Tag: esol

  • A Tale of Two Cars

    Let’s start with something easy.

    Question one: What’s yellow, blue and white, and has four wheels?

    Answer:

    Question two: The guy in the orange vest in the picture below is kneeling at the side of the road. What has he got in his hands? The picture isn’t clear, but the thing begins with a “c”, ends with an “a”, and has six letters in total. If you still can’t guess, read on.

    One morning, I was walking down the road to the supermarket. On the other side of the road, I saw a policeman standing in the road beside a black car, talking to the driver. His police car was parked a short distance behind the stopped car.

    I took a photo with my phone, and stopped to look. I couldn’t hear anything, but I thought the driver of the black car had done something wrong, like driving too fast, for example. This happened outside a primary school, so there are speed restrictions around schools. Well, that was my first thought, but sometimes you can get the wrong end of the stick.

    Anyway, I did my shopping, and on the way back home, I saw a young man on the other side of the road, walking up and down, and talking on his phone. He was dressed the same as the driver of the black car, and in fact, it was the same guy. I went over and talked to him, and I told him I had taken a picture of the incident. I showed it to him, and I asked his permission to use the photo for this post. He agreed.

    I walked on, and then I heard somebody running up behind me. When I looked round to see who it was, it was the driver. He said to me, “I don’t suppose I could get a copy of that picture, could I?”, so I did what he asked.

    But that’s not the full story. Here’s the order that things happened. As he was driving, the young man’s fan belt broke, and his car wouldn’t move.

    A police car was passing, saw the problem and helped. The policeman got out and pushed the broken-down car to where it’s sitting in the picture.

    In the police car, there was a cameraman who was taking films for a TV police show, and he’s recording the policeman talking to and helping the driver.

    But that’s not the last word; there’s more! The driver didn’t have just one piece of bad luck; he had two!

    He was on his way to a friend’s graduation ceremony at the University, and when his car broke down, he missed it. Maybe he wanted a copy of my photo as proof for his friend of why he missed the capping ceremony.

  • Fair’s Fair. Pay the Fare.

    This morning, I saw these two schoolkids (a girl and a boy) waiting for the same bus as me. When you’re on a bus, you see lots of different people, and you hear things. This is what I saw and heard, not today, but last week.

    At the same bus stop last week, the driver was waiting to start the journey. I was sitting in my usual seat, and in front of me, there were two young kids (not the two in the picture above). There was no adult with them. They looked like brother and sister. The girl was younger.

    I know this driver because I’ve been on his bus before. He’s a middle-aged Korean man, and he’s always friendly and polite. On this day last week, he got out of his seat and walked towards us. I thought he was just stretching his legs while waiting, but he wasn’t.

    He stopped in front of the kids, and asked the boy how old he was. He said he was 9. The driver said the boy didn’t tag on, and that he usually didn’t tag on. The driver said that only kids under five can travel free if they’re with an adult.

    The driver didn’t shout. He wasn’t angry, but he was firm. He just told the boy the rules. Then the driver returned to his seat and started the journey.

    The boy started looking for something in his backpack. He took out a HOP card, stretched for the reader and tagged on! So he did have a card, but didn’t tag on at the start. Why not? Did he forget or was he cheating? Who knows?

    When we came to the stop at their school, the girl tagged off, and the boy was half-off the bus. But then he remembered and searched again in his backpack for his HOP card. So maybe he really did forget.

    The next day, I was on the same bus again at the same time. I saw someone standing at the front of the bus near the driver beside the card reader. It was the same boy, searching in the same bag for the same HOP card!  So maybe he is just forgetful.

    Or maybe not. This morning, on the same bus at the same time, there was a different driver. The boy got on after me, but didn’t tag on. The driver didn’t say anything, and the boy just sat down. At the school, he hopped off, but he didn’t tag off. So maybe he isn’t just forgetful. Or maybe I should just mind my own business.

    LANGUAGE NOTES

    FAIR’S FAIR

    The words fair and fare sound the same. They have the same pronunciation. Fair is an adjective, and fare is a noun.