Last
week
I
told
the
story
about
the
Reader’s
Digest
editions
I
received,
a
present
sent
by
Nathércio
França.
I
told
of
the
long
wait
I
had
for
them
to
arrive
and
of
the
pure
joy
I
felt
at
finally
having
them
in
my
anxious
hands,
and
the
pleasure
I
still
have
in
reading
them.
Today,
I
continue
to
take
advantage
of
them,
at
the
moment
I
am
browsing
through
some
from
November
1945,
researching
information
which
would
be
helpful
in
my
essay
about
the
calendar.
A
little
history
and
a
proposal
of
change,
to
help
our
lives
become
a
little
more
orderly
in
terms
of
weeks
and
months.
Don’t
be
alarmed;
my
friend…at
the
present
moment,
no
known
government
is
concerned
about
these
things.
All
are
much
more
involved
about
how
much
money
they
owe
and
to
whom
they
owe
it,
and
also
about
rising
taxes
and
tax
evasion.
The
name
calendar
comes
from
the
latin
“calendas”,
which
represented
the
first
day
of
each
month
in
ancient
Rome.
There
have
been
countless
ways
of
measuring
time
through
history,
each
nation
having
their
own
method
of
organizing
the
weeks,
months
and
years.
And
so…pre-history
calendars
began
to
appear.
The
Hebrew,
Chinese,
Mayan,
Armenian,
Egyptian,
Hindu,
Moslem,
Roman,
Aztec
and,
who
knows,
perhaps
even
a
Brazilian
calendar,
back
when
our
native
Indian
population,
the
Tupi-Guanany
nation,
measured
the
passing
of
time
by
counting
the
phases
of
the
moon.
It
was
always
such
an
absurd
mixture
of
criteria,
calculated
in
such
a
way,
that
an
airplane
which
left
London
on
the
5
of
January,
1939
and
arrived
in
Belgrade,
in
Yugoslavia
on
the
same
day
but
on
a
date
designated
as
of
December
23,
1933.
If
an
airplane
flies
very
quickly
and
arrives
in
Japan
in
only
5
hours,
it
would
end
up
arriving
yesterday!
It’s
so
crazy
that
no
one
can
understand
it.
For
example,
Easter
can
fall
on
any
Sunday
from
March
22
and
April
25,
and
Christmas
always
falls
on
the
same
day,
December
25.
Take
note
that
Holy
Friday
is
always
on
a
Friday
but
never
on
the
same
day
of
the
month.
Mathematicians,
in
doing
their
calculations,
see
that
there
are
no
three
trimesters
of
exactly
the
same
number
of
days.
They
always
have
90,
91,
92
or
93
days.
This
is
because
30
days
have
September,
April,
June
and
November.
February
has
28,
and
all
the
rest
have
31.
In
this
poetic
manner,
it’s
very
confusing
to
calculate
mediums
and
make
statistics.
The
Orthodox
Jews,
even
until
today,
use
the
lunar
calendar
and
synchronize
their
seasons,
injecting
an
extra
month
every
two
or
three
years
in
passing.
The
first
Romans
lived
under
a
year
of
only
ten
months,
or,
if
you
please,
304
days.
This
continued
until
Numa
Pompilio,
in
the
seventh
century
B.C.,
added
the
months
of
January
and
February.
But,
all
this
made
dates
so
uncertain
that
the
high
priests
resorted
to
habitually
cutting
them
down
time-wise
when
their
adversaries
were
in
power
and
would
then
stretch
them
out
to
please
their
favorites…
The
Egyptians,
on
studying
the
shadows
cast
by
the
pyramids,
created
the
year
of
365
days
and
eight
hours,
having
twelve
months
of
thirty
days
each
and
five
extra
days
reserved
for
celebrations,
and
besides
all
this,
they
even
had
a
leap-year
every
five
years.
On
the
other
hand,
the
Aztecs
had
a
year
consisting
of
eighteen
months
and
twenty
days,
and
the
remaining
days
reserved
for
festive
days
or
for
bad
days
which
they
referred
to
as
“nefastos”.
In
an
attempt
to
uniform
time,
the
system
was
then
adapted
to
the
Roman
world,
when
Julio
Cesar
decreed
that
the
year
46
B.C.
be
stretched
to
445
days,
so
that
it
would
be
synchronized
to
the
sun.
Due
to
the
numerous
superstitions
regarding
odd
numbered
days,
the
five
extra
days
saved
for
celebrations
were
promptly
distributed
among
the
months.
One
day
was
subtracted
from
“Februarius”
and
given
to
“Quintilis”,
which
later
was
renamed
“Julius”,
in
honor
of
himself,
creator
of
this
calendar.
Cutting
the
year
down
further
yet,
a
second
amputation
was
perpetrated
against
“Februarius”,
for
Augusto,
who
summed
this
day
to
his
birth
month,
August.
It
was
only
in
the
year
325
A.C.
that
the
council
of
Nicea
established
the
week
consisting
of
seven
days,
independent
of
the
number
of
months
and
years,
strong
enough
to
walk
on
its
own
legs,
if
a
week
could
have
legs,
of
course.
It
was
in
1852
that
Pope
Gregorio
corrected
Cesar’s
astronomy,
ordering
that
three
leap-year
days
be
stricken
from
the
calendar
every
four
centuries.
And
here
is
a
novelty,
if
a
world
year
calendar
was
developed,
each
one
would
be
doted
with
thirteen
months,
each
week
starting
on
Sunday
and
ending
every
Saturday.
The
365th
day
would
be
extra
and
be
called
the
last
day
of
the
year.
That
would
then
be
a
great
disadvantage
for
us
Brazilians:
Christmas
and
New
Years
would
always
fall
on
the
week-end.
We
would
lose
our
much
cherished
extended
holidays.
