Learning English - What is April Fool's Day? - pranks, jokes, hoaxes - English Lesson with Duncan

We all like to have a laugh once in a

while I know I do however some enjoy it

more than others one of the ways of

raising a titter is to play a trick on

someone or to prank someone into

believing something that is not true or

real fortunately for those who enjoy

playing the occasional prank or hoax on

others there is a special day put aside

for just such an event of course I'm

talking about April Fool's Day

April Fool's Day occurs each year on the

first day of April on this day people

will play tricks and pull pranks on each

other for fun most of the pranks are

harmless and cause no real upset while

some create anger outrage and even mass

hysteria there have been some rather

adventurous pranks played on the general

public over the years for example in

1980 the BBC reported that the four

clock faces on the famous Big Ben clock

tower would be replaced by digital

numeral readouts many people call in to

complain before it was revealed that the

whole thing was a big hoax in 1978 a

wealthy adventurer returned from

Antarctica to Australia towing a large

iceberg with the intention of selling

chunks of the ice to locals this turned

out to be an elaborate hoax in 1998 the

fast food chain Burger King released an

advertising campaign to promote a new

product the left-handed hamburger

amazingly thousands of people fell for

the prank by showing up at burger

outlets asking for one of the

left-handed meals in 1976 British

astronomer Patrick Moore announced on

BBC Radio that the planets Pluto and

Jupiter would align in such a way that

here on earth people would experience a

change in the Earth's gravitational pull

whilst jumping up and down amazingly the

BBC received calls from listeners

purporting to have floated around the

room in 1962 Swedish television viewers

we're told that if they stretched a pair

of ladies tights over their TV screens

the black and white picture would become

colour of course it was all a hoax

TV viewers in Sweden had to wait another

eight years before they could really see

broadcasts in colour so what are the

origins of April Fool's Day well it

depends on who you ask there are many

stories surrounding the reasons why we

play tricks on April 1st first ironically

most of the stories surrounding April Fool's day are made up

the first written reference of April Fool's Day appears in

Geoffrey Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales

published in 1392 where a mix-up with

the wording of the dates refers to there

being 32 days in march another origin

albeit an unlikely one occurred in

France when the Gregorian calendar was

adopted in 1564 which meant that from

there on the new year would be

celebrated on January the first and not

at the end of March those who continued

to celebrate after the change on April

the first were labelled as fools other

theories are that the date refers to the

Roman festival of Hilaria or a revolt

against Christianity when an annual day

of chaos took place as a protest

organised by the worshippers of demigods

in all honesty it would be fair to say

that there is no definitive reason why

April Fool's Day really exists

April fools day is also known as All Fool's day

in some places to many people the act

of playing pranks and hoaxing others for

fun seems childish and infantile

however this has not stopped people from

fooling each other with their creative

shenanigans have you ever played an

April fool's joke on anyone?

have you ever been the victim of an April Fool's hoax?

did you fall for it?

in this instance tooth or for something means

that you were taken in or fooled by

the hoax or prank you were made to look

stupid you are made a sucker of you are

made to look a fool quite the April Fool if you will.

today's keywords prank to

play a trick or to fool someone with a

practical joke hoax a form of joke

where someone pretends that something

will or has happened instance the

occurrence of something or an example of

something occurring