第578期:英語美文 新生活從選定方向開始

還有不到一週的時間，我們就要和2018年說再見了。2018年，像每一個平凡的一年一樣，在分秒的時鐘中就這樣的流走了。這一年，我相信對每一個人的意義都是不同的，或許它只是你人生中波瀾不驚的一個篇章，又或它對你的生活中意義重大。不管這一年發生了什麼，不管是好是壞，是喜是樂，一切終將過去。而新的2019年，即將等待你的開啓，你準備好了嗎？

New Words:

Patch n.小塊土地

oasis n. 綠洲；

barren adj. 貧瘠的；

reluctant adj. 不情願的；勉強的

academician n. 院士;大學教師

parlance n. 說法；用語；

compass n. 指南針，羅盤；

Bissel is a small village of the West Sahara. It lies next to a patch of 1. 5-square-kilometer oasis, from where three days and nights are generally required to go out of the desert. However. before Ken Levin discovered it in 1926, none of the people had walked out of the desert. Reportedly, they were not reluctant to leave this barren land, but had no way to walk out of it after they had tried many times.
比塞爾是西撒哈拉沙漠中的一個小村莊，它靠在一塊15平方千米的綠洲旁，從這裏走出沙漠一般需要二晝夜。可是，在肯·萊文1926年發現它之前，這裏的人沒有一個走出過大沙漠。據說，他們不是不願意離開這塊貧瘠的土地，而是嘗試過很多次都沒有走出來.

As an academician of the British Royal College of Sciences, Ken Levin, of course, did not believe this viewpoint. He asked the reason of the people here. As a result, the answer of each was the same. To whichever direction they went from here, they would eventually return to this place. To prove this parlance he did an experiment. He went north from Bissel Village and finally walked out from it in three and a half days.
作爲英國皇家學院的院士，肯·萊文 當然不相信這種說法。他用手語向這裏的人問其原因，結果每個人的回答都是一樣的:從這裏無論向哪個方向走，最後都還要轉回到這個地方。爲了證實這種說法，他做了次試驗。從比塞爾村向北走，結果三天半就走了出來。

Why couldn't Bissel villager walk out of it? Ken Levin was very puzzled. In the end, he had to employ a Bissel villager to lead the way and wanted to find out the reason. They prepared the water that could be used for half a month and two camels while only leaning on a stick, Ken Levin put away the compass and other facilities, following the man.
比塞爾人爲什麼走不出來呢？肯·萊文非常納悶。最後，他只得僱一個比塞爾人，讓他帶路，看看到底是怎麼回事。他們準備了能用半個月的水，牽上兩駱駝，肯·萊文收起指南針等設備，只栓了一根木棍在後面。

Ten days later, they walked for about 800 miles. On the 11th morning, an oasis came into their view. They really came back again to Bissel. This time, Ken Levin came to understand: the Bissel people couldn't walk out of the desert because they had no knowledge of the North Star.
十天過去了，他們走了大約800英里的路程，在11天的清晨，一塊綠洲出現在眼前，他們果然又回到了比塞爾。這一次肯·萊文終於明白了，比塞爾人之所以走不出大沙漠，是因爲他們根本就不認識北極星。

In the boundless desert, if a person goes forward relying on his or her sense, he or she will make lots and lots of circles of different sizes, and the final footprints will be most likely the shape of a tape. Bissel village was in the middle of the immense desert with more than one thousand square kilometers, so without a compass, it was indeed impossible to walk out of the desert.
在一望無際的沙漠裏，一個人如果憑感覺往前走會走出許許多多、大小不一的圓圈，最後的足跡十有八九是一把卷尺的形狀，比塞爾村處在浩瀚的沙漠中間，方圓上千公里，沒有指南針，想走出沙漠，確實是不可能的。

Leaving Bissel Village, Ken Levin brought a young man called Argutel, who was the man that had cooperated with him last time. He told the young man "As long as you rest in the daytime and walk towards the brightest star at night, you would be able to walk out of the desert.” Argutel did as he was told. Three days later, he, sure enough, came to the edge of the desert.
離開比塞爾村時，肯·萊文帶了一個叫阿古特爾的青年，這個青年就是上次和他合作的人。他告訴這個青年說：“只要你白天休息，夜晚朝着北面那顆最亮的星星走，就能走出沙漠。”阿古特爾照着去做，三天後果然來到了大漠邊緣。

Now in the West Sahara Bissel has been a bright pearl, where tens of thousands of tourists come here. As the pioneer of Bissel, Argutel's bronze statue stands in the center of the town. On the base of the bronze statue the following line was engraved, "A new life starts from the fixed direction.”
現在比塞爾已是西撒哈拉沙漠中的一顆明珠，每年有數以萬計的旅遊者來到這裏。阿古特爾作爲比塞爾的開拓者，他的銅像豎立在小城中央，銅像底座上刻着一行字:“新生活是從選定方向開始的。”

想知道卡卡老師的發音祕訣?關注微信公衆號 卡卡課堂