A day
to say 'hello' - November 21
Hello
is among the most commonly used (English) words in the world, thanks to the
telephone, the great inventor Edison having used it on receiving his first
telephone call, though Graham Bell himself is said to have used 'ahoy'
throughout. It is found to be relative newcomer into the English lexicon just
around early 1800s. Its precursor could have been 'hail' as found addressing
the emperors (Hail Caesar - Shakespeare), which could have meant health (hale,
health, whole), and might have had versions like 'hollo', 'hallo', 'halloa'
when shouted out amidst the din of crowds. Today, hello is a word easily
addressable to anyone to greet, to catch attention, to check on, if you are
there.
Hello
Day was born from the initiative of Michael McCormack, a student of Harvard and
his brother Brian, who sought an idea for a better world, with the bitter three
year Yom Kippur war between Egypt and Israel in background, ending in October
1973. While his fellow students busied themselves with their academic tasks,
they dreamt of a peaceful world through personal communication, spent all their
savings to post letters on hello-day to world leaders - not to be disappointed,
getting endorsement from 15 within a year, and in due course from 31 Nobel
laureates and over 100 leading authors. Hats off to the well meaning
McCormack's, who challenge us to step out of our boxes to extend peace!
The
celebration involves reaching out to others, saying hello to friends, family
and to at least 10 unfamiliar people, using hello equivalent from other
languages! Though 'hello' has become almost translingual, some of the typical
equivalents are hola, mrhaban, hallo, ciao, ni-hao, bonjour,
namaste - see if you can identify the languages! But as the
kids-song goes, you can say 'a hello from your mouth, your eyes, your
hands, your arms and above all, from your heart'!
Today,
50 years of hello day, and yet the world is war-torn - internal: Yemen, Syria,
Libya, Lebanon, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Somalia, Myanmar, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka;
external: Ukraine, Palestine, Taiwan; and warlike - India-Pakistan,
Armenia-Azerbaijan... perhaps, many more. It is not enough to have powerful
arms for security; peace ought to be built, brick-by-brick, by increased
engagement between peoples, reaching out with a hello, a how-are-you, a smile,
a mail, a hand-shake, a hug - that build bridges between people of good will
everywhere, in spite of religio-political differences.
Now my
dream is to cross our border and reach out to Pakistan in a year, to say a 'salam'
from my heart to at least 100 of them across, and find, like the Bajrangi
Bhaijan, 100s of them just awaiting such a hello for lasting peace!
https://nationaltoday.com/world-hello-day/
https://www.daysoftheyear.com/days/hello-day/
https://www.thecrimson.com/article/1999/6/8/bonjour-hola-shalom-michael-mccormack-founder/
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