Chulip
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This is part of the Martian Successor Nadesico (see Categories, below) series of articles
Chulip is a term meaning space/time travel apparatus, featured in the science fiction comedy anime series Martian Successor Nadesico. The word itself stands for "Cellular Hangover from Unkown (sic) Labyrinthine Intelligence of Prehistorical age," but it also ties in with the floral nomenclature patterns, as chuurippu (チューリップ) in Japanese also means tulip. This can explain their unique shape, which is almost tulip-like. The chulips aren't strong weapons in their own, but they have tentacles for short-range combat. These seem to serve little purpose against most enemies, but can strangle and crush some larger vessels.
The chulips themselves were discovered as a means of transportation from Jupiter to Earth and the moon. The Jovians would put their unmanned combat vessels in one end, and they would end up coming out on Earth. Originally, chulips were perceived merely as instantaneous transportation or teleportation, but Inez Fressange discovered that chulips were also a form of time travel. Also, it was discovered that one chulip can lead to multiple spots, explaining the presence of Jovian forces on both the moon and Earth.
To jump through a chulip, an act referred to in the series as boson jumping, one must be surrounded by a jump field. Jumping without a chulip is also possible, thanks to the presence of chulip crystals or C.C.'s. These crystals are made of the same material as the chulips themselves. Unless a successful distortion field is developed, jumping is harmful, even fatal to what Fressange calls normal humans.
The Jovian Superior Male Forces had trained for 100 years in order to perfect chulip and boson ravelling. The only problem is that it would seem the amount of jumps by the Jovians are limited by the total number of chulip crystals. This leads to a hypothesis that the Jovians have learned how to boson jump without sacrificing crystals. Chulips are referred to by the Jovians as dimensional leap gates, which leads to the inference that the name chulip itself was chosen by the Earth forces to describe what they first thought to be simply ships capable of carrying vast numbers of robotic combat units.
[edit] Excerpt From Dan Kinimitsu's Translation Notes
- Tulips or Chulips? This was an issue that I did not see coming until I realized until it was almost too late. The Jovian Lizards use a matter transportation that employs large elongated ridged objects that act as "jump gates." Two work in tandem, as an object entering one will emerge from the other. Numerous types of these "portals" exist and the largest of these can transport battleships and cruisers through itself. These massive structures were dubbed chu-lippu, or the Japanese imported word for "tulips" by the UEAF and others on Earth. Naturally, you would think one should spell out the word as "tulip," but it turns out that this the incorrect spelling. If you go through the first Nadesico 1000% reference collection, in its listings of terms, "tulip" is spelled "chulip." Why? It is because "chulip" stands for, get ready, "Cellular Hangover from Unkown [sic] Labyrinthine Intelligence of Prehistorical [sic] age." I can't make up stuff like this.
- What they meant to say was "An organic artifact left behind a mysterious but clearly a highly developed civilization dating back long before humanity’s written history." In any case, this is the reason why "tulip" is spelled "chulip" in Nadesico. It's been my policy to leave alone any words that the Japanese use, unless it poses a real problem. To be fair, the full term, "Cellular Hangover from Unkown [sic] Labyrinthine Intelligence of Prehistorical [sic] age" never comes up, but another term that is dependent on the "chulip," "CCs" (which stands for "Chulip Crystals") does come up. For those and other reasons, the original spelling of "chulip" was preserved.
