A Calendar That Is 7 Years Behind !

A neighbour of mine visited Ethiopia, an African country, last month. He was on business tour. When he returned, he told me about the Ethiopian calendar which was different from the Western version. I listened to him and then forgot all about it. Today when I read about it in the newspaper I came to know how different it was. The paper said it was 7 years behind.

What surprised me most was many young people were waiting for the millennium to get over. A man ,Daniel Hailu ,had promised to marry his girlfriend after the millennium. And how eagerly she awaits the arrival of her wedding ring ! “She is so relieved that 1999 is almost over”, said Mr. Hailu. Mr. Hailu is not living in a time warp ,but rather in Ethiopia where, thanks to a quirk of history, the country’s calendar lags more than seven years behind the Western version. Only on Tuesday night, after years of anticipation and months of frenzied preparation, will the year 2000 finally be ushered in.

Although many Ethiopians , particularly those in the cities are equally comfortable using the western dateline, there is little doubting their pride in maintaining their own calendar. Ethiopia is considered as the cradle of humankind and holds the record of being the only African country to resist colonization successfully . The faith-based calendar reinforces the feeling that while they are African, they are also unique.

There are more than 200 countries in this world and these people are the only ones to celebrate the millennium at this time . World is full of amazing things and we seem to know only a fraction of it. This is one such thing that amazes us.

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