Tomorrow will be the last day of the year 2018, as the new year will soon come, and
we will all spend a few weeks writing our 19’s like this.
It happens every year.
But New Year’s doesn’t always have to come just after the winter solstice.
In fact, most calendars put their new year celebrations in very different times of the
year.
So, in what seems to be my annual holiday tradition of talking about other calendar
systems, let’s look at some of the other new year’s celebrations from around the
world.
One of the most well-known new years celebrations (at least in North America, where people probably
don’t give much of a care about these things) is Chinese New Year, also known as the Spring
Festival.
The festival occurs around late-January to early-February, and is associated with numerous
different traditions, including honoring ancestors, red envelopes filled with money, and huge
festivals (but I mean, that’s basically everywhere).
From a non-Chinese perspective, Chinese New Year also frequently brings up the Chinese
Zodiac, based on assigning different years to a cycle of 12 different animals of 5 different
elements in either yin or yang energies (2019 will be the year of the yin Earth pig).
Chinese New Year is popular both in China, and in Chinese communities across east/southeast
Asia, the Americas, Europe and other areas around the world, and in fact has also inspired
new year’s celebrations in Tibet, Korea and Vietnam.
Rosh Hashanah is the Jewish new year, and is celebrated around September, on the first
day of the month of Tishrei.
Confusingly, while Tishrei marks the beginning of the civil year, it is actually the seventh
month of the year, with the first being Nisan (which has Passover, and is in spring).
Nisan comes first because it marks the anniversary of when the ol’ G-dash-D created Adam and
Eve.
Perhaps the most well known symbol of Rosh Hashanah is the shofar, a musical horn made
out of a ram’s horn.
It’s only really used for religious purposes, it’s not actually used for any real musical
purposes, since there’s no real way to adjust the pitch or anything like that, on account
of it basically just being a ram’s horn someone plucked off.
The Islamic New Year works slightly differently.
The Islamic New Year is marked with the month of Muharram, the first month of the Islamic
calendar year, and one of the four holy months of the year.
The new year itself isn’t too unusual, but what is a bit unusual is how the date of the
new year changes every year.
This is because the Islamic calendar, unlike most other calendars, is a purely lunar calendar.
So, while it does follow the cycles of the moon, it doesn’t align itself to the seasons,
so it falls back with every passing 354-day year.
So, the 1st of Muharram, 1440 was on 11.Sep.2018 (I swear there’s no relation) but the 1st
of Muharram, 1441 will be on 1.Sep.2019.
In fact, the 1st of Muharram, 1450 will be on 26.May.2028, so the Islamic calendar is
really kind of objective when it comes to what season new year’s (or any holiday)
happens in.
Nowruz is the Persian new year, celebrated all across central and southwest Asia, not
just Iran, and is celebrated on the spring equinox (which is usually 21.March).
Nowruz marks the first day of the year in the Persian calendar, meaning Iran effectively
uses three calendars: the Persian calendar for tradition, the Islamic calendar for religious
purposes, and the Gregorian calendar for dealing with us annoying tourists.
The origins of the holiday aren’t quite clear, but are rooted in Zoroastrianism, and
date back more than 2,000 years.
I mean, the Gregorian calendar itself isn’t even 500 years old (though the similar Julian
calendar is a bit older).
The original Roman calendar only had ten months of 30 or 31 days, making for 304-day years;
and with January and February basically completely missing, there was a 51-day period where there
basically weren’t any months.
DR: Canada, ¿cuándo es tu día de independencia?
Canada: It’s the first of July.
When’s yours?
DR: No sé.
Canada: You don’t know your own independence day?
DR: Bueno, está cerca del final del invierno, pero no sé exactamente.
Canada: I see… sorry about that.
But then, Julius Caesar (or Iulius Caesar) went to Egypt and liked what they had, and
reformed the calendar after their system, creating the Julian calendar.
However, in Egypt still exists the Coptic calendar, and their new year celebration Neyrouz.
Neyrouz (whose name does in fact come from that of Nowruz) is a feast celebrated by the
Coptic Orthodox Church in Egypt in commemoration of various martyrs and confessors, and is
generally celebrated on the 11th of September.
[USA] Which is also the same date as the Ethiopian new year, Enkutatash.
[USA] Though they’ll both move to the 12th if it’s a leap year in either of their respective
calendar systems.
Of course, most of these calendar systems are used traditionally, though some are actually
used for day-to-day affairs, and not just in places like Iran.
Israel also essentially uses both the Gregorian and Hebrew calendars, and Saudi Arabia would
probably much prefer to run on the Islamic calendar, though doing that in the modern
world is like trying to use the metric system in America.
You’re definitely going to have to work for people to understand the measurements
you’re making.
Of course, most of these celebrations are used out of tradition, and Gregorian new year’s
is generally still celebrated, at least in most parts of the world.
However, the point of this video was really to show how new year’s celebrations don’t
always have to be in the depths of winter, and in the case of the Islamic calendar don’t
even have to correspond with any seasonal changes.
Thank you as always for watching, and be sure to give this video a like if you liked this
video, and give a dislike if you didn’t, I guess.
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