美式发音 适合精听
也许各地庆祝新年的时间不尽相同，但各地人们在新旧交替的那一时刻，汹涌澎湃的心情总是相似。
In New York City's Times Square half a million 1)jubilant people stand in the freezing cold waiting for the countdown to midnight. And as the stroke of midnight nears, the anticipation of the new year only grows. Something magical is about to happen.
五十万民众站在寒气逼人的纽约时代广场, 兴高采烈地等待午夜的新年倒数。随着午夜钟声即将到来，人们对新年的期待就变得越发强烈。不可思议事情即将发生。
Dick Clark (Famous Emcee): And you can feel the excitement building as the ball drops and lowers. The bottom of a, you know, a 70 foot flag pole, and it lights up the new year; the noise is deafening. It's…it's just overwhelming.
迪克·克拉克（知名主持人）：当球向70英尺的旗杆底部下坠跌落的时候，你可以感受到激动热烈的气氛在不断累积。它照亮了新一年的到来，全场爆发出震耳欲聋的欢呼声，势不可挡。
The Times Square New Year's Eve Ball is a tradition that dates back to 1907, but celebrating the arrival of the new year is an age-old custom, practiced the world over for thousands and thousands of years.
时代广场的除夕球庆典是一项可以追溯至1907年的传统，但庆祝新年的到来则是人类世界延续了好几千年的旧传统。
Fifty-five miles south of Bagdad in Iraq lie the ruins of the ancient city of Babylon, one of many cities that made up the 93,000 square miles of land once known as 2)Mesopotamia. Here the foundations of the first new year rituals can be traced. The first, an ancient ceremony called Zogmu, dates back to around 2,500 BC.
古巴比伦的遗址位于伊拉克巴格达以南55英里处，这古城是这片占地93000平方英里的、曾被称作美索不达米亚地区中众多城市中的一个。第一个新年庆典仪式可以追溯于此。第一个古代庆典称为Zogmu, 源于约公元前2500年。