What's In A Birthday?

An apt post on the day I turn 14.........

Its an everyday habit. You open up your Facebook page, glance to the newsfeed and then glance to the left! OMG! My friend has a birthday! And you post "Happy Birthday" or a variation of it (which nowadays ranges from hapi b'day to haaappiieeeeee buddddayyy!).

What's In A Birthday? Well, tomorrow (by the time this post's online, it'll be today) is my 14th Birthday, (Yay!), and NOT being the-kid-who celebrates-birthdays-cutting-cake-blowing candles-calling friends (woah!), I wondered, "What's In A Birthday"?

(Pre) Midnight inspiration struck! After browsing through a dozen pages, I thought of penning (digitalizing) it down into a blogpost. Well, read on!

Well, I declare Birthdays an ASTRONOMICAL (not astrological) phenomenon. The Earth revolves, and so do we, and after completing the looong (about 300 million km) journey around our Sun, we complete a full ellipse, right in time to celebrate our next birthday. Due to some technical stuff, we are not at the same on our birthday as we were the last year. In simple words, one more year has passed since you were born.

What's so great in that? Why did Birthday Parties start? Quoting a website, "The tradition of birthday parties started in Europe, due to a fear of evil spirits being particularly attracted to people on their birthdays. To protect them from harm, friends and family would to come be with the birthday person and bring good thoughts and wishes. This is how birthday parties began." Gradually as people started getting more socialized, new party 'gimmicks' such as Cakes, Balloons, Candles, Party Hats, Party Games, Return Gifts, Party Spray (so long till infinity) made their appearance. Recently, a haywire facebook b'day party attracted 20000 UNWANTED guests!!!

There IS a helluva going around this 'Birthday' phenomenon. A birthday has religious, legal and time related aspects as well, not to mention a brood of mathematicians mulling around a 'Birthday Paradox.' Let me introduce you to all that below!

Ah! Wondered about 'Leap' years? A Leap Year occurs once every four years. Think of those people born on 29th February on a Leap year! Famous ones include Morarji Desai (former Indian PM) and Pope Paul III. They face a Paradox! What do they do? Celebrate their special day once every four years? Or celebrate it on 28th Feb or 1st March? Legally, I guess its your free will to decide! By the way, these bunch of people are branded "Leap Year Babies."

Lewis Carroll, (creator of Alice and Wonderland), coined a neologism (a phrase not used commonly) in his book 'Through the Looking Glass'. Called an Unbirthday, it is an event that can be celebrated on any day that is not the person's birthday! (Most probably, its your unbirthday today!)

Then there is the Half Birthday, which occurs approximately six months before or after the person's real birthday. This can be quite useful in schools, especially when a kid wants his birthday to be celebrated in front of the whole school, but cannot do so because his birthday falls in the holidays! Then there is a Decimal Birthday, celebrated according to base ten, commemorating 100 or 1000 days after you were born!

Then you have the traditional birthday song, according to the Guinness Book of World Records, "The Most Recognised Song in the English Language." "Happy Birthday to You" "Tra La La La La La"....Well! The value of this song is based at $5 million!!! The song (performed by the Chipmunks) below:

Thanks for reading so far! Glad you made through all the stuff above! Given 365/366 days in a year, another question pops up into your minds! What is the most common birthday around? Well, in USA, the most common birthday is October 5. In the rest of the world, generally the period between September 15 to October 15 is likely to have more birthdays. Quotes a website, "Any birthday has a theory: To be born in this period, a baby would most likely have been conceived on New Year's Eve."

Well, given the same fact above, I ask a question, "What is the probability that given a random group of people, some pair of them will have the same birthday?" Well, according to the popular Pigeonhole Principle, if you get in 367 people there is a 100% chance that you will come across a pair sharing their birthdate.

But, if mathematical probability holds then, there is a 99% chance that you will find a same-birthday pair if you have a group of 57 people. There is 50% chance when there are 23 people and a 90% chance when you have 41 people in the group.

Well, With a mixture of thoughts in my head, a prospect of having a Facebook wall full of Happy Birthday posts and mumbing "Happy Birthday To You" in my mind, I sign off.

Later!