Dear reader,
have you ever just lazed about in your spare time and then thought about certain words and how they don't quite make sense? Like fingers for example. By adding the suffixe "er" to a word, we usually turn that word into an adverb, like "runner", for example i.e to run. So when you think about the word "finger" then, well.... through the use of the suffixe "er", I suppose the word "finger" would mean to fing... but then again, what on earth does it mean "to fing" ??? Well I certainly have no idea.
Anyway, I was at the Starbucks in Tropicana City Mall the other day when I encountered a similar problem. As usual I go there to order a Green-Tea frappe and well, while I'm waiting for the drink to be ready the barrista (is that what you call those people?) starts making small conversation with me. Deciding to indulge my sweet-tooth I point to one of the lollipops and asks him to add that to my bill. "What flavour?" he asks. "Strawberry!" I decide. And he reaches out to take one of the strawberry flavored lollipops, but just as he's about to hand it to me he says, "Why do people call a strawberry a strawberry?"
"Why does one call a strawberry a strawberry?" now that seems like a rather redundant question on the surface, I mean, for all it is worth I might as well ask "why do we call apples, apples?" But then again if you think about it, names are not quite the same with these fruits. For example, we call blueberries, blueberries because they are blue, blackberries because they are black, gooseberries because they have those "wings" that make them look like birds... so what about strawberries? The word straw would certainly suggest some sort of relation with the object "straw" - the kind you feed cows, not the ones you suck beverage out of - but well, and I'm sure any of you who have seen strawberry plants can testify to, they look absolutely NOTHING like blades of straw-grass. So anyway I managed to do some research into the matter and found out something quite interesting.
The term "strawberry" comes from the word "strewberry". Now the word "strew" literally means to throw sometimes or scatter it on the floor. For example, the floor was strewn with the feathers of the chickens that were slaughtered for the night's festivities. Strewberries were so named - and rather aptly too - because unlike most berry-plants which grow as some sort of bush or shrub, grew in small tufts and when their fruits were riped would be strewn upon the floor thus giving them the name "Strewberries", "Scattered - berries". However as we all know language is never fixed and always changes to the times and so eventually the word "Strewberries" was mispronounced to the point where it evolved permanently into the world "Strawberries"
Dear reader, now isn't that a random fact?
go figure.
Thanks for coming and enjoy the weekend~
Most jubilantlyCyren.~
