Unit The less Traveled Path.docx

Unit The less Traveled PathUnit 1 The less Traveled Path Part 1 Tape scripts A Man 1 What makes me happy is slowing down. I think that we live in a very fast, speedy- world and we often forget to take stock and take time. Well, the problem -with happiness is of course that sometimes when you are happy, you are infected with the spirit of the fact that it's going to stop, so sometimes you can't enjoy happiness because you know it's going to end. Man 2 I think it is a very good thing to try and aim to be happy. Happiness is a difficult concept. You're aiming for sort of contentment and satisfaction .with a few moments of joy. And for me, like most people actually, what the evidence tells you is it's about having good relationships and making time for them, so I'm never happier than when I'm with my wife and child and also having fulfilling and satisfying work. Man 3 Again there's a wealth of evidence about this - above a certain point wealth and possessions don't contribute to happiness. Of course there's a minimum, if you've just lost your job and you can't pay the mortgage, you're going to be miserable. But above a certain level, and it's actually relatively low in a society like ours, money doesn't actually buy happiness. B. Tape scripts 1. I don't remember very much about my childhood, actually. My wife's always asking me "When you were a boy, did you use to ." and I reply "I don't know, I can't remember." We didn't . . . we didn't use to talk very much, we weren't very close, or if we were, we didn't show it. I remember I used to have my hair cut every Friday. My father Unit 1 Step by Step 3000, Book IV 1 and I would go together. I had the shortest hair in the school. When they'd finished cuffing it, they'd burn the ends with a sort of candle. Oh I'll never forget that smell. 2. I got on very well with my mother. I used to tell her everything or nearly everything - and she'd talk to me very openly too. Sometimes she'd say to me "Don't go to school today. Stay with me." And we'd go out shopping or something like that. 3. I'm not a very tidy person, but my mother's very house-proud, so she's always telling me to pick things up and put them away and do this and do that. She goes on for hours about “Cleanliness is next to godliness.” My father isn't like that at all. He lets me do what I want. I think he's learned not to pay attention. 4. I have very fond memories of my childhood. To me it represented security. We used to do a lot together as a family. I remember walks, and picnics, and going for rides on a Sunday afternoon. Every Friday, when my father came home from work, he had a treat for each of us. My mother used to say he was spoiling us, but why not? It didn't do us any harm. C Tape scripts Man-M Woman-W M: Gee, I don't remember it being this small. I thought the room was a lot bigger. W: So did I. But it'll be OK once we get the furniture in. Look, why don't we put the armchairs in front of the fireplace? M: Yeah. Um, maybe we should decide really where the bed goes first. It is the biggest piece of furniture, after all . . . W: Right. Well why don't we put the bed behind the door as you come in? M: Oh, yeah, that's a good idea. Um . we can put the bed in the corner. W: OK. Now, what's next? M: Well, how about the dresser? W: why don't we put it across from the fireplace in the corner next to the closet! I'm Unit 1 Step by Step 3000, Book IV 2 going to put it there now. Why don't you help me? M: Why don't you move it and I'll just watch. W: Oh, yeah, right. Come on, lift your end. Now don't scratch the floor M: OK, but it's heavy. W: whats in it? I thought you were supposed to empty out the drawers. M: Well, I didn't get around to that this morning . . . W: Ah . . . (Mm.) didn't get around to it . . . Let me see . . . How does that look? M: It looks good. W: Hmm, now, where do you want your desk? M: Well, how about in the far corner between the two windows? I mean, I need lots of light. W: Do you think it'll fit there? M: Well, it'll probably fit if w . . . we can put it diagonally. W: Oh, good idea. And then the chair can have its back to the fireplace.( Mm-hmm.)Yeah, I could live with that. All right, what about the bookcase? M: Well, how about on the far wall between those two windows, I guess, so it'll be right near the desk? W: Yeah, yeah, good idea. All right, where do you think the TV should go? M: How about in the corner to the left of the fireplace, so we can watch it from the armchairs? And we can put the stereo next to the TV with, uh, the speakers on either side of the fireplace. W: Terrific! Now, let me see, what else is there? W: Well, there's the table lamp. W: Well, the table lamp should go on top of the dresser. Hold it a minute, I'm . I'm trying to find the outlet . You know, that really looks nice. M: Mm-hmm. Looking at the desk, though, I think I may need some more light to work. Well, I could buy a desk lamp. W: Good idea. You know, the place really looks good. M: Yeah. W: You want to put your books in the bookcase now, or do you want to wait for. Unit 1 Step by Step 3000, Book IV 3 Part II Opting for a slower pace of life in the 21st century Tape scripts A As you may have noticed life is fast-paced. We travel on bullet trains and jets. News comes to us at the speed of light. And with cell phones and the Internet and of course, fast food, most people rush through their days, trying to do more in less and less time. But not everyone. Some people are trying to slow down, and instead of racing through life, actually experience it. Journalist Carl Honor6 admits that not long ago his life was a breathless race with time. "n the old days, when I was a 'speedaholic,' if you like, my whole life was just a long list of things to do. " To finish all those tasks, day after day, Mr. Honore says he became obsessed with saving time wherever he could . . . a minute here, a few seconds there. He says people usually don't realize that their whole life has turned into an exercise in "hurry up" until they get a wake up call .and something stops them in their tracks. Mr. Honor6's wake up call came three years ago when he began reading bedtime stories to his3-year-old son. "I'd go into his room at the end of the night and I just couldn't slow down. I'd be speed-reading The Cat in the Hat, which is ridiculous. I heard about a series of books called One-Minute Bedtime Stories, which is a horrible idea, but my first reaction was, 'What a great idea, I must get some.' That's when I caught myself, and I just thought 'No, this has gone too far. ' " To improve the quality of life, Mr. Honors says, people need to embrace what he calls "the philosophy of slow." "I think that one of the cultural assumptions we make nowadays is that slow is bad and that slowing down means being lazy or unproductive or giving up. But the opposite is true. Now, more than ever in this high-tech 24/7 technology-drenched society, we need moments of slowness. When you work more slowly you actually work better, your productivity goes up. So you know, sometimes you have to go fast at work. People need to do things at the right speed. They need to re-learn the lost art of shifting gears. " Unit 1 Step by Step 3000, Book IV 4 B Tape scripts The philosophy of slow is a worldwide phenomenon, and a variety of slow movements are redefining our relationship with time. One of those groups is Slow Food. Makale Faber is spokeswoman for its US chapter, "The organization has always been kind of against the spread of the fast food culture around the world. But it's more than just the food. We really kind of educate consumers about how foods are related to culture. It's also about this industrial life, which you know, has changed the culture of many work places. People are multi-tasking, doing several jobs at once, not being able to take time to have lunch during their workday or vacations. " Slow Food now has 1.3,000 members in the United States and more than 80,000 in 60 countries around the world. Other organizations in the movement focus on business, exercise or product design. One design that reflects slowness is a line of products called Broken White by Dutch industrial designer Simon Heijdens. "It's actually a set of dinner dishes, white ceramic dishes. They appear to be just white plates, bowls and mugs, but over the course of their use they begin to develop these very small cracks. And as they continue to be used, the cracks reveal themselves to be floral patterns, which you might find on your grandmother's china. And so you have a stronger attachment to those products. And you're less likely to dispose of them because they are actually carrying an expression of your relationship with them. " With the slow movement now spreading across the globe, In Praise of Slowness author Carl Honord says he hopes the world's hurry-up, impatient lifestyle will start to relax. However, he acknowledges that slowing down is not something people can do quickly . and, with all 'he pressure on us to go even faster, it's not always easy. But, he says, it's worth the effort. Part III Family Tape scripts Throughout history the basic unit of almost every human society has been the family. The members of the family live together under the same roof, they share the economic burdens of life as well as its affection joys, and it is the family which has primary Unit 1 Step by Step 3000, Book IV 5 responsibility for the important task of raising children to adulthood. The family is not a uniform concept in all societies. In many places it is an extended group which includes uncles, aunts, cousins and in-laws. The family head usually has considerable influence in arranging marriages, selecting careers and determining all important moves and purchases by any member of the family. Particularly in conditions where society or the state does not give aid and where consequently the responsibilities of the family are greater, this larger group provides better protection in times of economic or other emergency. In many other societies, including most industrialized ones, the "nuclear family" is the basic social unit. This term refers to a husband and wife united through marriage and their dependent children, whether natural or adopted. Industrialization and urbanization create many specialized jobs which tend to scatter family members among different employers and thus to separate residences as soon as they become wage earners. The small family, which has only one - or if the wife works also, two-employed members, is better able to adapt to rapid change and to move when the job moves. The nuclear family is almost universal and the nuclear group of father, mother and their children is recognized even when it is part of an extended family. There are cases, however, which strain the definition. Polygamy, for example, brings several wives and their children into the picture. But polygamous households are not common in any society. More difficult to explain are the cases of divided residence. Among the Ashanti people of Africa, where the wife and husband do not reside together, the child gets training and affection from the mother's brother and learns that his mother's husband is "not his family. " An even stranger situation existed with the Nayar of India before being changed by outside influence. There the household consisted of brothers and sisters and the sisters' children. The sisters were not married and the brothers simply took care of whatever children their sisters had. Inheritance customs also have an influence on the structure of the family. In England the farm was passed on to the eldest son in order to keep the family land intact. Younger sons had to go out and start a new farm or join the army or move to town and take up a trade. They provided a large part of the labor supply during England's industrialization process. In many areas of the European continent all of the sons shared Unit 1 Step by Step 3000, Book IV 6 equally in the inheritance and more extended households were common. Although the exact form varies from place to place and time to time, we can say that the family is the original and the most natural social group. The ties we develop by long intimate association with the small group of persons who are biologically related to us cannot be matched in any of the forms of communal living which are tried every now and then. Part IV Listen and relax Tape scripts I am an identical twin and as children we looked exactly identical. So identical that we had to wear initials on our shirts so that teachers could tell us apart in school. And I think that's quite often the case with identical twins - that when they are young children they tend to be more identical physically than when they grow up and I think that twins tend to diverge more as they get into adolescence and then into adulthood. And I think it reaches its climax when you're an adolescent because as an adolescent you are striving to be an individual but of course everybody looks upon you as one of a pair, so you have this real problem of identity. My theory is that twins actually look alike physically but often they complement each other when it comes to their personalities and natures, if you like. And I think in our experience we complemented each other, we were the mirror image of each other. So my brother was more introvert . . . was more academic, schoolish. I was, perhaps, or still am, you know, extrovert, more extrovert than him. And I think that's what we carried through our childhood really. As children going through primary school we got on very well. We were. .we always played together, we had common interests. Our parents actually encouraged that, so that when we were, you know, young children we had piano lessons and we did this and we did that together, and we were just like Very, very close friends. And it was natural for us to play together rather than to play with other children. When we got to adolescence, then thats where the truly competitive element came in and we found ourselves more likely to want not to be together. Not that we argued tremendously but that we just were searching for our own identities and therefore we Unit 1 Step by Step 3000, Book IV 7 would clash more. Up until the age of eighteen we were always together, but when we left school I went to teach in France for a year, my brother went straight to university to read sciences - I was doing languages. So that when I came to go to university, he was a year ahead of me and by sheer chance, we ended up in the same college in the same university, so the interesting factor was that we had deliberately aimed not to go to the same,. to be separate. but because I had this year off and he went straight in and through a quirk of the selection proc