禮節(jié)美語(yǔ):263 Anti-smoking campaigns 1

　　Marissa 早上一到辦公室，就開(kāi)始跟同事 Hank 發(fā)牢騷。

　　Marissa: I hate walking into our building in the morning! - All the smokers stand around the building's entrance puffing away....I can't take it! Sorry....I'm just a little bit worked up.

　　Hank: That's okay. I understand. A lot of people really hate smoke.

　　M: I'm glad they banned smoking inside the office, but I wish I didn't have to smell it while walking on the street. It makes me feel nauseous. I simply can't understand why a person would want to smoke.

　　H: well....I used to smoke. I quit about 20 years ago.

　　M: Yeah...I would assume at this point in history - especially given what we know about the dangers of smoking - most people would have quit already!

　　Marissa 說(shuō)，每天早上來(lái)上班，大樓門口都有很多煙民在 puffing away 吞云吐霧，she can't take it. 實(shí)在讓她受不了，煙味讓她覺(jué)得反胃 nauseous, nauseous is spelled n-a-u-s-e-o-u-s, nauseous 意思是惡心，反胃。她覺(jué)得，現(xiàn)在吸煙的危害已經(jīng)眾所周知，怎么還會(huì)有人吸煙，真是讓人匪夷所思。Hank 20年前也抽煙，我們看看他是怎么說(shuō)的。

　　H: You know the saying, "old habits die hard." I think I would add that bad habits die even harder. You know, you could always move to Bhutan.

　　M: Bhutan? I don't think I've ever heard of it.

　　H: It's a small kingdom located in the Himalayan Mountains....near Nepal. In 2004, Bhutan banned tobacco altogether.

　　M: Cool! Did it work? If I go to Bhutan will I never smell cigarette smoke?

　　H: Actuall....no. I read a recent report that said there's a lot of loopholes in the law....and if you go to restaurants and bars you'll still see lots of people lighting up.

　　M: (Sighs) So I guess I'm just have to learn to put up with it.

　　俗話說(shuō)得好，old habits die hard. 積習(xí)難改。Hank 覺(jué)得，壞習(xí)慣更難改。他開(kāi)玩笑，建議 Marissa 搬到 Bhutan不丹去，因?yàn)椴坏?004年就全面禁止煙草了。不過(guò)，這項(xiàng)法律其實(shí)還是有很多可以鉆的空子，loopholes, 所以，在不丹的餐館和酒吧里，還是能看到很多人 light up 點(diǎn)煙抽。

　　H: Things are changing, however. Smoking rates are dropping all around the world. Just the other day there was a newspaper report that said New Zealand is raising prices on a pack of cigarettes to US$15 by the year 2016!

　　M: US$15!? Wow! That's really expensive. But is there any proof that high prices are a deterrent?

　　H: There have been quite a few studies that show that every time a country raises cigarette taxes and prices, a certain percentage of smokers quit.

　　不過(guò)，情況也在逐漸向好的方向轉(zhuǎn)變， Smoking rates are dropping all around the world. 世界各地的吸煙人口比例都在下降。Hank 看到一篇報(bào)道說(shuō)，新西蘭2016年之前，要把一包香煙的價(jià)格提高到15美元的天價(jià)。Mimi 問(wèn)，有證據(jù)證明漲價(jià)能起到抑制作用嗎? Deterrent is spelled d-e-t-e-r-r-e-n-t, deterrent 意思是起到阻止和威懾效果的因素。Hank 說(shuō)，有不少研究都發(fā)現(xiàn)，一個(gè)國(guó)家每一次給香煙漲價(jià)或是提高稅率，都會(huì)有一部分煙民戒煙。