Topsy-Turvy
| Date | Azara 21 |
| Type | Festival |
| Region | Sub-Hazari Idiri, Western Sirdabi Caliphate |
Topsy-Turvy is a festival that takes place every year at the fall equinox, Azara 21st. It is celebrated primarily in the lands of Idiri south of the Great Hazari Desert, but also in some parts of the western Sirdabi Caliphate, including in the Raziyan city of Category:Omrazir.
Just as the days and nights are about to "flip" from longer days to longer nights, Topsy-Turvy is a time when ordinary social conventions are likewise turned over on their heads for the day. The roles and dress of women and men may be reversed, servants may give orders to chieftans, children can boss around adults, slaves and servants may dress in mockery of their supposed betters, and many other small reversals play out through the course of the day. It's also a day for pranks and jokes -- usually though not always light-hearted, sometimes disruptive.
Perhaps not surprisingly, Topsy-Turvy is a rather informal holiday, with few strict traditions other than that things must in some way be upside-down. Different communities may focus on different aspects of reversal, but in most places it is a time in which the powerless are suffered to have power for a single day. Save for extreme demonstrations of this power, such as actual physical harm to others, authorities of whatever kind -- whether parents or rulers of entire chiefdoms -- are bound to accept the upside-down-ness of the day, and most do so as a matter of long-standing tradition. After Topsy-Turvy society reverts to its usual orientation and life proceeds as if nothing out-of-the-ordinary ever happened -- though of course, some authorities or targets of pranks may not quickly forget particularly galling incidents.