Show 218 Thursday 7 December

Watch today’s show at YouTube or BlipTV.

Hi, I’m Sarah. Welcome to The Daily English Show.
Yesterday I got some sad news. A family friend passed away.

One of the downsides to living so far away from home is times like this. I would have really liked to visit him before he died and it would be really nice to be with friends and family right now.

But thanks to this great technology I could make him a video message. Well where I’m from in New Zealand is in the wop-wops so they don’t have broadband internet ... so I made a DVD and posted that.

And he really enjoyed that. He wrote me an email to say thank you. He was such a warm and positive man ... I said that he must be in pain... but he said he was “mostly cruising in a beautiful, peaceful place thanks to drugs”.

I am just happy that this kind of technology exists so I could say what I wanted to say to him which was thank you for the love you gave me and goodbye.

So, sadly, I’m not going to be at the funeral on Saturday to celebrate his life with his friends and family. So I thought I’d talk a little bit about him today.

STICK NEWS

Kia ora this is Stick News. Thousands of people died all over the world yesterday. One of those people was a beautiful man from New Zealand.

The world’s population is estimated to be 6.5 billion. Thousands of people die every day and the world keeps spinning. But for some people it seems to stop.
Yesterday a New Zealand man called Bryce spent his last day on Earth.
Bryce was a potter. He had 3 daughters. When his youngest daughter was three years old his family met another family with three daughters.
Two of the girls became best friends and spent hours playing together deep in the peaceful wop wops of the Coromandel Peninsula.
Years later one of the girls had moved on from tree-huts and midnight feasts to playing with a video camera on the other side of the world but she never forgot the love she received as a child from the people in the valley where she grew up.
A few months ago something started to go haywire in Bryce’s body. He gradually grew weaker and weaker but his spirit never faded.
Bryce’s body has now gone but the warmth of his love remains in the hearts of his friends and family.

And that was Stick News for Thursday the 7th of December.
Kia Ora.

the snow report

I didn’t feel like snowboarding today, so I took the day off. It snowed a lot in the early evening. I went for a walk to the convenience store and there was a lot of fresh powder. This is a picture on a garage door near my house.

conversations with sarah
#130 When did he die?

Step 1: Repeat Ric’s lines.
Step 2: Read Ric’s lines and talk to Sarah.

Ric When did he die?

Sarah Yesterday morning.

Ric How old was he?

Sarah In his 50s.

Ric That’s too young. Was it cancer?

Sarah Yeah.

Ric Were his family around him?

Sarah Yeah. Two of his daughters were living in the UK and they came back to spent the last couple of months with him.

Show 217 Wednesday 6 December

Watch today's show at YouTube or BlipTV.

Hi, I’m Sarah. Welcome to The Daily English Show. Yesterday I was talking about mistakes and I made one myself. A sneaky little hyphen climbed into my video description. I wrote no-one but it’s not supposed to have a hyphen.

I often make mistakes with words like that. I can’t remember if a word is supposed to be one word or two words or have a hyphen or no hyphen.
One of the tricky things is that sometimes they can be spelt in two ways.
Like all right can be spelt all right or alright. Although according to my dictionary alright is non-standard or informal.

No one is two words but nobody is one word. I wonder why.

You have to be careful with some words because their meaning can change.
Like every day and everyday.
I eat breakfast every day. This book has ideas for turning everyday objects into works of art.

STICK NEWS

Kia ora in Stick News today a dress that Audrey Hepburn wore in Breakfast at Tiffany’s has been sold in London for thousands of pounds.

Breakfast at Tiffany’s is a movie made in 1961. Audrey Hepburn played a character called Holly in the movie. At the start of the movie Holly eats bread for breakfast, standing outside a jewellery shop in New York called Tiffany’s wearing a black dress.
Recently the owner of the dress gave it to his friend to be sold for charity.
Last night someone bought the dress in an auction for 410 thousand pounds. The money will help underprivileged children in India.

And that was Stick News for Wednesday the 6th of December.
Kia Ora.

the snow report

It didn’t snow much last night so today the road was black and the snow on the side of the road was brown.
The tdes I wrote yesterday is still alive. I thought it might have been destroyed by a snow clearing machine or a cheeky kid.

conversations with sarah
#129 Why not?

Step 1: Repeat Daisuke’s lines.
Step 2: Read Daisuke’s lines and talk to Sarah.

Sarah So if I was to point out a small mistake on a blackboard in a shop – just to be nice, not to be rude ... what do you think is the best way to say it nicely in Japanese?

Daisuke I don’t think you should point it out at all.

Sarah Why not?

Daisuke Because ... maybe you like having your mistakes pointed out, but 99% of people don’t.

Sarah I think that’s true for other mistakes – but don’t you think that English spelling mistakes are different?

Daisuke No, I think it’s the same.

Sarah It just feels kind of rude to have a quite smile at mistake – but not say anything. Like not telling someone they have food stuck between their teeth or something.

Daisuke I see what you mean. But I still don’t think you should say anything.

Sarah Because there is a 99 percent chance that the person will be offended?

Daisuke Yeah.