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Hello Spring 2018 by the Gingerbread Ladies
Template from January 2025 Challenge by J Conlon and Sons
Journaling:
Coming from Saskatchewan, Canada, where the time stays the same all year round, we are used to having a bit of confusion in our lives in the spring and the fall when everyone around us resets their clocks. Suddenly the TV shows we watched at 7 pm are on an hour earlier (or an hour later) but we learn to adjust. Similarly, calling family and friends in other parts of the country requires a bit of adjustment to be sure it is not too early (or too late) for a call. When we moved to Fiji in 2015 it was already past the date on which clocks changed there, so it wasn’t until late in the year that we experienced the true confusion that can come from the semi-annual time change. It seems that there are two steps involved in a country implementing or stopping the use of Daylight Savings Time. First, the government has to pass the appropriate legislation to either opt in or opt out of the practice. Second, the government has to let the keepers of the World Clock in Greenwich know of their decision and if applicable, the dates of the time changes for the year. Apparently in Fiji, the first step was taken but somehow not the second. Imagine the confusion when the country stayed on regular time one year, and still all the cell phones and computer networks moved to DST. To make things even more confusing, of the two main cellular service providers, one implemented a fix for the time change while the other was not so proactive. There was know way to know what the correct time was, especially as someone new to the country, because the analog clocks that people historically relied on for the time had fallen into disrepair since everyone had a phone or computer to tell the time so the clock in the park became redundant. That experience will come back to me every spring and every fall when we hear about the time change - even if it doesn’t affect us directly.