Recent acquisitions for MEDALS

 As previously discussed, the Microphalerist Educational Archive and Library of Slabovia (MEDALS) was founded to document and preserve examples of medals, decorations, and awards from micronations. The archive was recently gifted with a full set of medals from Obscurium, which were donated by President Zar Antonov. While the MEDALS archive has not been updated yet with these items and their descriptions, that should be done in the next few days.

In the meanwhile, here are the awards, honours, and decorations of Obscurium. Top row (left to right): The Obscure Friendship medal, the Medal of the Obelisk, and the Most Illustrious Order of the Sleeping Dragon. Bottom row (left to right): Most Honorable Order of the Obscurian Forest Dragon, the Medal of the Golden Dragon, and the Grand Cultural Award.

The Royal Person of His Royal Majesty King George 2.0 has been awarded with the Most Illustrious Order of the Sleeping Dragon, with the grade of knight, and several Slabovians have been inducted into the Most Excellent Order of the Dancing Dragons, including HRM (with the grade of commander); Chancellor Rankin MacGillivray, Baron of Mars (with the grade of captain); and Commander Paul Robillard of the Royal Slabovian Navey (with the grade of knight). 

Further information about Obscurium's decorations can be found at https://micronations.wiki/wiki/Orders,_decorations,_and_medals_of_Obscurium

The archive thanks President Zar Antonov of Obscurium for his generous donation!

Diplomatic Blitzkreig!

At the end of June, the Royal personage embarked on a whirlwind diplomatic tour. 

On the weekend of June 14-16, He joined forces with His sister, the Queen of STATYS (So There And Told You So), to deliver a much-needed economic stimulus package to Detroit, Michigan (AKA cross-border shopping).  While there, both royals were hosted for dinner by the Sogmo of Sandus, Will Soergel, and their consort, Oliver.

Will and Oliver

On Monday of the following week, the King met up with Emperor Eric Lis of the Aerican Empire, who was accompanied by his consort Jenny and their son, Jake (AKA "Squishy") on their own grand tour. The royal party played mini golf and stopped for lunch.

Lunch time!

On Wednesday, the King visited the Niagara consulate of Syldavia, which is hosted in the Belgian Chocolate Shop at 2455 Queen St. E., Toronto.  Unfortunately, the consul general (AKA the shop owner) was not present to receive His Majesty, but He did pose for a photo with their flag, left a business card, and bought some very tasty chocolates.

Outside of the shop

Posing with the flag

Finally, on the Friday of that week, His Majesty did a walking tour of the Republic of Rathnelly, an area of Toronto which briefly separated from Canada in the 1960s to protest a planned Spadina Expressway which would have passed right through their neighbourhood.  Local street signs still proclaim the republic's existence and "Stop Spadina Lane" is named to commemorate their victory.

Local street signs delineate the boundaries of the Republic of Rathnelly

Stop Spadina Lane commemorates their victory

Micronational Bling and Things

 One of the frequently-asked questions among micronations is, "Where can I get (insert object) made for my micronation?"

Arthur Tourneau of Duckionary and Zar Antonov of Obscurium have come up with the following list of companies that produce objects that might be of interest to micronations. The list is Euro-centric, since that's where both of these micronations hail from, but it's a good place to start:

• Postal Stamps: www.yourstamps.com (Jürgen Schwarz)
• Flags: www.anley.com / www.microflag.net
• Medals: www.pokal-total.de (Ships to Austria, Germany and Switzerland only)
• Medal Ribbons: www.baenderservice24.com (Ships to Western Europe and other EU countries only)
• Medal Mounting: www.bigburymint.com
• Flag pins, patches, room banners, pennants, car licence plates, table flags: www.microflag.net
• Stamps: www.stempel-fabrik.de (Ships to Western Europe only)
• Buttons: www.buttonorder.com / www.stylebuttons.de
• Printing Service: www.wirmachendruck.de (ships to Europe)
• Currency Design: www.instagram.com/diasnhdk
• Currency Advice: www.instagram.com/edristangov (Nils Seuthe)
• Uniforms: www.etsy.com
• Coins: www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002997832866.html
• ID Cards: www.draculgov.com/foreign
• Flag and Coat of Arms Design: https://obscurium-gov.wixsite.com/flags

I offer my thanks to both Zar and Arthur for their work in compiling this list!

Forty years of llamas!

 This year is Slabovia's Ruby Jubilee - forty years!

MicroCon EU will continue!

 Just a brief update tonight, but we have confirmation that the European Union edition of MicroCon will be an ongoing event.  I believe the plan is to hold them every two years, like the current one, but on the "off year".  More information when I have it, of course!

Awards standardization - an example

 Recently, I've been proposing a standardized form for awards (i.e. medals) - see, for example, our brochure on the topic at the MEDALS website.

Today, I'd like to show you why this is something I think is important.  The below picture has two awards: on the left is the the "Order of the Pink Flamingo", which was presented to me by Aigues-Mortes at MicroCon in 2019, and on the right is the "King's Mark of Friendship" (or KMOF), which is a small award I give out to people I've formed a close personal bond with, both inside the micronational community and outside of it.

The size disparity is, to say the least, striking.  Attempting to wear both of these awards at the same time would look fairly awkward, in my opinion.  And, I'll admit that part of this huge disparity is my fault, because I'm the one who designed and makes the KMOF medals, and I chose to make them small based on the parts that I'd found.  (I have a LOT of those crown charms!)

Now, this example is somewhat contrived, as these are, respectively, the largest and smallest awards in the MEDALS collection (at least, at the time of writing).  However, I think that it demonstrates my argument for me, that standardization of award sizes within the micronational community is beneficial.  Of course, if you're only giving awards within your own micronation, and not presenting them to people from other micronations, then you can model your awards any way you wish.  (I'm aware, for example, that the "Klingon Assault Group" (or KAG, a Star Trek fandom group) uses "battle notches" for marking event attendance that are small, triangular pieces of medal - they have hook-and-loop fastener on the back, and as more are earned, the wearer can arrange them into more complex geometries.)

NOTE: The Order of the Pink Flamingo is, unfortunately, damaged - one of the flamingo feet "snapped off" during the MicroCon closing banquet, and has never been seen again.

MicroCon retrospective video from West Who

West Who recently posted this video over on YouTube - a nice little retrospective of MicroCon, including a good shot of our delegation (in all of our gala finery) at about 0:43.  The video's literally only a minute long, perfect for those of us with busy days or short attention spans!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MDr1rZ38OXg&ab_channel=WestWho