The time is changing, let's sleep longer. But do you know why?

Autumn can bring couple of nice things that we cannot imagine this season without. Cold, so we have to bundle ourselves up into warm and knitted scarfs, hats or mittens. Rain, so we can just stay at home in our cozy beds, sofas or bathrobes and just read a good book, and the last thing - change. Everything is changing. The weather is changing so fast that you don't have time to spot it, the colours of trees are changing and the most important thing, time is changing! When? This weekend during the night from Saturday to Sunday. Are you getting excited? You should be as you can sleep for one hour longer. But do you know why is the time changing? Well that my dear friends, is the main topic of our blog post today.

Time change!

Each year, though in not every country, in the wee hours of  a Sunday morning in March, 60 minutes just disappear from the clock and the time reappears each year in October. Apparently this whole process is called Daylight Saving Time!

Daylight Saving Time well known as "Summer Time" or "Winter Time" was created to make better use of the long sunlight hours (or for some of us who are not very lucky with the sunlight, lets say daylight), of the summer (Do you remember that season in Wales? Being bit sarcastic, sorry). By changing the clocks forward an hour in March, we move an hour of daylight from the morning to the evening. On the other hand, in autumn, we rewind our clocks to return to Standard Time.

But where did Daylight Saving Time come from? And how is it or was useful?

We have to thank for this idea to Benjamin Franklin, who suggested changing of time in his essay in 1784 as the first person. Later, in 1907, it was proposed to British Parliament by Englishman William Willett in a pamphlet called The Waste of Daylight. He wanted to encourage people out of bed earlier in summer by changing the time on the nation's clocks. I think that nobody wanted to buy him a pint in a pub after this great idea - wake up earlier and go to work, poor thing. Apparently he was fighting for that his whole life.

But then came something that probably changed loads of thing - World War I and countries as Austria, Germany, Denmark, Portugal or Sweden were introduced to daylight saving time. To save energy and help the war effort, the Summer Time Act 1916 advanced the clocks in the UK. After this it had got very very complicated with the saving and changing time and then even World War II came and everything got even more complicated, so probably we will just skip this part of history of Daylight Saving Time.

Why is Daylight Saving Time good?

At the present, daylight saving time is most useful to those who live farther from the equator, where daylight hours are much longer in the summer than in the winter. As in locations closer to the equator, daylight and nighttime hours are nearly the same. That's why many equatorial cities and countries do not participate in Daylight Saving Time.

According to advocates that support Daylight Saving Time it can help to reduce crime and automobile accidents, extended daylight hours also improve energy conversation by allowing people to use less energy.

What to do, if you are not happy with changing time

I understand that not everybody is chuffed with the idea of changing time twice per year and it might cause some confusion with getting up, going to work and going for your meetings. Though you know that there always is a solution for these problems. And if you are asking what you can do, well, you can call Harry Potter and ask him if he can get you one of the time turners or just call to Dr. Who and ask for a lift in his TARDIS. Both of them are more than happy to help and answer the phone calls.

So do not forget! This weekend during the night from Saturday to Sunday the time is changing even for us normal people who are not time lords or wizards etc. Good luck with that!




We used the information from websites: http://wonderopolis.org/wonder/why-do-we-change-the-clocks-twice-a-y and http://www.timeanddate.com/time/uk/time-zone-background.html

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About Peartree Languages

Peartree Languages is a language school located in Cardiff.