Welcome to English as a Second Language podcast number 235, Parking Instructions.
This is English as a Second Language podcast episode 235.
I'm your host, Dr Jeff McQuillan, coming to you from the Center for Educational Development in beautiful Los Angeles, in the state of California.
On this podcast we're going to talk about parking instructions what you do when someone is telling you where you should park your car.
Let's get started.
I arrived for my meeting at the headquarters of Woon Enterprises and I stopped at the kiosk to ask for directions.
It's a huge organization and the offices are located on a 30-acre compound, so it's very hard to find your way around without some help.
Good morning.
Good morning.
I'm here for a meeting with Mark Johnson, Could you tell me how to get to the right building?
Sure.
Take this road and follow the bend to the right.
When you see the fork in the road, take the road on your right.
Follow that to the parking structure.
You can't miss it.
Okay, so when the road splits, I should veer right.
That's right.
Here's a guest parking permit.
Make sure it's visible on your dash at all times.
Drive past the lot and go into the parking structure.
You can park on any level and in any space that isn't reserved.
The building right next to the structure is where Mark Johnson's office is.
Thanks.
I think I've got all that.
The guard raised the arm of the gate and let me through.
As I drove through the huge compound to the parking structure, I couldn't help thinking that this wound must be one very successful businessman.
We're parking our car in this podcast.
Something that is very important here in Southern California, where most people have a car, because it is very difficult to get around this city without one.
In our story, Edita says that she arrived for a meeting at the headquarters the main office of a company called Woon Enterprises.
She stopped at the kiosk to ask for directions.
A kiosk.
K-I-O-S-K is a small building located.
Sometimes you will see these in a downtown area where they sell newspapers or maybe some food or drinks.
We also use that word kiosk when we are talking about a small building where you can ask for information, ask for instructions or directions on how to get somewhere.
Edited says that the offices of Wound Enterprises are on a 30-acre compound.
A compound.
C-O-M-P-O-U-N-D is a group of buildings, usually that are part of the same business, or maybe even the same house, if it's a big house And it's often surrounded by a wall.
Edita says it's hard to find your way around without some help.
To find your way around somewhere is to be able to find what you are looking for in a city or in a building.
Well, Edita asks the guard, where...
She needs to go in order to have her meeting with Mark Johnson.
The guard gives her instructions, gives her directions.
He says A bend, B-E-N-D when we are talking about a road or a street is a curve.
Usually the road goes to the left or to the right.
Not a corner, not 90 degrees, but something less than that, something that is still sort of straight, but it goes to one side or the other.
In this case, the bend goes to the right.
That word bend has many different meanings in English.
Take a look at the learning guide for some more information on that.
So the guard says, when you see the fork in the road, take the road on your right.
A fork, F-O-R-K in the road is a point where one road divides or splits and becomes two roads.
It can sometimes look like the fork that you eat with, because it has one handle on the fork and then it splits into two or more different parts.
Well, this is an expression we use a fork in the road.
When a road divides into two, The guard tells Edita that she should take the road to the right and follow that to the parking structure.
A parking structure is usually a building with two or more levels, two or more floors, where people park their car.
He says to Edita, you can't miss it.
This is a common expression.
When you are giving directions to someone and you think that it is very easy, that it will be very obvious.
We say you can't miss it.
We mean it's impossible not to see it.
You'll find it easily.
Edita says okay.
So where the road splits I should veer right splits S-P-L-I-T-S is when something divides into two pieces.
In this case, the road divides into two different roads.
Edita says I should veer, V-E-E-R, right.
To veer means to make a change in the direction that you are going in.
Usually we use this word when we are talking about a vehicle like a car or a truck.
Sometimes people use this expression to veer right or to veer left when they are talking about a political party or a political candidate in terms of their policies, their political philosophy.
Conservative would be right, liberal would be left.
Well, this is not a case of politics, but a case of giving directions.
So the guard says to Edita, that's correct, that's right.
And then he gives her a parking permit.
A permit, P-E-R-M-I-T, is a piece of paper that you are given to do something.
In this case, it's a piece of paper that allows you to park in a certain place.
Notice the pronunciation permit, where the accent is on the first syllable.
If we say permit...
With the accent on the second syllable, that makes it a verb.
But as a noun, the accent is on the first syllable.
So we say parking permit.
And that's what a company will give you if you are visiting them.
It gives you permission to park in their parking structures.
The guard says that Edita should make the parking permit visible on her dash.
To be visible, V-I-S-I-B-L-E, means that people can see it.
The dash, D-A-S-H, as a noun, is the front part of your car.
Usually it's the part that is right behind your car's front window and it's flat or usually flat and you can put a piece of paper there so people could see it by looking in through the window.
The guard says to Edita, drive past the lot and go into the parking structure.
A lot, L-O-T, or a parking lot, is a place to park, but it's not inside of a building.
It's a flat piece of land where you can park.
He tells Edita she can park on any level, any floor, and in any space that isn't reserved.
We call the places where you park your car.
That are usually marked with some lines, white lines.
That area is called a parking space.
You can have parking spaces that are reserved.
If you see a sign that says this space is reserved...
It means that you have to be that particular person.
No one else can use it except that person.
So it could be reserved for the president.
That's where the president can park his or her car.
Parking spaces are very important in some companies and some organizations, because if you have a good parking space, that means you're very important.
If you have a reserved parking space.
At the University of California Berkeley, which is a famous research university here in the United States.
If you win a Nobel Prize, you get a reserved parking space.
If you don't win a Nobel Prize, you don't get a reserved parking space.
So you have to be pretty important to get a reserved parking space in some places.
Usually it's not that difficult, however.
After Edita thanks the guard, the guard raises the arm of the gate.
The arm of the gate is a piece of wood or metal that prevents people from going past the guard without stopping.
Or sometimes you will see it as you are leaving a parking structure and you have to pay for the time that you were there.
There'll be a parking gate, an arm of a gate, that will stop you from leaving until you pay.
Well, the arm goes up, the piece of wood or metal goes up and that allows you, that permits you to keep driving and leave that area.
Our story ends with Edita saying that this wound, the person who was the.
The use of one here is for emphasis.
It means this is a very important or this is the only person or thing.
For example, you could say, Tiger Woods is one great golf player, meaning he is one of the few.
He's a very important person in that particular area.
It's used, as I say, for emphasis.
If we say ESL podcast is one interesting podcast, we mean it is a very interesting podcast.
Well, I hope it's a very interesting podcast.
Not always.
Sometimes I forget to drink my coffee in the morning and it's not as interesting as it should be.
Now let's listen to the dialogue again, this time at a native or normal rate of speed.
I arrived for my meeting at the headquarters of Wound Enterprises and I stopped at the kiosk to ask for directions.
It's a huge organization and the offices are located on a 30-acre compound, so it's very hard to find a way around without some help.
Good morning.
Good morning.
I'm here for a meeting with Mark Johnson.
Could you tell me how to get to the right building?
Sure.
Take this road and follow the bend to the right.
When you see the fork in the road, take the road on your right.
Follow that to the parking structure.
You can't miss it.
Okay.
So when the road splits, I should be right?
That's right.
Here's a guest parking permit.
Make sure it's visible on your dash at all times.
Drive past the lot and go into the parking structure.
You can park on any level and in any space that isn't reserved.
The building right next to the structure is where Mark Johnson's office is.
Thanks.
I think I've got all that.
The guard raised the arm of the gate and let me through.
As I drove through the huge compound to the parking structure, I couldn't help thinking that this wound must be one very successful businessman, the learning guide for this episode.
From Los Angeles, California, I'm Jeff McQuillan.
Thanks for listening.
We'll see you next time on ESL Podcast.
English as a Second Language Podcast is written and produced by Dr Lucy Say, hosted by Dr Jeff McQuillan.
This podcast is copyright 2006.
