A couple of Legends...

The title is inspired by the fact that yesterday was a very unique day. Ok.. Not so unique actually. It happens at fairly equally spaced intervals. It was Friday and it was also the thirteenth of the month and hey... Put this together and you get

Friday the thirteenth.

This got me thinking (yes, I was majorly jobless for most of yesterday) as to why this day is unlucky and why it got its name. I actually uncovered some very interesting facts. I believe that this fear of Friday, the thirteenth is called paraskevidekatriaphobia. There is not really any scientific logic behind all this but the funda is otherwise simple.

This fear arsises from two separate fears namely the fear of the number thirteen and the fear of Friday. And if both these occur together, its considered a very unlucky day. Thirteen is because it was the number of people present at the last supper (jesus and his twelve apostles) and Judas, the apostle to betray Jesus Christ was the the thirteenth member to arrive. The fear of Friday is of more common knowledge because it was the day Jesus Christ was crucified. Additionally, many people believe that Friday was also the day the Great Flood started, Adam and Eve had the forbidden fruit etc etc..

Many people also believe that if they commence somethin on a Friday the thirteenth, that project will be doomed right from the start. People who only believe in scientific proofs think its all gibberish and a bunch of nonsense :-D. There are a lot more theories that supplement these facts but as I mentioned earlier, this is the basic funda.

As I was reading this, there was this link that was about another very common legend

April Fools Day

This got me to read about why April 1st is celebrated as April Fools day all over the world. The funda here is something to do with the ancient calendar system.

I believe that this explanation dates back to 16th Century France, the year 1564 to be precise. The new year according to the Julian Calendar that was being followed accepted the beginning of the year in April. Now, there was this king named King Charles IX who declared that France would use the Gregorian Calendar which meant that new year's day was shifted to January. Wonder why he had to do that..??????

Anyways, what resulted was confusion and not everyone accepted the date change at the same time. Some people still celebrated new years in april as they did not like the date change. Some people who lived in far off remote vilages in France did not even hear about the date change for a long time. These people who celebrated new years on april became the butt of jokes and thus were called fools giving rise to the phrase April Fool!!!!!

Also a quick update, Part 2 of the post below will follow soon.

I think thats enough "gyan" for the time being..
Adios!!!