Most of Europe switched to the improved Gregorian Calendar in the late 1500's, but Ethiopia stayed with the Julian. Since then, the errors in the Julian Calendar have added up to over seven years of difference. Can you imagine the problems we would have if every country had its own calendar? |
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Maria Puente wrote an article for the Gannett News Service that exposed the peculiar problem with tombstones. Some proactive people had already purchased their tombstones and had their year of birth engraved in the stone. Some did not include the "19" to indicate the century. If they are unfortunate enough to survive into the next millennium, their survivors will need to pay for a new engraving to prevent any confusion and panic for future grave visitors. We made it up, but answer B has a bit of truth in it. The east African country of Ethiopia uses the Julian calendar instead of the internationally accepted Gregorian Calendar. Therefore, their calendar is eight years behind the calendar used everywhere else around the world. But they started using the Julian calendar centuries ago, and it wasn't in response to the Y2K problem. However, if you want to use up your checks with the preprinted "19", maybe you can move your checking account to Ethiopia.
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Tombstones inscribed with only two digits will need to be fixed. 
Ethiopia turned back their calendars eight years to postpone the Y2K problem.