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I remember my Kindergarten days when I first learned that Daw is the Dzongkha word for moon. Fast forward to my teaching years, I found myself singing the same old lyric to teach my
students.
However, today I experienced a wild kind of suffocation inside the prison of a hard mystery, as I realised that the same song I sang many moons ago has a deeper, elusive meaning. This mystery has parked me on my chair, helplessly mulling over for hours.
Misunderstanding?
Until now, I had not solved this mystery. It felt like a lingering confusion that clouded my understanding and made me question what I was teaching. It kept bothering me - like a thorn in my mind. The
mystery was not something most people would even notice. But to
me, it felt something a clear misunderstanding.
I always thought that the word "Daw" meant moon in our language. Every time I read about the moon, I saw it referred to as Daw. But today I realised that this same word seems to have another meaning.
For example, the way it is used for weekdays confused me. If the moon is
still believed as ‘Daw’,
then why is Sunday called ‘gza daw’ (གཟའ་ཟླ་བ་) instead ‘gza nyim’ (གཟའ་ཉི་མ་), since ‘Nyim’ refers to the sun? Should not Sunday be linked to the sun, not the moon? 😁.
What's in the Tibetan Calendar?
In
a Tibetan calendar, they also use the moon
for ‘daw’ and
that’s why Monday is ‘gza daw’ (གཟའ་ཟླ་བ་) - just like Monday in English means Monenday, meaning
‘Moon Day’.
Their Sunday, however is called gza nyim’ (གཟའ་ཉི་མ་) because it is connected to the sun. This makes sense since their calendar is
lunisolar, following both the moon's phases and the solar year.
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| Same but different |
Lesson?
Growing up with a purely Bhutanese understanding, it is challenging now to see things from a different perspective. But even with this new knowledge, I still prefer speaking in our traditional way - it's a part of who I am as a Bhutanese.
Nice post la. Thoroughly enjoyed.
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ReplyDeleteconfusing hey sirji..:P
ReplyDeleteSonam sir,
DeleteThis has already confused me. While teaching my children, I have to expect the unexpected. I wrote this in a hope that somebody can rescue me explaining the mystery.
Thank you for visiting my page. You are one life line that keeps me hang around the blog.
indeed sir...i hope you would make simpler than this for your students.., and thanks for considering me as a lifeline for your blog...:)
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ReplyDeleteLanga sir,
DeleteThank you for the comments. Your feedbacks are always welcome. It is the kind of educational prescription advised by the literary experts in restoring the health of one's writing. I am afraid whether I make some sense to the readers, who passes by.
Thank you visiting it.
Its indeed a food for thought!, never realized as such. it is also confusing though. Nice post any way..
ReplyDeleteThank you Mr.Tshewang for the comments. Sometimes, the smallest things that we leave unattended leads to a sheer confusion in understanding it.
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I am not native speaker of Dzongkha, just a Western scholar of Classical Tibetan. I have learned the days of the week according to Tibetan system, but just today I realized that there is also a Bhutanese way. In the morning I saw a Bhutanese calender and noticed the difference. At first I thought it must be a mistake, but now I have found more information, including this web page, and learned something new. Still I am wondering what is the reason of this difference.
ReplyDeleteDear PL,
DeleteThank you for reading my post. I will try to find out the difference and let you know. Thank you so much.