Site name and link: Sufficient Unto the Day
Site genre: Historical
Site info: It is the year 1797. In India, the Jewel of the East Coast is known as Visakapatnam. Now a jewel in the crown of the British East India company's ever expanding holdings and protectorates, those who have held her before look for a way to do so again. The French and the Sultante make their plans while men, women, and children continue to live life in all its nuanced ways.
Your name: Livie Marie
Contact info: PM through SutD Site at Livie_Marie/Site Cbox/Discord:Livie#4357/Reply to this ad
Role(s) requested:
The Pricha Household
The home of Master Pricha, Noble and Private Diplomat, for Siam and the Yorkshire Fellowship. His wife, Madame Pricha, who servers as his translator, adviser, and holds sway over the Fellowship. Their high ranking servants are often Fellowship members, with rich histories of their own.
Additional Background Info in the Original Site Listing: Here
Yorkshire Fellowship: Here
Celeste Ambrose - The Governess
PB Suggestion: Saiorse Ronan
Age: 23-27
She didn't begin life as a governess, nor ever intend to be one. The daughter of a renowned traveler, author, and statesmen, she was born a colonist of England in the land of India, in the city of Calcutta. It was a fortunate thing in life. Her parents were both adventuresome, educated, and of sufficient class to enjoy all of the cultures of the world. Both of her parents published memoirs regarding their travels, in particular, the families time living in the court of Siam. Fortunes change in an instant, and only favors those with enough tenacity to grow beyond the hard circumstances. A scandal for which her father was implicated saw his innocence proven far too late. It saw to his depression, alcoholism, and loss of the family's money. Out of despair, her mother died, leaving her a woman alone in the world. So what is an Anglo-Indian to do? While she understands the niceties of English society, she is also skilled in the protocol among those by which she has lived. She speaks not only only English and French, but is fluent in the Hindi and Thai. She can play piano forte, and learned to paint in jungle ruins. She does more than math for household things, but was taught geometry, classical architecture, ancient maps, and botany. Also included are rather unusual skills in archery and knife work. Traveling trails are treacherous, after all.
With her parents being dedicated Yorkshire Fellowship Members, when opportunity arose to serve a pair of dedicated, high ranking members, one did not hesitate. There were also instructions that should anything befall them, to seek out those members for they would not leave their child wanting. As God would ordain it, an arm of it, and its new ruling, cultural elite would find its way to the same city of Visakhapatnam as Celeste did. It also helps that the family of Ambrose is not unknown to the Pricha family, either. Not only is Celeste dedicated to her charges, but shares in furthering opportunities for education with the Lady of the House. Together, they plan the education and oversight of the young charges Paul and Lyra Pricha,5 and 3, who will become 6 and 4 in the coming year. Young though they are, their minds are voracious. Their legacy? Incredible. The secrets of their family? Many. The need to protect them? Always there.
Biyu Martin/Chang Biyu - The Lady's Maid
PB Suggestion: Zhu Zhu
Age: 26-32
Born Chang Biyu, she is the daughter of Chinese silk weavers from Northeastern China. Her life was for many years watching her parents lay out silk worms on mulberry leaves, only to weave their cocoons on the great loom. While her mother was not literate, her father was. Both he and her brother daughter her the written language and numbers of their culture, while It would be a former Jesuit, safe to remain and teach the faith to the working classes, who taught her family of the wider world through Christ Jesus. In his lessons, he found a zealous student whom wished to learn as much of his people as he did of her own. In addition to catechism, she learned to speak French. While her mother and father remained adherents to Confucianism, herself and her brother took up Catholicism. The name of the Jesuit who brought them in to the fold was Jon Martin, leading to the taking of the name Martin as a European surname on baptismal records. Life did not too much change after that, until the day that Father Martin offered to take her and her brother back with him to Europe, in particular, to the seat of the Paris Foreign Missions Society. Concerned for the lack of prospects for their daughter, and feeling betrayed by their son's choice of conversion, the parents let their two eldest children go in the direction of the setting sun.
The world was more tumultuous than the one he had left behind. Even greater than the end of the Jesuit Order as a whole was the chaos that the world after the French Revolution was in. It was a frightening time for Biyu, whose dreams of seeing the West were torn at the seams by the harrowing sound of the guillotine, the public unrest, and the oddity of the alien world. Still, determined to endure, she put her knowledge of French to good use. Martin managed to find his family in Paris, arranging for Biyu to have lessons in what it was to live in the West as a woman by his sister, a well to do silk merchant's bride before the family fell on hard times, bringing her to the point of companion. As much as she spoke the language of fabric, she was also taught to speak fashion, accessories, and all of those things a woman would wish to know to be fashionable. For while the world was afraid of the Revolution? French words, French fashion, and French servants were still a sought after commodity. Even more so was one who had someone managed to learn the art of poison craft, for even silk weaver's daughters have secrets. After a time, the turmoil proved too much for her hosting family. Once they reached England, she resolved to try freedom as she would have otherwise never known it, ending up a lady's maid to a family traveling back in the direction from whence she'd come years ago. The references of her teachers had proved more than sufficient. Her command of spoken and written English grew more so, thanks to the instruction of her lady's companion, governess, and the lady herself.
The Kin of a Gypsy
The adopted kin made by souls who had served in the harem of the Nizam of Hyderabad
Additional Background Info in the Original Site Listing: Here
Farhad Geese
Suggested PB: Jacob Anderson
Age: 34
Farhad was the product of a liaison between an African slave woman and a member of the Nazim's court. Due to the blackness of his mother, his father deemed her worthless, and not fit to be the shit of a dog let alone any sort of claimed son. He was to be hidden among the ranks, so lived in seclusion with others like him, and was so kept as such until the age of fourteen, when he was made into a eunuch to ensure that no more like him were made. It had been the plan to do this all along.One blessing of the later age of development was that he had sprouted to his full height early in life, and trained for so long he was able to maintain more muscle, even if slight in comparison to other males. Without hair on his face and his ability to have children taken, further insult was given when he was given over to he harem to guard the Nazim's women. Ultimately, he became one of the higher ranking guards, especially given he was literate, making him a useful mixture of brain and brawn. He was one of the founding bedrocks of Durga's education, teaching her spoken Urdu before she was ever given a tutor to learn to read or write. He was raised as a Muslim, and remains a believer to this day. Him and his sister were given the sirname of Geese, as in Persian/Urdu, it means weird and strange. Much like their circumstances.
By the time Durga arrived at age ten, he was already twenty-four. He was one of the three men it took to control her fits of rage, and the only one in time who could stop it all together. Instead of more pain dealt to one in pain? He gave kindness. Structure. Purpose. Noting her strength, speed, and dexterity, he had it made known that she would make a better Urdubegis, despite an observed talent in songs and stories. While she was trained in both Mughal art forms, it was as an Urdubegis she was given the most recognition, stature, and safety. Their relationship is like an elder brother to a younger sister, though she looks out for him just as much as he does her, by being her constant shadow, companion, and a guard in a world that still does not see the full value of such a woman. He will watch as his heart-sister performs, watching the crowds to ensure their safety.
Laleh Geese
Suggested PB: Nathalie Emmanuel
Age: 21
Some years after Farhad was born, his sister was created under the same circumstances. The same African Slave woman, and once again, her children were taken from her to be hidden out of view. It is hard when you are lighter than some, darker than others. When your features favor too clearly your father's. It was one of the reasons another hand maiden told her that her father had given her to the harem. She was too like him in the face. Too beautiful. Maybe it was a rare instance of pity that saw him not sell her, but after being taken to task for conceiving no legitimate children with his own wife and several bastards by others? It was more the better she was put away. No doubt she ended up better than the others gotten on whores, concubines who were no longer favorites, or those women who had little choice.
She is a gentle spirit. Slow to anger, slow to speak, and sometimes too quick in fumbling up her feet. Still, it was she who taught Durga to remember her patience, caring, and sense of duty. While she tended to Durga as faithfully as if she were a Sultana? In return, Durga made it so that she left the harem unscathed and unplucked. She taught Durga tenderness, and in return, Durga taught her to survive in a world beyond the veil and screen. She has an excellent head for figures more than language, tripping horribly over Hindi, muddling through English, but able to keep excellent track of money, pantry inventory, and items for laundry, or anything in a household account. She is the heart of the home, often taking away cleaning from Durga to do it herself. She sees keeping their home, a free home, as an act of worship. Like her brother, she also remains Muslim.
She joins Durga in performances from time to time, holding the basket for funds, singing, or dancing.
The Leveque and Obray Family
A Family of Academics, Priests, Missionaries, and Travelers
Additional Background Info in the Site Listing: Here
Barthelemy Leveque - age 54
Suggested PB: Colin Firth
Father/Grandfather/Retired Professor/Land Manager/Patriarch
He has always been an outgoing man just as he has always been clumsy. It was said he came feet over head from his mother's womb on the outskirts of France on the day he was born. Since he found his feet? He has always been a person who enjoys taking notes at the source of what he studies to be able to make his classes that much more enriching. The son of middle-class men who had fallen on harder times, he worked for every bit of his education from his time in Catholic run school rooms clear through to University, when he worked as a clerk and assistant to professors to supplement his income. A fan of Arthurian Lore and chivalry, he made a study of the cloudy, overcast British Isles so spoken of in Le Morte d'Arthur in order to make his own accompanying notes to the French classic, ratify history, or find whom legend was based from. Despite his ability to speak several languages, he was still a man apt to get lost. While in Wales, all but running head long in to a wall for looking at her? He found his Lady of the Lake, Ebrain. Having been a widower for nearly two years, he took his daughter Aimée every place he went. Out of all his discoveries, he says the Welsh-Catholic Obray family, especially Ebrain,is the best one he ever made. She is the love of his life. Without her, he would forget his hat, where his research notes were, and how to anchor himself in to the world around him.
In China, he was charged with research, writing, and cultural transmission of ideas and concepts. While it was the mission society that sent him? It was a man who would become a friend, and later family member, Renshu Zhang, who sponsored it. The East was kinder to him than the West. He ran into trouble during the Revolutionary years, finding it hard to teach until doing so would have meant his neck. Once his family was smuggled out of France thanks to sympathizing Girodonists, on the advice of Renshu? The family took to settling in India for the opportunities there, and it being one step closer to a possible return to China. In the mean time, he is thrilled to see his daughter's dame school take off so! He enjoys the life it brings to their home just as much as he does telling his granddaughter the same legends he told his girls.
Amiee Leveque -- age 28
Suggested PB: Zoey Deschanel
Sister/Widow/Aunt/Tutor/Teacher
The oldest of the Leveque sisters born outside of Paris like her father was, half-sister is a term that would never do to describe Aimee's relationship to Eirian. The two might as well have shared the same womb! Her mother died at a young age, leaving her father heart broken. Throwing himself in to his work, she became his connection to the world at large, his littlest adventurer, his companion. While having no memories of her own mother, she lacked for nothing. She loves Ebrain as much as Ebrain loves her. Memories of life in Wales and France are with her, though the great majority of her story after age ten began during the years in and around Peking, China. She thrived on challenges, surmounting them with a warm smile, inspiring words, and beauty. Like her sister Eirian, she is a teacher in the school and a tutor. Her list of talents include needle work, playing piano, as well as the impressive Orient skills: Speaking and Reading Manchu and Chinese, playing the erhu and flute, calligraphy, water color painting (all of the Chinese style of course) and playing Go. To the Western end of things, she also thrives in several languages and shares an Uncle's love for mathematics.
At the age of 20, she was wed to a young Chinese convert in what would prove to be two permissible marriages of this sort with her sister taking the second. Tragically, injury and infection would pull her husband from this world in under a year's time, with no children left of the match to speak of. While in Paris in her adult years, she served as a governess to a family found by a man who claimed to be a "Friend" but was proven wrong. She was nearly beaten with her virtue stolen. While the events of Paris have stayed with her? India is healing as she throws herself head long in to learning local languages and history with her sister, uncles, mother, and father, teaching, or chasing after her capricious niece.
Gwyilliam Obray -- age 44
Suggested PB: Dylan McDermott
Brother/Uncle/Great Uncle/Secular Priest/Mathematician/Scientist
Ebrain's brother had never wanted to be anything more than a priest, and happened to stumble in to his scholarly pursuits along the way. He had served in the Orient for many years by the time the supression of the Jesuits came to pass. It was a sad thing to him, for they represented a way of teaching God and seeing the world that did not remove a person's host culture. By the time it all came to pass, he had returned to what was now a combined home with his fellow brother in spirit, and now by law, Jacq! God works in mysterious ways does he not? Just as he joined to be friends with the man in the Orient, it would be that their sister and brother wed in the West. Along with Father Louis de Poirot, they became a trio of Jesuits who remained in favor of the Emperor. Even if they were not, by holy law, Jesuits any longer? It was what they would always be called. Skilled in mathematics and science, he took to the history of the Church in the Orient with zeal. He read through the science of the country, finding things in the East the West had only began to touch on. A man of many opinions, hit finds him authoring many books, and being in the habit of teaching older male students the art of debate.
Returning to the West proved the hardest thing him and his family had ever done. The Catholic nation of France had then become secular, the Church dismantled, and priests had become servants of the state. Beliefs once held up saw him beaten. Schools he had gone to now closed. He tutored to help the family survive, and though sworn to serve the state of France? In secret, he continued to teach catechism to those who would ask. England proved a little better, but he was glad to return to the far side of the world. He is now a priest with no real order, having taken no new vows, and is happy in secular service. Like his fellow brother-in-law, he assists the family by balancing books, teaching, and tutoring. It is not uncommon to hear him clapping his hands or going "No that is not it!" in his debates, or being toppled down by his great niece.
Jacq Gabriel Leveque -- aged 50
Suggested PB: Russell Crowe
Brother/Uncle/Great Uncle/Secular Priest/Historian
Jacq was the brother far more strong, steadfast, and stable on his feet. So that he became a priest was something of a surprise to everyone, even given the birth order. However, his love of learning was surpassed only for his love to the Lord Almighty. Missionary work became a passion of his, not only because it took God to foreign lands? But it taught people like him that the world was wide, different, and broad in scope than some in Europe would have him believe. Even for his place in the Church, he had to work as hard as his brother did to become a Professor. When one is poor? One learns the value of hard work, patience, and gratitude. He is full of all three of these.
He never agreed with the suppression of the Jesuits, which he may call one of his greater faults given to not agree with such suppression would be to disagree with Holy Mother Church. However, it was men who complained long before His Holiness had, and men who saw fault where God might not have. Like his brother-in-law, he is very opinionated. He is apt to share them with those who will listen with an open mind, albeit with more care since his time in Revolutionary France. He agreed with the reason for the revolution, but was vocal against how it was being carried out after seeing whom it was harming. For this, he was beaten and imprisoned on more than one occasion. Now, he is less of a rabble rouser for public justice, but will help those in need irregardless of their ethic origin. Like his niece Eirian, while he respects the culture surrounding them, he finds the treatment of the Untouchables on par with the hardships faced by biblical Untouchables of the Old Covenant, and finds it sad and wrong. On a happier note, he much enjoys his loud debates with his brothers in law and nephew in law, walks with his nieces, and chasing after his great niece much to everyone's chagrin around the entire house.
Notes The links to the original site listings hold additional information such as background history on each family group, organization, or associate person(s). There is plenty of room for your originality in features, quirks, and personal history to expand, grow, and flourish! Looking to make something easier to grow at the start? Each ad also has listings for things such a variety of maids, footman, laborers, fellow Catholic travelers, teachers, and more!