05 May 2013, 11:42 AM IST
Recently, in what is reportedly nothing more than an urban legend, Australia banned Santa Claus characters from saying 'Ho-ho-ho' loudly at public places as it was "scaring children" who are only used to 'Ha-ha-ha'! Well, if you think that's funny, here's what the Finnish people say, and Finland is supposed to be the official home of Santa Claus, up there in the Arctic Circle in a small town called Rovaniemi: "Santa doesn't say Ho ho ho – he says Hey hey hey!" The difference in vowel would seem to hardly matter, the point being that the sound rises up from one's belly as laughter or mirth. The idea is to express the happiness and joy we feel, especially during festive occasions – take or leave a few ho's and ha's!
Why do we laugh? And why is it that this ability (to laugh) is the exclusive privilege of humans? The laughing hyena doesn't really laugh; it earned the moniker on account of all the high-pitched shrieking and maniacal laughing sounds that the spotted hyenas generate as they feast on carcasses – "so much at such times that a superstitious person might really think all the inhabitants of the infernal regions had been let loose," wrote Alfred Brehm in the nineteenth century. (Here's a non-sequitur about hyenas while we're on the subject: The International Union for Conservation of Nature has listed the species as being of 'least concern' as opposed to 'most endangered' – because they are to be found in large numbers and no one pays them any special attention).
To come back to laughter and thence to humour, the unwritten rule, as frequently pointed out by humour writer Jug Suraiya, is that you don't make fun of those who are less privileged than you are. To do so would not only be downright rude and unfeeling, it would also reflect poorly on you. All else is kosher, from lampooning politicians (the more exalted the person's status, the more he lends himself to being the butt of jokes) and poking fun at peer groups to cracking dark jokes and performing stand-up comedies, as long as it makes you laugh without being wicked and hurtful.
Perhaps the repeated reminders given by gurus, masters and life coaches on the need for us to be grateful for our lives as human beings is not only because we are supposed to have intellect, but also because we can joke about ourselves and look upon existence, too, as one big coc parody.
Nowhere is our love of laughter more visible than in internet and SMS slang as in LOL (laughing out loud), ROTFL (rolling on the floor laughing) and usage of emoticons and smileys that come in a range of expressions from grins and chuckles to guffaws and wink-winks. And the return of gallows humour -- dark or black humour -- that makes light of grave situations is to be welcomed as respite from an otherwise dreary and involuted view of life.
If death is imminent, it is far more pleasant to die laughing than to leave behind a trail of sad memories that plunges everyone into depression. And in order to be able to do this, we need to deposit happy memories into our memory banks and those of others' as well, drawing from the innings we make in our daily lives.
So here's to Madan Kataria, the Mumbai-based physician who started the business of assigning a special day for laughter while promoting it as a good way to experience wellness. But let's not reserve our smiles for just this one day of the year – if laughter is infectious, this is one 'affliction' Dr Kataria would be happy to let proliferate, 365 days of the year!
Anda sedang membaca artikel tentang
Jest a minute
Dengan url
http://osteoporosista.blogspot.com/2013/05/jest-minute.html
Anda boleh menyebar luaskannya atau mengcopy paste-nya
Jest a minute
namun jangan lupa untuk meletakkan link
sebagai sumbernya
0 komentar:
Posting Komentar