美語情景對話 第353期:April Fools Day 愚人節
April 1st is an unofficial holiday in the United States called April Fool's day. In the past, April 1st used to be celebrated as the New Year. And then in the year, I think, 1592, or something like that, the official New Year was changed to January 1st and some people never heard of this change so they continued to celebrate the New Year on the April 1st, but the people who knew of this change called them fools. A fool in English is someone who is not smart. We have many words for this in English: dumb, a dummy, stupid, imbecile, idiot, but you're all nice people so you'll never need to use those words so you can forget that. But the people who continued to celebrate the New Year's on April 1st were called April fools. So a tradition started, that on April 1st people would try to make, would do pranks on other people.
4月1日是美國的一個非正式節日，稱作愚人節。過去，4月1日曾經被當作新年來慶祝。我想大概是在1592年，新年正式更改爲1月1日，可是有些人並沒有聽到更改的消息，所以他們繼續在4月1日慶祝新年，而知道更改日子的民衆便稱那些人是愚人。英語中說的愚人就是那些不聰明的人。英語中有很多詞來形容這個意思：愚蠢的，笨蛋，笨的，蠢貨，白癡，但是你們都是善良的人，所以你們永遠不需要使用這些詞，所以你可以不去管那些。但是繼續在4月1日慶祝新年的人被稱作四月愚人。所以這就是這個節日傳統的由來，在4月1日，人們會對其他人做惡作劇。
重點講解：
1. hear of
聽說；
eg. Your mother will be furious if she gets to hear of this.
你母親若知此事定會怒不可遏。
eg. I must admit I was rather disturbed to hear of his failure.
我必須承認聽到他失敗的消息我甚感不安。
2. continue to do sth.
繼續；持續做某事；
eg. We will continue to hold meetings on Thursdays, as heretofore.
一如既往，我們將繼續每星期四開會。
eg. Sales figures continue to show signs of improvement.
銷售額持續顯示出增加的跡象。
3. know of
聽說過；略有耳聞；
eg. We know of the incident but have no further details.
我們聽說過這件事，但對詳情不是很清楚。
eg. It was gratifying to know of the success of our efforts.
聽說我們的努力取得了成功是令人欣慰的。
