April 1 is celebrated as April Fools’ Day across the world and is a holiday dedicated to pulling harmless, silly pranks and goofy tricks.
There’s a longstanding tradition in France where people stick paper fish on other people’s backs, kind of like an elevated “kick me” sign accompanied by the phrase “Poisson d’Avril” which means, “April Fish.”
In Brazil, April Fools’ Day is known as “Dia das Mentiras” which literally translates to “Day of Lies”. It is a day to pull playful pranks on one another.
Falling on April 1 or April 2, Iran celebrates the 13th day of the Persian New Year as “Sizdah Bedar”. Legend has it that pranksters have been pulling tricks on this day since 536 BC,seemingly making it the oldest celebration of April Fools’ Day.
It is said that April Fools’ Day celebrations stretch out over two days. First there is “Hunt the Gowk Day”, “Gowk”, a slang for fool. The second is “Tailie Day”, which is a day for playing harmless pranks.