22
Purpose to share with others an account of an unusual or amusing
incident.
Text Structure Abstract
: signals the retelling of an unusual incident Orientation
: sets the scene Crisis
: provides details of the unusual incident Incident
: reaction to the crisis Coda
: optional reflection or evaluation of the incident Significant Grammatical Features
☺ Use exclamation ☺ Use rhetorical questions
☺ Use intensifiers ☺ Use material processes
☺ Use temporal conjunction
INDEPENDENT CONSTRUCTION OF THE TEXT
1. Read the following conversation carefully
“HOW ARE YOU?” or “WHERE ARE YOU GOING?”
“How are you?” is said when English speaking meet one another, showing that he or she recognized the other person as someone with whom he or she is on friendly
terms and is, as a matter of fact, just a kind of greeting. Similarly “Where are you going?” is said by Indonesians when they meet one another and one is in fact not
expecting some factual information. In both cases sometimes one does not even wait to listen for the answer.
These two greetings are however not always interchangeable in different
countries as I well remember when I went abroad to Australia in 1956. Waking up early in the morning and seeing the hotelkeeper left the hotel, I asked him politely
IT’S ALL ABOUT ANECDOTE TEXT PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI
23
where he was going. As it was my first day in the hotel my question seemed very impudent to him whereas in Indonesia it would be quite common.
Another experience happened when I was driving a car without having a driving license and without knowing how to drive well either. When a car came from the
opposite direction I turned too much to the left to avoid it and hit a cyclist going in the same direction. He fell with his bike on the side of the road. His cycle was
damage and his trousers were torn. I stopped the car to apologize because I was the one to
blame for the accident and thanked God there was no policeman around, otherwise I would be in some trouble. The young man I had hit stood up with the
hands on the hips and elbows bent outwards looking threateningly in my direction
and I already imagined myself being beaten up by him when….what do you know? – no sooner he recognized me than he completely changed his attitude, by hundreds and
eighty degrees, as we would say in Indonesian. Smiling sheepishly he asked: “Is it
you Pak Gondo? Where are you going?” He turned out to be one of the numerous students I used to teach at that time. “Well, I never, this must be the acme of
Javanese politeness Someone hit you with a car and damaged your bike and trousers”, I thought to myself, “and you asked him
where he was going”
summarized from: Soegondo. 1994. HUMOUR AND FACTS Recollection of A Retired English Teacher. Yogyakarta:
Gajah Mada University Press. Second Revised Edition
2. Complete the following Generic Structure of “How are you?” or “Where are you going?”
Title Abstract
Orientation
1. When
2. Where
Crisis
Incident
