FOCUS NOW II

EXERCISES ON PAGES 56, 57

EX. 3

1) Simon Dale built the Hobbit House because he didn’t want to live in a mass-produced box. 2) He built it in the countryside, in rural Wales. 3) It took only four months and it cost £3,000. 4) They got the materials from nature. 5) They got heating from a wood-burner, electricity and light from solar panels and water from a nearby spring. 6) Simon Dale wants to live in harmony to the natural world.

EX. 5

1) an eco-house, 2) in the countryside, 3) on a housing estate, 4) mud, 5) stone, 6) wood, 7) cosy, 8) open-plan, 9) lots of natural lights

EX. 6

1) bungalow, 2) flat, 3) in the suburbs, 4) cottage, 5) terraced house, 6) cosy

EX. 7

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 18, 19

EX. 8

EX. 9

EX. 10

1) make, 2) make, 3) do, 4) does, 5) make, 6) do

EX. 11

1) No, I didn’t. 2) No, they don’t. 3) No, I don’t. 4) My mum does. 5) Yes, I have. 6) My parents usually do shopping at Tiare.

SUMMARY

The first episode of General’s lady TV series starts with a scene in which there are two girls (one of them have moustache) are reached by a group of people. The girl with moustache challenges each person in a Chinese game.Suddenly, arrive some men and start to run after the girl, who starts escaping. After being taken, the girl is brought at home. In the second scene, there is a man who is doing a portrait of the girl, that later will be send to the emperor palace; in the room there is also her father. Then is announced the emperor edict, which reports the emperor’s choice of marry the second daughter of the girl’s father (she is the third). The chosen daughter discusses with her father, his wife, his concubines and the respectives daughters (the chosen daughter’s sister and the protagonist, Jiner) about her not wanting to marry the emperor and, thanks to her mother and her sister, succeeds to confer the second birth to Jiner and convinces him to make her get married.

Jiner’s mother doesn’t want to allow the marriage, so is bullied by the second daughter, her mother and her sister. Jiner successes to stop them, but after decides to ensure that her mother accepts that union, so Jiner, as the emperor’s wife, asks her father that nobody would injure her mother from that moment.

Then Jiner leaves Shen Mansion to reach General’s dwelling with the other girl seen in the first scene (Cutie Pie, her servant). While they are travelling, happens an ambush. A fight begins and the two girls try to hide themselves. Thanks to the help of a masked knight, arrived in that moment, the enemies are put to flight, but Jiner and Cutie Pie, as soon as they return to the fight place, they don’t find nobody else. So they decide to follow the horses’ footprints to reach the General’s Mansion.

They arrive tired in the night, they knock on the dwelling gate but nobody answers them. So Jiner climbs over the wall to open the gate for her friend from inside. But there she doesn’t find it and goes a lighted room. There she is scared by a man who silently comes near her and asks her who she is. Jiner says that she is the general’s wife and asks him, confused by her for the General’s attendant, where she can find her husband and after, not receiving an answer, where she can find the gate.

So, Jiner goes where indicated, but finds Cutie Pie with two men who wants to kill her because they believe she is a spy. Jiner, who says that she is the General’s lady, saves her friend, but is convinced that one of the two men is her husband… but when she turns around she finds in front of her the man previously met, who tells her that he is the General, leaving Jiner completely stunned!

ANTICIPATORY ACTIVITY

I think that in the second episode of General’s lady, Jiner will be very embarrassed for her mistake, mostly because she spoke to the General calling him “demon” and she told him about her disapproval about that marriage, believing it only a business for him.

I suppose that the General might be severe with her, giver the way she treated him. On the other hand, I believe that he may be kind and he may forgive her for her behaviour, because she can be justified for the obligation imposed on her; moreover, in the scene where Jiner and the General met, for a moment this latter seemed regretful forher sadness caused by him and for the bad impression of him that this fact have provoked in her. So, I think he may be forgiving.

In addition I think that Jiner will stay by General’s dwelling and soon they will be able to know each other and maybe they will fall in love. Certainly, he will know about what she did for her mother and that, because of this, she renounced to choose her own fate, and so he will be able to see her like a nice and careful girl.