From BOMBAY to MUMBAI

Somehow the name change slipped by me. Bombay is now Mumbai – did you know that? In 1997, fifty years after the British left India, the government decided to ‘delete colonial rule from public memory’ and changed the name back to Mumbai, a legendary ‘divine’ protectress, and the original name from way back when. I guess I was paying too much attention to the millennium crisis to notice the name change when it happened?

It was in 1935 that the Shah changed Persia into Iran. Siam became Thailand (land of the free in the Thai language) in 1939 but went back to Siam after its embarrassing alliance with Japan during the war. It changed back to ‘Thailand’ again in 1949 though. Ceylon became Sri Lanka, Belgian Congo became Zaire, British Honduras became Belize, Rhodesia became Zimbabwe, Southwest Africa became Namibia and the dissolution of the USSR created a myriad of hither-to unrecognized –ias and –stans: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan…

Good grief. Really makes you wonder why Todd’s 7th grade geography teacher was so hot on having his classes memorize all the countries and their capitals.

Tough to keep up. Evidently the stamp collectors are having as much trouble as the historians and geographers. One has to wonder if it is really national pride or a heck of a sales job on the part of the people who make the stationery and maps.

I don’t really have a point here. Just kept running across ‘Mumbai’ and wondering how that happened and why I didn’t notice it and one thing led to another. You know how it is. With the internet available one can find answers to all perplexing questions in a bat of the eye – or a few letters typed into Google.

And now that I’ve done this… Would this be an appropriate time to say “Have a nice day?” Or maybe add a smiley face? (Good grief - am I really losing it here?)