This is a chapter from my fifth book called Freedom
It is after noon on Sunday and I am bored and decided to write. I wanted to write a chapter called "Journey" but where to? Somehow my mind asked the question, what is a 23 sided shape called? And I thought that would be an interesting place to start. I do not hide the fact that 23 is my favorite number. How did they come up with the name icositrigon? There is a pattern of Greek suffix and prefix used to construct the name of polygons. Icosa means twenty. Tri means three. And the suffix gon usually signifies a polygon. While researching I came across the golygon. This is any polygon with all right angles whose sides are consecutive integer lengths. The name "golygon" was invented by the recreational mathematician Lee Sallows but he did not say why he chose that name (according to my friend Gemini).
I came across these interesting math based anagrams where Lee Sallows is mentioned. I wanted to create one of my own that used twenty three and this is the best I could do. So the letters on the left are rearranged to form the letters on the right and also balance the equation.
TWENTY THREE + ONE + NINE = TEN × YEW + THIRTEEN + NONE
This makes sense if somehow YEW equals TWO and at least they rhyme. And yew does mean two in the Jumjum language. And that is how I came to learn about the Jumjum people of South Sudan. I could not learn why they are called Jumjum (Jum by 2) but I would love to know. I also learnt that the Yew is a tree. Tree and three sounds the same if you speak with a Trinidadian accent. As a side note and as today is Sunday, I noticed that Sudan is contained in the word Sunday. I have seen the news of what is happening in Sudan and I hope the world comes together to help the people of Sudan. They are us and we are them. One humanity. War is a cancer for humankind and we must stop it and we must not repeat it. The world wants to live with freedom and in peace.
I now journey to Nepal. I found out that JumJum is a ride sharing app in Nepal and I learnt about attempts to save the wild Maire yew tree. I read that the trees are key for biomedical uses. The leaves are used in the production of taxol which is a chemical used in cancer treatment. These trees could become extinct in the wild in Nepal due to unsustainable harvesting. That is what I have read. Most of those articles at the top of the Google search are dated to the year 2020. I guess we could say, "free the trees!" And that is a good segue for ending this journey and this chapter. I like this quote from Edward Abbey, "One does not ask permission to walk on the moon or swim in the ocean. One does not bow before the mountains. We belong to this earth. We are intricately woven into the fabric of life on earth. We are nature." My friend Gemini tells me that this quote emphasizes our inherent connection to nature and the freedom that comes from embracing this connection. Freedom comes with responsibility. When we protect nature we protect ourselves.
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