高级休闲英语 辅导

高级休闲英语辅导
More practice with the video
Video 4
Home improvement
Focus question for text
Make a note of all the negative points about the flat
Text
As we become a little more prosperous, one of the first things we think about is home improvement - making the place we live a little more comfortable, a little more attractive. We’re going to show you an example today, two flats in the same block, this block, built in the early 80s. One of the flats is exactly as it was when it was first built, and the other one has been improved greatly. I think you’ll be interested - come inside and have a look.
Now I’m sure you’re all familiar with this kind of kitchen - it’s obviously a kitchen designed by a man, because men don’t often use the kitchen. It’s a difficult p lace to use.
First of all the surfaces - the floor, the walls, the ceiling. What’s wrong with them? Well, they’re of basic rough concrete. Concrete is very cold, it’s very unsympathetic, it’s cold on the feet, it’s uncomfortable, and - most important - it’s impossible to keep really clean. That rough surface attracts the grease, the dirt, and therefore the germs, and it’s germs which cause the lack of hygiene which causes disease in our families, disease for our children, disease for us. No matter how clean we are, it’s difficult to keep this kind of kitchen really clean.
Another kind of surface - the work surface. You have to have a space to chop up your vegetables and your meat and the rest of your food. How can you do it in a kitchen which doesn’t have en ough work surface?
Storage space - where can you keep the food? Where can you keep your pots and pans? Very difficult in a kitchen like this. Notice the layout - the oven is on that side, the water is on that side, very very difficult, not convenient.
Another thing - notice the lighting. There’s one bulb, doesn’t give enough light, makes it difficult to see and therefore dangerous, you can chop your finger off while you’re chopping the vegetables.
Another thing - the power supply. What do you do in a kitchen like this if you want to plug in an extra piece of equipment like a microwave or an electric kettle or a food mixer? You can’t, because there is no extra electric supply.
It’s uncomfortable, difficult to use, and it’s very very unhygienic.
This room is o ften called the smallest room in the house, and it’s one of the most important: the toilet and bathroom, where you keep yourself clean. Now again, rather difficult in a toilet and bathroom like this. It’s the old-fashioned kind of toilet, the floor closet, and it’s open and therefore you have to clean it every day to keep it really hygienically clean. It’s just a cold water supply, not very comfortable, and only a shower. There’s a kind of sink unit down here, and again everything is surfaced in rough cement, therefore since it’s a rough surface it will tend to trap all of the germs that you don’t want in your toilet or in your bathroom. It is not very convenient, it is certainly rather unsightly - it doesn’t make you happy to be in a place like that. Not a lot to be done about it in its present condition.
Now in these small flats, space is very important. Look at the amount of space wasted by this door. As you open it, you take away space from this little ante-room to the kitchen itself.… Now they’ve tried t o utilize space because up here you have some storage cupboards. But look at the problems with them. I can just about to reach them. But I’m sure a normal sized lady would have a lot more difficulty.
Again, designed by a man with women not very much in mind.
This is the living room and the bedroom - a very important room, and it has all the problems we’ve been talking about already: first of all the surfaces are cold and unsympathetic because they’re bare concrete and bare plaster on the walls, difficult to keep clean and very cold in the winter and not very comfortable to look at - they’re not pretty. Then space - where do you put your things? You have to bring in all sorts of boxes and cupboards and wardrobes just to keep your clothes and things tidy. Ther e’s a bed which takes up a third of the floor space. You can’t do much about that, you’ve got to have
a bed, but of course it means that when you want to invite some friends in, three friends and the place is full. How do you entertain anybody?
There’s a b alcony, but again like many of these balconies it tends to be wasted space, it’s where you keep your old rubbish. The fittings are not very attractive, it’s the basic iron frame and it’s draughty - lets in the cold in the winter, always much too hot in the summer.
What can we do about all that? Well, there is something we can do. Downstairs is exactly the same flat, but it has been modernised.
Now, this is the flat downstairs. It’s in the same building, it’s the same flat, but it has been modernised, it’s b een renovated, and you could almost be in a different world.
First of all, look at the surfaces. Now, the floor is beautifully tiled with a large pink ceramic tile with a kind of floral pattern. It’s very attractive, it’s very sympathetic, it’s warm to the feet, and it’s very very easy to keep clean - all you need to do is to wipe a cloth over it and it’s clean. The walls in this little ante-room have been nicely plastered so they’re much smoother and they take the paint more easily, and notice this thing - it’s a sliding door, a sliding arrangement which saves a great deal of space - you remember upstairs the door opened outwards.
And then inside the kitchen, now that’s what I like - this kitchen has been more - not exactly designed by a woman, but it’s bee n changed by a woman. First of all, look at the surfaces - again, the floor is ceramic tiles and the walls - all ceramic tiles, white ceramic tiles right the way up to the ceiling, and even the ceiling has been given a special
plastic-finished beam effect which again is very very easy to clean - you can even clean the ceiling, and in a kitchen that’s important. Notice that the cowl or hood of the gas oven has been further enclosed with glass so that even less of the steam and gas escapes to make the walls d irty, so it’s cleaner anyway.
Look at the storage space, you have a nice space underneath to keep all your pots and pans, and the work surface, now the work surface once again is beautiful white tiles, easy to work on and easy to keep clean.
Look at the wa ter supply and the sink, it’s been moved from over there to there, it’s closer to the work surface, closer to the gas stove and therefore much more convenient for the housewife to work in.
And have a look at the power point supply, the electrical supply, three points 1 - 2 - 3. So if you want to put in that extra equipment, your microwave oven, your electric kettle, you can - it’s easy, it’s safe, and it’s very very convenient - and notice the light: it’s light, it’s pleasant.
And the smallest room in the h ouse. Well, I think you probably know what we’re going to see inside - like the kitchen, it is beautifully tiled throughout, nice clean tiles on the floor, beautiful white tiles that go all the way up to the ceiling, and the same plastic ceiling at the top so everything can be cleaned over in a couple of minutes …
And a very comfortable sit-down toilet, a seat toilet, rather more comfortable than the other arrangement … A nice big water heater for the small but convenient shower unit, so once again everything is nice and clean and very very convenient.
And so into the sitting room combined with the bedroom - we often call that kind of room a bed-sitting room in england. Now again, our two themes are surfaces and storage space. Look at these beautiful surfaces. The floor, first of all, is a lovely wood parquet tile, which is very pleasant to walk on , it’s easy to keep clean, and it’s very very beautiful to look at - human beings like to be surrounded by wood.
And then you have this wonderful unit, it’s called a fitted unit because it’s fitted against the wall. You have huge storage cupboards all the way along the top and all the way along the bottom. You’ve got these lovely big wooden shelves for storing your books and videos and cups and saucers and everything - everything has its place and yet everything looks attractive and beautiful. It’s a really nice room, beautifully plastered, the ceiling is plastered, look at that lovely light up there, it’s a four-bulb light unit, again a nice easy switch on the wall and it switches on - lovely. Everything around you is comfortable and pleasant.
The power unit over there, the socket in the wall, it’s just behind the television and it’s very easy and safe to use - you don’t need lots of wire spread all over the place, dangerous for your children. And a very important thing - a very good space-saving device,
this - here we have a foldaway bed. It’s actually a sofa, but when you pull it out, it becomes a double bed, very comfortable, and then when you fold it back up again it’s a sofa on which you can seat three people. Notice that in this space you could invite a dozen people into your house for a party and everybody would have plenty of space and you would have a really good time.
Look at what she’s done over there. You r emember that rather ugly balcony - we all know the balconies in these flats - well, this one has been enclosed in and made a part of the living space of the flat itself. She has taken away that window there and she has replaced it with wood panelling. There is double-glazing in the windows both in the balcony and in the kitchen - now, double-glazing means two panes of glass so that you insulate the whole of the area from the cold or even the heat outside, altogether a very beautiful, very convenient and very hygienic flat to live in.
(to be continued)。