Origins of a few strange customs

QWhy do ships and aircrafts use ‘Mayday’ as their call for help? This comes from the French word, ‘m’aidez’ which means, ‘help me’ — and is pronounced, approximately as ‘Mayday.’

QWhy are zero scores in tennis called ‘love’? In France, where tennis became popular, the round zero on the scoreboard looked like an egg and was called ‘l’oeuf,’ which is French for ‘the egg’. When tennis was introduced in the US, Americans, mispronounced it as ‘love.’ And then the word stuck on.

QWhy do X’s at the end of a letter signify kisses? In the Middle ages, when many people were unable to read or write, documents were often signed using an X. Kissing the X represented an oath to fulfil obligations specified in the document. The X and the kiss eventually became synonymous.

QWhy is shifting responsibility to someone else called ‘passing the buck’? In card games, it was once customary to pass an item, called a buck, to indicate whose turn it was to deal. If a player did not wish to assume the responsibility of dealing, he would ‘pass the buck’ to the next player.

QWhy do people clink their glasses before raising a toast? In earlier times it was common for someone to try to kill an enemy by offering him a poisoned drink. To prove to a guest that a drink was safe, it became customary for a guest to pour a small amount of his drink into the glass of the host. Both men would drink it simultaneously. When a guest trusted his host, he would only touch or clink the host’s glass with his own.

QWhy is someone who is feeling great ‘on cloud nine’? Clouds are numbered according to the altitudes they attain, with nine being the highest cloud. Hence the phrase. — This was a message trending on social media and cannot be credited to a particular individual