Happy Fools Day!! Origins! Fun Facts! Pranks Ideas!

Its the day of the fools. Learn a little bit about April Fools Day before you play a prank on someone this year.

On which day of the year do you look behind you every few minutes to see if an unflattering picture is stuck to your backside, or you treat every phone call claiming you have won the lottery suspiciously? Yes, it’s the All Fools Day celebrated worldwide on April 1^st. Every year on this day, the unwitting, and the gullible are taken in by tall stories and practical jokes.

These hoaxes and pranks have been part of our lifestyle for years now. Ever wondered how it all started?

Origin or Is it??

Well, you can continue wondering because no one really knows. One of the theories floating around suggests it was the change of the calendar that started this tradition of tomfoolery.

A lot of ancient cultures celebrated New Year around the 1^st of April. When in 1582, Pope Gregory XIII ordered the new Gregorian calendar to replace the old Julian calendar, the New Year’s date was changed to January 1^st. One of the theories goes that France was one of the countries to go with the change of New Year from end of March to January 1^st. Those who stubbornly clung to the old calendar system and failed to keep up with the change and continued to celebrate New Year in the last week of March, had jokes played on them. Pranksters would stick paper fish to their backs and the victims of this prank were called ‘Poisson d’Avril’ or April Fish—which, to this day, remains the French term for April Fool.

But this explanation does not fully account for the spread of the April Fools tradition in other European countries. In England, for example, the Gregorian calendar was not adopted till 1752, but the April Fools day was already well established by that point.

The March-April Springtime period is time where throughout the world a lot of fun and crazy festivals are celebrated. Noted among them are  Saturnalia, Hilaria and of cource the very popular Indian Festival Holi.

Its origins may be suspect but that doesn’t stop the hilarity that ensues every 1^st of April. With the advent of the internet era, a lot of websites have gotten involved in the horseplay.

Google has it -

Google has over the years come up with many ingenious plots to fool the naïve searcher. Some of their most creative hoaxes were the MentalPlex (which claimed to read the user’s mind about their search requirements), Gmail Paper (A new service where users would just click and Google would print all their email and send it to them via traditional mail) and Google Gulp (a fictitious drink that would optimize the drinkers’ intelligence). Google has been running so many interesting hoaxes on April Fools day over the years that when Gmail was launched in 2004 with 1 GB of free storage space, many considered it a hoax as its only competitors Yahoo and Hotmail only provided around 2-3 MB at the time.

Good, Bad and the Ugly -

To this day, one of the best hoaxes is said to be the one played by BBC in 1957, where they broadcasted a short clip about “pasta farmers” in Switzerland harvesting a crop of spaghetti and showed a short video of Swiss peasants pulling strands of spaghetti off some trees. Hundreds of people wrote in to BBC enquiring on how to start their own crop and this pronounced the Swiss Spaghetti Harvest hoax a resounding success.

But not all pranks end up in laughs; many times practical jokes can go horribly wrong.

A London City Hall employee was working on a big report with a far-away deadline when he received a memo that said it was due in 2 weeks. He got so agitated trying to finish it on time that he had heart palpitations and collapsed, causing him to take leave from work. He sued everyone at City Hall after he found out it was a not-very practical joke.

Another sad example is Randy Wood’s infamous April Fools joke. In 2004, Wood asked his ex-wife to come over so he could show her something. When she arrived at his house, she found him hanging from a tree in his front yard (he was actually supported by a safety harness). His unknowing ex-wife called 911 before he could reveal the gag. He was fined $1,000 and jailed for a year.

Play it safe -

It is definitely fun to plan and play a prank on an unsuspecting target, but you must anticipate the possible repercussions also. When playing practical jokes on peers at school or co-workers, make sure you don’t use April Fools day as an excuse to ‘get’ a colleague or school mate that you don’t like. Once you know what you are getting into, forget the hassles of everyday life and have safe fun and a bundle of laughs this April Fools day.

And the gullible….well, watch out!!

Prank it up with some common April Fools day tricks.

Running Late

While the victim is asleep, reset all the clocks ahead two hours. When they wake up they will panic and think they slept late and are late for school or work.

While You Were Out

Leave a phone message for the victim that says that a “Mr. Lyon” called (or Mr. Behr also works), and wants to be called back. Then list the phone number of the local zoo.

Door Ambush

This is the most classic and simple prank ever. Balance a small disposable cup of water on the top of a partially open door. Then wait for the splash!

Mouse Trap

Take a Post-It note and place it over the eye of the victim’s optical mouse. When the victim tries to use his or her computer, the cursor won’t move. Be sure to write “April Fools!” on the note! (if they have a standard mouse, you can perform the same trick by taping a piece of paper over the ball underneath the mouse.)

Weakling

Steal all the victim’s pens and replace them with pens that have the caps glued on.

Don't Cry Over Spilled Cola

Tell a friend that you know a great trick. Put your hand palm-down on the table and balance a full glass of Cola (or any liquid) on the back of your hand. Bet your friend that they can’t balance a glass on both hands at once (with your help to put them in place). As soon as you have the glasses balanced, stand up and walk out. They will be trapped and will have to spill the drink to escape.

Rude Awakening

Sneak up on your victim while they are sleeping and put some shaving cream in their hand. Then tickle them on the nose with a feather and watch while they give themselves a face full of foam!

Leave a Mark

Take a coin and use a pencil to trace around it—this will leave pencil dust all along the edge of the coin. Hide this coin in your hand for now. Go to your victim and tell him you want to show them a trick. Tell him you can do something that you bet he can’t. Take a different coin and roll it down your face from the top of your forehead, over your nose, and down to your chin. Challenge your victim to do the same thing—handing them the “marked” coin. When your victim finishes, congratulate them and walk away. Let them figure out for themselves that you tricked them into marking a big line down the middle of their face!


 

Fooled me!!
One of the most hilarious pranks that was played on me was by a friend when I was in Dubai. A cooking competition was running at that time where a famous Indian actor would come for dinner to the winners house. My friend told me that his aunt had won this competition and she could have a few people at her house when this superstar visited. Since I was a huge fan of this actor, my friend had arranged an invite for me. I was super excited and had even finalised what to wear for the occasion when the joke was revealed. Needless to say I was super embarrassed but also did tremendously enjoy the prank with my only regret being that I couldn’t play prank back.

I'm sure many of us would have had such an April Fool experience. I would love to hear about it. Tell me about an amusing prank you played on someone or an embarrassing prank that was played on you.
And have fun!!

Part of this post are excerpts taken from a feature penned by me for 'The Woman' magazine – Gulf Times Doha

 

Love to hear what you think!

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