:: Cyrus Broacha

Why do we have a New Year?

By Cyrus Broacha

My son asked me a very important question while instinctively rubbing my foot with a fork: "Why do we have a New Year?"

As I gently removed the fork, and started applying the necessary bandage, I realised that this was a beautiful question and how rare it was for someone so handy with cutlery to ask such a beautiful question. Think about it, we all have a vague idea as to how the concept of a calendar with days, months and year came about.

Romans, who had got paper from the Chinese and ink from the Egyptians, after some misleading experiments including putting paper on top of ink, discovered the art of writing. However, after doing so they immediately panicked as no one had a clue about what to write about.

It was then that Julius Caesar did one of the two things, he is most famous for, the other being the hairpiece of course. He just got up and danced. He then made others dance. These others in turn made some others dance. Finally everybody knew somebody or the other who were dancing. These dancers were then timed. The first record was 24 consecutive hours. The next record was for straight 30 such days.

Ultimately, on Caesar’s deathbed all of his home, minus himself, danced for the then world record of 30 days x12.

All these figures were then put on paper. Each group of days represented a naked figure of a young goddess except February. February was accompanied by pictures of Caesar’s great great grandmother, Julie Aunty the second, and from no angle or point of view could she be considered a young woman, when she was actually young, those many many years ago.

This also explains why February has only 28 days. It’s because the writers and artists who were working on that month all either quit or died or both well before February 31st, unable to daily bear the rather uncomely sight of Julius Caesar’s great great grandmother. But I waste time as every little school boy knows the story. The question is, then why do we have a New Year?

The stress being on New. Why can’t we just repeat the old year especially if it’s been a good one? For eg. 1973 was a good year (I’m judging by the Playboy centrefold I have of that year. It was a very good year). Then why not just repeat 1973 in the next year. Why bother with 1974, let’s just go and do 1973 all over again. To ward off confusion, we could call it "1973 — Part II" or "Deux" or "1973 Strikes Back". Or "1973 — The Return of Jedi" or my favourite, "A blast from the past, 1973 — An encore". Conversely, 2008 between November 26 and the worldwide recession has been a poor year. India’s cricket journey, the election of Obama and my wife spending more time in Hyderabad, being the only silver lining.

In such a case of a bleak year, why not herald in the year before. Let’s celebrate 2007 once more, instead of 2009 or even worse, a repeat of 2008 or a 2008 Part II. Deux. If you still feel 2007 would have a bleak ending because it leads to ugh, yuck in 2008, we could create a buffer zone by simply rolling a few years back to say, 1998! After all 1998 was good and 1999 was even better.

Thank you son for opening my eyes and fillet mignoning my foot!! I would also like to take this opportunity to wish everybody a Happy New Year for "1998 Part II". Deux. Or "1998 Strikes Back," or "1998 — Return of the Jedi".