Boat Merchant/Kunoso
Career
Qualifications
Many merchants upon large rowboats do not have or need qualifications, as long as they produce or can bargain someone into making goods so they can sell them for quick money. Many more successful merchants have qualifications in finance which foreigners brought over from Europe. Another such capability may be swimming if the merchants wish to appease larger vessels approaching the The Archipelago of Seasons.
Payment & Reimbursement
Payment depends on what they are selling, who is selling it and where they get their goods from. For example, many fish and seafood sell at 25 Steel coins a bundle (10 in a Crate), whilst Agriculture, Produce and farm animals are sold at 50 steel coins per bundle (25 Crops). People can buy a set of clothes for 1 Silver. These are simple estimations rather than strict facts.
Other Benefits
The Merchants get to keep a 1 crate of the products they sell a day without having to pay for it, and so the merchants can spend their money without having to worry about looking after their family. There is also a share in the taxes which come with buying a product.
Perception
Purpose
The purpose is to provide products made by artisans, farmers and workers all along the straits and rivers and advertise them to other prefectures and even other countries and communities. Whilst the merchants and store owners cannot move Whilst stalls and shops, these can, and there is an excellent business in selling your product in other riverside prefectures.
Social Status
Merchants are a low class despite reaping a bunch of the benefits of farmers and artisans because they do not produce anything but instead profit from the labours of others. Merchants are considered an easy or cheap way to make money because no work is used to create or provide anything. Artisans make tools, clothing, art and entertainment; farmers, hunters and anglers grow or find food; soldiers and the police fight and protect the civilians and nobles provide employment, diplomacy and money for the people, but the merchants only sell provided things for cash. Nevertheless it is still and important business to bring attention and money to other businesses along the prefectures.
Demographics
Most merchants are men, but unlike the Stilt Fisher/Kuknazs there is a much smaller ratio of women to men 1:10. Many of these merchants are people of the K'aisi/Archipeligons ethnicity, with others being of Ainu or Honshu Japanese ethnicity due to the Japanese colonisation and the flocking of Japanese natives.
History
Due to the large amount of rivers in Rora, and the large strait which splits the islands, but also connects them there is a demand to sell things to other prefectures in Rora and Kayo. The obvious choice was to equip special travelling merchants with boats to carry their products like in Vietnam. These boats are made out of Lacquered Red Maple hardwood and are larger than the average rowboat to carry more goods like fish, produce, tools, foods, clothes and more.
Then came a new change, these ships would get bigger with a new trading partner, Feudal Japan, which was entering a time of peace when they helped the K'aisi/Archipeligons fight of a Second Helmgar invasion. The K'aisi/Archipeligons really wanted to trade with these new friends, and so attempted to get near the welcoming ships and converse with the crew. Unfortunately, the sheer size of the ships meant that these merchants had their boats destroyed with their goods, got injured or even died because of the ships or the waves. To combat this, merchants who could afford to trade with these boats could buy larger red maple ships which could withstand the waves and the ships to trade with them, and soon the rest of the world. And thus, the merchants were split between the river and ocean ship merchants, those who traded within the The Archipelago of Seasons and those who traded with the other countries.
Operations
Tools
Clothing: The merchants are divided between the Riverine and Oceanic groups.
Riverine merchants wear K'aisi robes with tonbi pants without the loincloth up to the knees and sleeves tied just behind their elbows without any proper legwear other than their geta sandals, making them short-sleeved. These merchants also wear a black waterproof undersuit to protect them from the cold. This undersuit is supposedly made out of the skin of a breed of eel, with Koshkod Trees cloth on the underside of the clothes. The fabric is patterned to look like fish scales and often come in darker, cooler colours from green to purple. Headgear is the conical straw hat worn a lot but he K'aisi.
Oceanic merchants wear a much regular version of the K'aisi dress, but with a deel instead of the shirt, lined with hiding on the inside to warm them, and patterned like a much greyer version of the cool Riverine garments, and there is still the waterproof eel skin and cloth undergarments. The robes had stretched down to their feet, and many sailors had mistaken them for mermaid-like creatures or fish monsters. Headgear is instead a Roningasa which hides their face from the salt and waves of the ocean.
Boats: The lacquered red maple wood rowboats for riverine merchants are 5 metres x 2 metres (Length x Width) to give vast space to hold people, but can get smaller for thinner river systems. These rowboats are meant to store large amounts of goods and advertise them to potential buyers. Oceanic merchants have Atakebune ships imported from Japan which they could trade with other larger vessels and their crew, as more copies of the ship came in again made out of the red maple wood. Like the houses of the K'aisi, the main cabin on the top has a more smooth and flat wooden shape, and the main docks are rooved with cloth stall rooves like the markets. The banners have the logo which marks merchants, something similar to the K'aisi flag but like a hexagonal yen coin without the compass points. Other merchant ships for international trade look more like the Koreans' turtle ship with a fusion with the K'aisi Atakebune.
Oars: Oars are made from the lacquered red maple wood and have the same anatomy as a square-bladed oar. The hexagonal yen coin logo on that oar blade to mark merchants and a carving of the merchant's name under the logo. The oars might also have a small slip of fabric on the square blade, which mark what they sell.
Workplace
Riverine Merchants work along the rivers and straits of Rora, Toro and Kayo, whilst Oceanic Merchants work along the coast and other trade routes across the oceans, often staying on their ships for long times upon these ships, so long that a tsunami couldn't knock the sailors of deck.
Dangers & Hazards
Whilst Riverine merchants have relatively safe lives, Oceanic merchants have to contest with storms, tsunamis, waves, pirates and thieves. That's why many Oceanic merchant ships have onboard Nusod/Archipelago Samurai to protect them and ensure safety measures are up to speed.
Alternative Names
Baiteijin (売艇人/Sell Boat Person)
Type
Financial / Trade
Demand
Staple
Other Associated professions
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