Scenes From Fantasy Faire's Last Weekend

By Bixyl Shuftan

From April 23 to May 10, the Fantasy Faire took place in Second Life. A fundraising event for the Relay for Life in Second Life, only the Relay Weekend is larger in terms of people attending or sims involved.

There was a lot to see, and a lot to shop for. Yours truly took more pictures of more scenes than I have time to post, so I'm going to try and concentrate mostly on what I did in the past few days.

I had fun exploring the sims. One guy commented of what I thought was the "Mistakes Were Made" area, "Good lord, this sim is like a bad trip through Willy Wonka's nightmares."

On Wednesday May 6, there was a centaur parade in Heliodor.

Okay, so it was before the weekend. But how often do you see centaurs in large numbers?

And in such a variety?

A common sight was various DJs playing somewhere on the map. On Friday May 8, it was the tune of Team Sunbamers' DJ Matt to play at Auxentios' Pass.

Matt had modified his Spirit Fennec avie to look like "Carbuncle" of Final Fantasy.

A variety of avatars showed up

From the tiny,

To the large and the winged,

To the equine,

To the gigantic. Yes, Ceri Quixote was wearing undies. She was also wearing a facial mask, a nod to 2020 reality.

 Sunbeamer team captain Rita Mariner and her friend Gil Otaared were among those cheering Matt on.

At the end of her two hour set, Matt had raised 60,000 Linden dollars. While these had gone into general donations and not part of the Team Sunbeamer total, an anonymous donor gave about that much to the team sometime that day. So everyone came out ahead.

And there was the Fairelands Quest. This was more relaxed than the previous two I was in, one year looking for the Bard Queen's father, the next helping out a wizard whom had been turned into an owl. This year, the objective was planting a garden for the Bard Queen.

One needed to items at the start, the backpack that was magically enchanted to carry all the sacks of seeds.

And there was the almanac, which gave you a little info about the plants and how to plant them. Much of the time, Matt and I teamed up to search.

 Some of the sacks of seeds were easier to find than others, such as the rose seeds in Zodiac found next to a large rosebush.

Zodiac was pretty, with those sparkling globes all around.

And this one was more ore less out in the open, though easily overlooked.

X marks the spot.

One was in a cemetary.

Other times, I had a little help from Skylark "Snowbuns" Lefavre.

After getting all the seeds, it was off to Queensgarden.

Where I had to look for various pots of water.

And various pots of soil.

After getting them all, it was off to the garden area.

 Players, once they had all the soils and waters, were transported to a garden skybox, where they would mix soils, waters, and seeds to get right combinations.

Succeed, and the player was rewarded with the sight of a beautiful garden.

The Bard Queen herself appears, explaining why such a fuss over a garden.

And for helping out, the player would be awarded. There were so many prizes, my screen was temporarily flooded. I had to copy-paste the list to keep track, though this website helps.

Saturday May 9 was the last day of the roleplay in Kuruk. The plot was that the bear chief had been found dead, and it was suspected a number of the cubs were the cause.

No doubt the whole story would be worth an article of it's own right. The short version was that the cubs did end up killing the chief, but from an exorcism. The Unweaver, the lasting villain of the Fantasy Faire over the years, had possessed the chief, and the cubs had finally freed him of it's grasp, but at a terrible cost: his life. Not Guilty.

Sunday May 10 was the last day of the Faire, and "The Final Ravedown" party.

From 11AM to 11PM, the party took place at various sims. When I was able to visit, I was needed elsewhere, so I sent an alt, which made things a bit laggy. But I did catch some things, such as DJ Madonna wearing something other than her trademark suit.

The flyer for the party commented, "No glowsticks allowed after The Incident." I never did get a straight answer as to what "The Incident" was.

In the Faire's last few hours, I never could get into the Ravedown as it was packed, so I explored a few places with friends.

Nothing like spending the last hour of a great event with friends.

Thank you everyone for your wonderful company and support not only for the Faire but for Relay for Life. We have had a wonderful 2 weeks and you have raised over 73,000usd! Thank you from the bottom of our hearts. We will be back next year

It was a great event, but like all good things, the Fantasy Faire would end. After Midnight, the sims were closed to anyone trying to get in. Many in the group expressed their sadness. But for some Relayers, the sadness would only be temporary. The next month promises many events, such as the Relaystock, the Sunbeamers Under the Sea party and Moon Dance, and of course the Relay weekend.

For those wanting to check out more pictures, head to the Flicker page:

https://www.flickr.com/groups/fantasyfairesl/pool/

Wildstar Beaumont's pictures: https://www.flickr.com/groups/fantasyfairesl/pool/wildstar_b

Ishtar Kiss's pictures: https://www.flickr.com/groups/fantasyfairesl/pool/ishtarskiss

Bixyl Shuftan

Scenes From The RFL Sunbeamer Air Show

By Bixyl Shuftan

On Saturday April 25, the Relay for Life's Team Sunbeamer's had it's Seventh Annual Air Show. This yearly event at Farshore Field in Sunlight Bay has been thanks to the efforts of Cynthia Farshore whom owns and runs the place.

 In southeastern HV Community, not far from the Newser office and next to Sunlight Bay, Prof Grey of Arcadia Asylum had set up a small pirate-themed town.

The town had a small coffee shop named "Starbuccaneers." One ladder led to underwater and an underseafood place. No sign of any pineapple though.

 The planes and other craft could be seen from a distance. Note the B-2 bomber.

 Besides the air show, there was a car show on the side with a number of cars and a few motorcycles on display.

"Na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na - Batman!"

Cyantia Farshore, with Spooked Dreamscape.

Skylark "Snowy" Lefavre with Rita Mariner, the latter still in her "Bid Me Mouse" time.

One attraction of the event was the moon cannon, which when fired made quite a a boom.

To get on, one had to wait for the chair and capsule to rezz.

When fired, it would go up ...

and up ...

and up ...

 And up to the moon.

 I and the others found some dancing aliens there.

An Earthrise

 "Lakia, dogkind has made it over."

I was wearing a mask for oxygen. Not sure how Gil Otaared gets it through, whatever that was placed in her mouth.

Back on the ground, Cynthia was preparing to take off in an F4U Corsair. The plane is distinguishable for it's inverted "gull wing" design, which allowed for shorter landing gear in comparison to it's large propeller.

 A look at the cockpit and controls

And takeoff and climbing into the air.

The Corsair, or "U-Bird" or "Bent Wing Bird" as it was nicknamed, would be manufactured for about 11 years from 1942 to 1953, the longest of any propeller-powered fighter in US service, serving in both World War Two and Korea.

Following the Korean War, it would serve in other countries until the 1970s, including El Salvador and Honduras, which in the brief "Football War" in 1969 would end up fighting the last dogfight between piston-powered planes.

And the plane the Corsair would tangle with: Imperial Japan's Mitsubishi A6M2 Zero. The plane was fast and maneuverable, and deadly in the hands of a skilled pilot. But it couldn't dive as fast or operate as high an altitude as American fighters. Attrition would take a toll on veteran Japanese pilots, and technical developments for US fighters would outpace the Japanese. By 1944, they were outclassed in the battlefield.

A Curtis P-40 Warhawk. First produced in 1939, this aircraft would be used by the "Flying Tigers," US pilots whom volunteered to fight for China before Pearl Harbor.

A P-47 Thunderbolt, nicknamed the "Jug." It was one of the heaviest fighters in the war, sometimes serving as fighter-bombers, and could take a lot of punishment. 

Some of the time was spent just relaxing.

I had a plane of my own, a First World War French Nieuport 17.

It's instrument panel was considerably simpler than those of fighter planes of the Second World War.

A chat before takeoff. Note the gun is on the top wing.

 And up I go.

 Going by one of the Sunweaver estate's airship transports. In the First World War, there were a number of fights between airships and fighters. It was mostly the Imperial Germans who made use of airships for bombing.

 The Nieuport 17 first saw service in March 1916, and was briefly the top fighter as it was highly maneuverable and could perform steep climbs. But it couldn't handle steep dives, and at high speeds the lower wings would shake. 

 Flying inverted.

In about a year, the Imperial Germans were coming out with better planes. New models with more powerful engines helped, but the structural problems remained. Besides the French, the plane would see action with many other air forces, such as the Russians, Italians, Americans, and especially the British. After the war, the plane would continue to be used by various countries in the 1920s.

Buzzing by  the Newser office.

Landing, I had a few words with Relay personality Gem Sunkiller.

 Cynthia, chatting with fellow Sunbeamer builder Shockwave Yareach, and Dusk Griswold, in the airfield control tower. Although a member of the Sunweaver community, Dusk puts her Relay efforts with the smaller Meli's Maniacs team, helping it raise more cash.

 I soon got called away, but when there was some activity with the dunking booth and German 88 flak cannon, I sent my alt Rezzdammit. 

 Snowy was acting as the volunteer for the dunking booth.

 Getting the sights lined up took a little practice.

But eventually, 'ol Rezz hit the target, and Snowy got a bath.

Although it's been going on for the past seven years, there is a possibility this air show may be the last. Linden-wise it was a success, getting thousands in cash and bringing the team past the 400,000 mark. But aside from Gem and Dusk, I saw only one other from outside the team around. While there were probably others showing up when I wasn't there, this low turnout from other teams dispirited Cynthia, whom wondered if she should keep on doing the event. Shockwave would comment it was an irony that so many in Second Life complain "there's nothing to do," and when someone goes out of their way to make something, they don't show up.

Yes, there is the "one team" principle. But the Relay efforts by the Sunbeamers/Sunweavers have been a source of community pride. And much of the effort has been made by builders Cynthia and Shockwave.

In the meantime, the Relay goes on. And May will have the Sunbeamers in some multi-team events, leading up to the Relay Weekend in early June. But it may take a little positive feedback from others to keep the air show going next year.

Bixyl Shuftan