The truth about: birthday celebrations

“Have you ever thought about why any adult would bother to celebrate birthdays?”, a colleague asked me the other day while going through a birthday invitation he has received. He had been invited to a party celebrating one of his friend’s 60th birthday.

Before I could offer an answer, he said, “When you really think about it, birthday parties are just opportunities for your friends and family to come together and congratulate you for surviving another year”.

I disagree with my colleague’s opinion. Perhaps, he was not aware that birthday customs and celebrations have a long history far beyond anyone’s imagination. Although research on the exact origin of birthday celebrations remains inconclusive, there is enough of a consensus to piece together an approximate history.

Linda Rannells Lewis, the renowned author, in her book Birthdays: Their delights, disappointments says, “Birthdays have been celebrated for thousands of years. In early civilisations, where the development of a calendar made an organised reckoning of birth dates possible, the horoscopes of ruling monarchs, their successors and rivals had to be cast with care and birthday omens meticulously examined, for the prospects of the mighty would affect the prospects of the entire society.

“By the time of Ptolemy V, this practice was well established”. (Ptolemy V was an Egyptian king who reigned from 204-181 BC.)

Communal use

Lewis says in her book that even at this early stage, birthdays were not strictly reserved for the great rulers. Society also adapted for its communal use practices of the elite which it admired.

In the fifth century Before Christ, the Greek historian Herodotus, describing the festivals of the Persians, wrote: “It is their custom to honour their birthday above all other days, and on this day, they furnish their table in a more plentiful manner than at other times. The rich then produce an ox, a horse, a camel and an ass, roasted whole in an oven; but the poor produce smaller cattle”.

Lewis said, “In Egyptian households of the same period, birthdays were celebrated similarly. A part of the family budget was set aside to buy birthday garlands and animals for sacrifice, just as we might plan to spend a certain sum for balloons, party hats, and an ice-cream cake”.

The emperors of Rome often went to extremes in their own birthday celebrations. When the first birthday of Drusilla, the daughter of Caligula, approached, the emperor arranged a party suitable for the infant daughter of a “god” (himself). To celebrate her birthday, two days of horse racing were held, and a ritual slaughter of 300 bears, and 500 various beasts from Libya, in the amphitheatre of Taurus, was held.

Special day

It is obvious, therefore, that for thousands of years, people all over the world have thought of one’s birthday as a very special day. People believed that on a birthday, a person could be helped by good spirits, or hurt by evil spirits. So, when a person had a birthday, friends and relatives gathered to protect him or her. And that’s how birthday parties began.

Though the exact origins and significances of the candle-blowing ritual and candles themselves are unknown, there are multiple theories as to the history of placing candles on cakes.

It is commonly thought that the tradition of placing candles on birthday cakes could be attributed to early Greeks. In Ancient Greece, Artemis was the goddess of the hunt, as well as the moon. (Her twin brother, Apollo, was god of the sun). It is said that cakes brought to the temple of Artemis were adorned with candles to make them glow like the moon.

The Greeks believed that everyone had a protective spirit or demon who attended his birth and watched over him in life. This spirit had a mystic relation with the god on whose birthday the individual was born. The Romans also subscribed to this idea. This notion was carried down in human belief and is reflected in the guardian angel, the fairy godmother and the patron saint.

Birthday candles, in folk belief, are endowed with special magic for granting wishes. Lighted tapers and sacrificial fires have had a special mystic significance ever since man first set up altars to his gods. The birthday candles are, thus, an honour and tribute to the birthday child and hopes for good fortune.

Cake

The birthday cake has been an integral part of the birthday celebrations. Certain rituals and traditions, such as singing of birthday songs associated with birthday cakes are common to most cultures. The development of the birthday cake has followed the development of culinary and confectionery advancement.

While throughout most of Western history, these elaborate cakes in general were the privilege of the wealthy, birthday cakes are nowadays common to most birthday celebrations.

Why do people say, “Happy birthday” to each other? We believe that the good wishes of our friends and relatives are supposed to protect us from evil spirits. Party snappers, horns, bursting balloons, firecrackers and other noisemakers are just one more way of trying to scare off any evil spirits that may be hovering about.

In other words, we follow many of the old birthday beliefs. We pay attention to the meanings of old-time birth symbols. We do these things mainly for fun. However, it is also possible that there is something deep inside us that wants to believe.

These customs and traditions connected with the observance of birthdays have to do with guessing the future, good wishes for the future, good luck charms against evil spirits and the like. All birthday rituals, games and ceremonies are a form of well-wishing towards the birthday child, which are supposed to work their magic in the year ahead.

Birthday song

Finally, a few words about the most important event of any birthday party - the birthday song sung while the cake is cut. This song Happy Birthday to You is traditionally sung at every birthday party. According to the Guinness Book of World Records, Happy Birthday to You is the most recognised song in the English language, and its lyrics have been translated into at least 18 languages.

This song had its origins in 1893, when Mildred Hill, a kindergarten teacher in USA, put together a simple little tune. Whether she composed it entirely out of her head, or was influenced by other folk song fragments, is not clear. However, when her younger sister Patty (also a teacher) added words, the groundwork was laid for a very pleasing song.

They called it Good Morning to All:

Good morning to you, Good morning to you. 

Good morning, dear children, Good morning to all.

Good Morning to All was initially used as a welcoming song to be sung by the teacher to the class each morning. However, when it was published later in 1893, in a book of songs for kindergartens, it proved to be popular in reverse - children sang it to their teachers, rather than the other way round, and the word “children” was popularly replaced by “teacher”. So the song gently morphed into Good Morning to You.

In this form, young children across the United States began to sing the song. The slow development from ‘Good Morning’ to ‘Happy Birthday’ seems to have come from children themselves, with encouragement from Patty Hill, who helped create the new lyrics when children liked the song enough to want to sing it at parties.

sundayobserver.lk - By Lionel Wijesiri

පුංචි වෙනසක් වත් එපා .......

හමුවනා නෙත් දහක් අතරින්
ඔබේ දෑසම සොයා ඇවිදින්
ඔබට මෙතරම් ලංව ඉන්නේ
නොලැබෙනා බව දැන දැනයි...

අයාලේ ගිය හීන අතරේ
ගොඩගසා මහා වේදනා
මමම විතරද පෙම් කරන්නේ
ආත්මය පරදුව තියා......
ඔබව හිමිවේනම්... ඔයා අදහන්නම් ....
අදරෙයි මන් රත්තරනේ දැන්
නෙතුව ඉන්නට බැහැ ඔයා.....

තෙතමනේ ඇති පපුව ගැඹුරේ
උනනවා පෙම් දිවි තුරා
අද ඉඳන් වත් ඉමුද සෙනෙහෙන්
පුංචි වෙනසක් වත් එපා .......
ඔබව හිමිවේනම්... ඔයා අදහන්නම් ....
අදරෙයි මන් රත්තරනේ දැන්
නෙතුව ඉන්නට බැහැ ඔයා.....

Discover this New Year: The joy of simple living

It was around 11.45pm on December 31, 2013. My last incoming telephone call for the day (or for the Old Year) came from an old friend whom I haven’t seen for over two decades. We exchanged the usual greetings for the dawning New Year and had a pleasant chit-chat for a few minutes. Ending the conversation, I asked him, “Any resolutions for 2014?” His reply was to the point. “Just one - to begin a happy life.”

My friend had come home after 25 years working as a Medical Specialist in the United Kingdom. He had brought with him a fat savings account and the perk of a comfortable monthly pension. I believe he was looking forward to a cushy and easy-going retirement and would have thought that his financial stability would make his life very happy and comfortable.

As I kept the phone down, a question popped into my mind. How much money does it take to make someone happy? You would naturally say: “Probably a lot of it. The more the better.” As a rule, the answer is yes, but there is a catch because you arrive at a threshold.

According to research by Princeton Professors Daniel Kahneman and Angus Deaton, money makes us happy, up to a limit, depending on our aspirations.

They say that the effect of money on happiness depends on how “happiness” is defined. When happiness is defined as overall satisfaction with life, including heavy philanthropic and social activities, money continues to raise happiness - beyond that threshold. But when happiness is defined as the satisfaction from day-to-day life, more money doesn’t raise happiness.

What can explain this? I can think of three plausible explanations:

??With more money usually come more headaches. You’ll be facing a lot of day-to-day problems that you must solve and they could keep you up in the middle of the night.

??The prosperity that comes with more money is not by itself a cure-all against an ill-led life, and may be a source of dangerous foolishness.

??While money can certainly buy a lot of goodies that make us happy, it cannot buy true friendship, the reciprocal attachment that fills the need for affiliation. No amount of wealth, status, or power can adequately compensate for a life devoid of genuine friends.

According to the research, more money may be necessary, but not the sufficient condition for happiness, measured by the satisfaction that may be derived from daily living.

Simple rules

Living a happy life can mean something different for everyone. The happy life, in its most simple form, is a series of never ending satisfaction that only grows more powerful as time goes on. So, how do you reach it?

The answer to this question is available in a little book, The Ten Golden Rules: Ancient Wisdom by M. A. Soupios and Panos Mourdoukoutas. The book condenses the wisdom of the ancient Greeks into a few memorable and easy-to-understand rules that, if lived by, can enable all of us to lead happy, meaningful lives in 2014 and beyond.

Let us go through them:

Examine life: When Socrates said the unexamined life is not worth living, he laid out the fundamental philosopher’s view. Socrates believed that the purpose of human life was personal and spiritual growth. We are unable to grow towards greater understanding of our true nature unless we take the time to examine and reflect upon our life. So, examine your life. What do you want in the next week? The next month? The next three years? Figure out what your priorities are so that you can figure out if you are on track at actually reaching your goals.

Reduce your worries: You should worry only about the things that are within your control, the things that can be influenced and changed by your actions, not about the things that are beyond your capacity to direct or alter. In other words, while we cannot control all of the outcomes we seek in life, we certainly can control our responses to these outcomes and herein lies our potential for a life that is both happy and fulfilled.

Treasure friendship: This relationship cannot be acquired in the market place or social network, but must be nurtured and treasured in relations penetrated with trust and amity. No amount of wealth, status or power can adequately compensate for a life devoid of genuine friends.

Experience true pleasure: Avoid shallow and transient pleasures. Keep your life simple. Seek calming pleasures that contribute to your peace of mind. True pleasure is disciplined and restrained. In its many shapes and forms, pleasure is what every human being is after. Some pleasures are shallow and transient, fading away as soon as the act that creates the pleasure ends.

Often, they are succeeded by a feeling of emptiness and psychological pain and suffering. Other pleasures are deep, prolonged and continue even after the act that creates them ends; it is these pleasures that secure the well-lived life.

Master yourself: Resist any external force that might delimit thought and action; believing only what is personally useful and convenient. Complete liberty necessitates a struggle within, a battle to subdue negative psychological and spiritual forces that prevent a healthy existence. Today, freedom tends to be associated, above all, with political liberty. Therefore, freedom is often perceived as a reward for political struggle, measured in terms of one’s ability to exercise individual ‘rights’.

Avoid excesses: Live life in harmony and balance. Avoid excesses. Even good things, pursued or attained without moderation, can become a source of misery and suffering. Our ancestors fully grasped the high costs of passionate excess. They correctly understood that when people violate the limits of a reasonable mean, they pay penalties ranging from countervailing frustrations to utter catastrophe. It is for this reason that they prized ideals such as measure, balance, harmony, and proportion as much as they did, the parameters within which productive living can proceed.

Be a responsible human being: Approach yourself with honesty and thoroughness; maintain a kind of spiritual hygiene; stop the blame-shifting for your errors and shortcomings. Be honest with yourself and be prepared to assume responsibility and accept consequences. This rule has special relevance for all of us because of the common human tendency to reject responsibility for wrongdoing. Very few people are willing to hold themselves accountable for the errors and mishaps that inevitably occur in life. Instead, they tend to foist these situations off on others complaining of circumstances “beyond their control.”

Moral of story

The bottom line is clear. You need not have a lot of money to be happy and enjoy life. A trip to the local park, the beach or the mountains is virtually free and is all it takes. A donation of Rs. 100 will generally make you feel the same as a donation of Rs. 100, 000 - it’s the act of giving that seems to matter most.

You don’t need a stack of psychology books to understand these few basic things, all of which are backed by research studies. All you need is the willingness to incorporate more of them into your life.

සමනළ සංධවනිය අසම්මත සෙනෙහසක දෝංකාරය

ජීවිතය කවියක්‌, ගීතයක්‌ බඳු යෑයි කියන සහෘදයෝ බොහෝය. එහෙත් වත්මන අප නෙත සිත ගැටෙන බොහෝ සිංහල ටෙලි නාට්‍ය සේම චිත්‍රපටද ඒ සොඳුරු සංකල්පනා උපන්ගෙයිම මිලින කරවයි. හේතුව එබඳු නිර්මාණ බොහෝමයක්‌ ගම්‍ය කරවන්නේ ජීවිතය අදෝනාවක්‌ය, ෙ€දාන්තයක්‌ය යන්න වීමයි. සමනළ සංධවනිය චිත්‍රපටය ඒ අප්‍රසන්න වූ ඒකාකාරිත්වයෙන් සිංහල සිනමාව අලුත් මාවතකට ප්‍රවිශ්ඨ කළ නෙත ගැටෙන තරමට සිත සුවඳවත් කරනා සඳුන් හරක්‌ බඳුය. ප්‍රවීණ සිනමාවේදී ජයන්ත චන්ද්‍රසිරි මහතා සමනළ සංධවනිය සමග විචිත්‍ර ආදරණීය අත්දැකීමක්‌ සංවේදීව මනා සංයමයෙන් ප්‍රේක්‍ෂකයන්ට තිලිණ කර ඇත. සාම්ප්‍රදායික ජන සමාජයක්‌ නොකළඹා විළි ළන මුත් නූපදින සමාජ කතිකාවකට ගැනීමට බිය මාතෘකාවක්‌ විශිෂ්ට සිනමා කෘතියකට ගැබ් කිරීමට ඔහු සමත් වීමම ඔහුගේ ප්‍රතිභාව පෙන්නුම් කරවයි.

ඔපෙරා සංගීතයට නුහුරු පොදුජන ප්‍රේක්‍ෂක මනසට අලුත් සංගීතමය අත්දැකීමක්‌ ලබා දෙමින් අලුත් ආරක කතා පුවතක්‌ අධ්‍යක්‍ෂකවරයා චිත්‍රණය කර ඇත. සැබැවින්ම සමනළ සංධවනිය එක්‌ අතකින් ගීතමය චිත්‍රපටයකැයි කීම වැරදි නැත. ප්‍රේක්‍ෂක නෙත සිත මනස ඇද බැඳ ගන්නට හැකි එහෙත් සිංහල චිත්‍රපටයක එලෙස ප්‍රතිපල නොගත් කදිම උපාය මගක්‌ වන ගීතය, සංගීතය සමනළ සංධවනිය භාවාත්මක හා ගුණාත්මක තලයට ගෙන ඒමට අති විශාල දායකත්වයක්‌ සපයා ඇතැයි කීම සාවද්‍ය නොවේ. ප්‍රේක්‍ෂකයන් සමනළ සංධවනිය නරඹමින් සුන්දර සිහිනයක දැවටෙයි. එතරම් හෘදයංගමව, සෞන්දර්යාත්මකව, සියුම්ව සමනළ සංවනිය සිතුවම චිත්‍රණය කර ඇත. එනිසා සමනළ සංවනිය රූ පෙළහරකැයි නොකීම නොහොබී.

New vistas in television technology

Even as many countries around the world have switched their radio and TV broadcasts to digital, Sri Lanka seems to be lagging behind. There is very little awareness among the public that around eight channels are currently being broadcast in Sri Lanka in the higher-resolution digital format.

The catch is that your TV set should have a DVB-T (Digital Video Broadcast-Terrestrial) tuner.

Unfortunately, most people do not even know whether their TV set has a built-in DVB tuner. Most people have already replaced their ageing CRT TVs with the latest LCD versions and within the next three-four years, the entire television population of the country would be LCD (contrary to popular belief and sales talk, there are no LED TVs - the LED just refers to the back-light of the LCD panel).

However, this expansion would not mean anything if they do not have built-in DVB-T tuners and a vast majority of them still do not.

There is still no word on a cut-off date for the digital transition, which other countries have already achieved. That should be publicised and all TV importers and local assemblers/manufacturers must be told to sell only those sets which have digital tuners built-in. Set Top Boxes (STBs) can be made available later for those whose sets do not have DVB-T tuners.

Some TV stations already work in High Definition (or even higher resolutions) internally, so the transition will be smooth for them. This is why you see black bars at the top and bottom of your normal 4:3 (CRT TV) screen, because they already work in a wide-screen format. This is most apparent in the digital broadcasts, where you can see the ‘native’ wide-screen aspect ratio on a wide-screen LCD set.

There are many benefits of going digital: The pictures will have a higher resolution and more clarity, viewers can keep their existing antenna, surround sound options will be available (most TV stations broadcast sound digitally even now on the NICAM system), interactive features can be included, programs can be indexed and recorded and most importantly, the analogue spectrum presently used for analogue TV broadcasts can be given over to other users through a bidding process.

However, there is another option in the wings that can be considered if there is no immediate sign of converting to high definition digital broadcasts. It is called 4K or Ultra High Definition (UHD).

Broadcasters worldwide, including streaming operators such as Netflix and Amazon Instant Video, will be trialling 4K Ultra HD broadcasts from next year, which have four times the resolution of 1080-line high definition broadcasts at close to 4,000 lines. These 4K broadcasts will also be made from the 2014 Soccer World Cup in Brazil and the Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia.

Granted, it will take a few more years for the format to go mainstream, as TV networks which had barely made the transition to 1080-line HD have to upgrade their equipment once again to 4K. Broadcast regulators and manufacturers are also finalising 4K broadcast standards.

On the other hand, Sri Lankan networks have the ability to leapfrog straight to 4K once these standards are defined because some of them had done little or no investments in digital or HD so far.

Right now, everything points to a 4K future. TV sets capable of displaying 4K resolution can already be purchased in Sri Lanka.

They are a bit expensive compared to even the priciest normal HD sets, but within the next 4-5 years prices will fall dramatically and you will only be able to buy 4K sets anyway (Try your luck finding anything less than 1080p on a 40” or above set now – the same thing will happen with 4K).

With economies of scale kicking in, there will be very little difference in panel prices and manufacturers will incur no additional costs in selling 4K LED-LCD panels.

Besides, the newer OLED (Organic Light Emitting Diode) TV sets which require no back-lighting and consume much less power will also become cheaper and more widely available (they are not yet available in Sri Lanka).

Professional 4K broadcast equipment are also falling in price rapidly so that TV stations will be able to afford the equipment on more or less the same budget allocated to a normal HD broadcast suite.

Even ordinary consumers can buy 4K video cameras and editing equipment off the shelf now.

Moreover, in a few years’ time, it will no longer be necessary to watch TV on a conventional set.

Both terrestrial and satellite TV channels will easily be accessible through your laptop, tablet, phablet or smartphone all of which will also support 4K resolution.

Such services are already available in many countries and even here in Sri Lanka, some mobile companies offer a limited number of terrestrial and satellite channels ‘on the go’.

But users will be able to enjoy a far superior service through a combination of digital TV and perhaps 5G cellular service (an evolution of 4G), due to come on stream around 2018-2019. Internet technology too will have advanced by that time and streaming 4K content to end user devices (TVs, smartphones etc) will be much easier and faster.

New technology will also make it much more feasible to beam live TV to vehicles on the move.

There are endless possibilities with 4K some of which we cannot even predict now. In the early days of TV, there were many who predicted the death of radio. They were proved spectacularly wrong as radio has thrived around the world. We are still stuck in the FM (Frequency Modulation) age in radio whereas many other countries have moved over to the Digital Audio Broadcast (DAB) technology, which gives crystal clear reception and high fidelity sound. It is also possible to transmit station and song information via DAB to users’ radios.

DAB can also be paired with the Radio Data System (RDS) which can relay traffic and weather information, which is especially useful to those travelling by vehicle. DAB radios are already affordable and come in a variety of sizes. In a couple of years, in-vehicle Internet will be sufficiently advanced to provide access to Internet radio stations as well, so that someone driving in Colombo will be able to listen to a local station in Sydney, Australia without any interruption.

Satellite radio services aimed at vehicles, now available only in a few countries, will also be more widespread.

Our authorities must take preliminary steps to move to DVB/4K and DAB without delay so that we would be able to reap the dividends of this technological revolution in TV and radio broadcasting.

By Pramod De Silva -Sunday Observer

Brain's thickness associated with religion and spirituality

The importance of religion or spirituality to a person appears to be associated with the thickness of certain brain regions, according to a new study.

Researchers conducted a familial study of 103 adults (ages 18-54 years) who were the second- or third-generation offspring of depressed or non-depressed study participants.

Religious or spiritual importance and church attendance were assessed twice over five years. The cortical thickness of the brain was measured with magnetic resonance imaging at the second time point.Study findings indicate that importance of religion or spirituality, but not the frequency of church attendance, was associated with thicker cortices in some regions of the brain, independent of familial risk for depression.

Also, the effects of the importance of religion or spirituality on cortical thickness were stronger in the group at high familial risk for depression than in the low-risk group, especially in a brain region where a thinner cortex may be associated with a familial risk for developing depressive illness Although a high frequency of attendance at religious services was associated with a high personal importance of religion or spirituality, the association between attendance and cortical thickness was not significant, according to the study.

“We note that these findings are correlational and therefore do not prove a causal association between importance and cortical thickness,” the authors conclude.

MNT