実践ビジネス英語 ディクテーション (1/17, 18)

NHKラジオ「実践ビジネス英語」”Talk the Talk”のディクテーションです。

Lesson 19のテーマは、’Overprotective Parents’（過保護な親たち）でした。Vignetteでは、息子の就職面接に親がついて来たというエピソードに始まり（米国で実際に発生しているそうです）、大学入学に関する贈収賄スキャンダルなど、成人した後も子供への干渉がやめられない親が話題になりました。社会経済的な事情とテクノロジーの発達がそうした過保護を後押しする要因となっているようです。

Talk the Talkでは、昔の子供たちが早く自立せざるを得なかった社会的背景や、Heatherさんの大学時代の体験について話されています。

Overprotective Parents

（S: 杉田敏先生　H: Heather Howardさん）

S: Our current vignette begins with Lidia Grace telling her colleagues that a father came to his son’s job interview at A&A.

It’s hard to believe that kind of thing happens, isn’t it?

H: But apparently it does.

You know, I can’t imagine a situation where that would benefit a job applicant.

Is there an interviewer, anywhere in the world, who would say, “Oh, great, the candidate brought his daddy. That’s just the kind of self-confidence and maturity I’m looking for!”

Though, I had to chuckle at Steve Lyons’ comment that some parents go to their kids’ places to clean up and do their laundry.

It reminded me of my first winter vacation from college.

I started putting my clothes in the washing machine one night, and found my mother staring at me in shock.

She said, “You’re doing your own laundry without being told to half-dozen times?”

I replied very blasé, “Mom, it’s Sunday night. I always do my laundry on Sunday nights.”

She couldn’t believe it.

Later she said, “Yep, there’s a reason why the mommy bird eventually boots* the baby birds out of the nest.”

That’s how they learned the function on their own.

S: In my childhood days in postwar Japan, there were few overprotective parents.

People were mostly free-range parents, so to speak, not by choice but by necessity.

Families were fairly large in those days―I had three brothers and three sisters―and we had to be on our own with littler parental meddling.

H: That must have encouraged children to mature faster than they usually do today.

Especially when it came to the older children, who would help look after the younger ones.

S: And even today, Japanese children are taught to be independent early on.

Foreign media have reported with amazement on Japanese schoolchildren riding the subway all alone.

In the United States, parents can be charged with neglect and endangerment for allowing their young children to walk to school or play in the park without close adult supervision.

The vignette also discusses the college bribery scandal in the United States.

How did you react to that, Heather?

H: I fumed. I fumed and fumed and fumed.

I mean, it just boils my blood to think of these wealthy parents trying to steal a place from, well, kids like me and my high school friends.

We worked our butts off to get into college.

It especially makes me mad when I think of all the help those parents can give their kids to get into college that is completely legal: the best private schools, tutors, travel around the world.

You know, my college roommate, freshman year, came from a pretty wealthy family.

I think there were four siblings including her, and her father was going to send them all to medical school.

So, this family had some money.

And that girl studied like there was no tomorrow.

I thought I was pretty dedicated, but she put me to shame.

One time she stayed at our room for two days straight to prepare for a test.

She cooked all her own food on a hot plate and only left to shower or use the restroom.

Her parents did it right.

Yes, she had many advantages in life but she didn’t coast on them.

（*訂正しました：コメント欄に詳細）

Words and Expressions

fume: 激怒する

work one’s butts off: 猛烈に働く（勉強する）

お疲れ様でした。

お読み下さり、ありがとうございました♪