好英语网展望2023：那些可能改变世界的事件
“War, what is it good for?” belted out Edwin Starr in 1970.
“战争，有什么好处？”埃德温·斯塔尔在1970年痛斥道。
The answer is the same today as it was more than 50 years ago: “Absolutely nothing!” But in February 2022, seemingly expecting an easy victory, Russian President Vladimir Putin launched an unprovoked invasion into Ukraine that is now estimated to have killed more than 40,000 civilians and displaced up to 30 million more. As the war grinds on into the winter, Russia has adopted the tactic of striking key Ukrainian infrastructure facilities, leaving millions without power, heat or water for extended periods. But Mr. Putin can’t escape history, and within Russia, internal divisions and a declining population show that, as far as the confidence and unity of his own people goes, he may have already lost.
对于这个问题，今天的回答和五十多年前是一样的：“完全没有！”但是2022年2月，俄罗斯总统普京对乌克兰发起无端的侵略，似乎以为自己会轻松取胜，如今这场战争估计已经导致四万平民丧生，3000万人背井离乡。随着战争逐渐步入冬季，俄罗斯开始采用袭击乌克兰关键基础设施的战术，让成百上千万人长期失去水电暖供应。然而普京无法逃脱历史，在俄罗斯，内讧和人口的减少表明，从本国人民的信心和团结方面看，他可能已经输了。
2023年，沃特·迪士尼公司将迎来100周年庆。
Outside of Russia’s war, 2022 offered little by way of consolation: In June, the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, ending the constitutional right to abortion in the United States; in August, flooding devastated hundreds of villages in Pakistan, killing around 1,500 people and affecting more than 33 million; then in September, Queen Elizabeth II, the most steadfast and drama-free member of the House of Windsor, died, and the British pound hit a historic low against the U.S. dollar. As the year drew to a close, central banks around the world hiked interest rates to curb inflation and warned of the likelihood of a global recession.
除去俄罗斯的战争，2022年这一整年也没发生多少令人宽慰的事：6月，最高法院推翻了罗诉韦德案裁决，结束了美国对堕胎权的宪法保护；8月，巴基斯坦数百座村庄洪水泛滥，致约1500人丧生，超3300万人受灾；而后是9月，温莎王朝最沉稳、最少是非的成员——伊丽莎白二世女王驾崩，英镑兑美元汇率跌至历史低点。行至年末，各国央行纷纷升息抑制通胀，并警告全球可能进入衰退。
Now, 2023 has us in its sights. From the launch of the largest offshore wind farm in Japan to the 100th birthdays of The Walt Disney Company and Warner Brothers to a celebration of dogs in Nepal — read on to find examples of perseverance and ingenuity in action.
2023年即将到来。从日本启动最大的离岸风电场，到迪士尼和华纳兄弟公司百岁生日，到尼泊尔的狗狗节日——以下是一些坚韧与智慧的典范。
JANUARY
1月
CROATIA, Jan. 1: Nearly a decade after joining the European Union, Croatia adopts the euro and becomes part of the Schengen visa-free travel area. Undeterred by a looming recession in the eurozone, the Balkan nation hopes to reap the rewards of membership by attracting tourists to its Adriatic coastline.
克罗地亚，1月1日：加入欧盟近10年的克罗地亚开始使用欧元，并成为申根免签旅行区的一部分。欧元区面临的衰退前景并没有让这个巴尔干国家却步，它希望欧元有助于吸引游客们前来领略亚德里亚海岸线的风光。
ITALY, Jan. 16: Venice enacts a “day-trippers” fee for visitors who come to the city for a few hours but don’t stay the night. City officials have been working on the measure, designed to limit transient travelers who strain the city’s fragile infrastructure, since before the Covid-19 pandemic. The fee will range from 3 to 10 euros, depending on how crowded the city is on a given day.
意大利，1月16日：威尼斯开始向来该市呆几个小时但不过夜的人收取“一日游费”。市府官员在新冠大流行之前就已经在酝酿这项措施，其目的是限制短期旅行者给本市脆弱的基础设施带来的损耗。费用在3到10欧元不等，具体取决于该市当天的拥挤程度。
UNITED STATES, Jan. 23 and April 4: Two Tinseltown titans turn 100: Warner Brothers and Disney, of course! Both studios are planning elaborate celebrations involving their extended families of theme parks, video games, television channels and streaming services throughout the year.
美国，1月23日和4月4日：两大好莱坞巨头100岁了：说的当然是华纳兄弟和迪士尼！两家制片公司正准备在这一年里通过旗下众多主题公园、电子游戏、电视频道和流媒体服务进行精心的庆祝活动。
FEBRUARY
2月
AUSTRALIA, Feb. 17–March 5: Grab your rainbow flag and pop the champagne: WorldPride is coming to Sydney. More than 500,000 people are expected to attend the 17-day festival. Not all members of the L.G.B.T.Q. community feel welcome, however. Some commentators have called the events “elitist,” given the ticket prices. For example, the three-day human rights conference costs $1,497 for general admission, and tickets for the Bondi Beach party start at $179.
澳大利亚，2月17日至3月5日：拿起你的彩虹旗，开起香槟庆祝吧：悉尼要举办世界骄傲节了。预计将有超过50万人参加这场为期17天的节日。但并非所有LGBTQ群体都能感到宾至如归。考虑到售票价格，一些评论人士称这些活动是“精英主义”。例如，为期三天的人权会议普通门票为1497美元，邦迪海滩派对入场票的起价为179美元。
UNITED STATES, Feb. 12: Nearly five years after her last performance at the 2018 Grammy Awards, Rihanna — who dominated the Billboard charts from the 2000s until her last album, “Anti,” in 2016 — returns to the stage to perform in what is always one of the world’s most-watched musical events: the Super Bowl halftime show. The impressive get is seen as a power play by Apple Music, which takes over from Pepsi as the lead sponsor of the show.
美国，2月12日：距离她在2018年格莱美颁奖礼上最后一次表演已经过去了近5年，蕾哈娜重返舞台，在全球最受关注的音乐盛事之一超级碗中场秀奉献表演。从2000年代开始到2016年她最后一张专辑《Anti》，她一直是Billboard排行榜的霸榜歌手。她能获此良机被认为是Apple Music影响力攻势的结果，它取代百事成为了中场秀的主要赞助商。
MARCH
3月
UNITED STATES, March 12: Clocks in the United States spring forward one hour, perhaps for the last time. The Sunshine Protection Act, which the Senate passed in March 2022, will make daylight saving time permanent in the United States. Proponents of the bill include Senator Marco A. Rubio, Republican of Florida, who says that more daylight hours would lower the number of car crashes and accidents, reduce robberies by 27 percent and cut energy usage.
美国，3月12日：这可能是美国最后一次在这一天将时钟拨快一小时。参议院于2022年3月通过了《阳光保护法案》，将让美国永久沿用夏令时。该法案的支持者包括佛罗里达州共和党参议员马可·卢比奥，他说，更多的日照时间能减少车祸和交通事故，减少27%的抢劫，并减少能源消耗。
APRIL
4月
FRANCE, SPAIN and the UNITED STATES, April 8: To mark the 50th anniversary of Pablo Picasso’s death, museums around the world will participate in “Picasso Celebration 1973-2023,” organized by the Musée National Picasso-Paris and Bernard Ruiz-Picasso, the artist’s grandson. The featured historiographical exhibits include “Picasso 1969-72: the End of the Beginning” at the Musée Picasso in Antibes (April 8-June 25); “Young Picasso in Paris” at the Guggenheim Museum in New York (May 12-Aug. 7) and “Picasso vs. Velázquez” at the Casa de Velázquez in Madrid (September-November).
法国、西班牙和美国，4月8日：为纪念毕加索逝世50周年，世界各地的博物馆都将参与由巴黎毕加索美术馆和毕加索孙子伯纳德·鲁伊斯·毕加索联合组织的“毕加索庆典：1973-2023”展览。这些年鉴专题展览包括昂蒂布毕加索美术馆的“毕加索1969-72：起始的终结”（4月8日至6月25日）；纽约古汉根美术馆的“年轻的毕加索在巴黎”（5月12日至8月7日）以及马德里委拉斯开兹之家的“毕加索与委拉斯开兹”（9月至11月）。
MAY
5月
UNITED KINGDOM, May 6: Charles III, who once described the prospect of being king as a “ghastly inexorable” experience, will be crowned in a ceremony at Westminster Abbey. Buckingham Palace has indicated that Charles’s coronation will be short — just over an hour — and less extravagant than his mother’s, which lasted nearly three hours and featured a congregation of 8,000 dignitaries.
英国，5月6日：查理三世将在威斯敏斯特教堂举行加冕仪式，他曾将等待接任国王的体验描述为“可怕却无法避免”。白金汉宫表示，查尔斯的加冕仪式将会很短——只有一个多小时——也不会像他母亲那样办得奢华隆重，她的仪式持续近三个小时，有8000名政要出席。
JUNE
6月
EGYPT, June 30: The first phase of construction of Egypt’s new administrative capital, a $30 billion project east of Cairo, is scheduled for completion. The new capital promises practical solutions in the form of jobs and housing for residents in overcrowded Cairo, as well as more ambitious plans like the Olympic City, the second-largest sports complex in Africa, which Egypt hopes to use in its bid to host the 2036 Olympics.
埃及，6月30日：耗资300亿美元的埃及行政新都第一阶段工程将于开罗东部竣工。新都承诺在就业和住房等问题上为过度拥挤的开罗居民拿出切实可行的解决方案，以及更雄心勃勃的规划，如非洲第二大体育综合体奥林匹克城，埃及希望能凭此申办2036年奥运会。
JULY
7月
LITHUANIA, July 11–12: NATO holds a summit of its 30 member countries in Vilnius, a mere 138 miles from the Russian border. It will be one of the largest summits ever hosted by the Baltic nation and will cost around 30 million euros.
立陶宛，7月11日至12日：北约在距离俄罗斯边境仅220多公里的维尔纽斯举行30个成员国的峰会。这将是波罗的海国家有史以来举办的规模最大的峰会之一，耗资约3000万欧元。
JAMAICA, July 24–28: The International Seabed Authority issues international rules on deep-sea mining. The burgeoning industry will target the extraction of minerals like nickel, which is a vital component in the batteries used in many electric cars. An alliance of Pacific nations, scientists and organizations like Greenpeace have accused the I.S.A. of drafting the rules too hastily and are calling for a moratorium on the industry, claiming deep-sea mining will destroy some of the world’s most fragile ecosystems.
牙买加，7月24日至28日：国际海底管理局发布有关深海采矿的国际规则。这个蓬勃发展的行业将以镍等矿物的开采为目标，镍是许多电动汽车所用电池的重要组成部分。一个由太平洋国家、科学家和绿色和平等组织构成的联盟批评国际海底管理局起草规则过于仓促，并呼吁暂停该行业，称深海采矿破坏了世界上最脆弱的一些生态系统。
AUGUST
8月
WORLD: Four Airbnb judges choose the 100 quirkiest home ideas from around the world. Sponsored by Airbnb’s OMG! Fund, the contest gives 100 people $100,000 to build the “craziest places on earth.” Winners so far have included a potato hotel in Idaho and a retro ’60s camping bus in Portugal.
全球：爱彼迎的四名评委从世界各地选出100个最古怪的家居创意。此次活动由爱彼迎“OMG!”基金赞助，为100人提供10万美元，建出“地球上最疯狂的地方”。到目前为止，获奖者包括爱达荷州的一间土豆酒店和葡萄牙的60年代复古露营巴士。
FINLAND, Aug. 23–25: Champions of regional air guitar competitions around the world gather in Oulu to compete in the Air Guitar World Championships. The competition has been held since 1996 and last year attracted an audience of more than 3,500 spectators. What other international sporting competitions does Finland host? So glad you asked: the Swamp Soccer World Championships, the Mobile Phone Throwing Championships and the Hobby-Horsing Championships, to name a few.
芬兰，8月23日-25日：来自全球的空气吉他地区比赛冠军将在奥卢齐聚一堂，参加世界空气吉他锦标赛。这项赛事自1996年开始举办，去年吸引了超过3500名观众。芬兰还举办过哪些国际体育赛事？很高兴你问了这个问题：还有比如说泥泞足球世界锦标赛、世界手机抛掷大赛和骑马头木棍锦标赛。
SEPTEMBER
9月
UNITED STATES: Thanks to a gift from the Roy Lichtenstein estate, students in the Whitney Museum’s Independent Study Program for artists, historians and curators will begin their studies in a remarkable classroom: the three-story, 9,000-square-foot Greenwich Village studio where the artist lived and worked until his death in 1997.
美国：得益于罗伊·利希滕斯坦的遗产捐赠，惠特尼美术馆为艺术家、历史学家和策展人开设的独立研究项目的学生将在一间非凡的教室开始他们的学习：那是一间三层楼高、占地约840平方米的格林威治村工作室，惠特尼曾在这里生活和工作，直到1997年去世。
UNITED STATES, Sept. 24: OSIRIS-REX, the first NASA mission to collect samples from an asteroid, returns to Earth. Scientists at the Utah Test and Training Range hope the dust and pebbles OSIRIS-REX gathered from the surface of the asteroid Bennu will provide insights into the formation of the early solar system, as well as how asteroids could impact Earth in the future.
美国，9月24日：OSIRIS-REX完成美国宇航局首个从小行星收集样本的任务后返回地球。犹他实验训练场的科学家希望OSIRIS-REX从小行星“贝努”表面收集的灰尘和碎石能为早期太阳系的形成，以及小行星在未来将如何影响地球提供见解。
OCTOBER
10月
SOUTH AFRICA, Oct. 18–30: Endurance athletes head to Kouga in South Africa’s Eastern Cape province to participate in the Adventure Racing World Championship — the first time the series is held in Africa. Participants compete in mountain biking, trail running, river kayaking and navigation challenges while negotiating varying climates and wildlife — which, in Kouga, will include lions, leopards and rhinos. The winner takes home $50,000 in prize money and gets a free entry into next year’s race.
南非，10月18日至30日：耐力运动员前往南非东开普省库加市参加世界探险越野赛总决赛——这是该系列赛首次在非洲举行。参赛者要完成山地自行车、越野跑、河流皮划艇和航海挑战的竞赛，同时还要适应多变的气候和野生动物——在库加生活着狮子、豹子和犀牛。获胜者将获得5万美元的奖金，并可以免费参加明年的比赛。
NOVEMBER
11月
UNITED ARAB EMIRATES, Nov. 6–17: The world’s first hydrogen-powered hydrofoil makes its inaugural “flight” (or is it sail?) at the U.N. Climate Change Conference. The vessel, called The Jet, can carry up to 12 passengers and produces zero emissions. The Swiss-based startup behind The Jet plans to launch commercially in Dubai for private clients and hotels later in the year.
阿拉伯联合酋长国，11月6日至17日：世界上第一艘氢动力飞行船将在联合国气候变化大会完成首次“飞行”（或是首次航行？）。这艘名为“喷气机号”的船最多可搭载12名乘客，并且实现零排放。推出“喷气机号”的瑞士初创公司计划在今年晚些时候为迪拜的私人客户和酒店推出商业化服务。
NEPAL: The Nepalese Tihar festival is a multiday celebration of good over evil akin to Diwali, the Indian festival of lights. The second day of celebration — Kukur Tihar — is dedicated to dogs, who are considered to be sacred messengers of Yarma, the god of the dead. On that day, across Nepal, domestic and stray dogs are given baths, treats and rewarded with marigold garlands placed around their necks.
尼泊尔：尼泊尔灯节类似于印度排灯节，是持续多日的庆祝善战胜恶的节日。节庆的第二天——“拜狗节”——是专门献给狗的，狗被认为是死神雅玛的神圣使者。在这一天，尼泊尔各地的家犬和流浪狗都会得到沐浴和款待，脖子上还会挂着金盏花环作为奖励。
DECEMBER
12月
UGANDA, Dec. 7-10: The Nyege Nyege electronic music festival lives to see another day. Held annually on the banks of the Nile River, the celebration was canceled in 2020 and 2021 because of Covid-19. Then the Ugandan parliament banned the 2022 event, claiming it promoted immorality. Eventually the festival was allowed to go ahead after the Ugandan ethics and integrity minister met with organizers to establish rules, including age limits for entry and dress code restrictions.
乌干达，12月7日至10日：Nyege Nyege电子音乐节得以继续举办。由于新冠疫情，每年都在尼罗河畔举行的该活动在2020年和2021年取消。随后，乌干达议会禁止2022年活动的举办，称其助长了不道德行为。乌干达道德与诚信部长同音乐节组织者会面，制定了包括年龄和着装限制在内的规定，音乐节才获准继续举办。
JAPAN: Japan’s largest combined offshore wind and power storage facility becomes operational off the coast of Ishikari Bay in Hokkaido. More than 15 years in the making, the Ishikari offshore wind farm is one of several dozen being built in the country to exploit Japan’s strong winds. The country’s scramble to secure alternative energy sources comes after its first energy shortage warning last summer amid a heat wave and soaring fuel prices following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
日本：日本最大的海上风电储存设施在北海道石狩湾投入使用。石狩湾海上风电场是日本在建的数十个利用日本强劲风能的风电场之一，其建设历时超过15年。夏天的酷暑导致日本首次发出能源短缺警报，加之俄罗斯入侵乌克兰后燃料价格飞涨，日本急于寻求替代能源。
SOMETIME IN 2023
2023年的某个时候
FRANCE: Get your fill of Marcel Duchamp’s “Fountain” and Yves Klein’s “Blue Monochrome” now, because the Centre Pompidou in Paris will close in 2023 for several years of maintenance before reopening for its 50th anniversary in 2027.
法国：巴黎蓬皮杜艺术中心将于2023年关闭，进行为期数年的翻新工作，到2027年的50周年庆时再重新开放，所以现在就去欣赏马塞尔·杜尚的《喷泉》和伊夫·克莱因《单色蓝》吧。
NEW ZEALAND: Can you have your cigarette and put it out forever, too? New Zealand attempts to achieve both with a novel law that allows existing smokers to continue the habit while preventing young people from taking it up. Beginning in 2023, the legal age limit to buy cigarettes will increase every year, effectively prohibiting anyone 14 and under from purchasing cigarettes in their lifetime.
新西兰：你能否在让人吸烟的同时又永远禁止它？新西兰准备通过一项新法律来实现这两个目标，允许现有的吸烟者继续吸烟，同时防止年轻人养成吸烟习惯。从2023年开始，购买香烟的法定年龄将逐年提高，实际上会让14岁及以下的人一辈子都买不到香烟。
WALES: The Royal Mint with Excir, a Canadian clean tech startup, will open a plant to recover 99 percent of gold from electronic waste contained in the circuit boards of discarded laptops and mobile phones. The value of precious metals contained in electronics worldwide is estimated to be $57 billion.
威尔士：皇家铸币厂将联合加拿大清洁技术初创公司Excir开设工厂，从废弃笔记本电脑和手机电路板中的电子垃圾里回收99%的黄金。全球电子产品中所含的贵金属估值达到570亿美元。
NIGERIA: The Nigerian National Petroleum Company will decide whether to invest $25 billion in a pipeline to transport gas from Nigeria to Morocco and onward to Italy and Spain. If approved, the project will enable Nigeria to help reduce Europe’s dependence on Russian energy — but not anytime soon. According to estimates, it will take at least 25 years for the pipeline to become operational.
尼日利亚：尼日利亚国家石油公司将决定是否投资250亿美元修建一条从尼日利亚途经摩洛哥再到意大利和西班牙的天然气管道。如果获得批准，该项目可让尼日利亚帮助减少欧洲对俄罗斯的能源依赖，只是这在短期内依然无法实现。据估计，这条管道至少需要经过25年的建设才能投入运营。