The banks of Teknapan and Karet
General introduction
The heartland of Andaperna is defined by a large plain with only few interspersed hills and many rivers, flowing down from the surrounding mountains. Two huge streams collect all of the smaller rivers water, the Teknapan and the Karet. They flow from West to East, draining into the Duinis 'Árforat eventually. The river systems carry relatively huge amounts of clay and silt, providing the farmers with fertile soil and builders with good material for stomped earth buildings or bricks. But the material carried by the water also brings with it the challenge of ever changing river beds, which force the people of Andaperna to be flexible, especially around the two bigger rivers.
Geography, climate and features
The climate of Andaperna is warm to hot and dry. Nonetheless water is an abundant ressource because of the many streams and rivers. Only in summer, when it is too hot and sunny, the soil dries out except for around the rivers. The entire central plain is characterised by alluvial hills and plateaus from the slowly withering rock. Most of the ground is fertile, as the waterways change their course so regularly, they deposit lots of material from upstream.
As most of the ground is either silty or rocky, there are hardly any bigger trees. Some resilient conifers and olive trees grow quite well on some of the plateaus, but otherwise the land is charcterised by grassland and shrubland. The rocky plateaus, which are quite numerous, often have springs emerging from the top or frum the cliffs around them. Erratic boulders are strewn into the landscape as well, hinting at larger flooding events in the past.
The climate in Andaperna is generally speaking warm and has two distinct seasons, a dry season in summer and a wetter season from autumn to spring. That does not mean there is much rainfall, though. Rather the level of the rivers is higher during the wetter seasons. Many of the smaller rivers, which dry out in the summer, start having water again, making the area overall more moist and suitable for agriculture. Especially in the central plain around the banks of Teknapan and Karet, the seasonal changes in temperature are more moderate, unlike in the foots of the mountains around Andaperna. Rainfall is rare and if it occurs it is short and heavy. This also often leads to flooding events, albeit being more geographically contained than the big seasonal floods during the wet season.
History and culture
The fertile land of Andaperna has attracted peoples from around the area for a long time. Nowadays around five larger ethnic groups exist there, vying over land and influence. The struggle between these groups has - in ever changing alliances - been going on for millennia, leading to some development in different fields of technology and thought like nowhere else in Samthô, but also to a cultural sphere, that is on the one hand diverse but also showing signs of merging of the cultures.
Two very defining features of Andapernan culture in general is their cultivation of cereals, which probably was invented here and has lead to one of the most diversified array of grain in the cuisines around Samthô. Nowhere else is there a cuisine, that is so much centered around cereals as it is here, with many discussing, if there are more kinds of grain or more kinds of Anindas - the common term for all kinds of bread - to be found in Andaperna.
The second feature is that of religiosity and religious tolerance. Even though there are several ethnicities, they all share a deep respect for the supernatural. Prayers, sacrifices, but also superstitions and hauntings are part of everyday culture. Even though war is an enduring phenomenon in Andaperna, the mutual respect for everything related to religion has led to the land around Teknapan and Karet being filled to the brim with ancient architecture and artifacts. It is more natural causes like floods and fires causing a threat to this cultural heritage than it is the people.
Cities in the river valleys of Teknapan and Karet are constructed on hills or plateaus, as the lower areas are prone to su much restructuring during every single year, that permanent settlements can not be maintained there. The people living outside of the cities, mostly farmers, have adopted either a semi-nomadic lifestyle, living in huts during the vegetation period to tend to the fields or they life in house boats all year long.
Type
River Basin
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