腐国为何这么“拽”（上篇）

　　略有点常识的人都知道英国是世界上最伟大的国家。我本来没必要就这个真理做什么解释，但是也许说两句也无妨。点出我们“拽”的几点理由其实不难，当然，我们英国人一向对我们众多伟大和卓尔不群的成就和气质保持谦虚，尽管下面有一两点可能在人们的意料之外。

　　Britain,as any sensible person knows, is the greatest country in the world. Truth betold, I shouldn’t have to explain why, but needs must. Summing it up isn’thard, though of course we British are characteristically modest about our manygreat and extraordinary achievements and qualities, even if one or two of thesemight not be obvious at first.

　　1. 炸鱼加土豆条

　　君主制和海军一直是我们的骄傲。一个民族吃什么往往能帮助你了解他们。

　　意大利人吃匹萨饼，这表明什么呢，他们全靠外卖食品生存？我们是一个岛屿国家，由于我们英国人都很有常识，所以我们发现吃炸鱼加土豆条是最好的。

　　我们充分发挥了岛国的优势：鱼来自大海，土豆条产自陆地，全球最佳菜谱组合！

　　Fish and chips. The British have a proudtradition of monarchy and navy. What nations eat tells you everything you needto know about them.

　　Italians eat pizza and what does thatsuggest, relying on take away food for sustenance?

　　The point is we live on an island and,because of our strong driving force of Common Sense, we have made the most ofit by eating fish and chips.

　　We’re making the most of our island: thefish from the sea, the chips from the land. World beaters!

　　2.巨石阵

　　这些伟岸的石柱矗立在索尔兹伯里平原上(尽管你到它们面前可能发现它们不如你想像中那样大)，向我们展示着没人知道的我们高贵的祖先的文化。但我们至少知道一点：他们当时可没有安全帽戴。换一句话说，我们的一大成就是，嗯，不用安全卫生管理协会掺和也能建成这么个大家伙。

　　原因嘛，青铜时代的英国人可能会这样或那样，但他们绝不会像某些软蛋那样，让自己脑袋故意撞上什么去骗赔偿金。

　　Stonehenge. The mighty solemn stones standon Salisbury Plain (though actually when you get there they’re not as big asyou’d like them to be)，anancient reminder of our noble ancestors and their ancient culture, about whichwe know nothing whatsoever. But what we do know is this: they didn’t build itwearing hard hats. In other words, one of our greatest achievements was, um,achieved without the intervention of Health and Safety. In other words, one ofour greatest achievements was, um, achieved without the intervention of Healthand Safety.

　　Because Bronze Age British man was manythings, but he wasn’t some soft-handed twerp hoping to bang his head and claimthe compensation。

　　3.英语

　　英语本来就是合乎人性的语言。所以你出国的时候冲着人家用英语喊就可以了，只要你叫得够响，他们的脑袋里一定会产生英语回声，这样他们就能明白你了。

　　The English language. English is thenatural language of the human being。

　　That’s why, when you go abroad, if you shout at people loud enough inEnglish their brains will reverberate to their original frequency and they’ll understand you。

　　4.英式幽默感

　　毫无疑问我们的幽默感天下第一。我们的笑话最好笑，而且没有人像我们这样常拿自己开涮(我怎么没见到德国人像我们这样拿自己开玩笑的呢，谁见过？) 哪怕英国的现状没啥可开心的。

　　The British sense of humour. We have thegreatest sense of humour in the world, without a doubt.

　　Our jokes are the funniest and, unlikeeveryone else, we can laugh about ourselves (why don’t the Germans findthemselves funny the way we do? Search me), even though there’s nothing funnywhatsoever about the current state of the country.