DS9 Stories/News: Bajoran Life Part (1)

BAJORAN LANGUAGE

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The Bajoran language family is a group of both extinct and existing languages and dialects used on Bajor.

Site: http://bajoran.wordpress.com/

The Bajoran script is possibly the most complex phonetic script encountered by the federation. The Bajoran written language is thought to have been developed from a logo syllabic script used in the B’hala region on Bajor. The characters are sometimes described as being ideographic (each symbol represents an idea) this is not the case. Although the Bajorans consider each symbol to represent the idea of language, the script is primarily a syllabary, although it has some unusual spelling conventions.

Site: http://celestialtemple.wikispaces.com/Bajoran+Language

The Bajoran written language consists of square symbols which are composed of thick lines. There are a large number of different symbols which can be used in any of eight rotations (flipped and rotated each and every way). Bajoran tends to be written in horizontal lines, although it can be written vertically. (DS9: “Shadows and Symbols“)

Bajoran writing is said to be ideographic, that is, each character represents a single thought or word pictured. Most forms of written Bajoran share some root ideograms, as evidenced by the Reckoning Tablet. Each ancient Bajoran symbol translated into a pair of nearly identical modern Bajoran symbols. (DS9: “The Reckoning“)

Keiko O’Brien‘s classroom featured a chart depicting the English, the Ferengi, the Cardassian, and the Bajoran alphabet. The chart listed some twenty-five Bajoran language symbols. (DS9: “The Nagus“, “In the Hands of the Prophets“, “Cardassians“)

Site: http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Bajoran_language

Pagh- Bajoran word for life energy or soul. [Emissary]

Peldar Joy – Bajoran greeting used during the Gratitude Festival. [Fascination]

Balik (am) – Shouted by Keeve Falor to children. Possibly “go away”or “get out of here”. [Ensign Ro]

(Beli) Clavian – Bajoran musical instrument. Most likely wind instrument similar to a Clarinet. [Pre-emptive Strike]

Boryhas – Bajoran term for ghosts or spirits of the dead. [The Next Phase]

D’jarras – Ancient Bajoran caste system. [Accession]

Deranya- Lamp for the dead. Candle suspended by chains from four pillars. [Shakaar]

Itanu- Cerimony carried out when a child reaches the age of fourteen. [Accession]

Tessipate, Decipate, Kellipate – Bajoran measures of distance and area.

“Ah – kay – ah. A – ya Va – suu. Ko – van – ha. E – kay – ha.” – Bajoran Death Chant. Repeated over and over again for excess of 3 hours. [Battlelines]

“Tesra Peldar Impadre Bren. Bentel Veytan Olan Sten.” – Presiders address at the Gratitude Festival. [Fascination]

“Raka Ja Hoot. Shalla Moralla. Emma Buru Kana. Uranak Rana Non (Person’s Name).Propay Va Nara Eh Suuk. Shalla Com…” – Bajoran chant for recent deaths. Used with the Deranya lamp. [Shakaar]

“Shakala tie unsyor. Tevan akares kova antana kel.” – Marriage blessing by the Emissary. [Accession]

DS9 Stories/News: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine – Crossroads of Time (Genesis/Mega Drive) (2)

Right, awesome, can I go there now? Fantastic!

ONE TRIP ALL THE WAY DOWN BACK TO THE DOOR LATER.

Finally I’m allowed inside the docking pylon to find out who’s going around beating up my technicians. Doesn’t look like this guy will be needing this gun any more, so I’ll hold onto it for now.

The SNES version looks pretty similar, though it seems to have been entirely redrawn. The lead designer actually apologised for this version saying it’s “a very poor port”, but to be honest it seems more or less the same so far to me.

This lift’s broken, but Sisko can climb up ledges like he’s the Prince of Persia, so getting to the top wasn’t a struggle. I wouldn’t want see what happens if he falls though.

Hang on, what’s this? This guy’s acting very suspiciously. I think I’m going to have to go over and have a word.

Son of a biiiiiiiiiitch…

EVENTUALLY.

Okay, I had to climb back up a few times, but eventually I was able to subdue the perp and confiscate his timed explosive. With seconds left on the clock I flush it down the convenient ‘emergency ejection tube’ on the wall next to me.

The bad news is, all those other green dots showing up on my radar are bombs too, and the timer’s running.

Hah, I was ready for you this time.

These guys are a pain in the ass, but easy to take down if I’ve got my phaser equipped and I’m paying attention. The trouble is that half the time I’m not paying attention, I’m looking at my radar trying to find the next bomb.

Awesome. I can finally relax for a minute and listen to this semi-decent password screen music. Sadly SNES players don’t get any password music.

And I’m back in the game. This time those sneaky enemies have hidden the grenades, so I have to switch to my tricorder to sweep the area and make them appear as orange diamonds. Actually screw that, I think I’ll be fine just going off the green dots on the radar.

The trouble is that whenever I pick up a bomb I get mere seconds to flush it, and the ejection tubes don’t have any radar dots

Using the computer terminals brings up a map of the level, and holy shit it is big. A giant maze of lift shafts and dead ends, and this isn’t even all of it. The map scrolls.

Those purple things are the ejection tubes I’ll have to run to each time I find a bomb. There’s no way I’m going to remember where they are though.

DS9 Stories/News: DS9 Stories/ News: Odo & Kira Relationship Review (9)

 ”The Abandoned”

Review originally printed in ORACLE

Newsletter July 2011

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Review written by Mary Shaver

Odo’s explanation confirms Kira’s suspicions about the purpose of the objects. “I thought it was something like that. After all, you don’t need an entire set of quarters just to sit in your bucket.”

“I don’t use the bucket anymore,” Odo answers, shyly proud. This statement alone is a huge step for Odo. The bucket represents the smallness of the world Odo chose to live in. By discarding the bucket, Odo is throwing off many of his self-made shackles. He is no longer constricted – and no longer constricting himself. Odo has kept the bucket as a reminder of how he used to be, and it turns out to be the perfect receptacle for Kira’s gift of the houseplant. Kira gazes fondly at Odo as he repurposes his bucket. It is a touching moment, made even more poignant by the flashback scene from “What You Leave Behind” when Odo presents that bucket to Kira as a precursor to his leaving her for the Great Link.

           

 

In the Infirmary, the orphaned child has grown into an adolescent and a dangerous one at that. Escaping the confines of the Infirmary he threatens and intimidates the patrons on the Promenade, including felling Bashir with a single blow. Dax, who was with Bashir, realizes their patient is a young Jem’Hadar, and calls for security. Odo bolts out of his office to apprehend the disturber of the peace. He orders the Jem’Hadar to stop. Instead, he comes at Odo. As he prepares to attack, Odo liquefies his form and the Jem’Hadar flies right though him. As Odo resolidifies, the boy, rather than pressing the attack, bows down reverentially. Odo is surprised by this behavior, but determines that the Founders, who created the Jem’Hadar, have implanted in their genetic code a moral imperative to worship their creators. The Jem’Hadar that Odo and Kira battled on board the Defiant didn’t display this reverence for Odo. Perhaps it was Odo’s shifting shapes that triggered this Jem’Hadar’s submissive deference.

         

DS9 Stories/News: Magic in Deep Space Nine: The Bajoran Prophets of Yesod…

Source: http://bajorron.blogspot.com/2012/01/magic-in-star-trek-deep-space-nine.html

Inside the Bajoran Wormhole: abode of the Prophets

It is an interesting endeavour to rewatch my all time favorite Star Trek series Deep Space Nine with my spiritual training in the back of my mind. Science fiction, like all good storytelling, does rely on the imagination, which is also one of the cornerstones of magical practice. But in Star Trek, magical concepts and ideas are often dealt with in new and surprising ways. And as Deep Space Nine may be the most spiritual of all Star Trek series, interesting correlations are bound to be found.

Take for instance the pilot episode “Emissary”. One of the key features of that episode is an encounter of Commander Benjamin Sisko with “wormhole aliens”, who the Bajoran people know as their “Prophets”. These creatures are presented as “non-corporeal” and do not live in our own “space-time continuum”, but in another higher form of being. They possess no fixed shape but communicate with Sisko while borrowing faces from people from his present and past, and continuously shifting countenances as well as the surroundings. All this happens in Sisko’s mind, because we, the audience, see what’s really going on: he is stuck in what looks like a white limbo, a “sea of milk”. And on an even lower level we know that his “runabout” is somehow stuck inside the Bajoran wormhole.

Sisko’s encounter with the Prophets

What are these “Prophets” in our own magical terms? The Bajorans consider them as gods, but do we agree with them? The way these aliens are portrayed offers a key: they show themselves in a wide variety of guises yet their true form is somehow not perceivable. This “shapeshifting” reminded me of the next higher plane relative to our own, which is known in Kabbala as the Sphere of Yesod. This is a Hebrew word meaning Foundation, but more importantly for this discourse, Yesod is also -and more commonly known as the World of Dreams.

Tree of Life diagram: Yesod is indicated by the purple sphere,
our material world is the green sphere at the bottom

It is a “world”, where images abound and these images are often illusionary and fluid as the waters or the sea. As fluid as the faces of the Prophets Sisko is encountering! Mark also that these aliens in Bajoran religion are called “Prophets” and not “Gods”. A “prophet” is someone who speaks on behalf of (a) God and not a god him- or herself. So, one starts to wonder who are the real gods of the Bajorans and whether these can be found higher up in the Tree of Life.

A Prophet wearing the face of Sisko’s deceased wife, Jennifer

The concept of shapeshifting as shown by these Prophets is often considered a trademark of a “higher being” in Star Trek. Later in Deep Space Nine, a race of shapeshifting Founders also proclaim themselves as Gods, also tapping into the power of the realm of Yesod. The same can be said about Q, the “omnipotent” nemesis of Captain Picard who resides in a realm called the Continuum which is equally fluid in its appearances. And many more examples may be given from all the various Star Trek shows. It seems that the makers of Star Trek did not want to deviate too much from the familiar states of being when portraying the nature of “advanced” beings. The World of Dreams, called “Yesod” in Kabbalah is quite close to our own experience (we all know dreams!), so that’s where we see most of these entities operate. It will be interesting to test these ideas in future episodes dealing with the Prophets and assorted beings!

I also spoke about the power of Imagination, and in Season One of Deep Space Nine there are at least two episodes that make an interesting use of this: The Storyteller and If Wishes Were Horses. More about that in a next blog!

DS9 Stories/News: Design Appreciation, The Costumes of Deep Space Nine (2)

Cont.

Ferengi

Nowhere is the breadth of pattern more evident than in the Ferengi costume. Used as the comic element of the show, every Ferengi was always dressed in formal suits of at least three layers with metal clasps, buckles and ornimentation. You might guess that the vest and shirt were abbreviated, but Quark was sometimes shown without his jacket and you could see that each piece was fully tailored. The Ferengi are such a great example of the excellence of the DS9 costume design that we’ve devoted a gallery of enlargeable images to their genus.

Black and white

Even without colour in costumes, pattern was used extensively, often with numerous designs within a monochrome outfit, sometimes so subtly, it’s hardly perceivable in the seconds they’re on screen. But colour itself was often used to convey clues about the alien or humanoid’s true nature. Many characters were costumed from head to toe in black, indicating their evil intent without speaking a word.

This ‘good guy – bad guy’ costuming tradition was cultivated to its natural culmination in Necessary Evil (Season 2, Episode 8) when a woman believed to be a widow in need of a favour starts off clothed entirely in white. Midway through the episode she wears a purple costume and by the end, when she’s revealed to be a deceptive extortionist, she’s wrapped (and arrested) in black.

A similar costuming tactic was used for characters of ambiguous moralities and confused principles or those who were tied to evil-doers, like the daughter of a Cardassian dictator or a father who had his son genetically altered illegally, out of love for his child.

Heads

Religion played a big part on the series and the clergy were given very brightly-coloured outfits, often with flowing robes and wraps and shaped headwear that denoted their rank.

Extremely ornate headpieces, often a part of elaborate wigs, were also often seen on the show.