岛国萨摩亚“丢掉”一天 提早迎接新年

If you are reading this on Friday you cannot be in Samoa.

Friday, December 30, has been cut this year for the tiny South Pacific island nation as it ditched a time-zone alliance with the United States and moved its time zone 24 hours ahead to catch up with Asia, New Zealand and Australia.

On New Year's Eve, Samoa will have jumped to the west of the international dateline, which runs zig-zags through the Pacific Ocean and broadly follows the 180 degree line of longitude, in a move Prime Minister Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi said would make it easier for Samoa to trade with key partners.

"No longer shall we have people ringing us up on Monday from New Zealand and Australia thinking it is Monday when we are closing our eyes and praying at churches. And vice versa on our Fridays when we ring up and already our contacts are holidaying on their Saturdays," he told Radio New Zealand on Friday.

"It will remove the enormous amount of confusion in our travel times for the Samoans and especially for the tourists who come to Samoa, who keep thinking of the New Zealand and Australian time zones."

Church bells will ring and carol services will herald the changeover time.

To help win public support, the government declared employers must still pay workers for the missing Friday, although banks will not be allowed to charge interest for the lost day.

Countries are free to choose whether the dateline passes to the east or west, and Samoa's decision will mean all new maps will need to change.

The vast nation of China uses one national time zone while Australia is a mesh, particularly with summer daylight savings time that sees southern Adelaide city move from half an hour behind the eastern states to an hour in front of far northeastern Queensland.

But some tourism operators are worried Samoa will lose business by losing its position as the last place on earth to see the sunset each day, although it will now be one of the first places to see in each new day.

Samoa, a country of about 180,000 people, used to be same time zone as New Zealand Australia but went back a day in 1892, celebrating July 4 twice and aligning itself with the United States.

The date change is not the first major change in Samoa in recent years. In 2009, the country switched to driving on the left hand side of the road from the right hand side, in line with New Zealand and Australia.

如果你是周五读到这篇文章，那么你一定不是在萨摩亚。

这个南太平洋袖珍岛国丢掉了12月30日（周五）这一天，因为它抛弃了和美国的时区联盟，将自己的时间移前了24小时，以和亚洲、新西兰和澳大利亚保持一致。

在新年前夕那天，萨摩亚将移至国际日期变更线西侧。国际日期变更线是大致沿180度经线穿过太平洋的一条折线。萨摩亚总理图伊拉埃帕•萨伊莱莱•马利埃莱额奥伊称此举将方便萨摩亚和主要贸易伙伴进行交易。

周五，他告诉新西兰广播电台说：“我们再也不会有人周日在教堂闭上眼祈祷时接到来自新西兰和澳大利亚周一打的电话。同样我们周五打电话时对方也不会已经外出度假过周末了。”

“这会为萨摩亚人、特别是为来萨摩亚的游客免去很多旅行时间上的困惑，游客们老以为是在新西兰和澳大利亚的时区里。”

在时间变更时，萨摩亚的教堂钟声将会响起，人们将高唱颂歌，来宣布这一时刻的来临。

为了赢得民众的支持，政府宣布雇主仍须支付工人在“失去的”星期五的工资，但不允许银行收取失去的那天的贷款利息。

国家可自由选择是位于国际日期变更线的东侧还是西侧，萨摩亚的这一决定意味着所有的新地图将需要做出变动。

领土广阔的中国是全国使用同一个时区的时间，澳大利亚则是不同地区采用不同时区的时间，特别是采用了夏令时，使得南部的阿德莱德市从原来的比东部各州晚半个小时，变成比东北部的昆士兰州早一个小时。

不过一些旅游境外业务操作员担心萨摩亚会因为不再是地球上最后一个看见每天的日落的国度而失去商机，尽管如今萨摩亚将是最早迎接每个新的一天的国度之一。

萨摩亚是一个拥有18万人口的国家，它曾经和新西兰、澳大利亚位于同一时区，但在1892年后退了一天，庆祝了两次美国独立日（7月4日），并和美国结成同盟。

日期变更并不是近些年萨摩亚做出的首个重大变动。2009年该国将汽车靠左手边行驶改成靠右手边行驶，以和新西兰、澳大利亚保持一致。