Learn English with the News: “Haiku is New York”

Hi lovely ABA Friends!

Today in the news we heard about a new plan to avoid pedestrians getting hurt in New York. Pedestrians are the people who are walking in the street. If they are not careful they get hurt by cars.

New York, being the original and unique city it is, will be hanging up haiku’s on street corners to remind pedestrians to make sure no cars are coming before they cross the road. Do you know what a haiku is? It’s a very short form of Japanese poetry. The poem has 3 verses of 5, 7 and 5 syllables each.

You remember what to do now, right?

1. Read the text
2. Understand the vocabulary
3. Watch the video

Text

New York City pedestrians – bombarded by traffic, noise and thousands of signs.

So the city’s Department of Transportation is offering 200 inventive options. Called “Curbside Haiku”, Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan says the project combines art and safety.

– The idea is to take a new approach and try some different ways to get the message across to pedestrians that they need to look out when they’re crossing the street.

The creator of the signs is poet and artist John Morse.

– I worked on those poems and worked on them and worked on them and worked on them and I’d sometimes grieve over a single word, a single syllable. You know the construct of a Haiku is five, seven, five syllables. So that every syllable counts, so you pick it well.

A dozen images and Haiku – two of which are in Spanish – are posted in 144 locations. Morse says he wants his Haiku to convey a sense of intimacy and be discovered rather than appear larger-than-life. And at only 8 by 8 inches each they are easily missed.

– I just don’t understand why it has to be up there, people could just crash and stuff, but yeah.

– I wouldn’t even notice it.

– I don’t know how many people will actually look at it. We’re a little focused on what’s going forward.

Some 4,000 pedestrians are killed or seriously injured in the Big Apple every year.

– For far too long we’ve looked at our streets through a 1950’s planning perspective, a windshield perspective. And when you think about the fact that over half of New Yorkers don’t even own a car, we need to really re-evaluate and prioritize sustainable modes of transport.

“Curbside Haiku” will be up for just under one year, but as Morse says: for an artist, 11 months in New York City is not a bad run.

Vocabulary

Bombarded – to hit or attack (something or someone) constantly or repeatedly. In this case, used metaphorically, people are not bombarded by the cars in a literal sense.

Curbside – a usually concrete path along the side of a street for people to walk on.

Construct – to build or make (something physical, such as a road, bridge, or building).

Grieve – to feel or show grief or sadness.

Pick – to choose or select (someone or something) from a group.

Larger-than-life – bigger than the size of an actual person or thing. It’s an expression we use when something is person-sized or bigger.

Windshield – the window at the front of a car, truck, etc., that protects the driver and passengers.

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