Changing something just for the heck of it, and justifying it as based on some reason, logic, explanation or pure sentiment seems to be an age old affliction of the humans. Lately it seems to be getting out of hand.
The Greeks and the Romans could not agree on common names for their Gods; thus when the Grecian Zeus crossed the Mediterranean, he became Jupiter (or Jove), as so did Hera who became Juno. By Jove!
There exist multitude of names for India in different languages; from Hind in Arabic, to Hindistan in Turkish, I’Inde in French, Yin du in Chinese and Tenjiku in Japanese. Tenjiku translates to ‘the heavenly centre of the world’. Good Heavens!
Soon after independence, there was a flurry of activity and in practically every Indian City, an arterial road was renamed as Mahatma Gandhi Road. Hell of a trip!
Not content with it and spurred on by public opinion/sentiment, they started to rename entire buildings. Thus the Victoria Terminus of Bombay became Chatrapati Shivaji Terminus of Mumbai. God save the Queen!
They even changed the name of movies - the Bond film From Russia with Love could only be released in India as ‘From 007 with Love’. Good Show!
Then the impulse propelled people to start renaming entire cities - Bombay became Mumbai, Madras became Chennai, Calcutta became Kolkata, Trivandrum became Thiruvananthapuram, etc. Not that it was limited to India; in Russia the famous city of Volgograd, which started out as Tsraitsyn in 16th century, was briefly Stalingrad in 20th century, before getting its present name; Closer home Saigon became Ho Chi Minh city and Rangoon became Yangon. Capital!
Soon the craze took over entire countries. Ceylon became Sri Lanka, Burma became Myanmar, Ivory Coast became Côte d'Ivoire to name a few. Vive la Liberté!
Not content with that, they went after the Planets too! Pluto’s status was changed from that of a Planet into a ‘dwarf planet’, on the discovery of a similar sized dwarf Planet, initially named ‘Xena’. Then in keeping with the spirit, they changed its name to ‘Eris’. Holy Smokes!
This January they are going after Time. A few weeks back, the International Bureau of Weights and Measures (BIPM) proposed to abolish the leap seconds and change the Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). It will be taken up in the upcoming Word Radiocommunication Conference (WRC-12). Wait a minute!
This week 2 John Hopkins professors have proposed to abolish leap years and change the Calendar. They want to fix specific days to specific dates. So if you were born on 09 Jan 1980, it would always be a Wednesday on your birthday, every year, unlike a Monday today. That makes my day!
So what are they going to think of next? Seeing that women are already wearing slacks, would they make the men wear frocks? But then, the Scots have been wearing Kilts for eons. There she blows!
The Greeks and the Romans could not agree on common names for their Gods; thus when the Grecian Zeus crossed the Mediterranean, he became Jupiter (or Jove), as so did Hera who became Juno. By Jove!
There exist multitude of names for India in different languages; from Hind in Arabic, to Hindistan in Turkish, I’Inde in French, Yin du in Chinese and Tenjiku in Japanese. Tenjiku translates to ‘the heavenly centre of the world’. Good Heavens!
Soon after independence, there was a flurry of activity and in practically every Indian City, an arterial road was renamed as Mahatma Gandhi Road. Hell of a trip!
Not content with it and spurred on by public opinion/sentiment, they started to rename entire buildings. Thus the Victoria Terminus of Bombay became Chatrapati Shivaji Terminus of Mumbai. God save the Queen!
They even changed the name of movies - the Bond film From Russia with Love could only be released in India as ‘From 007 with Love’. Good Show!
Then the impulse propelled people to start renaming entire cities - Bombay became Mumbai, Madras became Chennai, Calcutta became Kolkata, Trivandrum became Thiruvananthapuram, etc. Not that it was limited to India; in Russia the famous city of Volgograd, which started out as Tsraitsyn in 16th century, was briefly Stalingrad in 20th century, before getting its present name; Closer home Saigon became Ho Chi Minh city and Rangoon became Yangon. Capital!
Soon the craze took over entire countries. Ceylon became Sri Lanka, Burma became Myanmar, Ivory Coast became Côte d'Ivoire to name a few. Vive la Liberté!
Not content with that, they went after the Planets too! Pluto’s status was changed from that of a Planet into a ‘dwarf planet’, on the discovery of a similar sized dwarf Planet, initially named ‘Xena’. Then in keeping with the spirit, they changed its name to ‘Eris’. Holy Smokes!
This January they are going after Time. A few weeks back, the International Bureau of Weights and Measures (BIPM) proposed to abolish the leap seconds and change the Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). It will be taken up in the upcoming Word Radiocommunication Conference (WRC-12). Wait a minute!
This week 2 John Hopkins professors have proposed to abolish leap years and change the Calendar. They want to fix specific days to specific dates. So if you were born on 09 Jan 1980, it would always be a Wednesday on your birthday, every year, unlike a Monday today. That makes my day!
So what are they going to think of next? Seeing that women are already wearing slacks, would they make the men wear frocks? But then, the Scots have been wearing Kilts for eons. There she blows!
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