Ministry Of Tourism

Head of the Ministry of Tourism: Phineas T. Wolfcastle

In the beginning, when the Republic was young and the Constitution was newly minted, the Ministry of Tourism was established as the least effectual and least powerful wing of the Government. Its stated charter was to establish Message for the outside to see a nice, new, shiny, fresh and Republican Begma full of Enlightenment Ideals! It was given a charter of Feel Good Happiness and tasked to ensure everyone else felt Very Good about Begma.

300 years have passed since the Civil War and the Ministry of Tourism still exists with its original charter. Outwardly, the Ministry of Tourism is still follows the original charter as envisioned: it Advertises the Wealth and Prosperity of Begma! Internally, the Ministry of Tourism, called "MiniTour" by Begmans, has become the invisible hand of the government. It controls the message sent out via the broadsheets, newspapers and magazines to promote a Peaceful, Friendly, Warm and Welcoming Begma who wants nothing more than Happiness and Prosperity with her Neighbours. It unleashes its Agents, known as "Tourists," internally to maintain order.

The Ministry of Tourism is Begma's Internal Security Service. It is tasked with keeping the society of Begma moving smoothly at any cost. It keeps an eye on any publications that may escape to the outside and ensures that any sign of anti-Amber or anti-Begma dissent is squashed until the external view of Begma is of a peaceful nation full of mildly insane engineers. Internally, it cracks down on major sources of dissent, including the Mechanists who put forward a public, heretical idea that the engineering constructs of Begma may be, in fact, mystical in nature. Of course, the Ministry is always understaffed, for the work they have to do, and a lot of the work is done by the mystique of the service, rather than actually by Tourists.

The Ministry of Tourism controls the Government Warehouse.

Tourists and Fabulous Tourist Destinations

Agents deployed by MiniTour are called "Tourists." Tourist has the same connotation as spook in common slang: A person who secretly observes others to obtain information or a Secret Agent. Begmans utter the word Tourist under their breath when they speak of the government disappearing people for failing to be happy enough with the current order. According to Begman gossip, when the Tourists come to take someone away, they take them away to a Fabulous Tourist Destination on an All Expenses Paid Vacation from where they never return. Gossip, however, can never be entirely relied upon!

The Begman Government Warehouse

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When an engineer goes all unhinged and breaks one of the Four Unbreakable Laws, the Safety Inspectors are called in from the Ministry of Safety. Once the offender has been dispatched and sent to one of the Ministry of Tourism's Tourist Destinations, the Safety Inspectors recover the device. If the device is unique enough and interesting enough to render further "study," MiniTour orders it taken to the Begman Government Warehouse from whence it is never seen again.

What is in the Begman Government Warehouse? No one knows. Many groups at the University of Begma have taken up conspiring and speculating what is in the warehouse. They pass around long lists of what could and could not be in there — miniature black holes, the Ark of the Covenant, Autonomous Life, death rays, books full of the Answers to Everything, and lost socks from everyone's washing.

All they know is whatever goes in does not come back out.

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