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    The Letters of Paddy Panda
    The Letters of Paddy Panda
    The Letters of Paddy Panda
    Ebook115 pages1 hour

    The Letters of Paddy Panda

    By Barbara Hayes

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    About this ebook

    Letters explaining English as it is spoken in England, how to behave correctly in England, knowledge you will need when visiting or working in England - or even just speaking to English people. A “value-added” concept in English as a foreign language.

    Paddy Panda is a cuddly toy living in England with his owner John Smith. He has never been to China, but longs to know more about that land because that is where Pandas come from. Meanwhile by listening to John Smith and his family and teenage friends, Paddy is learning all he can about England - or as he soon learns - Britain.
    Paddy has written a series of letters explaining what he has learned and is learning about life in England. He hopes the letters will help students learning English or visiting England.

    Paddy strives to be grammatically correct and usually is, but he also writes in colloquial English as spoken in polite society of course. Knowing some colloquial English will be very useful to students of English when they speak to actual English people.

    Thus by reading Paddy Panda’s letters you will start to learn what you need to know when visiting England taking a trip to London or speaking with English people on business or on holiday.
    Paddy also explains a bit about British history and British culture as it is viewed by British people.

    Whether you work in a hotel used by British people, go to Britain on holiday or do business with British companies, Paddy Panda is for you.

    And they are quite fun stories as well! Like English people, Paddy does like a laugh.

    Contents

    The First Letter from Paddy Panda, in which he learns about himself.

    The Second Letter from Paddy Panda, in which he learns about Britain and England.

    The Third Letter from Paddy Panda, in which he learns about Scots and Irish.

    The Fourth Letter from Paddy Panda, in which he gets lost in the furniture.

    The Fifth Letter from Paddy Panda, in which he learns about British wars and battles.

    The Sixth Letter from Paddy Panda, in which he learns about travelling in Britain.

    The Seventh Letter from Paddy Panda, in which he learns the difference between tea and tea.

    The Eighth Letter from Paddy Panda, in which he learns about London.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBretwalda Books
    Release dateJul 14, 2012
    ISBN9781909099180
    The Letters of Paddy Panda
    Author

    Barbara Hayes

    Barbara Hayes worked on the editorial staff and spent many years writing stories and picture strip scripts for the Amalgamated Press, situated in Farringdon Street, which is round the corner from Fleet Street, London. Later Amalgamated Press became Fleetway Publications and subsequently part of the Daily Mirror IPC publishing group.Barbara was just in time to work with some of the old Fleet Street hacks in all their drunken glory before the move away from Fleet Street to modern technical respectability.She got advice straight from the lips of Hugh Cudlipp, the famous editor of the Daily Mirror, and became married to an Amalgamated Press editor, Leonard Matthews, who rose to be a managing editor and then an editorial director.Over the years she has had some 80 books and about 7300 scripts published by companies from England to Australia to South Africa to Florida and back to Holland.She likes to think of herself as an old hack writer who succeeded mainly because she always got her work in on time and the right length - but if you read on carefully you might find quite a few other hints to help you.

    Read more from Barbara Hayes

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      Book preview

      The Letters of Paddy Panda - Barbara Hayes

      The Letters of Paddy Panda

      by

      Barbara Hayes

      *****************

      Published by Bretwalda Books at Smashwords

      Website : Facebook : Twitter

      This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

      First Published 2012

      Copyright © Bretwalda Books 2012

      ISBN 978-1-909099-18-0

      ************

      Contents

      Introduction to the Letters of Paddy Panda.

      The First Letter from Paddy Panda, in which he learns about himself.

      The Second Letter from Paddy Panda, in which he learns about Britain and England.

      The Third Letter from Paddy Panda, in which he learns about Scots and Irish.

      The Fourth Letter from Paddy Panda, in which he gets lost in the furniture.

      The Fifth Letter from Paddy Panda, in which he learns a bit about British history

      The Sixth Letter from Paddy Panda, in which he learns about travelling in Britain.

      The Seventh Letter from Paddy Panda, in which he learns the difference between tea and tea.

      The Eighth Letter from Paddy Panda, in which he learns about London.

      Goodbye from Paddy

      ************

      Introduction to the Letters of Paddy Panda.

      I have written these letters from Paddy Panda both to amuse English people and also to help people who are learning English.

      It is not meant to be a text book, but is some friendly chatter in colloquial English, which should help foreign students to understand what is said to them when they actually talk to real English people.

      Although the letters are colloquial talk, as amongst friends, there is no bad language nor crude slang. Everything in the letters can be learned and used in conversation in polite society.

      I have given Paddy Panda’s owner the name of John Smith because this is a typical English name. They live in a place named Surbiton which is a busy, well known suburb of London. As well as different types and ages of English people, John Smith’s friends also include Scottish, Welsh and Irish boys with their national nicknames and alleged national behaviour.

      Chatter about what families and friends do in Surbiton and on their visits to London will give foreign students a good idea of the sort of people and methods of transport they will encounter if and when they visit London.

      Paddy’s letters also include snippets of British history, which I hope readers will find interesting.

      Anyway that is enough from me. Now go ahead and read Paddy Panda’s letters. At least they should give you a laugh and we all need a laugh in this troubled world.

      ************

      The First Letter from Paddy Panda,

      in which he learns about himself.

      Hallo. I am Paddy Panda and today I am so excited because today I have learned such a lot about myself.

      I have always known that I was a cuddly toy and that I was probably made in a factory, but also Grandma may have knitted me. I'm not sure.

      'Grandma’ is short for ‘Grandmother’.

      I belong to a young man named John Smith. When I say ‘young man’ I mean a very young man. John Smith is what they call a ‘teenager’ that means he is aged anything between thirteen and nineteen. Actually John is seventeen.

      But that is enough about John. Let’s get back to me.

      I am called Paddy Panda and I have very unusual black and white colouring.

      I always thought I was some sort of bear, but bears are usually brown, so perhaps I am not a bear. Then again bears which live near the North Pole are white so that no one can see them against the white snow. So perhaps I could be some sort of a polar bear. But who wants to live in all that freezing cold weather near the North Pole?

      Certainly not little me. I like living here with John Smith.

      Which brings me to all my exciting news. I think it is exciting anyway. I have found out a lot of information about pandas and where they come from.

      You see John Smith has quite a few teenage friends. They are mostly boys he is at school with.

      Now quite often some of these friends come round to John’s house for the evening or for a Saturday afternoon. They usually drink lots of cups of tea and either John’s mother makes sandwiches for them or perhaps on a Saturday they go out and buy what they call a Takeaway. That is a box full of ready cooked food of all sorts. But of course what English people like best is fish and chips.

      But here I am talking about other people.

      I am supposed to be telling you all about me.

      Later on in another letter I will tell you about where England is and how it happened that English people like drinking so much tea. I will tell you lots of other things too, but now I am bursting to tell you my exciting news.

      You see one of John Smith’s school friends is called Brainbox. Of course Brainbox is not his real name. I think his real name is Duncan, but no one ever calls him that.

      You see here in England people use what they call nicknames. These are usually casual, affectionate names you give to your close friends. This Duncan is called Brainbox because he is very clever. When the boys have exams (examinations is the proper word) at school, Duncan always gets higher marks than any of the others. Therefore he is called Brainbox.

      Nicknames can also refer to some physical characteristic. A tall person is often called Lofty. A short person is called Shorty, but this is not done very much nowadays. Apparently people do not mind being tall, but they are sensitive about being short, so Shorty is not a popular nickname any more.

      Of course no one likes being called Fatty as a nickname either. Yet Grandma (who lives nearby and often pops in for a visit. I get a lot of information from Grandma) says that when she was young people were called Fatty or Shorty and they did not mind a bit.

      Grandma also says that in her day people used to stand near to tall people and look up and ask Is it cold up there, Lofty? and everyone would laugh, including the tall person. How times do change!

      Anyway nicknames are used only amongst close friends and family. If you have only just met someone you must never use his or her nickname. This would be regarded as very bad manners and being over familiar.

      Anyway the other Saturday when several of John Smith’s friends were round at our house they started talking about some of their school work. Apparently for their homework they had to write an essay about a place called China.

      Homework is work school pupils are set to do at home. They have to look up information and write it down in a good, reasoned essay using correct spelling and correct English grammar. Then they take the work in to school and the teachers check it through and mark it.

      Needless to say Brainbox Duncan always gets the best marks.

      Well this Saturday afternoon Brainbox laughed and said: We shall not have much trouble finding out information about China. We will just ask little Paddy Panda here.

      Now I was sitting on the back of the sofa, as I usually do, and I was very surprised.

      I don’t know anything about a place called China I thought, "Where is it anyway? Is it anywhere near Surbiton? I have been there several times, but I did not see anything much except the

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