A Chinese podcast · Same story, 4 levels
他已经下到安全的楼层了，然后他转身又上去了：二十五年后，「红头巾的人」拿到了总统自由勋章
He Had Already Reached a Safe Floor, and He Turned Round and Went Back Up: Twenty-Five Years On, the Man in the Red Bandana Received the Medal of Freedom
About this story
Welles Crowther, 24, worked on the 104th floor of the South Tower. On 11 September 2001 he tied the red bandana his father gave him at six over his face and led people to the one passable stairwell, carrying a woman down seventeen floors and going back up again and again. Survivors knew him only as the man in the red bandana. Chinese listening practice at four levels. HSK 2 Chinese listening practice.
This is an HSK 2 Chinese listening episode that runs about 4 minutes. The full Mandarin script is shown with tap-for-pinyin and a line-by-line English translation, so you can listen and read at once — comprehensible input in the sense of Stephen Krashen's i+1 theory. It teaches 12 key vocabulary words such as 习惯、安全、呼吸 and walks through 3 grammar patterns, each explained in English with examples. The same news story is retold at 4 difficulty levels — use the level selector above to find the version that is challenging but still understandable for you.
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原文Read the complete story in Chinese. Reveal pinyin and English only when you need them.
English transcript reference
Today's story is about a person, and about a red bandana.
Last week, America gave him a very high honour.
He himself is gone; his family went to collect it for him.
He has been gone twenty-five years.
First, about the man.
Twenty-five years ago he was twenty-four.
He had graduated from university a few years earlier and worked for a company in New York.
The company was in a very tall building, and his office was on the 104th floor.
The 104th floor is very, very high up.
He had a habit he had kept since he was a boy.
He always carried a red bandana on him.
His father gave it to him when he was six.
He carried it when he played ball.
He carried it at school.
And once he was working, he still carried it.
There is one more thing to mention.
At sixteen, he went with his father and became a volunteer firefighter.
That means no pay — you go and help when something happens.
All right, now that day.
That morning, something very bad happened in the building.
He was on the 104th floor.
The floors below were full of smoke; you could not see anything.
A lot of people were trapped up there and could not find a way down.
He was up there.
He could have gone down first himself.
He did not.
He took out that red bandana and tied it over his face.
The smoke was so thick you could not breathe without covering up.
Then he started shouting, telling people which stairwell they could use.
He led the way in front, and a group of people followed behind.
He took them down.
Once he was down, he did not leave.
He went back up.
There were still people up there.
There was a woman who could not walk any further.
He put her on his back and went down floor by floor.
He carried her down seventeen floors.
After he set her down, he went back up again.
Up, down.
Up, down.
In between he also helped put out fires and helped people who were hurt.
The last time anyone saw him, he was with firefighters.
Then the building came down.
He did not come out.
For a long time after that, nobody knew who he was.
The people who got down said there was a young man up there.
They said he had something red tied over his face.
They said he was the one who told us to go that way.
More than six months later, a survivor told the story and it was printed in the newspaper.
His mother read that report.
Seeing the words "red bandana", she knew who it was.
Now count it up: how many people did he help that day?
People say about eighteen.
All eighteen of them went home alive.
His university holds a ball game every year where everyone wears red.
Here is what I want to say.
Coming down the first time was brave.
But after he came down, he went back up.
Up, down, and up again.
Think about it:
You are already down. You are already safe.
There are still people up there.
Would you go back up?
Listen again
Try it without the transcript and notice what sounds clearer.
What vocabulary does this episode teach?
词汇HSK 3. 他有一个习惯，从小就有 — the habit that later identified him.
HSK 4. 你已经安全了 — the condition under which the real decision gets made.
HSK 5. 不蒙上没法呼吸 — why the bandana went on, stated as a practical fact.
HSK 3. Where a survivor told the story, and where his mother read it.
HSK 5. 帮受伤的人 — one of the things he was doing between trips.
HSK 4. The episode uses the word once, and then argues it is not the right one.
The object the whole story hangs on — and for months, his only name.
He was a volunteer one from sixteen, which is why he knew how to move in smoke.
就是不拿钱，有事的时候去帮忙 — defined in the episode in plain words.
他把她背在背上 — seventeen floors, with a person on his back.
The specific verb for what he did with the cloth, and what survivors described.
HSK 5. The news peg: America gave him its highest civilian one, 25 years on.
* beyond level超纲词
What grammar patterns appear in this episode?
语法本来可以……，可是……
Could perfectly well have done X, but. 本来 marks the option that was genuinely available, which is what makes the choice a choice.
他本来可以自己先走。
他没有。
一……一……地 + verb
Doing something one unit at a time. The reduplication makes a long physical effort audible.
他把她背在背上，一层一层往下走。
看到"……"三个字，就……
On seeing those words, immediately… Chinese counts the characters in a phrase, which makes the moment of recognition very concrete.
看到"红头巾"三个字，她就知道那是谁。
Proper Nouns
专有名词Sources
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