Wednesday, August 13, 2008

The right to be left!


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Did you ever wonder why men's and women's clothing are buttoned on opposite sides?Or why wedding rings are worn only on the third finger of your left hand?Or why left handedness is banned in the game of polo?by now,i presume you have hit at what i am guessing.yeah,welcome to the "sinister" world of the gauchies,or plainly,the lefthanders.......the word LEFT,since time immemorial has been considered to have a malignous connotation,and an evil presence in our lives.The whole of chinese philosophy depends on the concept of yin and yang,or positive and negative bundles of energies,depicted by the right and the left respectively.Virtually ,all of the worlds religions associate the left with the evil,or dirty.Even clocks go in the right direction,and so do compasses.The christians still believe that Eve was made from Adam's left rib.and strangely, in modern day japan,a wife being left-handed can be a solid ground for divorce!!!!! ......
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Innumberable trivias follow the world of lefties.some interesting,some ridiculous,but at the bottom, very very painful.this world is made for the right handers i must say.in school ,has anyone of us seen a left handed desk?they dont exist.novelty coffee mugs are made with the picture or text for a right handed pick-up.then again scissors are for right handers.only lefties understand this.(another trivia: around the world , 2500 left handed people die each year using right handed products!!!in all,studies confirm that left handed people live an average of ten years less than their right handed counterparts!!).... and the mouse you are using as you read this is designed for right handers.the list spreads onto other products like the spiral bound notebooks,playing cards,rulers,belts,ATM machines,bowling balls,water jerrycans,cameras....et all.

.I still remember,once when i was in my second standard,the note of caution that my teacher sent to my parents when she caught me practising my cursives with my left hand. It read" the boy uses his wrong hand for writing.take care of it.".though my dad let it pass,henceforth,i could see my mom bending over me often to check if i ever used my left hand while writing.though i switched on to become a "rightie",i still have that note preserved safely ,a reminder of the first discrimination of my life.........this world beleives in equality.so why not give lefties a chance.not to return to right handedness,i mean ,but to be as they are..When Colonel Baden Powell ,the famous founder of the boys scouts,entered the city of ashanti people in 1896,he was met by one of the chiefswho came to him holding out his left hand for a handshake.baden powell held out his right hand in return,when the chief said out aloud,"no,in my country , the bravest of the brave,shake hands with the left hand."..So started the legend of the famous left hand handshake of the boys scouts. Even today when a scout meets another,they extend their left hands to express solidarity and oneness.

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Btw,today,August the 13th, is Worlds left handers day. You can choose to write a greeting note to Angelina Jolie,Amitabh Bachchan, or well,Darshak Parmar!


Keep the faith!




10 comments:

Spectator said...

finally !!!!!!!!!!!!!! someone said something about left handers !!!! i truly understand the problems faced by left handers. i m still facing the discriminations... however, wish you a very happy left handers' day !!!!

Che said...

Ah well the world loves to discriminate.
You forgot one more "Left", the reds.

But playing cards, belts,bowling balls ?????? How????

Surya, the Ayrus! said...

@djjay, happy lefty day to you too!

@che, well ya, as for the reds, the lesser it is said, the better it is..
and for playing cards, the arrangement of the identification number on each card is done in a diagonal from north west to south east, wherein the right handed person catches the card in the south west position.
belts, just think about the hand with which u buckle your belt.. isnt your operational hand right again? how does a leftie do it?
same case, bowling balls, arrangement of the finger holes with respect to thumb...

gotcha?

Anonymous said...

why do i get a feeling of deja vu :)
Reminds of rediff blogging days :D

Anonymous said...

good post ther....n yeah...quite an interesting topic...the day faded without creating much an awareness of being one....
my mom's too a leftie....neva noticed all this thou.....
good one ther...

keep the ink flowin....:)

Anonymous said...

good post ther....n yeah...quite an interesting topic...the day faded without creating much an awareness of being one....
my mom's too a leftie....neva noticed all this thou.....
good one ther...

keep the ink flowin....:)

Anonymous said...

well I am a left handar and ya happy left handers day to darshak...
Well as the author rightly pointed out that we are considered as sinicals or gouche.. but we have always adapted ourself no matter we live 10years less then right handed people we still live life with more adaptability..no wrongs against right handers but we the left handers have always adapted as the world demands us to... so cheers for all the left handers...

Nupur said...

You forgot mentioning that guitars and shirt buttons are also made keeping the right handers in mind!!!

Shanky said...

Hullo SP...

Thanks for writing this one... at last I have something to refute! But before that.. Happy lefties day! This post has come at a time everyone is hating the left! (pun intended):P

1. Mouse can be configured for left hand use, I think

2. Cards have come for lefties. But just imagine... four players one leftie and cards for lefties???

For once let there be advantage for the majority in this country!!! Already we have enough minority concessions. :) (again... pun.... !!! ;) )

But the Trivia mentioned are awesome.. nice post dude..

cheers
Shanky

Shanky said...

But having said all that.. changing your natural "use-hand" is bad. natural is beautiful!! :)