Aesop's fables

By The Brisish Council.

The ant and the dove

An ant went to the bank of a river to quench its thirst, and being carried away by the rush of the stream, was on the point of drowning. A dove sitting on a tree overhanging the water plucked a leaf and let it fall into the stream close to her. The ant climbed onto it and floated in safety to the bank. Shortly afterwards a birdcatcher came and stood under the tree, and laid his lime-twigs for the dove, which sat in the branches. The ant, perceiving his design, stung him in the foot. In pain the birdcatcher threw down the twigs, and the noise made the dove take wing.
And the moral of the story is: 0ne good turn deserves another.

The cat and the mice

A certain house was overrun with mice. A cat, discovering this, made her way into it and began to catch and eat them one by one. Fearing for their lives, the mice kept themselves close in their holes. The cat was no longer able to get at them and perceived that she must tempt them forth by some device. For this purpose she jumped upon a peg, and suspending herself from it, pretended to be dead. One of the mice, peeping stealthily out, saw her and said, "Ah, my good madam, even though you should turn into a meal-bag, we will not come near you."
And the moral of the story is: he who is once deceived is doubly cautious.

The Crab and the Fox

A crab, forsaking the seashore, chose a neighboring green meadow as its feeding ground. A fox came across him, and being very hungry ate him up. Just as he was on the point of being eaten, the crab said, "I well deserve my fate, for what business had I on the land, when by my nature and habits I am only adapted for the sea?'
And the moral of the story is: contentment with our lot is an element of happiness.

Better

By Peter Carter


I am sorry that there was no podcast last week. I was unwell. But now I am better. That means, I am not unwell any more. I have recovered. I am better.

And today’s podcast is about the word “better”. “Better” is of course the comparative form of the adjective “good”. Good – better- best. We can say: “This is a good restaurant. But the restaurant over the road is better. And the restaurant round the corner is the best restaurant in the town.”

We can use “better” in other ways, too. There is an English expression “I had better” do something. It means “I must” do something, or “it would be a good idea” to do something. Here are some examples:

Kevin and Joanne are having breakfast. Joanne looks in the fridge. There is no milk. “I had better buy some milk this morning,” she says. Kevin looks at his watch. It is nearly 7.30am. “I had better go now,” he says. “I have to go to a meeting at 8.30.” “Yes,” says Joanne. “You had better hurry, otherwise you will miss the train. And it is raining. You had better take an umbrella”.

In Birmingham, where I live, there is a bus company. Actually, there are lots of bus companies, because our government believes that competition in public transport is a good thing. Our government is wrong. Britain has some of the worst public transport in Europe. But that is different podcast. One of our competing bus companies has a slogan on the side of its buses. It says: “better buses, better service, better catch one”. This is what it means.

“Better buses” – the company has better buses. But better than what? Better than the buses of the other bus companies? Better than the old buses which it used to have? I suppose that “better buses” is OK as an advertising slogan, but if you want people to understand exactly what you mean, remember to use the word “than” – “better buses than our old buses”, for example.

“Better service” – This means more frequent buses, more reliable buses. Perhaps the company means that they now run buses late in the evening and on Sundays.

And “better catch one” is short for “you had better catch one”. In other words, it would be a good idea to catch one of our wonderful better buses. Remember that in English, we can take a bus or a train or a plane; or we can catch a bus or a train or a plane.

Now you know all about “I had better”. There is a quiz with the podcast today. You can find it on the website. Now it is late. I had better stop now. I had better go to the supermarket. I had better cook supper for the children. I had better say goodbye.

Download MP3 (3:57min, 4MB)

You had better do this quiz!

The Prefabs

The only remaining prefabs in Birmingham.

By Peter Carter.

Near to where I live, there is a group of small houses. They are bungalows – that is, they are single-storey houses. There are gardens in front of the houses, and behind them; and most of the gardens are well-kept. There is something unusual about the houses, however. Most houses in this part of England are built of brick. These houses, however, are built of cement mixed with asbestos. They are what we call “prefabs”, or prefabricated houses, and they have an interesting history.

At the end of the Second World War, there was a serious shortage of houses in Britain. Tens of thousands of homes had been destroyed by bombing. It was also necessary to find homes for all the servicemen returning from the war. The government decided to build 500,000 new houses to solve the problem. They thought it would be too slow and expensive to build proper brick houses, so they decided to build prefabricated houses instead. Prefabricated houses are made in sections in a factory. The house-builders then take the sections by lorry to the place where the houses are to be built, and fix them together. Houses of this sort are common in many other countries such as the United States. But they are very unusual in Britain. The government explained that the new prefabs would only be temporary. They would be taken down after 10 or 15 years, and proper houses would replace them.

The prefab building programme started in the final months of the war. German and Italian prisoners of war built some of the first houses. Factories which had previously built military equipment were used to make the sections for the houses. In some cases, they used aluminium from old fighter planes.

Things did not happen exactly as the government had planned. Prefabs turned out to cost more than normal houses, and in the end only about 167,000 of them were built. And they were not generally replaced with proper houses after 10 or 15 years; they had to last much longer. There were problems too about very poor insulation, which made the prefabs cold in winter, and leaking roofs.

But for many working-class families, a prefab was like a dream come true. Previously, they had lived in cramped terraced houses in the centre of big cities, where they had little space or privacy. Their new prefab had a garden for the children to play in, and an indoor toilet, and a fitted kitchen with a refrigerator!

Gradually, over the years, the prefabs were demolished. Often blocks of flats replaced them. The planners and architects liked the concrete tower blocks; but the people who had to live in them disagreed. The old prefabs – despite their problems – had been better, and closer to the sorts of homes that people wanted.

Today, hardly any prefabs remain. Here in Birmingham they have all gone, except for the small group near my home. These have been refurbished, and they are now, happily, listed buildings, which means that they cannot be altered or demolished. They are a part of the social history of Britain, and it is good that they are still here.

Download MP3 (4:28min, 2MB)

Quiz: how well did you understand the podcast?

Piano man

Video song: again and again