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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.
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| Same but different |
The
mystery unsolved hitherto, was like restoring carbon produced from the charcoal
of misconception that would further blacken and besmirch my teaching. It was
like a thorn in my thought that kept prickling. The
mystery is nothing typical that can draw an ounce of human attention. But to
me, it sounded something a clear misunderstanding.
Almost
on every page of publications, through my lens of understanding, I read the
‘moon’ as “daw’ in
our language. But it is only today that I realised this same word (which might have its own nature of explanation) proclaiming a different meaning to
me.
For example, the way it is used in referring to the weekdays posed a challenge. If the moon is
still believed as ‘Daw’,
then it should not be Sunday that gets the name ‘gza daw’ (གཟའ་ཟླ་བ་). The Sunday
should instead be named as ‘gza nyim’ (གཟའ་ཉི་མ་) if the literal
meanings of the sun for ‘Nyim’ and
moon for ‘daw’ has
to be retained 😁.
In
a Tibetan calendar, they also use the moon
for ‘daw’ and
that’s why they have ‘gza daw’ (གཟའ་ཟླ་བ་) on Monday. Monday
is actually believed to have derived from an Old English term known as Monenday, meaning
‘Moon Day’. Tibetan calendar portrays Sunday as gza nyim’ (གཟའ་ཉི་མ་) because it has
an astrological meaning with the object like the sun. The nature of the calendar is
lunisolar which signifies both the
phase of the moon and the time of the solar year.
Having been brought up with a purely Bhutanese way of understanding,
now I can detect a weak muscle in my tongue to taste the other way. I like
speaking in its own traditional way because that is the true charm of being
Bhutanese.
Nice post la. Thoroughly enjoyed.
ReplyDeleteThank you sir. You are often the first besides being a regular visitor in almost all blogs. Your words keep me moving. Thank you fro visiting my page.
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.
DeleteThank you for visiting my page.
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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.