Golden Retriever Day - February 3rd

Today we celebrate in honor of one of our best and cutest friends, who not only serve as pets that can be played with but also help us professionally many times - the Golden Retriever dogs.

The Golden Retriever dogs, abbreviated as "golden" are dogs with long golden fur (hence their name), which are medium to large in size and friendly and comfortable in nature.

They are not suitable to be guard dogs because they are usually not aggressive, but because of their great tolerance and high potential for training, they are often used as guide dogs for the blind or companion dogs for the disabled. Because of their well-developed sense of smell, the police also use them to detect explosives and they also help with hunting.

The Golden Retrievers are one of the most popular breeds of dogs all over the world.

The name Golden Retriever is derived from the word Retrieve which means "return". In the 19th century the Scots began to use this breed of dog in their hunting expeditions, to help bring in the hunt which was often shot and fallen in a distant and inaccessible place for hunters. The Golden Retriever breed was originally created from a hybrid of stray dogs that were used for hunting and John Newfoundland dogs brought to the UK by fishermen from the island of Newfoundland in North America.

The Golden Retriever Day was created by a Golden Retriever owner named Kristen who realized that there is no day to celebrate in honor of this breed of dog. She founded the Golden Retriever Day on the birthday of her beloved dog.

February 3rd is also Carrot Cake Day and Japanese Setsubun 

World Braille Day - January 4

The world celebrates Braille Day on January 4, the birthday of Louis Braille, the inventor of Braille.

The Braille script is a script used by the blind to read by touching up-highlighted dots on the page.

Louis Braille was born on January 4, 1809 in a small village near Paris, France. His father was a tanner (leather processor), and one day, when he was 3, Louis was playing with his amulet and was injured in the eyes. He lost his sight but his parents sent him to study in the company of sighted children. At the age of 12 he was sent to study at a school for the blind. At the school, founded by Valentin Howie, the children learned to read with the help of embossed letters they touched. Braille learned this way, but encountered difficulties because the letters were very large and so the books were very heavy and large.

The books were also very expensive, as they were printed using a special printing press with barbed wire. The letters were also too close to each other and made it difficult to read. The school where he studied at Braille had only fourteen books, and despite the difficulty of reading them, he read them all.

Braille was looking for a simpler method that would allow the blind to read. In 1821 a soldier named Charles Barbia appeared at the school, telling of a method he had invented that allowed soldiers on the battlefield, who were inside canals, to correspond with each other without revealing their place. He called the method "night writing" and it was based on the use of matrices of twelve prominent points. Barbia's method was cumbersome and rejected by the military, but Braille decided there was potential in the idea of ​​using highlighted points, and developed a method based on six-point matrices.

In 1852 Braille died of tuberculosis. Two years after his death, the Braille letter was accepted as standard.

Pictured: Doodle (Google Scribble) made by Google in honor of Louis Braille's 107th birthday, in 2006. (link)

Nowadays, the computer has taken the place of heavy braille books. There are special Braille keyboards and computer monitors that highlight the Braille so that a blind person can read them.

Braille Day is an opportunity to raise awareness for the blind and visually impaired, and that they need help and consideration. This is also a great opportunity to remember that limitations can be overcome, and that if you want, you can always find alternative methods to do things that seem obvious to people without disabilities.

Pictured: Braille 'n Speak PDA that works with Braille technology and provides voice output.  link

 Hungarian tactile cube suitable for the blind and visually impaired (link)

January 4 is also Trivia Day and Hypnosis Day