| So now you're a novice... |
| The first few days in the great halls of the Tower can be daunting to say the least. Here are some important tips to help make your transition easier and your time here that much more enjoyable! |
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| WHAT TO PACK: Dont bother packing much of anything, as all of your possessions will be burned upon arrival. It is highly suggested however that you retain a few items at your home and have someone smuggle them into you via a "care package" after your initial orientation week at the Tower. We have found the following items to prove the most useful: - A Hair Ribbon: When faced with a long day of scrubbing pots, the last thing a girl needs to worry about is hair in her face! Show off your silken tresses those those Warders in training with a lovely hair ribbon and do it all in the name of practicality. - Hand Salve: You'll need it. Enough said. - Extra Pillow: It will not only give you ease when sleeping on the hard shelves we like to call "beds" in the Novice Quarters, it may also give you ease after a particularly rousing visit to the Mistress of Novices office. - Honey Cakes and Sweetmeats: These can be bartered for other necessary goods. Sort of like tabac in prison. Except you're locked up with a lot of girls going through puberty. You do the math. - Wisdom Scholl's Practical Shoe Inserts: You'll be on your feet all day, and a little extra padding never hurt anyone's footsies. - Packet of Itchweed: You very rarely get a chance to get even with those who hang you out to dry.... get your own back when you hang their laundry out to dry... |
| YOUR FIRST DAY: There will be a lot of information for you to process this first day and you are likely to be overwhelmed. We recommend that you make an extra effort to accomplish the following. You'll thank us later. - Find the location of all privies and emergency exits. Some Accepted have been known to subject Novices to a bit of good natured "hazing" in the first weeks. This can take the form of anything mundane and telling you the privies are on the 40th Floor of the Tower (which IS highly amusing), to telling Dark Friends that you know the Dragon Reborn and trying to sell you to a foreign power. Forewarned is forarmed, ladies. - Don't talk to any Red or White Sisters. Chances are they ARNT Darkfriends.... but the probability is more on your side if you befriend a Blue. - Make friends with the Mistress of the Kitchens. Allow her to curl your hair and she'll be your friend for life. Very useful when needing to obtain more "contraband" honeycakes for trade in the cells..er.......novice quarters. - Curtsy Curtsy Curtsy! If it moves, curtsy to it. Better to accidently curtsy to a curten then to mistake the Amyrlin Seat for a stable hand. |
| UNWRITTEN RULES OF BEHAVIOR: You'll be certainly introduced to a whole slew of rules once you arrive. But there are certain unwritten codes of behavior that are expected of you and things will go much more smoothly if you abide by them from the start. Rule 1 - Novices do not snitch on other Novices. You may snitch on anyone outside your rank (i.e. Accepted and Aes Sedai) and may be, at times, commanded to snitch. If you are indeed commanded, then you must snitch, but expect a switch. A switched snitch is not necessarily a snitch. Unless she snitched on her roomate. Then she is a snitch, but as long as she was switched before she snitched, then snitching must be forgiven. Unless it was done on a thursday. Rule 2 - Using the power to do your chores is allowed as long as no one catches you. This helps cultivate the all important Aes Sedai "sneaky skill," and is necessary for the survival of our kind. Rule 3 - If you get in enough trouble, you may be sent to clean out the stables. Boys who get in trouble are also sent to clean out the stables..... 2 + 2 = yeah.... you're getting it now.... Rule 4 - The use of ter'angreal is strictly forbidden.... unless you make it yourself, and forget to tell someone about it. Rule 5 - If you do not get into trouble at least once a month the other Novices will think you are a goody two shoes and you will become a societal pariah, and then no one will ever like you again in your life. And Aes Sedai live a long.... long.... time. |
| Information Provided By: The Association of Eternal Novices |