Forest

Roless wins Forest Keeper

Roless has been elected Forest Keeper, winning 22 votes, or 67 percent, and avoiding a runoff.

The Realizer finished second with nine votes. Pletho and Prusmia received one each, while Mirg Givers received none. Thirty-three valid ballots were cast from 104 eligible voters.

The campaign focused heavily on how Forest brings newer residents into government as long-serving officials begin handing over some of the work.

Roless and The Realizer both made that transition part of their campaigns.

A week of questions

Election Discussion Facilitator Anxious And Kevin kept the candidates busy throughout campaign week. Early questions covered why they were running and what they hoped to accomplish. Later, the candidates discussed government problems and Forest’s constitution. They also considered whether the Arboretum could be easier to navigate.

Other Forestians joined in as the week continued. Forest’s place in the rebuilt World Assembly came up, as did relations with other regions and the future of the ambassador programme. The discussion also turned to sports roleplay and other ways of getting residents involved.

That gave the candidates plenty of room to explain what they thought the next government should concentrate on.

Different ways to participate

Roless proposed a tiered government built around a smaller group of primary positions and a wider selection of secondary roles.

The primary officers would handle the larger portfolios and could take on unfilled work when necessary. Secondary positions would give newer Forestians a narrower set of responsibilities and a more manageable way into government. More experienced officials would be available to help them learn the role.

Roless’s broader programme was fairly restrained. Recruitment would continue, but with care taken not to disrupt Forest’s culture. Getting people involved in government would take priority over expanding the ambassador programme.

The campaign also left room for some familiar regional projects. Roless supported another census and wanted the Photo Contest to continue. Sporting and roleplay events could also be developed where there was enough interest.

The Realizer offered more continuity with the previous two terms. Recruitment would continue, but the emphasis would shift toward getting newer Forestians involved after they arrived. The proposed deputy-minister system would give newer officers smaller projects while allowing them to work alongside experienced ministers.

The Realizer also wanted a more active programme of events and regional outreach. The ambassador programme would be rebuilt, and an embassy with Europeia could come back for discussion if there was interest.

On the cultural side, there was interest in bringing back Forest-themed trivia and interviews. The census and Photo Contest would continue, while sports and lore-based roleplay could provide more ways for residents to take part.

The case for a third term rested partly on experience. The Realizer argued that two terms as Forest Keeper put them in a position to help a new group of officials get established before handing things over.

Pletho offered a simpler campaign focused on trust and transparency. Government decisions, Pletho said, should be explained to residents rather than simply announced.

The campaign also leaned toward informal community activity. Game nights and trivia were suggested, along with the possibility of joke competitions.

Prusmia also remained on the ballot despite having a mouse with a mind of its own. As a result less policy material appeared during the campaign.

The candidate who asked not to be elected

A PEBKAC computer issue brings us to Mirg Givers. Mirg joined the field after clicking the wrong button on the nomination poll and quickly issued one of the clearest statements of campaign week:

“I do not want to be forest keeper.”

Mirg said they weren’t active enough for the job and urged everyone to vote for somebody else. They then realised that telling Forestians not to vote for them might encourage exactly that behaviour.

Bisofeyr promptly announced their support before withdrawing it in the same post.

The voters eventually followed Mirg’s instructions. The final tally was zero.

From policy to orbital cannons

As campaign week went on, the questioning became less conventional.

Chan Island presented candidates with the problem of an undead pirate cutting down a Forest tree. Roless proposed using orbital cannons, although the possible damage to several kilometres of surrounding forest was apparently “not relevant, probably.”

A spelling mistake in The Forest Leaf presented an even greater crisis. Roless concluded that the only response would be to refound the region while Realizer would require a lie down in a darkened room for the rest of the term.

The lighter questions also revealed a few things about the candidates themselves. Roless had recently hiked in Tanzania’s Uluguru Mountains, preferred pastel green and was considerably less enthusiastic about being asked for a fun fact.

The Realizer approached the undead pirate problem differently. An axe-wielding intruder might, after all, offer opportunities for the timber and furniture restoration industry.

Azure Mines later asked candidates to remove one letter from the alphabet. The Realizer chose E, largely for the disruption it would cause and the prospect of serving as “Forst Kpr.”

Chan Island eventually dispensed with ordinary election questions altogether and brought out the bridge scene from Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Candidates were asked their name and their quest before facing the important question of the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow.

Pletho, every pragmatic, put the answer at 21. A factual and honest response. If we leave Monty Python aside, a European barn swallow flies at roughly 10–12 m/s (36–43 km/h, or 22–27 mph) in ordinary flight.

Through all of this, Anxious And Kevin kept returning the discussion to how the candidates would actually govern. Transparency, government priorities and lessons from previous service continued alongside the swallows and orbital cannons.

After a week of serious discussion and some less serious questioning, the result itself was straightforward.

Roless won with a clear majority and will serve as Forest Keeper for the twenty-first administration.

Canopy holds the line to finish fifth in N-Day

Canopy finished N-Day in fifth place after its largest outing yet, passing one million successful strikes and one million intercepts while keeping radiation to just 486.

The Forest-backed faction entered the event with a defence-first strategy. Strategic and economic specialists were directed towards shields, while the Nuke Branch waited for targets.

The Nuke Branch didn't have to wait long. Forty minutes into the event, the first order was to target SPEAR. By 4:40 p.m. PDT, attention had shifted to Horsemen of the Apocalypse, beginning a campaign that would occupy Canopy for most of the next day.

The routine soon became familiar: produce, target HoTA, fire, return to production. By late evening, Priola barely needed to explain it:

“You know the drill. Target HotA.”

Canopy's Shield Branch, meanwhile, spent much of the night protecting other factions. CORAL received repeated assistance before shields were redirected towards ANAL and Starlight Brigade as attacks shifted between Canopy's partners.

HoTA remained the preferred offensive target. At 1:34 a.m. PDT, Garbelia gave one of the more memorable orders of the event:

“Let's make some more radioactive glue. Target the horsies.”

The attacks continued through the night and into the morning, despite increasing technical problems with NationStates. At one point Canopy had about 200,000 missiles targeted simultaneously, reportedly a faction record.

For nearly 20 hours, Canopy itself remained largely untouched.

That changed shortly after 11 a.m. PDT.

“@Shield Branch DEFEND CANOPY!!!!!!!!!!!”

“We've been waiting 20 hours for this,” Realize replied. “Time for the shield branch to have some fun.”

Several more volleys followed. Canopy repeatedly rebuilt its shields between attacks and came remarkably close to its goal of finishing without radiation. Only 486 radiation got through.

In the final two hours, Canopy's attention shifted from HoTA to The Subspace Rebels as command moved to secure fifth place. At 1:50 p.m. PDT, Garbelia made the objective explicit:

“FIRE ON SUBSPACE! LET'S LOCK DOWN 5TH”

Two more attack cycles followed. At 2:52 p.m. PDT came the final order to fire while Shield Branch prepared for whatever might arrive in the remaining minutes.

At 3 p.m. PDT, Garbelia posted simply:

“it's over.”

Canopy had secured fifth place.

The final numbers showed how much the operation had grown since last year. Canopy fielded 1,869 nations, up from 1,481, while its score rose from 116,069 to 272,058. Successful strikes more than doubled, from 489,140 to 1,088,408, and intercepts passed 1.09 million.

This year Canopy came close to its goal of zero radiation. Last year's Canopy finished with 31,616. This time, despite more than doubling its successful strikes, it finished with just 486.

But Shield Branch wasn't about to let Nuke Branch forget one other number.

“Over a million intercepts, and 11 thousand more intercepts than nuke branch got strikes,” Roless observed, “so we are clearly superior.”

Garbelia's final assessment captured the larger result: the largest Canopy faction yet, more than double last year's score and strikes, and the lowest radiation of any faction with more than 1,000 nations.

The Roster of Edible Voters

Forest’s election season began with an unfortunate discovery: some voters were apparently eligible to participate, while others were edible.

The revelation came during discussion of turnout for the Anti-GenAI tag poll, when Dest Oritio accidentally referred to Forest’s “edible voters.” Safiloa immediately asked whether a cannibal cabal had been uncovered. Ruinenlust confirmed the worst, cancelling the coming election and directing everyone on the Roster of Eligible Voters to report to a large cast-iron soup pot outside the polling station. Election Officers were asked to bring the seasoning.

Chan Island later identified as an “inedible voter” and requested further instructions. Fortunately, by the time the actual Forest Keeper election arrived, Forest had returned to counting ballots rather than ingredients.

The Mantis in Mum’s Backyard

A suggestion from Kawastyselir to go mantis hunting was one of the month’s more unexpected RMB item.

Safiloa recalled finding a praying mantis in their mother’s backyard in Aruba last year and uploading photographs to a citizen-science app. The sighting attracted local news coverage because, according to Safiloa, mantises were not thought to occur on the island. Then this July, Safiloa’s 12-year-old step-nephew found several more. There were enough of them that some began climbing onto visitors’ clothes.

Things became stranger when a Dutch camera crew announced plans to travel to Aruba to investigate what was being described locally as the Aruban praying mantis. Safiloa had heard it described as a species thought extinct since the late nineteenth century, while Melenavenia found reporting describing it as a newly identified species instead.

Who Takes Over the Photo Contest?

After years of running one of Forest’s most familiar events, Mount Seymour is stepping back from organizing the Photo Contest. Shout out to MS for the work they’ve done on this. But with the next contest expected in December: who picks up the camera bag?

The question came up during the Forest Keeper campaign. Roless proposed a possible Chief Photographer role responsible for organizing the contest, while allowing the work to fall under Cultural Affairs if no separate organizer emerged. Realizer preferred keeping the contest in the hands of a willing individual, with the region reaching a loose consensus on the new host rather than simply having the Forest Keeper appoint one.

No successor has yet emerged. Whoever takes it on will inherit an event has become a regular showcase for Forest photography. Feel like taking a shot? Let our Forest Keeper know.

Older, Wiser... Maybe?

One of the longer RMB discussions this month asked an awkward question: does age actually make us wiser?

The conversation moved quickly beyond the usual “experience comes with age” argument. Forestians discussed whether knowledge accumulated over decades remains useful when technology and society change rapidly, whether younger generations are necessarily better equipped for those changes, and how much value lies in passing experience between generations.

Sierra Brava and Chan Island took different views on the pace and consequences of technological change, particularly the effect of the information revolution on work, public debate and everyday life. The larger question remained harder to settle: experience grows with time, but what we do with that experience is another matter.

When the Issue Is the Issue

Sometimes the most interesting part of a NationStates Issue is arguing about the Issue itself.

Sierra Brava raised objections to A Chemical Reactionary, which places a celebrated chemist before a revolutionary court in a socialist republic. The complaint was partly about the scenario’s assumptions and partly about the statistical effects attached to its choices, including an increase in corruption for releasing the scientist.

For Sque suggested that some authorial bias is unavoidable in Issues and pointed out that the scenario leaves important details open to interpretation. There was also the simplest solution available to every head of government: the Dismiss button.

Sierra Brava conceded the point, then asked where the writers could be found because the revolutionary court had “a few friendly questions for them.”

A Quiz League Begins to Stir?

Mirg Givers’ Forest Keeper campaign may have been, by their own description, “completely fictional,” but another idea appears to have attracted rather more serious support.

After floating the possibility of a regional quiz league, Mirg reported receiving interest from several Forestians and said they would try to get something organized over the coming months.

Roless Begins Building the 21st Administration

With the election settled, Forest Keeper Roless has begun assembling the region’s 21st Administration.

The first round of appointments puts two experienced Forestians in the government’s broadest portfolios. Realizer, Roless’s predecessor as Forest Keeper, was appointed Deputy Forest Keeper and Cultural Affairs Minister, while Azure Mines takes over as Foreign Affairs Minister.

Garbelia has been named Statistician and Rogue River becomes Worldbuilder. Dest Oritio will continue as editor of The Forest Leaf.

The appointments show of how Roless intends to put one of the central ideas of the election campaign into practice. Roless proposed a government in which experienced ministers would oversee broad areas of responsibility while more focused roles could provide manageable ways for other Forestians to become involved.

The cabinet is not yet complete. Roless said at least one more round of appointments would follow and invited Forestians interested in serving to come forward, with a particular encouragement to newer members who might be hesitant because they lack government experience.

Forest Shortens Election Nominations

The September election was also the first held under a newly shortened timetable after Forest approved the Bisecting Overlong Government Signups, or BOGS, constitutional amendment.

The amendment reduces the period for prospective Forest Keeper candidates to declare themselves from seven days to three. The seven-day campaign period remains unchanged.

The change resolves a discussion covered in the August Forest Leaf, when Forestians were considering two proposals for shortening elections. The more extensive WRECK proposal would also have reduced Campaign Week, while BOGS concentrated on the nominations period.

BOGS ultimately won approval, cutting four days from the electoral process. The September election therefore began with three days of nominations before moving directly into Campaign Week.

The argument behind the change was fairly simple: prospective candidates already have six months between elections to consider whether they might run, while a full week of nominations could leave the region without a sitting government for longer than necessary. Others had been more cautious about shortening Campaign Week, particularly after several recent elections produced substantial debate between candidates.

Magna-Parva and Pletho Join the Forest Map

Forest’s regional map received another update at the end of August, adding two nations to the Old World.

Magna-Parva has been placed east of Elfrard and Canaltia, while Pletho now occupies territory west of Chilledsville. Shalotte was removed from the map.

There were no changes to the New World.

The August 31 update follows a larger revision earlier in the month that added Saint Agatha and Sierra Brava while removing five former nations. The latest changes continue the regular reshaping of Forest’s geography as new nations claim places on the map and inactive ones make way for new arrivals.

As always, Nations wanting a place on the region map can reach out Roless.

Election Records Show Consistent Turnout

Forest Governor Ruinenlust has also published a new record of participation in Forest Keeper elections dating back to March 2021.

The archive preserves the rosters of eligible voters for the twelve elections Ruinenlust has administered and identifies which nations cast valid ballots. It deliberately leaves out candidates and winners, concentrating instead on participation.

The figures give some context to this month’s election. September 2026 had 104 eligible voters, of whom 33 cast valid ballots, for participation of 32 percent. That sits close to turnout in several previous Forest elections and slightly above the 29 percent recorded in the first round of March 2026.

The archive will also give future Forestians something elections tend to lose surprisingly quickly: a record of who was actually there to vote.

NationStates Hits Ten Million

NationStates passed a rather large milestone on September 3 when its counter reached 10 million nations created since the game began. The number includes the many nations that have come and gone over nearly 24 years; around 300,000 were active when the milestone was announced.

Appropriately, the ten-millionth creation was NS 10 Millionth Nation, suggesting somebody had been watching the counter rather closely.

Read the NationStates announcement

GA Resolutions Now Come by the Tranche

The rebuilt General Assembly introduced Tranches, allowing World Assembly members to bundle GA resolutions into recommended sets.

Any nation can create a tranche based on the resolutions it thinks nations should adopt. Other WA members can follow it, adopt its recommendations together and receive further recommendations as new resolutions pass. That could make managing the growing post-reset GA considerably easier, although choosing whose judgement to trust remains firmly the nation's problem.

View Tranches

Issues Writers Asked to Seize the Means of Production

Barely two months after the annual Issues Contest produced three Forest winners, the Issues team announced another opportunity for writers.

The Red October Edition is NationStates' first themed Issues Contest. Entries must be submitted between September 29 and November 7 and must apply exclusively to socialist nations. Each player gets one entry, coauthored submissions aren't eligible, and winners are guaranteed the Medal of Issues Writing.

Given Forest's rather substantial contribution to the Issues system over the years, there should be no shortage of comrades capable of answering the call.

Read the Red October announcement

Issue Decisions Get a Clearer Paper Trail

The results screen after answering an issue received an overhaul on September 24. Changes to World Census rankings are now organized into a Decision Impact Report, with individual scales offering a deeper explanation of why a decision affected them.

The update also added eight policies, including Compulsory Vote, Gold Standard, Digital Money, Referendums and Piracy. Nation banners have meanwhile become collectible "postcards", complete with global unlock statistics to show just how rare an image is.

For anyone who has ever stared at an unexpected Census change and wondered exactly how that decision produced that result, the new report should at least provide a few more clues.

Read about the September update

Pressure Builds on Longingland Prime Minister

The political fallout from Longingland’s recent terrorist attacks has reached Prime Minister Nikolai Rasmussen, with opposition groups and some members of the public now calling for his resignation or impeachment.

Last month, The Forest Leaf reported that Longingland had imposed martial law after coordinated attacks by the Infinite Insurgency. Since then, the government has opened an investigation into possible foreign support for the militants, examining financial transactions, communications and possible supply networks. Klaussa, already a security partner of Longingland, has assisted with intelligence.

Rasmussen is also facing criticism over the government’s handling of the attacks, the lifting of the national curfew and changes in domestic policy. For now, the pressure remains political: no formal impeachment proceedings had begun when Longingland reported the story.

Read Longingland’s report on the impeachment discussion

Brush Tsanglu Votes to Enter World Assembly

One of Forest’s newest independent nations has taken an early step onto the international stage.

Following negotiations that established Brush Tsanglu as a sovereign country, its provisional government put World Assembly membership to the public. The referendum required 60 percent approval to proceed, a threshold the Yes side narrowly cleared with 63.52 percent of the vote.

The results also revealed some of the new country’s political geography. Rural communities were generally more sceptical of membership, while support was stronger around the tourism-dependent Teliwa River valley and its ski resorts. Provisional leader jan Teko acknowledged concerns about sovereignty while describing international participation as part of the country’s emerging political direction.

Read Brush Tsanglu’s referendum report

Rainges Wins Nortallius Presidency

Last month, The Forest Leaf introduced readers to an eight-candidate presidential race in Nortallius. That race now has its winner.

Vice President Catherine Rainges was elected the country’s second president, winning both the popular and electoral votes. Foreign Minister Riley Rockland will become vice president, while the other candidates have conceded.

Rainges succeeds two-term President Jared Cunningham and has said she intends to continue many policies of the outgoing administration. The result brings a straightforward conclusion to one of the international election stories followed in the August Leaf.

Read Nortallius’s election report

Karaa Charts a New Course After Civil War

Karaa Theocracy is describing a period of rapid political and economic change following the end of its recent civil war.

The government reports that its former corporatist planned economy has been replaced by a state-capitalist model, while restrictions on public protest, independent media and political criticism have been loosened. Term limits have also been introduced for legislators and the Dux, although the dispatch adds, with some confidence, that current Dux George Tronto “is not going anywhere.”

Economic recovery has taken priority, however, and Karaa acknowledges that its environmental ambitions have fallen behind schedule. That leaves the government trying to balance post-war recovery with the greener aspirations it had previously set for itself within Forest.

Read Karaa’s account of the “Era of Liminalism”

Lord Dominator Achieves Zero-Emission Public Transit

Lord Dominator has solved one of the more stubborn problems in transport policy: emissions from public transit.

Following the abolition of the automotive industry, the nation now reports that public transportation produces no emissions at all, largely because public transportation does not exist. Meanwhile, the gambling and arms industries have expanded to help fill the economic space left behind.

It is an environmental achievement of a particularly Forest kind.

Saint Dolmance: Please Compliment the Flowers

Saint Dolmance is a country where horticulturalists outnumber the military and flowers appear to influence both public policy and personal reputation.

Its Mediterranean landscape is carefully cultivated, with gardens and flower-lined streets shaping much of the public realm. Horticulture is taught in schools, while municipalities compete over whose surroundings are the most beautiful. Residents can even report neighbours whose gardens are deemed insufficiently impressive.

At the center of it all is His Most Beauteous, Most Serene, Most Fragrant, Incomparably Wise, Universally Admired Saint Dolmance. Apparently deciding that having separate names was unnecessarily complicated, he renamed both himself and the country. Failure to include at least one complimentary adjective before his name is technically punishable by law.

The country’s devotion to beauty occasionally collides with practical concerns. Affordable housing proposals have come with fountains, marble and decorative arches attached, while government spending on beautification has reportedly tested the patience of the finance ministry. One opera house even required chandeliers imported from six countries.

Forest nations have one easy way to make a good impression with this nation. Saint Dolmance enthusiastically supports reciprocal regional endorsements, sometimes celebrating them with feasts and fireworks.

Those who don’t reciprocate are still appreciated. They just might not be invited to dinner.

Sierra Brava: A Country From a Poem

Sierra Brava’s national story begins with a poet.

In 1763, Manuel Corbera wrote Oda al pueblo serrano, or Ode to the Mountain People, arguing that Sierra Brava should be a nation in its own right. His green cockade, representing hope, soon became a symbol among supporters of independence.

At the same time, miners led by Juan Guazurarí were rebelling in the north under the colour yellow. Corbera combined their yellow with his green, creating the colours that would become associated with Sierra Brava. The flag was first raised over a captured fort in 1767.

Corbera was executed, and his head was displayed in Tacuarendí’s Plaza Mayor.

More than forty years later, revolutionaries retook the city and raised his green-and-yellow flag in that same square. Sierra Brava eventually declared independence on July 19, 1816.

The country’s later history would include dictatorship, civil war and democratic renewal, but the flag endured.

So when Forest neighbours see Sierra Brava’s green and yellow today, see the memory of two rebellions and a poet who imagined the country before it existed.

Majalangka: At the Movies

One of the easiest ways to understand Majalangka may be watch one of its films.

Cinema began there with imported movies shown in modest halls near markets, ports and railway towns. Over time, local writers, musicians, artists and actors began making films of their own, drawing stories from royal history, village life and rapidly changing cities.

That created a distinctly Majalangkan question: what language should the country speak on screen? Early films often favoured the prestigious dialects of the capital. More recent productions have increasingly used regional languages and found larger audiences than expected.

The industry has also created stars of its own like Siti Marjoeki. Known as the “Orchid of Sriwangi,” she began in travelling theatre before being discovered by the Cahaya Selatan studio. She has since appeared in more than twenty films and spent nearly two decades in the industry.

Her career reflects some of the changes taking place in Majalangkan cinema. Newer films are beginning to give older women more substantial characters and stories of their own.

Majalangka’s cinema shows which stories the country wants to tell, which voices it wants to hear, and increasingly, what it looks like when Majalangka sees itself on screen.

Into Safiloa’s Lost World

There are easier ways to spend a holiday than following a guide hiking through the wilds of Safiloa in search of an egg-carrying mammal.

That was the thought running through my head. My editor wanted the story, so here I am beneath the canopy of Safiloa’s Burañnoan Cloud Forest. The air had gone cool and damp, and our guide had already reminded us more than once to keep an eye above us. Safiloa’s Vebo'ai crocodilians spend part of their time in trees, which is useful information before you start walking underneath them.

Ecotourism is a significant part of Safiloa’s visitor economy, drawing travellers beyond the beaches and resorts into forests, wetlands and other protected landscapes. The archipelago’s long isolation has preserved ecosystems and species that disappeared elsewhere, including the Kouway, an egg-carrying mammal descended from a lineage dating back to Gondwana. We’d look for that in the wetlands later.

First, we had the forest and the possibility of a tree-climbing crocodilian. For most of the morning, very little happened. We walked. We stopped. Our guide pointed into dense vegetation and we stared politely at leaves. After a couple of hours, I was beginning to wonder whether I’d traded a perfectly good beach for a long, damp walk through the forest.

Then the guide froze. A few metres ahead, something moved above us. What had looked like another dark branch shifted. Stretched along it was a Vebo'ai, leaner and more lightly built than the crocodilians I knew, with a narrow snout and long, clawed limbs gripping the tree. Its slender body almost disappeared among the branches when it stopped moving.

That’s the attraction of Safiloa’s ecotourism industry. The unusual animals aren’t exhibits waiting for visitors. You enter their habitat and hope you’re fortunate enough to see them.

From forest to wetlands

The Hoñie'lua Wetlands couldn’t have felt more different. The canopy fell away and the view opened across water, marshy ground and sky. This was also where we might finally find the animal that had brought me on the tour in the first place.

The Kouway is unusual even by Safiloan standards. It walks on its knuckles, eats plants and lays eggs, and it’s the last surviving Gondwanathere in the world. The wetlands are its territory, so once again we slowed down and started looking.

After the forest, I knew better than to expect anything to appear on cue. This time, though, we didn’t have to wait as long. Our guide pointed toward movement near the water. Vegetation shifted, then a stocky animal emerged onto the open ground, moving slowly across the wet terrain with the unusual gait we’d been told to watch for.

There it was. The Kouway.

It’s difficult to convey the strangeness of watching an animal whose lineage reaches back to Gondwana quietly feeding in a modern Safiloan wetland. We’d started the morning beneath a crocodilian in a cloud forest. Now we were watching the last surviving member of another ancient lineage in an entirely different landscape.

That variety is part of what makes the tour work. Safiloa isn’t offering visitors a single wildlife attraction. In the space of a day, the landscape changes around you, and with it the things you’ve come to see.

An evening on the water

After a day spent watching branches and staring into wetlands, I was ready for a break. The Falokrupu Floating Gardens of Hufaïeti provided it. The gardens spread across the bay in a mix of planted spaces, pavilions, food and performances. By evening, the pace was completely different. Puppetry, theatre, comedy and dance replaced the quiet searching of the day, while visitors wandered through the gardens long after most botanical attractions would’ve closed. Dinner offered another unexpected rich experience. The country’s food culture is overwhelmingly vegan, drawing heavily on seaweed, nuts, fruit and other locally grown foods.

After a day exploring what Safiloa’s isolation had preserved, the gardens offered a glimpse of the Safiloa people live in today. The next morning, the tour was heading down.

Below Kambanu

Kambanu Island contains extensive caverns and archaeological sites connected to a much older period in the islands’ human history. Among them are Aratta, subterranean monolithic ruins whose builders remain uncertain. Safiloan accounts attribute them either to the Doians, the islands’ earliest known inhabitants, or to the Ashab al-Rass who later displaced them.

The contrast with the previous day was immediate. Above ground, Safiloa’s isolation preserved animals whose relatives vanished elsewhere. Underground, the islands hold traces of people whose story now survives through ruins and archaeology.

Safiloa’s eco tours make good use of all of this. The landscapes alone are worth seeing. The chance to encounter wildlife found nowhere else, with some of the islands’ older history along the way, makes the tours even more rewarding.

So if Safiloa is on your travel list, leave some room in the itinerary for a guided ecotour.

In Memoriam

Four Forest nations left us this month.

Sapnu puas leaves one of the longest records behind. Founded more than nine years ago, it grew to a population of more than 17 billion and is recognized by NationStates as the nation of a former Issues Author. Its surviving dispatches and factbooks leave traces of a player who had been part of the game for a long time.

Rezua also leaves a substantial archive after more than twelve years. Its factbooks document cities, government, history, geography and culture, preserving a considerable amount of worldbuilding even after the nation itself has fallen silent.

Althean states was younger, but had already begun building a detailed history of its own, including the Althean Unification, the Rafflesian Flood and Walian Secession.

Prydaein had been part of NationStates for almost nine years. The Organic Co-operative was a long-standing Forest nation with a strong environmental streak, and it remained part of the region’s civic life, casting ballots in the March 2026 Forest Keeper election and runoff.

This month we remember Sapnu puas, Althean States, Rezua, and Prydaein, and the pieces of Forest they leave behind.