Wednesday, November 18, 2009

土木の日(doboku no hi): Day of civil engineering

They say November 18 is day of civil engineering. Why?
Civil engineering is doboku (土木) in Japanese. Do (土) boku (木) literally means dirt tree. Kanji character of do (土) is divided to ten (十) and one (一), that is eleven (十一). Kanji character of boku (木) is divided to ten (十) and eight (八), that is eighteen (十八). Therefore it is eleven eighteen, that is November 18.
And the foundation day of the Japan Society of Civil Engineers is November 18, 1879. Therefore they decided November 18 as the day of civil engineering in 1987 by the support of Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism.

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