Perhaps one day a week to catch our breath, to kick back on the couch and lounge about would be sufficient. However, most around the world that do enjoy the much-deserved two-day weekend spend one day catching up on chores – paying bills, cleaning gutters and organizing photos. So, while one day is dedicated to crossing off to-do lists, the other is for rest and relaxation. The walks in parks, movies in theaters and long lunches included.
However, accomplishing both is rather problematic with Nepal’s greedy one day off for every six days spent laboring.
Henry Ford, one of the world’s greatest entrepreneurs referred to earlier, not only cut the workday from ten to eight hours, but also the workweek from six to five days. If you don’t take my word for it, do take his, “Now we know from our experience in changing from six to five days and back again that we can get at least as great production in five days as we can in six, and we shall probably get a greater, for the pressure will bring better methods.”
If a six-day workweek was truly the most efficient means of getting more done – cramming more math formulas and increasing output in factories it may seem practical (even if also rude to work people like donkeys). Yet, as the case of Nepal showcases – it is not making students any more pleased to study or workers any more eager to work. And, here we will return to Ford again, who chided, “We find that the men come back after a two day holiday so fresh and keen that they are able to put their minds as well as their hands into their work.”
While foreign diplomatic missions, development agencies and bideshi staff, such as some doctors in rural hospitals in remote Nepal do get two-day weekends, Nepalis working in Nepali offices usually don’t. And this is when the Western world, perhaps with America taking the lead, is already considering Ford’s 90-plus year notion, "The five day week is not the ultimate, and neither is the eight hour day. It is enough to manage what we are equipped to manage and to let the future take care of itself. It will anyway. That is its habit.”
Times have changed as have lifestyle and needs. China adopted the two-day weekend in 1995, Vietman in 1999. When will it be our turn?
It looks like it is time for that next move. Anna Shipley over at greennurture.com last year wrote about how changing the current American five eight-hour days at work to four ten-hour (or to one day at home) would positively impact traffic, energy, water and waste. Based on a 2005 poll released by ABC News, Time magazine and the Washington Post (and so, very not Nepal-oriented) shortening the workweek would decrease carbon emissions and on commuting costs as well.
Not just the environment, but it would also conserve energy. Apparently the American state of Utah switched to a four-day, ten-hour workweek for some 900 state buildings in 2008 (still working 40 hours a week, but finishing the last hour by Thursday evening) and saved $705,000 in energy and operation costs.
While lowering carbon emission and energy consumption, a shorter workweek would also lower water usage and wastage in the office buildings (though I’m wondering if people aren’t drinking water and using the bathroom just as frequently at home). It seems Shipley is rather fond of Ford as well and his prolific ways, whose words spoken in 1926 are referred to by her in 2010.
While I was initially only concerned with students and workers receiving more time to play, it seems she has considered ramifications beyond the human being alone.
Traditional working hours differ across the world, based on both economic and cultural norms. For many in Israel the workweek begins on Sunday and ends on Thursday or Friday at noon in order to celebrate the Jewish Sabbath which begins on Friday evenings. In Afghanistan and Iran Thursday is a half-day while Friday is their only day off. Other Islamic countries also take the Friday off in order for Jummah prayers to take place. Until 1980 Japan worked half-Saturdays too.
Why Nepal has opted for the six-day week I don’t know. Reading about The Vedic Week on vedicbooks.net offered me little insight. The Vedic calendar to which Nepal subscribes says the week should start with the sun as it represents the soul so that beginning the week with the “sun-soul consciousness” will set it on its natural rhythm. This means Saturday, which is ruled by Saturn is “the grates of all malefic” and hence, the obvious day to rest. Unfortunately for me, I got little of that. If anyone cares to enlighten the rest of us, I’d be much obliged.
All to say, times have changed as have lifestyle and needs. China adopted the two-day weekend in 1995, Vietman in 1999. When will it be our turn?
sradda.thapa@gmail.com
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