[Sca-cooks] Aten Policy

[Mary Morman]

My thanks to Johnna for sending me the text in a form I could read.

I'll start by saying that - having cooked in the East kingdom, albeit 
many years ago - I understand where Brangwayna and AdamAnt are coming 
from.  To them the policy seems very restrictive.  However, after twelve 
years in the Outlands - an Aten rite kingdom - I think I have a clearer 
idea about what problems the rules are trying to fix.

The policy clearly states the number of people who are allowed to be 
comped.  That's vital.  I have cooked way too many feasts over the past 
ten years where as many as 16 people - NOT including servers - are 
expected to be fed out of the monies expended per head for the rest of 
the hall, and this can be the same whether the feast is for 80 or for 
180.  I would REJOICE at having the Aten limitations adopted and 
enforced as policy in my kingdom.

While the $ per head limit does seem a little low, I don't find it 
unreasonable.  Especially if it is indeed PER HEAD rather than the 
amount for only the paying customers with more than a dozen "freebies" 
expected at no additonal cost.

I would be overjoyed to see an official kingdom policy that made the 
only real reservation a paid reservation.  That's the way I learned to 
cook SCA feasts in the East and Atlantia.  It is NOT the way things are 
done out here.  There is absolutely no expectation of any paid 
reservations, and autocrats tend to feel privileged if they get some 
number of unpaid reservations.  If you are living where the expectation 
is to somehow cook for as many people as may come, and where a place 
WILL be made for as many people as show up with the cook being told to 
cook a bit more soup or head down to the grocery store for some of those 
barbequeued chickens to stretch the feast - well then, this kind of 
policy seems a welcome relief rather than an imposition.

All in all, while the policies are definitely very bureaucratic, I 
percieve them as an attempt to fix a problem, and think that, if 
enforced, they will probably succeed.  If they do succeed then people 
will learn different behaviors and in a couple of years, perhaps the 
need for the policy will no longer exist.

Elaina

-- 
To be humble to superiors is duty,
  to equals courtesy,
  to inferiors nobleness.
                Benjamin Franklin