The big cry baby battle
QUESTION
Why do sumo wrestlers hold an annual baby-crying tournament? This is a four-century-old custom called Nakizumo, which means ‘crying sumo’. it stems from a Japanese tradition that babies who cry loudly have powerful lungs so will grow up to be strong and healthy, while also scaring off evil spirits.
The largest and best known Nakizumo is at the sensoji Temple in Tokyo featuring up to 100 babies dressed in colourful costumes, caps and hairstyles.
The day begins with speeches and an introduction to each infant. Two babies are handed to a pair of sumo wrestlers, who stand across a wrestling ring facing each other. They each jiggle about a baby to try to make it cry. The first to cry wins.
if both start crying at the same time, the loudest is judged the winner.
if the sumo wrestlers fail to make the babies cry, masked men come out from the wings yelling ‘Naki! Naki! Naki!’ (Cry! Cry! Cry!) — which generally delivers the required result. Keiko Webber, Reading, Berks.
QUESTION
What was the story of Lady Isobel Barnett, a panellist on the Fifties TV panel show What’s My Line? BorN in Aberdeen in 1918 and raised in an upper- middle- class Presbyterian Glasgow household, isobel Marshall was precociously bright.
she started school aged three and in 1935 was the youngest female medical student at Glasgow University.
she married Captain Geoffrey Barnett, a lawyer who was 16 years her senior, in 1941, and their son, Alastair, was born three years later.
Moving to Leicestershire, she exchanged her work as a GP for that of a magistrate and local councillor. The first female chairman of Barrow upon soar rural District Council, she became Leicester’s youngest Lady Mayoress after her husband was elected in May 1952.
she gained the title Lady Barnett when her husband was knighted in June 1953 for charitable work. Following a successful TV debut on the topical Town Forum programme, Lady Barnett was asked to join What’s My Line?, a panel show in which celebrities questioned members of the public to try to guess their jobs.
she appeared on the programme for ten years and the viewing audience mistakenly regarded her as a member of the aristocracy.
Lady Barnett went on to use her distinctive velvet voice in public appearances for the Women’s institute and the Leicestershire red Cross. As well as being appointed honorary Colonel-inChief with the Women’s Territorial Army, she was an author and a member of the committee of a government inquiry into factory farming.
After her husband was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, she gave up her roles in the council and as a JP to spend more time with him, but continued an exhausting public speaking schedule despite suffering from arthritis.
After her husband’s death in 1970, Lady Barnett became reclusive and eccentric. she was found guilty at Leicester Crown Court in october 1980 of stealing a carton of cream and a tin of fish (total value 87p) from a shop a few miles from her home in Cossington, Leics. she was fined £75.
Four days later, she was found dead in her bath. An inquest concluded she had taken her own life. At her funeral, more than 300 well-wishers were outside the packed church. Mourners included her fellow broadcaster David Jacobs.
Lady Barnett had chosen a crown court case instead of appearing before magistrates over the shoplifting charge. in 1987, Lord hailsham suggested in the house of Lords that the delay between the arraignment and trial had contributed to her state of mind before her suicide and recommended legal changes.
Simon Morris, Loughborough, Leics.
QUESTION Where does the saying ‘throw your hat in the ring’ come from?
This term originates in the world of prize-fighting and boxing, and dates back to at least 1805.
Boxing rings were once circular, made up of a ring of people who had come to watch, rather than the squared, ropedoff raised platforms of today.
Prize fighters would turn up in a town or village and offer to take on anyone for a modest purse put up by the promoter, usually the fighter’s manager.
The promoter made his money from people foolish enough to bet against his fighter. Any local who fancied his chances would throw his hat into the ring.
The earliest citation of the use of this saying comes from The sporting Magazine (or Monthly Calendar of The Transactions of The Turf, The Chase And Every other Diversion interesting To The Man of Pleasure, Enterprise And spirit), published in 1805.
Nowadays, the term means being willing to participate in any contest and has often been used in elections. Also stemming from prize fights are the terms ‘to step up to the mark’ and ‘up to scratch’.
stepping up to the mark meant standing at a line scratched on the ground in the centre of the ring, indicating you were ready for the fight. This has translated into the world of baseball as stepping up to the plate and generally means to take responsibility for something.
Being up to scratch meant being fit to continue a fight. The boxer had to get up and stand at the line scratched in the ground to continue. Not being up to scratch means being unable to fight on.
Bob Cubitt, Northampton.
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