World’s Fair Officially Opens with Light of Al-Farabi

The Third SpinDizzy World’s Fair officially opened Saturday night with a gala opening ceremony in Edgeworld Park’s Center Plaza. The audience stood in darkness waiting for the official start of festivities, which saw the lights going on all at once, rides springing to life, and a dance party breaking out in the middle of the fairground.

Markers in the shape of one of the symbols of Expo ’13: Fifteen Years of Progress – an arrowhead pointing upward with “15” inscribed on it – had been placed around SpinDizzy in historically important places. The full list of places is known only to Austin, who has issued a challenge to those who would find all of them, but includes the Rose Garden, the Center Plaza of Edgeworld Park, and Charter Park. Due to a temporary occultation of Spengo and the Floating Island (another place of great historical significance to SpinDizzy), the light of the star Al-Farabi, presently about fifteen light-years away, was prevented from reaching the markers. When the markers sensed its light again, they would activate the lights of the Fairground and the Fair would officially begin.

Never averse to a bit of formality, BunnyHugger began the ceremony with a short speech. “The World’s Fair is now in its third iteration on SpinDizzy and has been developing as a tradition. I am proud to have been part of this tradition and grateful to those have assisted with carrying it on,” she said. “With help from Austin, I have devised an opening ceremony that emphasizes our connection with the past of SpinDizzy. Some may find it odd that I would emphasize tradition, and the past, in an Expo devoted to progress and the future, but given my own view of progress, it is not odd at all.”

She continued, “Last night at the Pageant, contestants were asked to speak about what ‘progress’ means to them. I was not a contestant, but I am going to take this opportunity now to say a little about what I think progress is. Progress is a process in which the past is built on to create the future. The people of the past hand off their works to us. We tinker with them, see what can be made sleeker, what can be made fairer or wiser or broader or lovelier, but where the heart is good we keep it. And then we, the people of the present, hand our works into the future, and hope they will be treated with the same generous spirit. In this way, we improve over time, but still have a connection to our forerunners that keeps them alive through their works.”

She then handed off the ceremony to Austin, who continued with some remarks of his own. After speaking some about the significance of the fifteenth anniversary of SpinDizzy, he explained the star ceremony: “Our city is presently just about fifteen light-years away from the star Al-Farabi, named for one of the great Aristotelian Islamic philosophers, the community which kept alive the ancient wisdom of the Greeks and developed it to the benefit and the progress of a world desperately in need of ancient wisdom spread on new times. As our path takes us through space, and as our moon of Spengo and the Floating Island above the Rose Garden move, a temporary occultation of Al-Farabi will pass, and – onto all these markers – will shine light which has spent fifteen years journeying to enlighten us all.”

Austin led a countdown and at the moment of zero, the lights of Edgeworld Park turned on, revealing not only a re-lit but a refurbished park, with more neon than ever, giving it something of an Art Deco revival appearance, mostly brilliant white in the center areas but with colored and animated lights on the rides and exhibition hall areas. Workers swiftly moved in space-themed decorations hanging on temporary archways and a band set up and began a dance party and the gathered crowd began to dance, except those who went to the northern rides area to ride the newly installed Droomtijd ride, which also had its official opening along with the Fair.