24 Unit 02 | Me time Narrative tenses Read the story Hannah wrote for her school magazine about the project on leisure activities. Underline all uses of the past continuous in one colour and the past perfect in a different one. Check the Language box if you need help (or go to Grammar revisited, p. 165). LANGUAGE 7 a On a beautiful, sunny day in Cambridge, where I live, we were punting on the River Cam with some visitors: five of us all together. One of the visitors, my cousin Adam from the States, said he had never tried punting before and wanted to have a go. Punting is a popular activity, but, like all beginners, Adam was finding it hard, even though he was fit. The punt wasn’t really going straight, but we were very happy, relaxing and enjoying the sunshine and the view. Several tourists had stopped to watch us go by and were taking photographs. Suddenly, the pole got stuck in the mud at the bottom of the river. Instead of letting go of the pole, Adam held on, and he was left hanging from it as the punt went down the river. He was shouting, and the tourists were pointing at him. There was a paddle in the punt, so we used that to go back and rescue Adam. I even tried to help with my hands, but the trouble was, we were laughing so hard that we couldn’t paddle fast enough. By the time we reached him, poor Adam had slid so far down the pole that his legs were in the air, and his bottom was in the water! Some parts of the river are rather dirty, and swimmers have become ill. We wanted our American guest to stay healthy, so we quickly helped him back into the punt. After we had got Adam, we stopped by the river bank, and he went behind some trees to take off his wet jeans. We had to get creative and gave him a big towel that we found in the punt. He wrapped it around himself, and we tried to dry his trousers in the sunshine. He was lucky it was such a warm day, not cloudy like it often is in England! I suppose it’s natural that he was embarrassed, but in the end, Adam also laughed about it. It was a day I’ll never forget! Language box: Narrative tenses Simple past He started quite well. Past continuous We were punting on the river. Past perfect He had never tried punting before. Find reasons why Hannah uses the tenses you have underlined in her story. He had never tried punting before … Used to refer to a time further in the past than the story. Now listen to Hannah and Adam telling Hannah’s mum about the boat trip. While listening, find the three differences between Hannah’s and Adam’s version of the story. b LISTENING 8 03 Curious about punting? Take a Deep dive using the öbv QuickMedia app! Nur zu Prüfzwecken – Eigentum des Verlags öbv
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy ODE3MDE=