I played an arabian character for the best part of two years, it was very interesting and I really enjoyed it. I developed lots of quirks for him, some of which I used, others I did not:
- Never, ever, touch a woman or be alone with them unless they were family. He saw no difference between touching a (non-relative)woman and laying with her. Either way he has taken her honour. This only applied to women of his own culture, all others were just a step away from harlots in his eyes.
- Relating to the above, he was both chivalrous and chauvinistic in the extreme. He would go out of his way to protect a woman from all harm, but could not conceive that they were capable of looking after themselves. He put them on a pedestal and was infuriatingly romantic while being bigoted.
- He would wait impatiently for women to leave the room before discussing "men's business" such as anything adventuring related.
- He had a restricted diet. I just made up a set of things he did not eat. More importantly, was who he would and would not eat with. He would not share a meal with unworthy people, or in a house of ill-repute.
- Drinking was very important to him. He would not accept a drink from somebody unless he planned on protecting them for the next 24hrs. This did not apply to servants on inns etc. Water and salt were a sign of an unwritten peace pact.
- He never really grasped the concept of inns, he was always so grateful that these people allowed them into their holdings. He would give them a parting gift which was more often than not something non-monetary but worth a lot eg. A golden helmet he found etc. It lead to many comedic moments as he would be very hurt if he thought they expected him to pay.
- Overly proud of his people's poetry, often reading it aloud to people despite the fact they could not understand a word of it.
- Compared every horse/silk/glass/poem/literature/medicine derisively to the vastly superior items of his homeland.
- Insisted that every crafted item have a flaw in it (because only his god was perfect). Trying to explain to the dwarf king that the legendary sword he had made for me could not be accepted as it was flawless was fun to play.
- Had no preconceptions about other races, not having had much to do with them. To him, everybody was an uncultured savage, the difference between hobgoblins/kobolds/etc and other humanoids was not that much to him.
- Considers the Sun to be a sign of forboding and great evil. I really liked this, it took him ages to work out that the Pelor equivalent was not evil. In his homeland the sun brings death in the desert. People spend their life hiding from the midday sun and can only work once it has past. It makes sense that the evil cults of his homeland worship the sun rather than the cool relaxing darkness. He followed the moon god who gave his people rest and protection, every day he battled the sun god who tried to scorch the earth to death, but every twilight was defeated.
- Would literally kill people who wasted water. After he learnt about these new lands, he would consider himself downright cosmopolitan for simply beating them.
- He was obsessed with bath houses as an absolute luxury. He went to one and got massages every time he got to town.
- Relating to the above, he could not understand how anyone would find a bunch of men walking around stark naked and giving each other massages was anything weird. It was outside his ken to think of it as anything but masculine bonding and relaxation. On the same note he could never tell the difference between a brothel and a bathhouse, leading to many funny encounters. I loved one quote about homosexuality "Oh, we don't have that where I come from" and he truly believed it.
- Elaborate food rituals, as he was a prince-in-exile he was use to being poisoned, in high society in his culture elaborate rituals gave time for poison detection and the host to prove the food was safe.
Those are just the relevant quirks I can think of. As if that were not enough he was: lecherous/opium-addicted/wastrel/suicidal/manic-depressive and impious. I don't think those qualities really fit the mould though
). But, this is some of the ideas I came up with:
