2011年9月高级口译听力Listening Comprehension 4评析

Hello, I’m Amber and you’re listening to BBC learning English.com. In London life today, we sit down to a traditional British breakfast in a smart London restaurant and a ‘greasy-spoon café’! A ‘greasy-spoon café’, or ‘caff’, is the opposite of a smart restaurant!

We find out what the traditional British breakfast is made of, and why it is becoming more and more popular, especially in London, to eat breakfast in a café before arriving at the office for a hard day’s work.

Now let’s listen to what an American anthropologist, Kaori O’Connor says. According to Kaori O’Connor, strangers to England have a ‘vague vision’, an unclear picture in their minds, of what the traditional British breakfast is – perhaps it’s served from silver dishes on a grand ‘sideboard’. As you listen, try to catch what Kaori lists as the three main ingredients of the great British breakfast.

She says ‘It’s a meal that everyone outside of England has heard of, and dreams about, and we don’t know what it is, but when we come here, we want to eat it. And we have some vague vision of, you know, a sideboard with silver dishes and it’s just going to be the most wonderful thing on earth and I got here, and I went to a café and there was the bacon, eggs and chips, and I thought – gosh, is this all there is?!’

Did you catch it? Kaori says she went into a London café for breakfast and there it was ‘bacon, eggs and chips’! Bacon is meat from a pig that has been salted and dried, and it is fried for a traditional English breakfast!

The eggs are usually fried too, and there is also usually some kind of bread – perhaps fried bread or even, as Kaori saw, chips – fried potatoes!

So now let’s go to a smart London restaurant where chef Lawrence Keogh is frying a traditional breakfast! You can hear the sizzling in the background! He explains why he eats breakfast – the egg and bacon are ‘protein’, for example – protein is healthy. ‘it keeps you going all day’. It’s ‘sustenance’, nourishment, healthy food.

As you listen, try to catch what he says is a new trend, or fashion in London’s top restaurants.

Lawrence Keogh says ‘I think it’s fundamental to the start of the day. If I’ve got a long day at work, I try and eat egg and bacon in the morning because it’s protein – it keeps you going all day. You know really, we do a lot of business meetings as well now in the morning –the place is very busy – and I think you see it across London now, there’s lots more people having business meetings in top restaurants and it’s getting very fashionable to have breakfast.’

Well, Did you catch it? Laurence says that more and more people are having ‘business meetings in top restaurants and it’s getting very fashionable to have breakfast.’

Well our last stop today is a greasy-spoon café. Russell Davies is an expert on these! He’s written a book called ‘Egg, Bacon, Chips and Beans: 50 Great Cafes and the Stuff That Makes Them Great’. He explains what makes a great breakfast in a down-market London café. He writes in the book ‘I would say the café experience, you know, it’s less than 50% the food, as it were, there’s also the atmosphere, there’s the fact that in a decent cafe, they’re not going to hurry you out. There’s the smells, there’s the sounds, you know, the badly-tuned radio, the eccentric art on the wall, the kind of odd condiment choice and most cafes are so small that it’s the best place for eavesdropping and just kind of listening to other people’s conversations.

16. What is the main topic of this talk?

17. Which of the following is usually not included in the great British breakfast?

18. 18. What’s the new trend or fashion in London’s top restaurants according to Chef Lawrence Keogh?

19. Which of the following does not make the atmosphere in a down-market London café?

20. What can we conclude about a traditional British breakfast from the talk?

评析：这是一片取自BBC的听力材料。主要讲述：统英国早餐的构成（bacon, eggs and chips）；越来越多的人选择在高级饭店开商务会议，且吃早餐也变成一种时尚；在不那么高档的咖啡厅里吃早餐也慢慢成为一种享受。这个听力材料内容接近生活，且在每一部分内容后都有一个“catch it ?”的提示词，降低了考生分析信息的难度。文章黑体部分为答案出处，考生可作参考。

高口听力理解题目的出题顺序大都和听力原文材料顺序一致，因此考生在没有题目只有选项的情况下，首先通过快速扫面选项可以预测听力材料的话题，做题经验丰富的同学甚至可以猜到题目是什么，做到心中有数。其次，在每个选项旁边要做好相关笔记，尤其是当选项内容很容易混淆的时候，更要注意对每个选项做好标记，这样在听到题目后就能迅速锁定答案。