Have Yourself a Plotty Little Christmas

[Seneca Lestrange]

The Chinese ways of betrothal sounded very silly. What if that stranger picked someone unsuitable? It was the parents’ business to pick a spouse, not the neighbour’s! But you couldn’t expect any better from non-European people. They were lucky that Europeans had reached the east and brought them some culture, otherwise they’d probably still live in caves.

“There were chinese circus performers at the carnival,” Seneca said. “I think some of them danced. So you can guess what their dancing must be like! I bet it’s a petty attempt to copy our dances.”

  

[Gretchen Lestrange]

“Most dances outside Europe are!” Places like America and Australia might manage some degree of copied elegance, but places that had never been assisted by the empire could never dream of such refinement that only a thousand years of civility could bring. oh look imperialist bullshit “I suppose it is like how everyone copies European fashion.”

[Seneca Lestrange]

“Non-europeans copy everything European,” Seneca commented. And if they hadn’t, then they’d probably still live in caves and be killed by wild animals.

“Even some Europeans copy the more European Europeans,” Seneca then said, with a smirk. Basically all the eastern-European nations. They were lucky that their kings were from more European countries, otherwise they’d still probably live in a 16th century way.

  

[Gretchen Lestrange]

“It is a shame for them that no copy ever lives up to the original.” Gretchen said. A copy of a famous painting wasn’t like owning the real one, a copy of a Worth gown wasn’t the same as a real Worth gown, and copied culture wasn’t like having actual culture. “There again, it must be an improvement on how they used to live. I imagine the rustic charm of provincial customs wears thin very quickly.”

[Seneca Lestrange]

Seneca nodded. Those countries were lucky to be finally brought to the nineteenth century. And they'd enter the twentienth in just two decades or so! It was about time those people started living like real people.

And living like a "real person" was what Seneca did for the rest of the day. She and her friends bought Christmas presents and enjoyed each other's company.