Philip the Bard's Harappan Blog

Welcome. I know many of you are here to better know Max Gavaskar, and here I’ve been rambling on about Harappa, a dead planet. Well, it’s where I grew up and it’s such an interesting story. I promise to give you some of the juicy stories of Max’s early life next week, but today I promised to tell you of the story of the last great Snowball game, so . . .

Some of you may not know what Snowball is. Rules for the game are a bit vague and to the uneducated spectator it looks more like a free-for-all. It is played on a large, snow covered field about 100 meters long and maybe 50 meters wide. At each end is a large round hoop, standing up and almost four meters high. The basic object of the game is to put an oblong leather ball through the hoop in any way possible, carried, thrown or kicked it doesn’t matter. Teams will usually assign two or three team members to guard the hoop. They would do this in any of several ways. Most teams take to building a wall of snow in front and defend this wall with a pile of snow balls prepared for the eventual assault on the goal. Of course opposing teams will assign somebody to be there attempting to tear down this wall.

The commotion of building up and tearing down the walls around the goal takes place at both ends of the field, while in the center the bulk of the teams are wrestling with the ball and each other. From the side lines it looks like a giant cloud of flying snow with an occasional arm or leg sticking out. Usually at some point one player will break from this mass and make a run for the goal. This goes on till one team scored three goals. This sometimes takes an hour.

There were eleven clans large enough to field a team. Players from the smaller clans were merged into other teams. The Thrans were favored again that year. Rex Thran was nearly unstoppable when he made a break for the hoop. This year the Sun family had high hopes of unseating the three time champions.

The game started with a quick toss to Fell Sun from his brother Dal, the Suns started the game with a goal barely seconds into the match. The ball was returned to play. The center pack wrestled with the ball till Goren Thran got hold of the ball and tossed out to Rex who took off like a spear towards the goal, trailing several Suns behind him. As he approached the hoop of the Suns he was battered by a volley of hard packed, wet, snow balls. Each ball that hit, stung Rex and reminded him that he would have a bruise for each one. Undeterred, he pressed on, shielding his face from the icy, stinging missiles. Because he was shielding his face he didn’t see Lagos Sun before his shoulder made contact with Rex’s stomach, knocking the wind out of him and causing him to drop the ball. Dal Sun picked up the ball and drop kicked it as hard as he could towards the other end of the field, where Onus Sun caught it and from there threw the ball through the goal. Sun clan 2 Thrans 0.

Members of the Thran clan helped Rex to his wobbly feet. The Thrans put Rex on goal while he recovered and the game went on. The mash in center field continued for some time with neither team gaining an advantage till Strom Thran broke free of the pack and single handedly ran the ball through the Sun goal with a graceful diving leap. 

The score was tied just moments later with a nifty pass from Goren Thran to Strom who tossed the ball to his cousin, Hammer who had come at the goal from the opposite side.

Again the game settled into a mid field tussle and stayed that way for some time. In the center of the melee hands groped for the ball as feet kicked at them and the ball. Biting, gouging, pulling, hitting, kicking all legal, all taking place. Finally, Dal Sun got free with the ball and made for the goal. Dal and Onus ran down the field parallel and tossed the ball back and forth to keep the Thrans from pouncing on one of them. About the time they were in range of the snow ball defense they were surprised when Rex Thran jumped from behind the Thran snow wall and intercepted one of their passes. Rex was at a full run when he grabbed the ball and scooted past all the Suns chasing the ball. No one on that field was fast enough to catch him. The Suns only chance was that their goal team could defend. Rex approached the goal straight on, not swerving at all through the fusillade of snow balls. 

When Lagos Sun came over the wall to stop Rex, Rex swerved sharply to his left. The moment that Lagos moved to counter, Rex spun around and back to his right and past the big Sun goal tender. He then cut around the Sun wall and ran over Nate and Will Sun to score the winning goal. Thrans 3 Suns 2. 

The crowd ran out on to the field and mobbed the winning team and the losers too. Almost everyone watching, thought this one of the best Snowball matches ever.

Monday: Childhood stories from Max Gavaskar’s life on Harappa

Philip Normer

of the White Mountain Clan of Harappa

Philip The Bard's Harappan Blog

In the weeks leading up the Winter Fest 200 the weather was quite gray. There was a snow storm just before the festival started and the day before it began the sun came out and shone brightly for the entire event.

Friends and family from all the outlying villages in the White Mountains came to Terramark. They were put up in family cabins and some settled into spare rooms in the Great Hall.

I had my own cabin then and my cousin, Pando from East Terramark stayed with me during the festival. Pando is a musician like me and I remember having a good time with him.

The first day of the festival was as busy as Terramark ever was. The night before, the Normer family held their private party for family only. Most of the families did this. Once the festival got going in earnest most of the young people would be so busy they wouldn’t have time for the family elders. For at least one night the younger Normers partied with the elder Normers. 

I can tell this you because I am one, that the Normers are not the most exciting people of the White Mountain Clan. Solid, trustworthy, stable, that’s most of the Normers, I don’t know what happened to me. I’m not sure if it was the music or my relationship with the Thains that drove me away from the staid Normer way.

The festival included a wide range of competitions. Cooking contests, art contests, craft contests and the sporting events. Archery, slide racing, and snow ball.

Tomorrow I will tell you of the snow ball tournament and Rex Thran’s great goal in the finest snow ball game  . . . ever.

Don’t worry I will get to the story of the Great Slide Race and my involvement in that.

Philip Normer

of the White Mountain Clan of Harappa

Phillip the Bard's Harappan Blog

 I am dying to tell you the story of the Winter Fest of 200 and, of course, my involvement in the Great Slide Race. But I think I may be getting ahead of myself. I know some of you might not know much about my homeworld, Harappa. So today I will take a few lines to tell you about the planet we called home and Earth called Smoot-28-4077-3, which is not nearly as romantic. 

 The name came from the Founder, Marcus Johnson. He apparently was interested in ancient Earth cultures and had been studying them for some time, trying to design a new paradigm for his project of colonizing a new world. We aren’t exactly sure why the Founder chose Harappa other than it was a culture that was lost to history for a long time and also that it’s origins are shrouded in some mystery.

 My Harappa is a planet covered mostly in water. There are two main continents on opposite sides of the globe. Humans have colonized a corner of one of the land masses. Much of the planet is not very hospitable. Too hot, most of it. Not so hot to make your blood boil, but uncomfortable. We humans live near the southern pole in a rounded triangle bordered by the White Mountains to the North and the Green Mountains to the East. The ocean lies to the West and South. Running down the center of this triangle is the Great River, fed by the high mountain waters of the White Mountains. From the Green Mountains run the Norton River and the South River which both eventually flow into the Great River near the town of New Junction.

 The Great River Plain is where most Harappans lived. Both the great cities, Caelum and Salus were near the bottom to the south, where the Great River ran into the ocean. Along the river were the cities of Sandon, Norton, New Junction and Junction, as well as several other smaller towns and villages. Along the coast were the fishing and algae harvesting villages of Segundo and Mira Mar.

 When I figure out how to post pictures, I’ll post a map and some pictures I’ve taken around Harappa.

 A Harappan year is 308 days. We have eleven months of twenty-eight days each. Winters are short and we only get snow in the high mountains. Some years we get only a trace of snow in our village. 

 I grew up in Terramark. Terramark is the main village of the White Mountain Clan. The Terramark Valley is a lovely, flat mountain meadow surrounded by high mountains on three sides. The Terramark creek runs a crooked, lazy path through the meadow.  This creek cascades down a rocky gorge and eventually ties into the headwaters of the Great River.

 The village lies at the eastern or up hill end of the meadow. The Great Hall where the leading family lives backs up to the Terramark Bluffs which are the toes of the great Terramark Mountain, the highest peak in the White Mountains.

 Over the years, many young Harappan men have lost their lives trying to scale the Bluffs. This giant rock slab hangs over the village and most young men want to conquer this rock face. It constantly stares down at us and says, "I dare you!" We've all thought about it, even me. Almost every young man  and most of the young women climb up to a spot called the "Lunch Bench" about three hundred meters up the cliff face. Getting there is not as tough as it looks. I did it. Above the "Lunch Bench", the climb becomes too treacherous for all but the most intrepid. Paladin Thain and his friend Cory Sun tried to climb it on a number of occasions, only to be turned back. One time they believed they had found a route to the top but a storm came in and stopped the climb. There are rumors that Dallas Thain successfully climbed the bluffs in the year 48, but no one I know can remember any one making the climb, alive.

 North of here is the Black Mountains. That is where the illumaphane is found. The White Mountains, while they seem mighty grand to us are only foothills compared to the Black Mountains. I’m not a scientist but I’ve been told that it’s the heavy gravitational pull of the illumaphane that caused the Black Mountains to be so big and steep. People don’t go there often. Some of the Old Creatures still live there. The strange and dark things that lived all over Harappa before humans got here. Folks avoid the Black Mountains also because of the Harappan Curse. Most doctors and scientists believe the sickness has something to do with the strange mineral. 

 I got the curse when I was a child, so I guess I am immune to it now, but I still don’t like to go too far up into the strange lands.

 That is what we knew of the galaxy before the “Marcus Johnson” landed. Most of us didn’t even know of the continent on the far side of the planet. We knew there was land beyond the Green Mountains that might be turned into a livable place and there were supposedly some folks who had gone off to settle the East River Plain. No one ever heard from them and we thought little about them. We were content to live with the cycles of the Great River. Our galaxy was very small and manageable.

 Then the Earthers showed up and everything changed.

   Philip Normer

   of the White Mountain Clan of Harappa 

Chapter One of The Gavaskar Field

Chapter One

From Melanie to Max

It started out as a simple physics experiment to better understand how the mysterious mineral, illumaphane, affected the dark matter and energy grid called the Gavaskar Field.  Melanie Gavaskar had been studying the focused beam that the FTL (faster than light) drive utilized to bore a hole in the field that all matter rested on allowing the Einstienan speed limit to be broken. That was when she saw something disturbing. The holes did not completely heal over. Continued use of the FTL could eventually tear the fabric of the universe apart.

When she was sure that her findings were correct she sent them to Professor Gupta’s tablet computer. She could trust him; he would confirm her findings. No one would listen to a student, no matter how high her test scores were. She grabbed her coat on the way out of her lab. She had been working very hard on this project and decided she deserved a treat. She went to the Bird in Hand, a local tavern to get a beer.

She said to the handsome young bartender, “How about a Harvest draft?”

When she had a full pint she found a table with one of her friends from school. Anne Sato wasn’t a close friend but they had shared a few beers over their school years. “Hi Anne. What’cha reading?”

Anne looked up from her tablet with a casual smile and said, “First century Harappan lit. Ugh! It’s all Marcus Johnson this, the Founder that. I am so tired of Marcus Johnson. What about you?”

Melanie took a sip of her beer leaving a thin foam mustache on her full upper lip. With a hint of a sparkle in her deep brown eyes she said, “I’ve just finished a scan of the local Gavaskar Field. I think I have a really important discovery.” She took another sip and wiped her face.

Anne said, “Look I’m a lit major, but I do get the basic of the idea of the Gavaskar Field and all. That it’s some sort of frame work that all shit is built on. But, here’s my question. Are you related to old Debendra Gavaskar?”

Melanie rolled her eyes and took a deep breath, she was asked this a lot. “No, he was born on Earth over a hundred years after my ancestors left there.” She said with rote precision.

Melanie looked up from her beer mug to see her professor standing in the doorway squinting to better see in the dark tavern. When his eyes adjusted enough to allow him to find Melanie he motioned frantically for her to leave with him.

Melanie nodded and looked to her drinking buddy Anne, “Sorry, but I have to go.”  

When she reached the Professor, he grabbed her by the elbow and said. “We need to go over your findings. If this is true there are going to be a lot of very upset people over at SID. The Science and Industry Division won’t take kindly to someone ending their space program. We need to go.”

Professor Gupta and Melanie left quickly and returned to the university physics building just a block from the tavern. The two of them went over and over Melanie’s procedures and calculations.

“This is serious, Professor.” Melanie said, “We have to notify the SID right away.”

The professor ran his right hand over the curly, salt and pepper stubble on his head. His eyes were squinted, “Not so fast little Mel. I don’t disagree with you but they are not going to like this one bit. I think we should move cautiously here.”

“What do you mean, Professor?”

“What I mean, Mel, is that you are very young and naive. You trust too much. You are too young to remember when the Earthers first showed up on Harappa. We had no idea that we had come from a planet called Earth. I know you learned the history of Harvest Day in school. Many Harappans still remember that day when the Earthers killed our hero Paladin and knocked our world off its orbit. The SID knows this about us and they distrust all Harappans because of this. Harappans and Earthers will never be one people. They won’t take too kindly to a pair of Harappans trying to take away their toys.”

“I know history Professor. I don’t like the SID either but this is bigger than Harappa or Earth, or for that matter Lava and Kusha too. We have to do something. If they continue their space program, it could rip the entire Universe apart. We could have a new Big Bang. Everything, and we are talking everything in the universe here, would be wiped out.”

The old professor offered up a gentle smile, put his hand on Melanie’s arm and said, “We will do something, my dear, but you must let me contact the authorities. This must be handled delicately. I will call them today. You rest. I’ll let you know how they respond when I can.”

Melanie looked up to the kindly old man, she gave his hand a gentle squeeze and started to leave but as she approached the door the professor said, “Melanie, please be careful. Don’t mention this to anyone just yet. OK?”

“Yes, sir.” Melanie wondered why the professor would caution her but went back to her apartment and read some early Harappan lit on her tablet to get her mind off the SID.

Melanie woke up when her tablet buzzed. It was the professor calling. 

“Melanie,” the professor’s image on the small tablet screen looked panicked, “come to my house quick. We need to talk right away.”

Melanie decided to stop by the lab to get her big tablet with all the technical data.

She eked out a small gasp when she opened the door to her lab and found the place wrecked. Not a single drawer, closet or file cabinet was left unmolested. Her lab tablet was gone. She ran out of the science hall and hurried to the Professor’s apartment. She rounded the corner just in time to see an SID water car screech to a stop. Four Agents got out and rushed Professor Gupta’s door. Melanie ducked back behind the corner and watched.

After several minutes of yelling and banging inside, two of the Agents came out and went to the water car, followed by Professor Gupta who was being escorted arm in arm by the other two agents. When he walked by a small rosemary hedge Melanie noticed that the professor dropped something from a fold in his caftan.

The old gray-haired gentleman was pushed into the car and the vehicle sped away. Melanie rushed to the rosemary hedge and found a small tablet. She turned it on and was relieved that her findings were intact on this little device. 

Also on the tab was a note from the professor, “Dear Melanie, I am so sorry you have fallen into this. I think the SID is coming to arrest me. I may only have a few minutes. This tablet contains your data, keep it safe. You are in great danger. The SID will want to question you at the least and may want to arrest you as well. Don’t let them get ahold of you. Get in touch with Alice Toten, she can be found at the Harappan Cultural Center. She is a good pal of mine. If she asks you if you are a pal say yes. You can trust her. I suggest you get off world as soon as you can. Don’t contact your parents. They will be safer not knowing what you are up to. When it is safe I will get word to them that you are OK. Please be careful, Little Mel. Professor Francis.”

She looked around in a bit of a panic. She didn’t want to go home. The SID most likely would go there, if they had not already. Melanie was glad that both her parents were in the field in the Black Mountains. At least they’d be safe. 

What is the Harappan History Project?

The Harappan History Project

What Is the Harappan History Project? 

Though Planet Harappa is gone, humans from the strange world have become some of the most influential individuals in galactic history. By now most people connected to the Encyclopedia Galactica know the details of the Mother’s life. Max Gavaskar did not grow up in a vacuum. She was a product of her early upbringing on Harappa and influenced by her time on Lava. Other notable Harappans, Dorian and Paladin Thain, Mary Carmini, and of course Marcus Johnson (even though he was born on Earth) deserve mention.

The Harappan History Project is an attempt to record the short history of this world that was at the very center of galactic politics for a brief but significant era in the tale of the Milky Way.

Volume One

The Harappan Secrets

(not in print)

The Harappan Secrets details life on Harappa before humans from Earth arrived, as seen through the eyes of Dorian Thain. A mere one hundred and eighty years after his death, Marcus Johnson’s society was on the brink of war as the Earth Starship “Marcus Johnson” shattered the myths started by Johnson himself, that Earth no longer existed.

Dorian Thain was there at the Battle of Caelum as well as the Arrival conference where the family of humanity was reunited.

Volume Two

The Harappan Curse

(not in print)

A diplomatic mission from Harappa to Earth included Dorian Thain, Mary Carmini and several other Harappans. Dorian Thain was abducted by a band of rebels who called themselves the Friends. Through them Dorian was able to cast doubt on the Green Bible. This book, the guiding light of the one hundred year Pax Veridis, had been attributed to Marcus Johnson in abstentia. Dorian Thain pointed out that there were no similarities to be found in the Green Bible and Johnson’s writings while on Harappa. 

Volume Three

The Last Secret of the Founder 

(not in print)

While Dorian was on Earth igniting the Earth Revolution his older brother Paladin was staging a war to stop the Earth/Salus Consortium’s mining project. A conflict between Paladin and the Starship Marcus Johnson ignited a vein of the exotic mineral illumaphane and knocked the already wobbly planet off its orbit. When Dorian returned from Earth he was involved in negotiating a settlement between Earth and the Harappans.

Volume Four

The Gavaskar Field

(available as an ebook through Amazon)

Volume Four tells Max Gavaskar’s early story; how she discovered the problem with the Gavaskar Field forcing her to go on the run from the government. She wound up running a saloon in a dusty mining town on Lava, until she was discovered by agents of the SID (Science and Industry Division). It was on Lava that she finds her ally to aid  her fight against what the government was doing to the universe.

Volume Five

Kusha

(not in print)

Volume Five follows Max to Kusha where she studies the illumaphane problem, makes First Contact and meets Dorian’s son Dallas Thain.

Volume Six

The Mother of the Galaxy

(not in print)

The final book in this series details the events that occurred when the Gavaskar Field problem was solved which opened up travel between worlds. The Mother was called on to deal with the colflicts that arose out of tensions between several alien races. 

Philip the Bard's Blog

My name is Philip Normer and I knew Dorian and Paladin Thain before they became famous all over the galaxy. We grew up together. Dorian and I were best friends. Through Dorian I also came to know Max Gavaskar as well. Now that the insanity of the last few decades is becoming just another chapter in a history book, people are telling me that I should write down the story. I was there standing next to the eye of the storm for most of it all. What I did not see for myself I heard about from the people who actually put these events into motion. I have read several histories of these event and have found them all wanting.

Earthers love to talk about humanitie’s impact on the Milky Way Galaxy but it was us Harappans who did the work. Dorian was Harappan and the Mother was Harappan before the SID set her on the run.

Back then we knew nothing of Earth or the SID, or the Gavaskar Field. We knew only the White Mountains, the Green Mountains and the Great River Basin. I lived in the White Mountains, the most beautiful place on Harappa.

I haven’t been to Earth and I’ve heard that it is a lovely world, but Harappa has it’s own beauty. The White Mountains are not unlike mountains ranges found on Earth. They are my home. The White Mountains are where I learned to be who I am today. My heart will always live there, even if I can not. The Great River Basin is lush, verdant and sweet, and the Green Mountains are where my beloved, Ina grew up. The Green Mountains are sheep and goat country.

Then there is the Black Mountains, the source of Harappa’s troubles. People didn’t often go into the Black Mountains because of the Harappan Curse but I’ve been to the foothills and I can tell you there is nothing on Earth like the Black Mountains. They rise nearly vertical, straight up to the sky, rocky, jagged, impenetrable fortress walls. They are the definition of oppressive. 

Over the coming weeks and months I will tell you of life on Harappa. In the long history of humanity, Harappa is just a tiny blip, the blink of an eye. But, in that tiny blink of an eye a lot of life happened. Those of us who grew up on Harappa don’t want all that living to be forgotten.

I am not a historian. Most of what I want to tell you is about the regular people who lived there, what they did for fun, what they did for love. I am going to tell you of the life of Harappa. That is the true Secret of Harappa. We really lived.

Don’t worry, I will get to the real Secret of Harappa. Isn’t that what everyone wants to know about? I will tell the story of how Harappa and it’s tiny population  became the center of the galaxy, all the way to the Mother of the Galaxy herself.

When I think of all that has happened in my life time, I laugh at just how different life was before the Arrival of the spaceship Marcus Johnson. We knew nothing of Earth then. We lived in the Founder’s shadow. History was only two hundred years long. Before that was the darkness, out of which Marcus Johnson had led the people to Harappa. Well it turned out that Marcus Johnson, the Founder, had led us into the darkness. How the people of Harappa fell out of the darkness is a big story, and my aim here is to tell some of the little stories that led up to what happened.

Life was so sweet back then. Our worries were directly tied to everyday survival. Did we have enough meat dried for the winter? Would the grains from Sandon come in before the road over the mountain pass would close due to a snow storm? Would my winter coat last another season? Would that pretty girl from the Nace family notice me? You know, the important stuff.

Twice a year the White Mountain clan held a festival. Once in the early summer when harvests started to come in and again in the mid of the winter when things were darkest and coldest. The mid winter’s fest was the light of the cold time. It gave people something to look forward to as winter set in. I loved winter fest. Music, wine, rich food and the games. 

The winter fest of the year 200 was one of the best ever. Good thing too, it was also the last festival before the Arrival. I remember that time as being one of profound naiveté. That is where I should begin my tale of life on Harappa.

Tomorrow then, I will begin to tell you of that last great winter festival. Some of you may remember that the festival was when we got the first hint that the world was about to change.

You know the theory no read the fun novel . . . The Gavaskar Field

The year is 2410. Melanie Gavaskar is a brilliant physics student from planet Harappa who discovers that the Faster Than Light Starships of the government are destroying the underlying fabric of the universe (the Gavaskar Field). When she finds her lab is destroyed, she is forced to go on the run and winds up on Lava, a pioneer planet that is tipped on it’s side. She becomes the owner of a saloon in a dusty back road town after the previous owner is killed by a stray bullet, from a gunfight in the street. Can Melanie, now known as Max, fit in with the locals, evade the government agents searching for her and prevent the SID from destroying the universe?

The Gavaskar Field Theory

The Gavaskar Field is my attempt to answer some puzzling questions not yet answered by the scientific establishment. I have no way to proove this theory nor any idea how it may be tested. 

The two questions I am most interested in are: One, how do we explain the accelaration of the Universe: Two, sub atomic particles come and go in the quantum world, when they go where do they go to?

I propose that there is an underlying structure to the Universe that is the frame work that all matter hangs on. This structure is one unified field I call the Gavaskar Field after a fictional character I attribute this theory to. It is different from the Higgs field in that the Gavaskar field is universal in that in that it is one sructure from one end of the universe to the other.

I further propose that the Gavaskar Field is spinning. For some time astrophysisists have been trying to understand what could be making the Universal acceleration. Logic would tell us that after the Big Bang matter would fly apart indefinitely till the Universe bacame a frozen and empty waste, “The Big Chill”, or gravity would slow the expansion untill things started falling back towards the center again, “The Big Crunch”. 

We lived with that for a long time, till we discovered that the Universe is speeding up. The current scientific answer is dark matter and energy, things we can not see, touch, taste, smell or observe in any way. It has to be there, they say, because of what we observe the Universe doing.

How about looking at it a different way? If the Universe is sitting on a framework that is spinning wouldn’t centrifugal fource cause expansion to accelerate?

Spinning in relation to what? This theory is consistent with the multi universe model propossed by Stephen Hawking. That theory supposes that there are multiple Universed that sprout like bubbles out of the Cosmose. The Gavaksar Field is the structure of the bubble Universe we live in. Our bubble is spinning with relation to the space the we and the other bubble Universes are sitting in.