Uboya Obuluhlaza
Green Parks, Brown Shacks
While many shapeshifters thrive in the Bush surrounding Durban, many others thrive in the city. Glass Walker and Bone Gnawer Garou survive side by side the ubiquitous Ratkin. And Durban, possessing the largest Asian population in the country, unsurprisingly has developed the presence of shen especially from the Indian subcontinent. That includes hengeyokai, who put together their own modest Beast-Court under the Great Burden. Other shapeshifters are much less common. If any Ananasi crawl in the Durban area, it would most likely in the city rather than in the Bush, so close to intolerant Garou and age-old rival Bastet.
Rules
The Garou follow their Litany rather close, as do the Ratkin. The Beast-Court has its own code, though that includes allowing its members to honor their own Litanies, which they do with a flair not atypical of Indian shen: a tendency to “caste up”, with certain Changing Breeds elevated over others as natural leaders of the Beast-Court.
Sept of the City-Tree
In Xhosa, the Glass Walkers of the Sept of the City-Tree are known as the Uboya Obuluhlaza (“Green Furs”). Durban has earned recognition as one of the greenest cities in the world, due to all the nature reserves and parks it keeps not only in its outskirts but in the city itself. Behind that effort labor the Glass Walker Garou, especially the City Farmers camp, who dominate the Tribe here.
Location
The Berea Ridge forms on the north side of Durban and overlooks a city nature reserve called Pigeon Valley. Pigeon Valley contains much more than pigeons, and it is famous for being one of the most biodiverse urban parks in the world. Animals of all shapes and sizes roam the valley, though no big-game predators have been introduced.
Bawn
The bawn includes the entire Pigeon Valley and stretches up into the wealthier, mansion-laced section of Berea (where many of the Glass Walkers and their Kin reside). The nature reserve is open to the public. Due to its location in a more affluent part of town, crime is not a serious problem.
Caern
Perhaps atypical for the Glass Walker Tribe, the caern heart is located deep in the forest. But for the City Farmers, it is entirely appropriate. In a glen protected by thick shrubs, such that only an agile Lupus could penetrate, stands a solid marble memorial. The statuary takes the form of a large chevron with a flat base, about the size of a human and weighing several hundred pounds. This monument was constructed by the Glass Walkers for the initiation of this caern and its symbol as progress for the City Farmers. This presents a Level 2 Caern of Progress.
Other Landmarks
Simple marble markers set into the earth in a secluded grove nearby the caern heart serves as the Grave of Hallowed Heroes. It resembles a human cemetery, save for the overgrowth and names carved with searing claws as Garou glyphs. The Pathstone is a smooth marble disc etched like a sundial and buried beneath the central chevron monument. The Glass Walkers do not lair in these woods, though they are always on patrol.
Tribal Structure
This is a Glass Walker Sept. A few Children of Gaia also join in advisory roles, but the City Farmers know what they’re doing.
Guardians
The Glass Walkers employ park police officers, many of whom are Kin, to help maintain law and order—and direct people away from Garou sacred sites. They also appoint their Ahrouns as Guardians to patrol the trails and watch the caern proper.
Sept of Piecemeal
In the Jacobs neighborhood of southeastern Durban sprawls the Morgai Scrapyard. Within, the Sept of Piecemeal stakes its claim. Called Isikrabhu in Xhosa, the Bone Gnawers and their allies survive and thrive off the odds and ends left by their fellow urbanites. The neighborhood may be on the poorer end of town but not necessarily the more dangerous or violent end. Bluff Nature Reserve lies only a few minutes away to the east, leaving a place for the Gnawers to reconnect with Gaia beyond the refuse of city life.
Location
The business, Morgai Scrap, hosts a tall, fenced-in yard some 20 square acres. It’s an automobile wreck yard dating back decades. Crushed cars stack two to six high. Two old but still functional mobile crane vehicles lurk near the massive compressing machine. The neighborhood is littered and depressed but no gangs roam near. The junkyard has a reputation for fierce large dogs that often “come loose” and chase loiterers all the way back to Wentwood.
Bawn
The bawn of the Sept of Piecemeal extends only to the fence of the scrapyard, though members roam all over the Jacobs neighborhood and beyond. The Bluff Nature Reserve is not technically part of the caern, but the Garou often wander—or conduct more nature-related business there.
Caern
Hidden off-center deep in the scrapyard beneath a multi-layered pile of rusting scrap and rubble piles an artificial cave. Within that cave, a rubbish bin inlaid with silver Garou glyphs rests, burning a smokeless fire permanently. Its fuel is pure Gnosis, and those who bask in its warmth are infused as well. The place offers a Level 2 Caern of Refuge, overseen by an avatar of the Great Junkyard Dog, an affiliate of the Great Trash Heap. Junkyard Dog offers similar boons and demands of his sept, save that it focuses on scrap (metal and parts, et al) instead of trash in general, and its members need not move homes so much as pillage other junkyards to add to this one.
Other Landmarks
The Graves of Hallowed Heroes are buried in the trunks of rusting, crushed cars stacked 3-6 high in a circle on the east side of the scrapyard. The Pathstone can be found at the bottom of the engraved rubbish bin at the caern center in the form of a simple basalt stone always hot from the blaze. Many Sept members dwell in the junkyard itself, making shelter from old cars and tarps.
Tribal Structure
The Sept is filled entirely with Bone Gnawers. Other urban-bound Tribe members tend to be attracted instead to the Sept of the City-Tree. The two Septs have a fair relationship, however.
Guardians
In addition to the Garou and their Kin, the Great Junkyard Dog loans a pack of similar Dog-spirits to patrol the Penumbra and keep it clear of both Pattern Spiders and Banes. The tall fence keeps out most casual intrusion and the dynamic labyrinth of scrapped cars and wrecks dissuades thieves.
Warren of the Shacks
In Xhosa, this nest of Ratkin is known as Iimpuku Zamatyotyombe—Rats of the Shacks. The wererats in Durban dwell in the harshest, roughest part of the city, or rather under it and call the surface their turf. Few but some daring vampires rival this claim, especially due to their focused territory on Albert Park—better known as Whoonga Park. Whoonga is a highly addictive, narcotic street drug in South Africa that combines marijuana and heroin, primarily in a smoked form, but which is also often laced with all kinds of dangerous household chemicals for density.
Location
Albert Park stands in the city’s rougher neighborhoods in Central Durban, which lies near the northeastern shore of the metropolis. Short squat public offices and police boxes line a trash-littered lawn in a central park area. Shacks have been thrown up as temporary residences for the extremely poor in the area, many of whom are victims and addicts of the whoonga drug trade. Though the city often comes in and forcibly evicts the squatters and demolishes the shacks, they always return and rebuild. Crime is rampant, misery is deeply embedded, and murder and overdoses are daily occurrences. In the heart of this blight runs vicious vermin who defy the misery with their mere survival.
Nest
The park and neighborhood are far too blighted to host a center of the Wyld. However, storm drain access tunnels in the area connect to the sewers. Within those tunnels, beneath the park center, lies the Ratkin’s home. Gnawing through stone and metal over decades, the Ratkin carved out a refuse-littered heart. This nest is always overrun with the rodents, most of whom are Kin, all of whom thrive off the leavings of the dying humans above. The pile of offal left behind is infused with desperation and hunger, feeding the fury of Rat himself to oversee the nest. (This warren is considered a ** Colony.)
Tribal Structure
Rattus Typhus dominate the Plague here. A few Ronin occasionally make berth here and, so long as they submit to the rule of this tribe’s Rat Queen, are welcome to visit or stay. The tribe is ravenous and atypical; a fair number of Freaks count among the Ratkin here.
Guardians
Rats. Lots and lots of rats. Unsurprisingly, more than a few whoonga dealers on the surface are either Kinfolk or actual Ratkin (usually Knife Skulkers). As usual, the wererats have little to no compassion for the humans (who aren’t Kinfolk), and they are more than happy to help them stay miserable and impoverished if it puts more food on the tribe’s platter. Sometimes that food is even a human corpse. The Rats of the Shacks have a treaty with the Bone Gnawer Sept but find themselves on their own when dealing with some of the Anarch vampires competing for gang turf in the area.
Court of Sweet Flames
The Beast-Court of Sweet Flames (in Hindi: Meethe Lapaten ka Darabaar) marks one of the rare times that the hengeyokai establish a base, a caern if one wills, outside of East Asia. The immigration of Indian immigrants into Durban, South Africa, has been significant and long-lasting. South and East Asians now account for a quarter of the city’s entire population, well outnumbering Caucasians and most other demographics. Additionally, people who identify as “coloured” tend to be mixed—some are white/black in heritage, but (in Durban especially) many are Asian/black. In short, the hengeyokai (as well as other shen) accompanied millions of other East and South Asians to this place, including a great many Kinfolk.
Taking advantage of Durban’s remarkable capacity and inclusion of nature reserves and green parks, these South Asian hengeyokai have settled right at home for many decades now. They have come to a peaceful understanding with the native Changing Breeds and boast a treaty with the other living shen in the city—namely, the small clutch of hsien also in Durban. They do not have such an agreement with the Kuei-jin, of whom—as the Makara like to understatedly say—the Emerald Mother does not approve.
Location
Just north of Durban lies the affluent resort town of Umhlanga. Situated just outside the town is the Hawaan Forest, a dry coastal dune forest. The forest is noted for its exclusivity: it is not open to the general public due to the endangered nature of its lands. Large estates, carefully planned and built to both preserve and appreciate the coast and its forest, line the forest’s edge. Once dominated by Afrikaaners, now descendants of Indian immigrant merchants who grew wealthy tend to dominate those homes. This makes it prime for the hengeyokai to inhabit and avoid humans stumbling across their sacred sites.
Bawn
Connected to the forest and the hengeyokai territory opens the Umhlanga Lagoon, which encloses the mouth and lagoon of the Ohlanga River. Though the Umhlanga Lagoon is also a nature reserve, it is open to the public. Indeed, its beaches are notorious as an unofficial nudist beach, though that may be a result of Same-Bito and Makara strolling in from the sea! The lagoon’s shores are also noteworthy for the heavy reed growth, through which bush animals pass to and from the reeds to Hawaan. The most noteworthy of animal in the Umhlanga Lagoon might be the hippo pod that has ventured into the area. They’ve been allowed to stay, as they keep to the water and the grassy and sandy riverbank closer to the Hawaan (away from humans, but still close enough that the hippos’ raucous noises can be heard from the beach).
Dragon Nest
In the heart of the Hawaan Forest lies a copse of large-leaved dragon trees. This circle of tall trees covers an earthy forest floor littered with buds and a bedding of discarded berries. The fruits of the dragon trees feed birds and butterflies. Their leftovers in turn create a mulch that melds into the scarp ground and gives off a pungent and sweet smell at once. Meditating in this grove saturates the hengeyokai with prana (Gnosis). This place serves as a Level 3 Dragon Nest of Plenty, and Hippopotamus agreed to host the site decades ago—a mighty totem indeed.
Other Landmarks
The Graves of Hallowed Heroes are interred in an otherwise unremarkable grove of mixed trees and brush west of the Dragon Nest center. The Pathstone takes the form of a clay vase (known as a kumbha) crafted into the shapely form of the river goddess Ganga. The vase is filled with purified and blessed water and buried in the ground. As for lairs: some hengeyokai live in the woods contentedly as beasts near their kin. Others dwell near the Ohlanga River or even by the lagoon, hidden in the dense reed groves of the estuary. Most, however, dwell as humans in the Hawaan Estates or in Umhlanga, especially near the beach.
Tribal Structure
Makara rule this Beast-Court. Indeed, the hengeyokai here are predominantly of South Asian descent, from all parts of India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh, for the most part. Han Chinese have become more common in recent decades. Some Burmese and Thai also stand among the changers. Southeast Asians and Malaysians also account for the third most common. Korean, Japanese, Indochinese, and Filipino are almost unheard of. Of these ethnicities then are these hengeyokai most commonly found, in this order: Garou—Dadi Ertong (Children of Gaia) and Baoyue (Black Furies) most prominently as well as the occasional Xing Kanmengou (Stargazer); Bastet—Bagheera mostly, with one or two Khan; Mokolé (Makara over Zhong Lung), Ratkin (Thuggee and a few Chinese-descended Nezumi), Nagah (a Nest of Vritra), and Rokea (Same-Bito, of course). One or two Kitsune might join, though this Beast-Court may be “too” cosmopolitan for most finicky Foxes. There are no Tengu or other Garou (like the Hakken).
Guardians
Aside from the exotic hengeyokai themselves, crocodilian and shark Kin keep the waters well-patrolled. Wise treaties keep internecine between the hengeyokai and Sunset People to a dull, virtually non-existent roar (the main concern is only with Rokea Betweener-hunters stalking Same-Bito and their kadugo Kin). Additionally, Hippopotamus has sent Hippo-spirits to help guard the bawn and waters. And that pod of actual hippopotami in the lagoon only seems to get aggressive towards humans when the curious monkeys stray too close to the restricted edges of the Hawaan Forest…
Special Events
Special events are annual (or more frequent) holidays or special ritual days that the main group or groups observe as a whole community. Attendance and participation are often expected of all members, and sometimes required.
National Braai Day
In South Africa, September 24th was known as Heritage Day. In the province of KwaZulu-Natal, it was first known as Shaka Day, honoring the great king for uniting the disparate Zulu tribes into one nation. In recent years, in an attempt to bridge unity between native Africans and the white Afrikaaners, the day was renamed National Braai Day. Braai, a kind of sausage, was traditionally cooked as a sort of family barbeque shared with one’s immediate neighbors, whatever their heritage and skin color might be. For the Glass Walkers of the Sept of the City-Tree, they generously embraced this holiday to celebrate their unity with both the humans of Durban and the flora and fauna they cultivate. (It essentially replaces the Memorial Day Rite that Glass Walkers in other parts of the world might celebrate.)
World Cup
The Bone Gnawers of the Sept of Piecemeal don’t dwell in as much squalor as others might. They do not live so desperately and pathetically that they can’t get together and enjoy a good game. The World Cup, held at the end of year after the league play, brings the sept together for good times and good food and friendly rivalries.
Boxing Day
Boxing Day in South Africa was officially renamed the Day of Goodwill. It falls on the day after Christmas and it has long meant to be a day of generosity and giving. For the Ratkin of the Rats of the Shacks tribe, it’s less about giving and more about taking from the selfish humans who don’t give charitably nearly enough. On this day, the Ratkin gleefully stream forth to pillage and steal food and toys from the wealthier humans in their city. The Ratkin tell their young: “Sinterklaas doesn’t come down into the sewers after all, and Black Pete is his little Uncle Tom bitch, so you’ve gotta go gift-shopping for yourselves!”
Diwali
Diwali is the festival of lights in Hinduism and has long remained an important fixture for those South Asian hengeyokai to celebrate, too. It last five days and involves lighting of lamps, redecoration of homes, and feasts with candied desserts. As the large Hindu population in Durban also celebrates this holiday, the hengeyokai largely partake in it with the humans (and hsien). However, solemn sun and moon prayers are also shared in the quiet of the forest. (This is the equivalent of the Level 3 Mokolé Rite of Sunreturn.)
“This isn’t about the Weaver or the Wyld. This is about Gaia.”
-- Stephen Chambers, Leader of the Sept of the City-Tree & City Farmer
