Holidays in OTU/YTU

[JAFARR]

Happy Thanksgiving!

This makes me wounder if there are any official holidays in the OTU other than "Holiday" which IIRC is a celebration of the Emperor's birthday and celebrated at the beginning of the year. That leads to 2 questions.

1. Does the date of "Holiday" change when the Emperor dies to the new Emperor's birthday or was it set based on the birthday of the first Emperor, Cleon Zhunastu?

2. What holidays are in your YTU?

 

[Icosahedron]

I've never really thought about holidays IMTU, I can see a couple of empire-wide holidays like the emperor's birthday, an 'empire day' and maybe a holiday to commemorate an important war, but I imagine most would be local planetary affairs - besides, most of the PCs in Traveller are self-employed freelancers or military servicemen, and when do those guys get a holiday??
Even annual maintenance breaks will be taken as an opportunity to look for more lucrative income. Local holidays are more likely to frustrate impatient traders than to act as R&R.

 

[aramis]

There are, in canon, two "Imperial Holidays"... Holiday (day 1), and the Emperor's Birthday (on the actual birthday). Nowhere have I seen Strephon's Birthday listed, tho.... (I might have missed it.)

IMTU, Most worlds also celebrate on their local Noble's birthday, their subsector and sector dukes BDays, and also a founding day if known. Most also have a local rest-day tradition. Most also celebrate Investure Day, the day when the Emperor was invested as such.

Most of these are not "life shuts down" holidays, but are "half-day and party tonight" kinds of celebrations.

Holiday, however, is the canonical "Don't bother trying to do anything other than land or call EMS on Holiday" pretty much everywhere.

IMTU, the Imperium requires at least 7 days of "holidays", with 1 being required for Holiday, half a day for Emperor's B-Day, and the rest being local choice, and minimum half day chunks.

 

[Andrew Boulton]

All the ones I know of are shown on the Calendar

001 - Holiday
014-1071 - Coronation of Strephon Aella Alkhalikoi
090 - Imperial Armed Forces Day
202-1049 - Strephon Aella Alkhalikoi born

 

[Jeff M. Hopper]

All the ones I know of are shown on the Calendar

001 - Holiday
014-1071 - Coronation of Strephon Aella Alkhalikoi
090 - Imperial Armed Forces Day
202-1049 - Strephon Aella Alkhalikoi born

I use the above, but also include a lot of regional variation. Since most real holidays coincide with either a religious or historical event observance, I have holidays happen based on the dominant religion of the region and what has happened there of importance historically in the setting. Mostly wars and origin dates.

Of course since there are wacky holidays now, there will be wacky holidays in the future. Members of the Church of Elvis still celibrate Elvis Day, when the King died while sitting on His throne and ascended into the afterlife to lead the Heavenly Choir in Rock-n-Roll Song. Because, you know, some historical events may get a little confused after five millenia and take on special significance.

 

[jfetters]

Of course since there are wacky holidays now, there will be wacky holidays in the future. Members of the Church of Elvis still celibrate Elvis Day, when the King died while sitting on His throne and ascended into the afterlife to lead the Heavenly Choir in Rock-n-Roll Song. Because, you know, some historical events may get a little confused after five millenia and take on special significance.

What, you mean that's not how it happened?

 

[Golan2072]

The Solomani probably have a holiday in the anniversary of their victory* in the Rim War, an Independence Day in the anniversary of the Rim War's start, and a Party Founding Anniversary. In addition they'll probably have a memorial day for all those men and women who've dies for the Solomani Cause. All of these, of course, would be accompanied by large military parades and flyovers.

* A partial one, sure, but unlike Illelish they've managed to make the Imperium accept their independence as an accomplished fact.

 

[su_liam]

Of course since there are wacky holidays now, there will be wacky holidays in the future. Members of the Church of Elvis still celibrate Elvis Day, when the King died while sitting on His throne and ascended into the afterlife to lead the Heavenly Choir in Rock-n-Roll Song. Because, you know, some historical events may get a little confused after five millenia and take on special significance.

Heheh. I can see devout Elvisites wearing little silver toilets. Some of the more, "protestant," Elvisites are a little disturbed by the Terran Elvisite habit of actually representing Elvis curled up under the Throne.

btw Was Elvis really a redhead with green eyes?

 

[Sifu Blackirish]

IMTU there has been a revision to the Terran calendar.

Now it has 13 months of 28 days each. You lightning calculators in the crowd are saying "Wait, that's only 364 days!" We get a new year's holiday and a leap day where appropriate.

As far as ethnic holidays go, humanity is very fragmented. There probably won't be many households like mine, where we celebrate...

Martin Luther King Jr. Day
St. Patrick's Day
Independence Day
Labor Day
Thanksgiving
Christmas
Kwanza...

 

[BlackBat242]

I've been using 12 months of 30 days each (plus 5 holidays) in my Traveller game for some time now.

Each month has three 10-day divisions... called a "tenday" (pronounced as one short word).

The Holidays are Newyear, Firstfourth, Midfourth, Lastfourth, Yearend (makes a two-day holiday with Newyear).

At least that is the Terran Confederation Standard Calender.

I use a slightly revised timeline for this alternate Traveller universe... instead of the Grand (1st) Imperium collapsing quickly, the 1st Terran-Vilani War lasts just short of 200 T.S. years, then the GI and the TC call a truce, and conduct an uneasy stand-off for another 400 years, when the 2nd Terran-Vilani War erupts... triggering the OTU Long Night.

I have been running adventures near the end of the "truce period"... ~2620-2625 TS dating (~1600 Vilani/GI, ~-1900 3rd Imp dating).


Oh yes, there is a "Neutral Zone" 1 subsector wide, made up of Zarushagar N,O,P; Massila M,N,O,P; and most of Delphi M and a little of N... thus stretching across the "pinch" formed between the Great Rift and the Lesser Rift.


Tech levels for both are:
10 - low average
11 - average
12 - "state-of-the-art"
13 - experimental