《经济学人》双语：美国春假堪比中国春运？

原文标题：
Beaches, booze and bullets
Breaking news
Spring break is an economic nightmare for the hottest host cities
海滩、酒和子弹
最新消息
春假是最热门城市的经济噩梦

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FEW THINGS are as rowdy and reckless as college spring break.
很少有什么事情像大学春假那样热闹和狂放不羁。

Each year swarms of students make a pilgrimage to America’s southern beach towns for a booze-fuelled week-long party.
每年，一大批学生前往美国南部的海滨小镇，参加为期一周的酒精狂欢派对。

According to Airlines for America, a trade group, this year an astonishing 2.6m Americans are expected to fly on each day of March and April—a number boosted, no doubt, by spring-break travel.
根据美国航空公司协会，今年三月和四月每天预计有惊人的260万美国人搭乘飞机出行--这个数字无疑因春假旅游而增加。

Many of their destination-cities are dreading their arrival.
许多目的地城市都担心他们的到来。

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Miami Beach never wanted spring-breakers. This year, as partiers flooded the beach, things got raucous.
迈阿密海滩不期待春假客的到来。今年，随着派对人群涌向海滩，情况变得混乱。

On March 19th, after two consecutive deadly shootings, the mayor imposed an emergency midnight curfew and banned the sale of takeaway alcohol after 6pm in part of the city. The rules could legally last just 72 hours.
3月19日，连续2起枪击命案之后，市长实施了紧急的午夜宵禁令，并在该市部分地区禁止下午6点后出售外卖酒精饮料。这些规定在法律上只能72小时有效。

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Compared with other tourists, college students barely spend money.
与其他游客相比，大学生几乎不花钱。

They pile into cheap (and sometimes dodgy) rented rooms and chug supermarket booze rather than buying cocktails.
他们挤进廉价（有时不安全）的出租房，狂饮超市酒，不会购买鸡尾酒。

If they dine out, according to vexed restaurateurs, they hardly tip. After dark they get drunk and drugged.
如果他们外出用餐，据烦恼的餐馆老板说，他们几乎不给小费。天黑后，他们就喝得浪醉如泥，且还会吸毒。

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The wildness attracts undesirable characters: on the South Beach shore a middle-aged man offers a teenager an unlabelled bottle of “champagne”.
疯狂的行为吸引了不良分子：在南海滩，一名中年男子向一名十几岁的少年提供三无“香槟”。

Non-college-goers who come to join in the debauchery commit more serious crimes—feuds become perilous when partiers bring pistols.
那些前来参加狂欢的社会人士会犯下了更严重的罪行——当聚会者携带手枪时，纠纷变得更加危险。

Nearly half of the 800 arrested at last year’s spring break were county residents from outside the city; just a quarter were from out of state.
在去年春假期间被逮捕的800人中，将近一半是城外的县居民；只有四分之一来自外州。

This year police arrested 322 people and seized over 70 guns in the first three weeks of March.
今年3月的前三周，警方逮捕了322人并缴获了70多支枪。

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More than 400 Miami Beach police officers are working overtime to tame the crowds. Resort-tax revenues do not cover the costs.
400多名迈阿密海滩警察正在加班加点工作，以控制人群。度假税收的收入并不足以支付这些成本。

The mayor, the police and the chamber of commerce are all desperate for the spring-breakers to retreat.
市长、警察和商会都希望春假学生能够撤离。

But an attempt to ban liquor sales after 2am was crushed when a nightclub sued. Busting illegal Airbnbs is a game of whack-a-mole.
因一家夜总会起诉，一项禁止凌晨2点后销售酒精饮料的尝试以失败告终。打击非法爱彼迎民宿也像打地鼠游戏一样困难。

And when the city withheld permits for beach parties, entrepreneurial hosts took to the sea, selling tickets for lawless cruises. (The city swiftly put more officers on boats.)
当市政府拒绝发放海滩派对许可证时，一些企业主将活动转移到了海上，非法售卖游艇票。（市政府很快增加了海上警力。）

 “Every single city in Florida that has been a spring-break destination has done everything it could to end its spring break,” says Miami Beach’s mayor, Dan Gelber. For him, it’s not working.
“佛罗里达州的每个春假目的地都尽了一切努力结束春假。”迈阿密海滩市长丹·吉尔伯说。对他而言，这一切都没起作用。

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Fort Lauderdale, nicknamed “Fort Liquordale” for booze-smuggling during Prohibition, was the first to host a roaring spring break and the first to shut it down.
罗德岱堡昵称是“烈酒堡”，因禁酒时期的酒品走私而得此外号。它曾是第一个承办狂欢春假的城市，也是第一个结束春假的城市。

When a 1960 film brought the hedonistic escapade there to the big screen, Americans became mesmerised.
1960年的一部电影将这种放荡的逃避方式带到了大银幕上，美国人为之着迷。

By the mid-1980s spring-breakers mobbed the place. Bad behaviour made residents rally.
到了1980年代中期，春假旅行者们大量涌入这个城市，恶劣行为引起了居民的抗议。

Florida raised the drinking age from 19 to 21; the city tightened open-container laws. The numbers plunged.
佛州将饮酒年龄从19岁提高到21岁；该市加强了“公共场所禁止开放式饮酒容器”的法律。因此春假旅行者人数暴跌。

“Back in the day it was belly-flop contests, nickel beers and hot-dog stands,” says Stacy Ritter, head of the city’s tourism agency. “These days it’s a different kind of college student, the kind that carries daddy’s American Express card.”
城市旅游机构负责人斯泰西·里特说：“那时候有肚子跳水比赛、五分钱啤酒和热狗摊。如今是另一类大学生，是那些带着父亲的美国运通卡的大学生。”

Though police expect double to triple as many students as last year, Fort Lauderdale’s spring break remains largely peaceful.
尽管警方预计今年的学生人数是去年的2-3倍，罗德岱堡的春假依然相对平和。

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Farther west, city efforts have also had more of a bite.
西部地区城市采取的措施也颇有成效。

After students wrecked motels and trashed the waterfront of Gulf Shores, Alabama, in 2016, a ban on alcohol at the beach and a forceful crackdown sent them scurrying. “We had the gun loaded, ready to pull the trigger,” says the mayor, Robert Craft.
2016年在阿拉巴马州的海湾岸，学生们破坏了那里的汽车旅馆、污染了海滩，因此该市禁止在海滩饮酒并采取了强有力的打击措施，学生们被吓跑了。市长罗伯特·克拉夫特表示：““我们已经准备好了枪弹，随时扣动扳机。”

Few have returned.
此后很少有人回来。

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Spring-breakers are not unwanted everywhere.
不是每个地方都不欢迎春假游客。

South Padre Island, off the Texas coast, spent $15,000 advertising on college campuses this year.
南帕德雷岛，位于德克萨斯州海岸外，今年花费了1.5万美元在大学校园里做广告。

Its population more than doubles when students arrive. It is easier to patrol than bigger cities, and its proximity to the Mexican border means there is already an overload of officers.
学生到达时，岛上的人口增加了一倍以上。该岛比大城市更容易巡逻，而且靠近墨西哥边境，意味着已经有大量警力存在。

But if its campaign is too successful, it may want to boot the college crowd out too.
但如果宣传太成功，该岛也可能想把大学生群体赶出去。

[Paragraph 9]
Back in Miami Beach police are afraid to lay down the law. “With social media these days, whatever we do will be wrong,” one says.
在迈阿密海滩，警方不敢强制执行法律。一名警官说：“在当今的社交媒体时代，无论我们做什么都是错的。”

The city is sponsoring night-time shows to tempt visitors away from the chaos. But volleyball tournaments are not what lured the fraternity brothers south.
市政府正在赞助夜间演出，希望游客能够远离混乱。但排球比赛并不是吸引大学男生前来南部海滩的原因。

（恭喜读完，本篇英语词汇量703左右）
原文出自：2023年3月25日《The Economist》United States版块。

精读笔记来源于：自由英语之路

本文翻译整理: Irene本文编辑校对: Irene
仅供个人英语学习交流使用。

【补充资料】（来自于网络）
罗德岱堡美国佛罗里达州的Fort Lauderdale市，位于佛罗里达州东南部，面向大西洋。这座城市以其美丽的海滩、运河系统和热带气候而闻名。昵称“烈酒堡”是因为该地区在春假期间成为了酒精和狂欢的热点之一。这里有许多酒吧、餐厅和夜店，吸引了大量年轻的旅行者。这个昵称反映了这个城市在春假期间流行的饮酒文化。

肚皮跳水比赛Belly-flop contest是一种游泳比赛或游戏，参赛者从跳台或较高的位置跳入水中，尽可能地让他们的腹部着水。然后，裁判根据参赛者落水的造型和水花的溅起高度来评分，最高得分者胜出。通常，这种比赛是在游泳池、湖泊或河流等水域举办的。它通常被认为是一种有趣和娱乐性质的游戏。

“开放式饮酒容器法”（open-container laws）是指针对在公共场所（如街道、公园等）持有未封闭的酒类容器（如瓶子、罐子、杯子等）的行为进行法律限制的规定。这些法律的目的是防止公共场所出现饮酒过量、闹事和酗酒等问题，以保障公共安全和秩序。

"Have more of a bite" 的字面意思是 "咬的力量更大"，但通常用来形容食物或饮料的味道更加强烈或刺激，有更多的刺激感和口感。这个短语也可以用来形容某种行为或言语具有更强烈的影响或效果。

【重点句子】（3 个）
Miami Beach never wanted spring-breakers. This year, as partiers flooded the beach, things got raucous.
迈阿密海滩不期待春假客的到来。今年，随着派对人群涌向海滩，情况变得混乱。

Farther west, city efforts have also had more of a bite.
西部地区城市采取的措施也颇有成效。

Spring-breakers are not unwanted everywhere.
不是每个地方都不欢迎春假游客。