busking, husking, hog-wrangling, hornswoggling, honey-fuggling, jug-honeying, ho-downing, horse-crowning, and of course, counterfeiting.

賣藝、剝殼、野豬摔角、詐騙、仙人跳、養蜂、踢踏舞、賽馬，還有最經典的：做偽鈔。

You see, before 1861, the dollar bills that we know and love were not standardized or issued by the US federal government.

這是因為在 1861 年之前，我們現在熟知和喜愛的一美元紙幣並沒有被標準化，也不是由美國聯邦政府所發行的。

Instead, more than 1,500 private banks across the country distributed their own bills, with their own unique designs, under charters from individual states.

相對的，全國有 1500 多家私人銀行在各州的特許下發行他們自己的鈔票，並各自有著自己獨特的設計。

With upwards of 7,000 different-looking bills in circulation, which varied widely in quality and reliability,

在這些流通中的 7000 多種不同外觀的鈔票之間，它們的品質與可靠性的差別相當的大。

it was pretty easy to just hand some guy a 5-dollar Monopoly bill, tell him you got it from that bank down on Baltic avenue,

你大可以把一張 5 美元的大富翁桌遊鈔票遞給某個人，告訴他你剛從波羅地大道那邊的銀行拿到這張鈔票，

and walk away with your cowboy hat or steamboat or whatever it was that 5 dollars could buy in 1860.

然後直接拿走一頂牛仔帽或是一艘蒸汽船，或是隨便什麼 1860 年時 5 美元買得到的東西離開。

The problem was so bad, in fact, that directly after the Civil War, it's estimated that somewhere between a third and half of all US currency was counterfeit.

整個問題嚴重到在美國內戰剛結束時，根據估計，有大約三分之一到一半的美元是偽造的。

That number is now believed to be well below 0.01%—only the most intricate and highly-engineered fakes can stay in circulation these days,

如今這個數字已降到了 0.01% 以下，只有製作得最為精細且技術高超的假鈔才能在市場上流通，

and these sorts of bills require resources at the scale of an entire nation to pull off convincingly.

而且這樣的假鈔需要動員整個國家的資源，才能夠真正達到可以獲利的規模。

That's where North Korea comes in.

而這就是北韓的優勢所在。

"But hold on," you might say.

「稍等一下，」你可能會這麼說。

"What resources, exactly? I mean, I have paper, I have a printer, and I have a pretty good idea of what a 20 dollar bill looks like, isn't that enough?"

「所以具體來說要怎麼樣的資源？我是說，我手邊有紙，有台影印機，而且我也很清楚一張 20 美元長什麼樣子。這樣不就夠了嗎？」

Well, outrageously stupid viewer that I made up to segue into this section of the video, no.

這個嘛，針對這位我只是為了配合這段影片而假想出來，愚蠢到無可救藥的觀眾，我得回答：不。

While our paper notes might seem fairly primitive, the US minting process is surprisingly costly, complex, and difficult to replicate.

雖然我們的紙幣可能看起來相當原始，但美國的印鈔過程其實出乎意料地昂貴、複雜且難以複製。

There are a number of reasons for this, but arguably the most important is that our paper money is not really made of paper.

當中有許多原因，但其中可說是最重要的一點，是因為我們的紙鈔並不是真的用紙做成的。

They're actually a blend of 75% cotton, 25% linen, and a handful of red and blue "security fibers" that are woven-in randomly throughout the bill.

它們實際上是由 75% 的棉、25% 的亞麻，以及混在整張鈔票中的少量紅色與藍色「安全纖維」所混合而成的。

This unique blend not only makes these bills ideal for a light summertime top sheet, but also gives them a distinct feel that can't be achieved by any other material.

這種獨特的組成使得這些鈔票不但適合拿來在夏天當作涼被來蓋，還給予它們一種其他材質無法複製出來的獨特觸感。

As for the printing process, the Treasury uses a hugely-expensive intaglio printing press, where ink is applied to a metal plate that's then pressed into the paper with 20,000 pounds of pressure per square inch.

至於印刷過程，美國財政部使用了昂貴的凹版印印刷機，原理是將墨水塗在金屬板後，再以每平方英寸兩萬磅的壓力壓在紙上。

This allows for a process called "microprinting," where tiny, nearly-invisible words are hidden throughout the bill.

這種技術讓印鈔過程能使用稱為「微型印刷」印刷，將為小到幾乎看不建的文字印刷在整張鈔票上。

On denominations higher than the one dollar bill—which hasn't changed since 1929 due to the cut-throat vending machine lobby,

在高於一美元面額的鈔票上 (而一美元鈔片則因為販賣機廠商的決斷性遊說而從 1929 年以來便從來沒有改變過，

a fact that my writer came up with as a dumb joke, but then later learned is actually the real reason—the security features get even more advanced.

我的寫手本來以為這又是個網路上愚蠢的笑話，但後來發現其實是真的原因)，上面的安全措施則更加先進一些。

All bills five and above have an invisible security thread woven into the fabric, that, if exposed to UV light, glow a different color depending on the bill:

所有五美元以上的鈔票中都縫入了一條看不見的安全絲線，在紫外線燈光的照射下才會依面額反射出不同顏色的光芒：

blue for five, orange for ten, green for twenty, yellow for fifty, pink for a hundred, and turquoise for if you've been laundering all of your money in a bucket of Mountain Dew Baja Blast.

五美元是藍色，十美元是橘色，二十美元是綠色，五十美元是黃色，一百美元是粉紅色，而如果你把所有鈔票都丟到藍色的激浪汽水裡去洗，則會是綠松色的。

These bills also feature subtle watermarks that can be seen if held up to a bright light,

這些鈔票上面還具有隱密的浮水印，會在把鈔票舉到強光下後浮現，

and bills ten and above use a magnetic color-shifting ink in the bottom-right corner that changes from copper to green when tilted.

而十美元及以上的鈔票則在右下角使用了磁性變色墨水，會在把鈔票傾斜時從銅色變成綠色。

In short, accurately copying one of these bills is expensive, and doing so to turn a profit is nearly impossible.

簡而言之，想要精確複製這些鈔票所費高昂，而要以此營利更是幾乎不可能。

But sometime in the late 1980s, North Korea's Room 39—the clandestine office that maintains the country's slush fund through meth production, insurance scams, and, yes, counterfeiting—

但是在 1980 年代末，北韓政府下轄的 39 號室，也就是負責利用製造冰毒、保險詐騙以及，沒錯，製作偽鈔來為該國賺取隱藏資金的單位，

set out to produce perfect hundred dollar bills in a large enough volume that the operation would be profitable.

開始以能夠獲利的極大數量，製作出了完美的百元美鈔。

By 1990, Kim Il-Sung had sourced an identical intaglio printing press from Japan, cloth paper with the same iconic red and blue fibers from Hong Kong,

到了 1990 年，金日成從日本採購了一臺與美國所使用同款的凹版印刷機、從香港進貨了同樣編入了紅色與藍色纖維的布料紙張、

magnetic, color-shifting ink from France, and a terrified workforce from his very own home country, because it's important to keep manufacturing local.

從法國進口了會改變顏色的雌性墨水，以及從自己國家徵招了一群畏懼不已的勞動力，因為保持本地製造可是很重要的。

Good on you, Kim!

幹得好，阿金！

The bills that Room 39 produced became known as "superdollars," because their only discernible flaws, if any, were that they were actually too perfect.

39 室所生產出的美鈔開始被稱作「超級美元」，因為它們唯一可見的缺陷，就是它們或許有點太完美了。

For example, this line on the base of this lamppost on the back of the hundred dollar bill is a little faded on the real deal,

例如，在真正的美元百鈔背面，這個燈柱的線條其實有點模糊，

whereas Kim took the artistic liberty of filling it back in one version of the superdollar.

而阿金卻在一個版本的超級美鈔上，擅自把線條給補上了。

On another version, the clock hands on Independence Hall stay inside the inner circle, whereas on the real bill they poke out just a smidge.

在另一個版本中，美國獨立紀念館上的時鐘的指針好好地待在內圈裏面，而在真鈔上指針們其實凸出來了一點點。

By 2006, there were estimated to be 19 different variations of the superdollar in circulation, each bearing a unique, nearly-unnoticeable flaw.

到了 2006 年，據估計總共有 19 種不同的超級美元在市面上流通，而每種都有一個獨特且幾乎無法發現的缺陷。

Not all of these variants can be traced back to North Korea, though.

然而，並不是所有的版本都是北韓製造出來的。

In 2002, a British crime syndicate was caught printing superdollars on a smaller scale, and some have also accused the CIA of producing a variant for off-the-books operations.

在 2002 年，一名英國的罪犯被查獲以小規模印製超級美元，而有些人還指控 CIA 也印製了一些假鈔，將其用在沒有記錄下來的行動中。

Of course, we're not accusing them of that, because, uh, this is a channel about bricks.

當然，我們可沒有要指控他們這麼做的一絲，因為，呃，這只是一個介紹磚塊的頻道而已嘛。

Anyways, for many decades, these supernotes made the US treasury quake in their fancy coin-studded boots.

總而言之，數十年以來，這些超級假鈔讓美國財政部的官員們困擾不已。

While it might not seem like a big deal for North Korea to print some extra cash to not feed people with, foreign counterfeiting operations have long been considered an act of war.

雖然讓北韓印製一些額外的鈔票好讓他們能「不」餵飽自己的人民感覺也不算是什麼大問題，但外國製造的假鈔其實長久以來都被視為是一種戰爭行為。

In World War II, for example, Hitler had seriously considered a plan to bomb Britain with piles of counterfeit cash, hoping to inflate their economy and cause it to collapse.

例如，在第二次世界大戰中，希特勒曾認真考慮過將大量的假鈔空投到英國，藉此來讓他們的經濟通貨膨脹並垮台。

Fortunately—or unfortunately, if you're watching this from Pyongyang—the hundred dollar bill got another high-tech redesign in 2013,

幸運的是－或者說不幸的是，如果你是從平壤觀看這部影片的話－美元百鈔在 2013 時經歷了一次高科技的重新改造，

and the trickle of superdollars out of Room 39 has seemingly, as far as we know, come to a halt.

而 39 室出產的超級美元自那時開始，至少就我們所知道的情況，似乎便沒再繼續出現了。

If you happen to have some superdollars just laying around for… uh… reasons, you should not use them to get HelloFresh,

如果你正好因為... 呃，一些不能明說的原因，身邊有一些超級美元的話，你不應該把它們用在 HelloFresh 上，

specifically because I feel like our sponsor would not appreciate us telling you to use shadily acquired North Korean counterfeit currency to buy them.

特別是因為我覺得要是我叫你用這些可疑的北韓偽鈔來買他們的服務，我們的贊助商應該會不太高興。

However, in any other circumstance, you should really try them out.

然而，只要不是用假鈔，你真的應該試試看他們的服務。

I've been using HelloFresh for over a year, long before they became a sponsor, and even have these hundreds of recipe-pages to prove it.

早在他們成為贊助商之前，我就已經使用 HelloFresh 一年多了，而我手邊甚至有幾百頁的食譜可以證明這點。

I started using them because I used to be a take-out addict—I found I just didn't have the time to make a meal from scratch each night—but take-out is unhealthy and expensive.

我一開始使用它們是因為我曾經是個外食族，因為我們發現自己根本沒時間每晚要從無到有變出一頓飯來。但外食既不健康又昂貴。

With HelloFresh, I get healthy, delicious, and quick meal kits delivered straight to my door each week, which typically take about 30 minutes to make.

通過 HelloFresh，每個禮拜都有健康、美味和快速的餐包直接送到我的門前，而這些餐點通常只需要 30 分鐘便能烹煮完成。

For example, this week I made the Bulgogi Pork Tenderloin—one of my favorite meals, which I always pick when it's an option.

例如，本週我做了韓式烤豬柳，而這是我最喜歡的一餐。每次只要有這個選項，我都會選它。

Best of all, you can to HelloFresh.com and use code HAI12 to get 12 free meals, including free shipping, and you'll be helping to support HAI while you're at it.

最棒的是，你可以在 HelloFresh.com 使用 HAI12 優惠碼來取得 12 頓免費的餐點，連運費也不用，而且你還能藉此支持 HAI。