Today is Friday the 13th – an unlucky day shrouded in superstition and fear or – a regular Friday if you ask most people.
Friday the 13th typically occurs at least once a year and is believed by some in western civilization to be a day of bad luck.
In 2017 it occurs twice, today Jan. 13 and again on Oct. 13. In fact, there will be two Friday the 13ths per year until 2020, and there is at least one every year until at least 2050.
The Black Press Digital team decided to see if Okanagan residents truly care about this 'bad luck' day, so we hit the streets of downtown Kelowna and asked what you had to say.
“It's my brother's birthday, so it's not too evil of day,” said one man.
“I didn't even know it was Friday the 13th,” said another. “I don't think it is an unlucky day at all.”
“It's just a regular day, a work day, heading to work right now on the bus,” said a Kelowna woman.
“I didn't realize it was Friday the 13th,” pondered one dad. “But now that you mentioned it, it makes more sense. I dropped my 5 year old off and it is always a tearful goodbye with many hugs, but this morning he said 'No, I don't need a hug today'.”
The origins of Friday the 13th are still up for debate, many believe its roots started in the middle ages in relation to Jesus' last supper and crucifixion in which there were 13 individuals present, the night before his death on Good Friday.
Another theory states that it may have started following the 1907 Thomas W. Lawson novel Friday, the Thirteenth. In the novel, a “unscrupulous broker” takes advantage of superstition to create a Wall Street panic on a Friday the 13th.
The fear of the number 13 has been given a scientific name of "triskaidekaphobia". The fear of Friday the 13th itself is called paraskevidekatriaphobia.
Do you have any superstitions? Send us an email to okanagan@bpdigital.ca.