” etc.). It’s why there’s still so much debate over who gets a say in pregnancy, why pregnancy is stillterrifyingly oftenreferred to as a punishment or as a means to control the beuterused. It’s the reason why family, friends, and even strangersfeel completely within their rights to ask you about your reproductive plans, to make you justify all of your life choices to them at a moment’s notice, to question your thoughts and beliefs as if they know you better than you do yourself.
It’s the reason why the questions are so intensive when someone asks for lasting birth control. It’s the reasons why we are told over and overthe rate of regret, the success stories of people who changed their minds, the horror stories of those who didn’t. It’s the reason why, when you state that you have a “phobia of pregnancy” in the hope that it will make people stop asking you without making you explain yourself or justify your feelings for the umpteenth time, the only advice you get is, “Well, that needs to be fixed before anything else.”
It’s the reason why “because I don’t want children” isn’t enough. It’s the reason why adoption is never seen as an option because “you’ll want some of your own someday.” It’s the reason why people put such value on “extending the family line” and “continuing the family name.”
It’s the reason I have to say I hate children for people to stop questioning me. It’s the reason I have to monitor my conversations with certain people because they’ll say, “Ah, see, you DO like kids!!” It’s the reason parts of my dysphoria kicks in hard when I see the sort of things mentioned above. Because, unless something happens to remove or damage a uterus, it is not only expected, but demandedof you to know why you’re refusing “the most precious gift on Earth,” “your womanly duty,” “the greatest love you’ll ever know,” and so forth.
It’s the reason why “I hate children” is rolled off my tongue more and more until finally people just stop talking.
But I don’t hate children.
I hate the culture of children.
I hate the misogyny that surrounds pregnancy.
Most of all, I hate the people who perpetuate this culture, who deny someone else the right to say they don’t want to be part of it, who threatento make them part of it.
But, you know, it’s so much easier to just say I hate children.
Reblogs this x1000 to try to get rid of cultural ignorance when it comes to this. Because breaking down Indian stereotypes in particular is incredibly important to me for many reasons.
Wanted to help out my buddy @kanashimibeast with their anatomy, and as always I put a bit too much work on something that just needed a bit of redlining.
like you get those ‘i hate to cook! 101: easy meals for the kitchen novice!’ and it still wants you to make a three-cheese spinach casserole
mine would be like
did you know you can put chocolate chips on a spoonful of peanut butter and obtain the perfect snack
did you know if you crack some eggs into your pasta sauce and stir there’s more protein in it so you can go longer without having to make another goddamn meal
did you know you can mix a cup of cooked rice to any condensed soup instead of water and now you have dinner and breakfast
also put cheese on it
put cheese on fucking everything
and finally here’s a list of things you can microwave in a short enough time that you won’t walk out of the kitchen, go back to bed, fall asleep for four hours, and totally forget you attempted a lunch
frozen pizza is expensive but! biscuits in a can + last dregs of jar of tomato sauce + some shredded mozzarella cheese = EIGHT MINIPIZZAS
dump all your chinese delivery into a hot pan and crack two eggs into it, stir, now it is soft and good
if you add a kraft single to mac and cheese from the box it’s magically more delicious (and if you also add hot sauce then it’s spicy)
nachos: chips + shredded cheese + salsa + rummage in fridge in case there’s other things? and then under the broiler for a minute or two. if it’s hot it counts as a meal! works good on stale chips.
an incomplete list of vegetables that won’t instantly rot on you: anything frozen, cauliflower, cherry tomatoes (they get wrinkly but u can still eat them), carrots, onions…i throw away a lot of veggies that have gone soft 😦
i love parchment paper. $4 for a roll but lay it down on ur baking sheet and know you’ll never have to scrub cheese or cookie crumbs off it again. perfect for cooking with low spoons. nothing sticks to it!
THIS IS SO IMPORTANT
also: mug cakes
also also: if you cook rice you might as well dump some canned tomatos and canned beans in it. TADA NUTRITIONALLY COMPLETE MEALS
in the list of foods that last: apples. apples can last an entire fucking winter.
also also also: cottage cheese + bell peppers + crackers = what I ate for dinner for like a year
1. You cook the rice in a pot. No spices, no nothing, just water oil and rice.
2. Just before it’s ready, when there’s about a pinkie fingernail’s worth of water on the top, add in a tablespoon of peanut butter.
3. Stir. Cook the rest of the way.
4. It’s a meal! It has carbs and protein, it’s filling, it tastes good and it looks and feels like a legitimate dish, which is great for lifting the spirits a bit.
5. If you feel fancy, add a teaspoon of honey or a handful of crushed peanuts.
Alt., mix the rice with lentils. Cereal (rice, wheat) + legume (lentils, beans) = complete protein. Most people’s bodies will accept that in lieu of animal products.
Since no-one explained how to cook rice: (1) put bit of oil in pot,
heat up on medium flame, (2) add 1-1.5 cup rice, mix up and add a bit of
salt (you may need to reduce flame), (3) while you’re doing that, boil
water in an electric pot, (4) add 2 cup water for each 1 cup rice;
reduce flame a few seconds before you do that and mind the steam won’t hit you, (5) cover and set a 20min timer.
Pasta: (1) boil water, lots of water (covered pot goes fast; you can also use an electric pot for a shortcut and bring to a full boil on the stove – experiment), (2) up to 100 gr pasta per 1L water will work, but the more water per pasta the better, (3) reduce flame to medium (light bubbling), add pasta, set time to 10min, (4) check and add time as necessary – you may not need to.
Egg or bean noodled cook faster than pasta – like, half the time.
Easiest pasta sauce: 20-50gr of butter, melt; 1-2tbs lemon juice,
homogenize; dump in pasta (and possibly peas, boiled from frozen). Taken
5min or under and will liven up pasta that’s been sitting in the
fridge.
Easiest cream sauce: 1 standard (250ml) cream carton, 1
tsp shredded cheese (keeps well in freezer) or more, 1 tbs cottage
cheese, spices to taste. Heat in a small pot on a small-to-medium flame
while stirring constantly (if it’s too hot to stick a finger in, it’s
too hot). Takes maybe 5-10min. Will keep in fridge up to 1 week.
Rice freezes well. Pasta doesn’t. Plain pasta (and most noodles) will last for up to a month in the fridge, though, and just dump it in the pan with some ketchup/tomato paste(+oil + water) and you’re good.
…nobody said that dry onion lasts? Dry onion lasts. Fried onion freezes well and keeps forever. So does diced garlic. If you
like ‘em but worried about them going bad/don’t always have the time or
spoons to deal with ‘em, there you go.
Fresh bread freezes well. Keep emergency bread
in your freezer, sliced. It’ll thaw in the fridge/on the counter
overnight, or you can stick a slice as-is in the toaster (just turn it
up 1 notch relative to your usual preference).
Potatoes in their peel are the single most nutritious food. (You can, actually, survive on mashed potatoes.) A boiled potato will stay good in the fridge for a couple days. Boil partway (should still somewhat resist a fork), turn over/toaster oven on 150C (350F) or higher while you do the rest, slice potato(s), spread like deck of cards, brush oil over (with the sort of silicone brush one uses for eggs – costs next to nothing and you’ll be glad you got it), bit of salt, stick into oven and come back 20-40min later. Will re-heat well.
All of the following are good in eggs, just (1) dump them in the pan before the eggs, (2) the more you fluff up the eggs the betters: cubed semi-boiled potatoes, sliced/cubed tomatoes, tinned garbanzo beans (<-legume), tinned/frozen corn. Tinned and frozen stuff lasts forever. A pre-boiled potato and a couple eggs will save your ass on a cold, miserable morning.
3 shortbread cookies + 2 glasses of milk = 500kcal balanced dinner. Or breakfast.
1 cup cooked pasta + couple fluffed up eggs + shredded cheese (from
frozen) to taste, in a stove-top pan or in the oven for ~20min = full
meal.
Black lentils, cooked, will last nicely in the fridge – and
unlike other legumes, they don’t need a pre-soak and only take 20min to
cook. ½ bowl + 3 tbs oil + 2 tsp lemon juice + ¼ onion = dinner so
nutritious you won’t believe it.
Cottage cheese and honey. No really. You only need a couple tsp honey for 250gr cottage tub.
1tbs peanut butter (flat as you can make it) + 3 tbs soy + 2 tbs maple/honey + 1 tsp vinegar = marinade for ~500gr of whatever. Takes ~5min to mix, 20min-2hr to soak, 5-10min to fry (non-stick pan and you don’t need oil). This + pot of rice (<-make while chicken/meat soaks) = lunch for a week. (Or dinner, if dinner’s your main meal.)
A tin of mayonnaise will last for months in the fridge. Hardboiled eggs last a nice while, too. 3 hardboiled eggs, chopped + 1tbs mayo + 1/3 onion chopped = 5min of work and egg salad for a few highly nutritious meals.
Ever make yourself hot chocolate? Make it with milk instead of water, for fuck’s sake. A large cup of hot chocolate is a legit small meal.
Buy broccoli and green beans frozen. For a couple dollars you can get a big enough bag of either to get at least 8-10 servings out of it and it keep for at least 6 months if you keep the bag closed. Buy a jar of chopped garlic in olive oil as well. That’ll keep in your fridge for months and adding a little bit to a handful of broccoli or green beans and sauteing(lightly browning them in a pan or pot on the stove) them together until everything is warm is a cheap, easy way to have a flavorful snack or meal.
Also, ramen, drop an egg and a handful of some kind of frozen veggie(the previously mentioned ones or even some mixed carrots and peas) it adds a lot of nutritional value to your ramen, makes it so much more filling, and makes it have way better flavor than plain ramen.
Buy a jar of Better than Bouillon. Amazon has them for as cheep as $2.99 a jar and one jar has enough in it to make a couple gallons of broth. Just one teaspoon of this stuff added to 1 cup of water will give you a deliciously broth for soup. Pick your flavor and drop whatever veggies or noodles you’ve got leftover in the fridge and you’ve got dinner. It’s also great to add to the water you’re cooking your rice in to give it some flavor as well.
Don’t buy boxed Kraft mac and cheese. It may seem like an easy approach but there is a cheaper approach. A 3 lb bag of macaroni noodles is only a couple dollars and you can get a 1 lb bag of the powdered cheese just like in Kraft for $10 on Amazon. I bought a bag of cheese powder that size and it lasted me more than a year and I made mac and cheese once a week. You can also mix it with milk and broccoli and you’ve got a great dinner of broccoli cheese soup.
My biggest tip for saving money on food is to make things that will freeze well. Say you make a pot of spaghetti. You could get 5 or 6 servings out of a full pot easily, if not more, but you’ll get tired of spaghetti before it’s gone. Stick servings in plastic baggies(which are fine to rinse and reuse!) and freeze them! Then you’ll be able to take out just the amount to eat for a meal and have some back up meals for when you’re loaded down with work, homework, etc and have no time to make a meal.
How to hard boil eggs:
1. Put desired amount of eggs in pot (don’t stack them on top of each other)
2. Fill with water just to cover the eggs
3. Add salt (kosher is good, table salt is fine)
4. Bring to a boil. Turn down.
5. Simmer 12 minutes!!! Time them.
6. Immediately run cold water over them (I dump ice in there too)
7. Peel, add salt and eat!
You can chop them and add them to stuff, make deviled eggs, make egg salad, chop and mix with potatoes and cheese, or just roll them in salt and eat as is. Eggs!
Your DA love interest probably never brushed their teeth in their life.
Let that sink in.
Oh my god
I can’t believe it
All that obsessive research into medieval dental hygiene actually paid off
I was spending all this time thinking “Literally no one cares about Thedosian dental hygiene, Amy, why are you wasting your time on this” but HERE IT IS
So yeah, this isn’t actually true! While the toothbrush itself is a fairly modern invention, there’s a well recorded history of people in medieval Europe using a combination of various sweet-smelling mouth rinses and scrubbing their teeth clean with a cloth and a mild abrasive herb paste of some sort. Some common rinses included mint and wine or mint and vinegar, and pastes included things like marjoram and mint, rosemary and charcoal, and vinegar, pickling alum, white salt and honey.
So rest assured, your DA makeouts are probably reasonably minty fresh!
Also in N. Africa we use swak.(dried tree bark its actually proven to be more effective than toothpaste) I feel like some cultures in dragon age considered how they’re coded culturally
(Ripped from the wiki page other places tht use it ’ It is commonly used in the Arabian peninsula, the Horn of Africa, North Africa, parts of the Sahel, the Indian subcontinent, Central Asia and Southeast Asia. In Malaysia, miswak is known as Kayu Sugi (Malay for ‘chewing stick’).)
Excellent addition! I had never heard of this – thank you! I mostly focused on Europe because we spend most of our time in the Europe-coded areas but we definitely have LI’s from scattered areas of Thedas, and there’s definitely gotta be some swak usage in there. There definitely seems to be a good chunk of northern Tevinter that corresponds to the Indian subcontinent, if not also large areas of Southeast Asia, so I’d say Tevinter using swak is a pretty safe bet.
This is a tricky one. I’m assuming by ‘very much’, you mean they do speak sometimes just not all of the time.
Have a think about the following questions:
Why does this character not speak very much? What is the cause behind that?
You need to know this because that way, you can incorporate some of the character’s own thoughts and feelings about their lack of desire/ability to speak, which will help the reader understand the character better. That way, when there are dialogue scenes in which the character does not participate, they will know that they are reporting on the speech of somebody else and are, for whatever reason you’ve chosen, not going to join in, at least not verbally.
How do you format their inner thoughts alongside the dialogue of other characters?
It is recommended that you come up with a format for how this character reports on speech and how their thoughts are interjected as a conversation unfolds. Even without a non-speaking character, your main should always be at the forefront of any development, reporting in on their feelings and thoughts, or having them narrated on in the event of third-person.
It’s really all about balance, so although you’re worried that their thoughts are ‘drowned in physical and emotional descriptions’, you can fix that in the editing stage later by considering how to balance your paragraphs better.
As for format, you could do something like this:
‘Well, what are we going to do about it?’ she asked.
‘Dunno, not my problem,’ came the reply.
Typical; I knew he would be that type of guy.
‘You think it’s that easy? That you can just walk away?’
‘Look, it’s not my business what you get up to. Not my fault you’ve invested yourself into somebody else’s life like this.’
‘Invested? I’m just doing what’s right’.
Yeah, exactly, I nod.
We were all stood here when it happened. It just wouldn’t feel right to walk away from it. As I’m considering this, I notice, just by Jeff’s feet, something unusual.
‘Take your morality complex,’ I hear him say, ‘and leave me alone. I’m not getting involved in this.’
That’s what you think.
He looks at me as I approach, kneel down by his feet, and tug from under his shoe a bloodied cloth. Come to think of it, he’s not the only one incriminated. Sal, following my line of sight, looks at her own hands in shock. I try to wipe away the marks on mine, only it smears, like warm paint. She locks eyes on Jeff’s clenched fists, on the crowbar he picked up in an attempt to prevent what happened, from happening.
‘Looks like you’ve got two choices,’ she says, smug. ‘Come with us, or walk yourself into a whole storm of trouble back home. Won’t be long before someone notices he’s missing, and they’ll all be asking where you were tonight.’
For third person, it’s going to be similar only there’ll be no ‘I’. It’ll be like,
‘Well, what are we going to do about it?’
‘Dunno, not my problem,’ said Jeff.
Typical, Tam thought, I knew he would be that type of guy.
‘You think it’s that easy?’ Sal pressed, ‘That you can just walk away?’
‘Look, it’s not my business what you get up to. Not my fault you’ve invested yourself into somebody else’s life like this.’
‘Invested?’ said Sal, exasperated. ‘I’m just doing what’s right.’
Tam nodded fervently from the sidelines, the reasoning behind the agreement being that they had all been there as witnesses. What right did they have to walk away from it, pretending it had never happened? It was whilst Tam considered this to herself that she noticed, under Jeff’s foot, something ominous…
What prompts/cues provoke the character into speaking, if any?
If your character does speak at certain times/moments, what is it that prompts them to talk? An overwhelming amount of emotion? The sound of someone saying their name, or directing a question/request right at them?
In that case, you can welcome your character into the discussion if necessary by getting another character to perform that ‘command’.
What does the character do as an alternative to speaking?
Say there’s a huge dialogue piece going on, and you find the character is just standing there, reporting what he, she and they say, without any active role in it. Although what I wrote up there isn’t exactly award-winning, I tried to put the ‘quieter’ character in the scene by allowing them to guide the story along. They found the bloodied cloth, because whilst the other two characters were arguing, they weren’t doing anything else.
Instead of other members of your cast jumping onto the next plot point, try to give more of the action to the main character. Reveal what needs to be revealed in the dialogue between the others, but ultimately, you need to give the power of movement and action to the main, so that the reader can ‘see’ how they are participating in a scene whilst still ‘hearing’ talk between the others.
Additionally, if this character uses some form of sign language or other motions to participate in speech, you can still bring them into a dialogue segment without having them say anything. Just make sure your other characters acknowledge your quieter character and ‘listen’/’watch’ them in some way, so their attention is as much on the main as your reader’s should be.
That’s about all I can think of right now. Assuming your character isn’t mute (or even better in terms of the following if they are), you might find some of the resources below useful:
I went on a hunt for word processing programs as a way to procrastinate actually writing, and figured I’d make a post for my own reference, and in case anyone else needs a new sleek editor.
A note: I have a Mac, so all of these work on Mac. Some work on other platforms too – I’ll make a note of that.
Another note: I was looking for some pretty specific things, so I haven’t included some pretty sweet ones I found, because they didn’t have some features I wanted. Check out this page for more, plus programs for other operating systems.
A final note: These are all free.
FocusWriter – I actually downloaded FocusWriter several months ago, and it’s served me well. I probably won’t stop using it. Try these on for size: 1. It’s got a sweet customizable interface. You can change the font to any font stored on your computer, change the text and background color, import an image as the background, and more. Check it out:
This is the theme I’m using currently. It’s very encouraging. Plus, you can share themes with your friends! 2. All the toolbars hide themselves while you’re typing, but they’re also pretty customizable. You can set daily word goals, show a word count and a page count, and set timers or alarms for yourself. Plus, it automatically opens all the documents you had open last time you used it and keeps them in tabs, so it’s easy to access all your stuff. 3. You can download it for Mac, Linux, or Windows!
OmPad – OmPad isn’t really a program, per se. Rather, it’s a nice typing environment with several great themes. It’s good to know a little HTML, since that’s how you do formatting, but if you’re just looking for a place to do words, it’s great. (Plus, if you need HTML help, check out W3Schools!) 1. It saves your text as you type, so you don’t have to worry about it. Browser crashed? Got you covered. 2. It’s entirely web-based, so it works on any platform – including your phone (or my phone, at any rate)!
JDarkRoom – JDarkRoom is a pretty exciting find, for me. It’s really simple, but has a variety of nice options. 1. Color options for background, text, highlighting, etcetera. 2. Word goals! The word goals here simply count how many words are in the program at the moment. 3. Will not allow you to bring another program to the front while it’s open. “Excuse me? I thought you came here to write. Why are you trying to do something that’s not writing? Hello? Not cool, dude.” (I don’t know if it does this for everyone – it feels like a glitch, so that may just be me, or it may just be Macs.) 4. Available for Linux, Mac, and Windows!
Quabel – This is for people who love Google Drive, but don’t like the way Google Drive looks. It’s basically Google Drive with only the documents, but it looks way better and is much more user-friendly. It uses markup language for formatting. 1. Has a pleasant white and green theme that can be inverted to a black and green theme. 2. You can set goals by words, characters, pages, speaking time, or reading time (excellent if you’re writing a speech or something). The speaking time and reading time also have options. 3. You can organize your documents with labels! 4. Entirely web-based, so it works on all operating systems (not recommended for phone use, though).
TextRoom – TextRoom is probably my most exciting find during the search. It’s a bit glitchy, but I still like it. 1. You can change the text color and background color, or set an image as the background. (This only seems to work in fullscreen mode.) 2. Word counts, goals, deadlines, and timers. Do I need to say anything else? 3. The website said to press F1 for options, but the actual key for that (for Mac) is F2. Sometimes when you set an option you have to quit the program and then restart it before it applies. Sometimes when you open the program your interface settings don’t show up, but going into options, sticking your cursor in the image box, and then pressing Enter usually fixes that issue. 4. Linux, Windows, or Mac!
FountainPen – This one took forever to download, fair warning. All the others downloaded pretty quickly. However, the product is very rewarding. Only for Mac, though. 1. Loads of customizable! Font, background color, everything. Uses an optional backdrop, which is an image in the background. You can pull other programs up over it, however, such as an outlining program or iTunes:
2. It organizes your files in the program so you can locate and open them easily. 3. It is completely customizable with images and everything, but it comes with several sweet default settings in case you’re a bit overwhelmed by all that.
Writed – Writed is good if you want to just keep both hands on the keyboard and type. It uses markdown formatting and the free version exports to PDF fully formatted. 1. Several great themes. 2. Really easy markdown user guide. 3. You can export to PDF or HTML with the free version. Paid versions add a few other export options.
Koi Writer – Last but not least, another online one! It’s a bit confusing at first, but nice once you figure it out. 1. Several nice themes and such. 2. You can save your work. 3. Online works on everything basically except the phone. My phone is very confused by all this.
Anyway, I hope y’all enjoyed this rambly guid to several writing programs. Now it looks like I’m out of excuses to write… Oh look! It’s sleeping time! JK I’m’a write. Have a nice night/day/morning, whatever.
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