Duplex 双层公寓（精讲之二）

影片对白

Kenneth: When I told you I had a particular building in mind for you. This is the one I was talking about. It's a historical home on one of the best blocks in all of Brooklyn.

Alex: Remember what we talked about.

Nancy: I know, poker face .

Kenneth: Built-ins, built-ins.

Nancy: Oh, the kitchen's a little small.

Kenneth: Well, rip off this awful room divider, and you've got an eat-in kitchen. And over here you have your library.

Alex: Wow.

Nancy: For your books.

Kenneth: Oh, you like books?

Alex: I have a little collection of first-edition novels.

Nancy: Alex is a writer.

Kenneth: The parlor.

Nancy: Oh, my God.

Alex: So, this staircase. This leads to where?

Kenneth: I thought you realized. This is a duplex.

Nancy: As in two floors for the price of one?

Kenneth: I believe it's right there in the listing sheet.

Alex: So, why was it sealed off? Were there, like, a slew of murders up there or something?

Kenneth: No, there's just a sweet, little old lady that lives upstairs.

Nancy: A tenant?

Kenneth: Mm-hmm.

Alex: So, rent control means we can't kick her out, right?

Nancy: Alex! 

Kenneth: That's a legitimate question. No, you cannot evict her. She has to decide to leave or, God forbid... Poor thing hasn't been feeling well lately. She's gotta be close to 100 years old.

妙词佳句，活学活用

1. poker face
非常好用的一个短语，是指不显露出任何表情的时候用的。打个比方，“在砍价的时候，千万不要露出任何喜欢的表情”就可以说成：When you are making a bargain, you'd better keep a poker face.

2. rip off
A：rip something off
这个短语有两个含义，第一层含义也就是本文当中所提到的“拆掉”。此外，我们说“脱衣服”也可以用它：rip off the T-shirt。
B：是最为常用的俚语之一，意思是steal something。比如：“有些人以偷东西为生”就可以说：Some people rip off the goods from the supermarket to make a living.

3. a slew of
意思是“很多”，用起来的时候也很简单，比如“今天我有很多课”就可说：I've got a slew of classes for today.

文化面面观

Rent control

Rent control has been in force in a number of major American cities for many decades. The best-known example is New York, which still retains rent controls from the temporary price controls imposed during World War II. But this policy, meant to assist poorer residents, harms far more citizens than it helps, benefits the better-off, and limits the freedom of all citizens. In many cities, policymakers understand that controls drive out residents and businesses. Thus many exempt significant portions of housing from controls, creating shadow markets, yet as controls hold down rents for some units, costs for all other rental housing skyrockets. And tenants in rent-controlled units fear moving to more desirable neighborhoods since the only units available for rent are very high-priced. ( With no doubt, rent control is a good thing, at least from someone's point of view, but nowadays some tenants even take advantage of the rent control law by getting the free tenant lawyers to escape from paying the rent. And this does give rise to the dissatisfaction of some landlords who adopt the way of evictions to get rid of the tenants).

考考你

1. 在做商业谈判时，千万不要露出任何表情。
2. 他骗了我，还偷走了我的钱包。
3. 我们还有好多店没逛呢！