Page 34 - American English File Student Book 3B

G third conditional
V making adjectives and adverbs
P sentence stress
9A Lucky encounters
1 READING & SPEAKING
a Answ er the questions w ith a partner. Say
what you would do and why.
W hat would you do if...?
1 somebody on the street asked you for
money on your way home tonight
2 you were driving home at night and you saw
somebody who had run out o f gas
3 you saw an old man being attacked on the
street by a couple o f teenagers
4 you were in a line at a bus station or airport
and someone asked to go in front o f you
because he / she was in a hurry
Glossary
student flat n oun cheap apartment usually rented out
to college students
phone box noun phone booth for a public telephone
Peterborough a small city 75 miles north o f London
hitch h ike n o u n travel by asking for free rides in other
people’s cars
tick et insp ector noun one who is in charge of a train
84 and travels with it, but does not drive it
You were
really lucky! Yes. If he
hadn’t helped me,
I would have missed
the train.
b Read the beginning o f a true story by the w riter Bernard Hare,
about som ething that happened to him when he was a student.
Then in pairs, decide what you think happened next.
c 5 2))) Now listen to what happened. W ere you right?
^ Listen again and answ er the questions.
1 W hat did Bernard have to do as soon as he got o ff the train?
2 How did Bernard react?
3 W hat did the ticket inspector then ask him to do?
inspector
I was living in a studen t fla t in N o rth London, when the
police knocked on my door one night. I thought it was because I
hadn’t paid the rent for a few months, so I didn’t open the door.
But then I wondered if it was something to do with my mother,
w ho I knew wasn’t very well. There was no phone in the flat and
this was before the days of mobile phones, so I ran down to the
nearest phone box and phoned my dad in Leeds, in the north of
England. He told me that my mum was very ill in hospital and that
I should go home as soon as I could.
W h e n I got to the station I found that I’d missed the last train
to Leeds. There was a train to Peterborough, from where some
local trains went to Leeds, but I would miss the connection by
about 20 minutes. I decided to get the Peterborough train - I was
so desperate to get home that I thought maybe I could hitchhike
from Peterborough.
“Tickets, please.” I looked up and saw the ticket inspector. He
could see from my eyes that I’d been crying. “A re you O K ? ”
he asked. “O f course I’m O K ,” I said. “You look awful,” he
continued. “Is there anything I can do?” “You could go away,” I
said rudely.
But he didn’t. He sat down and said, “If there’s a problem, I’m
here to help.” The only thing I could think of was to tell him my
story. W h e n I finished I said, “So now you know. I’m a bit upset
and I don’t feel like talking anymore. O K ?” “O K ,” he said, finally
getting up. “I’m sorry to hear that, son. I hope you make it home.”
I continued to look out of the window at the dark countryside.
Ten minutes later, the ticket inspector came back.