Yearly Archives: 2011

55. Mini Podcasts Collection 1

My first 7 mini podcasts in one full length episode. Idioms with ‘about’, politics, how to make a perfect cup of tea, a comedy song about badgers and some sentence stress and intonation practice.

Right-click here to download this episode.
Mini-Podcasts – Overview
There are 7 mini podcasts in this episode:

1. Introduction (losing my voice)
I talk about the new mini mobile podcasts and what to expect in the future.

2. Idioms with ‘about’
I teach you some common idioms and expressions using the word ‘about’

3. Government Cuts
At the moment in the UK the government is making large cuts to public spending. What will be the effect of those cuts on the funding of BBC Learning English? Are we going to lose BBC Learning English? This is an example of how we are living in an increasingly connected society where economic conditions in one country immediately effect people in other countries.

4. How to make the perfect cup of tea
I talk to my colleague Richard McNeff about making the perfect cup of tea. Listen closely for language for ‘how to describe a process’ – which is exactly the kind of thing you need to do in an IELTS writing exam.

5. Computer Games
Are games an art form like movies and television? What about the characters, the stories and the graphics?

6. New Guitar
I’ve got a new guitar and I’d like to play you a song. It’s a comedy song – remember that – it is supposed to be funny! So, look for the jokes in the lyrics of the song. The lyrics are printed below:

Bill Bailey – Hats Off To The Zebras (Tribute to Brian Adams)

The horse is a noble beast
From the mustangs of the west
To the stallions of the east
But the horse has a distant cousin
It lives I-do-not-know-where
But it’s message of racial harmony is one that we all can share

Hats off to the zebras
They are black and white
But they don’t fight
‘Cos they’re not very good at it

In a world of confusion
We all need a sign
If only we could live side by side
Like the stripes down a zebras spine

Hats of to the zebras, yeah

The humble badger
Takes a sip of morning dew
He’s totally colourblind
So he can’t judge you

But the badger is a dreamer
The badger has a plan
He knows that his destiny
Is to help his fellow man

Hats off to the badger
He is black and white
But he doesn’t fight
Except for mating rights and territory

Black man and a white man
Both they need to shave
United by the badger brush
He’s helping from beyond the grave

Hats off to the badger
What about the tapeer
Half zebra half pig
Imagine the stig-ma
But the tapeer stands proud
Hats off to the tapeer

Badgers and zebras
Skunks, oh yeah
Little ring-tailed leemurs
Living together in harmony

And if the killer whales can do it, why can’t we?
Tell me why can’t we?

It’s a song about how we can use the examples of black and white animals to learn to live together in racial harmony.

For the the funniest lines are “because they’re not very good at it…” and “except for mating rights and territory”

7. Sentence Stress / Intonation / Get Candy!
In this one I demonstrate the importance of sentence stress and intonation in emphatic speech. Listen to the same text read twice. First time I read with flat intonation. It sounds dull and meaningless. Second time I add emphasis, stress and intonation – it sounds more passionate and meaningful.

Here’s the text below. You should practise listening to it, marking where I pause and emphasize. Then say the text and try to copy the way I do it. Listen to the previous podcast about halloween to head a real comedian reading the text.

So the first time you hear the concept of halloween, when you’re a kid. Do you remember the first time you even heard about it? It’s like, your brain can’t even… “what is this? who’s giving out candy? Someone’s giving out candy? who is giving out this candy? Everyone we know is just giving out candy?? I gotta be a part of this, take me with you, I want to do it, I’ll do anything that they want! I can wear that. I’ll wear anything I have to wear. I’ll do anything I have to do. I will get the candy from these fools, that are so stupidly giving it away!”

54. Halloween / Guy Fawkes Night

English cultural information and expressions about Halloween and Guy Fawkes Night (5th Nov), some entertaining stand up comedy about Halloween and all the usual useful bits of language and vocabulary.

Small Donate ButtonRight-click here to download this episode.
Click Here to read Wikipedia’s information about Halloween (I used it as a source of information in this episode)

Click Here to read about Guy Fawkes Night on Wikipedia too.

TRANSCRIPT – 54. Halloween / Guy Fawkes Night – First 15 Minutes

Hello everybody, welcome to Luke’s English Podcast. It’s actually 5 November here and I’m just going to tell you some things about Halloween in this podcast. So I’ll be talking about, you know, Halloween and what people usually do at Halloween and some of the story behind the Halloween festival and exactly what it is. I’ll also be talking about 5 November which is also an important day in the calendar here, in England. We celebrate Guy Fawkes Night on 5 November. And there is an interesting story behind that as well. So I’ll tell you about that too. Also in this podcast we are going to listen to a bit of stand up comedy and you’re going to learn some interesting expressions using the word “up” and the word “down”. So cultural information, bit of entertainment and some genuine language learning opportunities for you. Isn’t that fantastic? Yes it is. Ladies and gentlemen, yes it is.

So Halloween. Now, as you know probably, Halloween falls on 31 October every year. And it’s a kind of traditional festival, which is celebrated in many different countries around the world. We celebrate it here, but it’s not quite as important a day here, in England as it is in America. In fact many British people think that Halloween really is more of an American invention or an American festival. We tend to celebrate 5 November, I’ll talk about that a bit later.

But what’s Halloween all about? Well, we do do it here, we do celebrate it. And, let’s see… well it’s rather complicated, because there is a bit of history to it. Basically, before I go into the history, Halloween is a kind of, generally something that children enjoy in Britain. And it’s a kind of a chance for kids to go out and, sort of, celebrate basically the end of summer and the beginning of winter. They do it by using bits of, kind of, horror imagery symbols that represents, kind of, scary things.

So you got lots of pumpkins with scary faces, spiders, skeletons, you know, demons, Dracula that kind of thing. And kids have little parties where they dress up in different costumes, like horrible costumes of ghosts and skeletons. And typically will go in their neighbourhood and they would knock on people’s doors and go “Trick or treating”, which is basically a way for them to just kind of knock on the door of a neighbour and they say “Trick or treat”. And the neighbour has two options: either they can give the child or children a treat, which is typically some sweats, you know. Or they choose trick and in that case the children then play a trick on that person in some way. And often it would involve some kind of practical joke like maybe spraying them with the some silly spray or I don’t know playing another trick on them, you know, doing something like splashing water or them or something like that, usually quite mild tricks. So that’s “Trick or treating”. So that’s it, but…

Some of the background information. I’m just going to read some things to you from wikipedia, the slightly unreliable online encyclopedia. Basically Halloween, as it says here, it’s an annual holiday observed on 31 October. Yeah, 31 October, if you say it properly like that. And it has its root in Celtic festival of Samhain, I think, and the Christian holiday All Saint’s Day. But these days it’s largely a secular celebration. So, not really a religious holiday. But it has its roots in, kind of, religious festivals. So, common Halloween activities include “Trick or treating”, wearing costumes, attending costume parties, carving jack-o’-lantern. In America they call them jack-o’-lanterns, in here we just call them Halloween pumpkins. Ghost tours, bonfires. A bonfire is like a large fire that you’d have in your garden or in a park. Apple bobbing – that is like a little game, where you put apples in a big bowl of water and you have to try catch the apples with your teeth and pull them out. And the person who gets most number of apples is the winner, and telling ghosts stories and watching horror films.

So, some of the history to Halloween. Let’s see… Basically, I think it comes from ancient Celts. Well, the Celts were a kind of race of people who lived in Great Britain and Ireland, probably more Ireland, I think, certainly after, you know, Britain was invaded by people like Normans and Vikings and so on. But the ancient Celts basically believed that they were two halves of the year: the light half and the dark half. Basically, kind of summertime and wintertime. Right? Now they believe that it’s on the border between the light half and the dark half of the year, which falls around at the end of October, the beginning of November. At that time the kind of border between this world and the spirit world becomes very thin. Right? And it allows spirits both harmless like playful harmless spirits, but also harmful scary spirits to pass through. So it’s kind of when we get close to the spirit world and some of the spirits come through into our world. Right? Now basically, traditionally, this was a time where families’ ancestors, so sort of spirits of dead relatives were invited into the house and welcomed. But the dangerous harmful spirits were kind of warded off or scared away. Right?

People believe that originally people started to wear scary costumes and masks as a way of trying to scare off the harmful spirits. Ok? So, as well as that, as well as kind of wearing these masks and using symbols to frighten away the scary spirits, people had these big bonfires, which kind of represented some act of cleansing using fire to kind of cleanse the evil spirits away. Then I guess more and more, as that festival was celebrated, it’s become kind of commercialized really. You know these days, particularly in America, that’s what a lot of people say, it’s very commercialized.

So you see all the shops are filled with you know toys and masks and costumes and pumpkins and things like that. “Trick or treating” is something that I used to do, when I was a kid. It was quite fun really. We’d get dressed up in different costumes, wearing our masks. And then we’d go walking… go walking around the neighbourhood. Knocking on doors, saying “Trick or treat” and of course people would generally give us some sweets and things and actually if you think about it. It’s quite a… It’s really a great day to be a kid, because suddenly all the people in your neighbourhood are willing to just give you free sweets and free candy. And so it’s quite an amazing day, really. So that’s pretty much it. Like I said it’s not such a big festival here in the UK. It’s more of a big deal in America. And here we tend to celebrate 5 November actually around this time of year.

And 5 November is also called Guy Fawkes Night. Basically on 5 November we celebrate the death of a man called Guy Fawkes. And he wasn’t a hero here. He was actually a bad guy. He basically tried to kill the Royal Family and the Prime Minister of Britain by blowing up the Houses of Parliament. There was a plot, which is called Gunpowder Plot, where Guy Fawkes and his men planned to use dynamite to blow up Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament in order to kill the Royal Family. Now the reason they did that because they were Catholics and at that time there was a lot of conflict between the Catholics and the Protestants in Britain. And we had a Protestant Royal Family and [the] Guy Fawkes, who was a Catholic terrorist actually, decided that he wanted to have them killed.

So, now I’m just having a look at it on Wikipedia actually right now and I’m going to tell you some details of the story. So here we go. Guy Fawkes Night which is also known as Bonfire Night is an annual celebration held primarily in Great Britain on or around the evening of 5th November. Festivities are centred of the use of fireworks and the lighting of bonfires. Some formal British colonies also celebrate the date. Historically the celebrations mark the anniversary of the failed Gunpowder Plot of 5th November 1605. The date was originally made a public holiday in England by the anti-Catholic thanksgiving act of 1605, which was later repealed in 1859. So, basically Guy Fawkes Night originates from the Gunpowder Plot of 1605, which was a failed conspiracy by a group of provincial English Catholics to assassinate the Protestant King James I of England and James VI of Scotland and replace him with a Catholic head of state. The survival of the King was first celebrated on 5 November after Guy Fawkes left in charge of the Gunpowder placed underneath the House of Lords was discovered and arrested.

So ever since that day we’ve celebrated the capture of Guy Fawkes and actually when he was caught, he was punished, because he committed one of the greatest crimes that you can commit here, which is attempting to kill the monarch or the king or queen. And back in 1605 it was quite a brutal time, so Guy Fawkes was hung, drawn and quartered, which is a particularly horrible act of punishment. And as well as obviously trying to punish him for doing what he did, it was a kind of warning to anyone else in the country that they shouldn’t try and do something similar.

And to hang, drawn and quartered basically means first of all Guy Fawkes was hung by the neck. So they hung him up with the rope by his neck until he was almost dead. They didn’t kill him, but they nearly kill by hanging him. Then he was taken down and he was drawn, which basically means that his abdomen, his stomach was cut open and his guts were pulled out. It’s disgusting, isn’t it? But this is a Halloween podcast, so what did you expect? His stomach was cut open, his guts were pulled out and then finally he was quartered, which means he was cut into four pieces. That’s right, his head was removed and he was cut into four pieces. And those bits of his body were then displayed in various public places around the country, for example on spikes on Tower Bridge. So really horrible actually. Really, really horrible thing for us to remember.

And now every year we have a bonfire and typically we will burn a kind of effigy of Guy Fawkes and that will be like a kind of, how would you call it, sort of a representation of Guy Fawkes. So typically it would be like a man made out of old clothes and old bits of newspaper and we put him on the bonfire and burn him as a way of celebrating the fact that Guy Fawkes was caught and he didn’t manage to kill the King in 1605. We also have fireworks, big firework displays. So if you are in Britain on 5 November you will notice lots of big firework displays and that’s because we’re celebrating Guy Fawkes Night.

So that’s pretty much it. That’s my cultural information there about Halloween and Bonfire Night. Now then, I think what we do is listen to a bit of stand up comedy. Now, one of mine favourite comedians from America is Jerry Seinfeld. Now you might know the tv show that he was in a few years ago, which was called Seinfeld, which is about his everyday life basically. As well as being famous for his tv shows he’s also a great stand up comedian. And one of his CDs which you can purchase from Amazon and from lots from other websites and shops. It’s a great CD. I highly recommend that you buy it. It’s called “I’m telling you for the last time” by Jerry Seinfeld. So I highly recommend it. I’ll put a link to the Amazon page, where you can get it.

I’m going to play you a little clip from it, where he talks about Halloween. So have a listen to this, this is Jerry Seinfeld talking about Halloween. When we have finished listening, I’ll explain some of the details for you, so you can understand it perfectly just like a native speaker.
[15:05]

Here is the transcript of Jerry Seinfeld’s stand up comedy bit about Halloween. Please buy a copy of “I’m Telling You For The Last Time” as it is a great comedy CD/DVD which everyone can enjoy. Click this link to see the Amazon page.

Transcript: Jerry Seinfeld “Halloween”

When you’re a kid you can eat amazing amounts of food. And that… just candy. That’s all I ate when I was a kid. The only thought I had growing up was “get candy”. That was the only thought in my brain for the 10 years of human life, just “get candy get candy get candy get candy”. Family, friends, school these were all obstacles in the way of getting more candy. That’s why you had to teach kids not to take candy from strangers if they’re playing in a playground. And they can barely understand it. “don’t… no candy from the, strangers, alright. candy, strangers, no candy? Alright, because otherwise I’m taking the candy anywhere I can get it.” They’re such candy moron idiot brains, just “this man has candy I’m going with him goodbye, I don’t care what happens to me, get candy get candy get candy”. “No don’t go they’ll torture you, they’ll kidnap you”, “it doesn’t matter, he has an O Henry I have to take that chance, get candy get candy get candy”.

So the first time you hear the concept of Halloween, when you’re a kid. Do you remember the first time you even heard about it? It’s like, your brain can’t even… “what is this? who’s giving out candy? Someone’s giving out candy? who is giving out this candy? Everyone we know is just giving out candy?? I gotta be a part of this, take me with you, I want to do it, I’ll do anything that they want! I can wear that. I’ll wear anything I have to wear. I’ll do anything I have to do. I will get the candy from these fools, that are so stupidly giving it away!”

So the first couple of years I made my own costume, they, of course, sucked. Ghost, hobo, no good. So I’m begging the parents, “you’ve got to get me one of the ones from the store, the cardboard box, the cellophane top. So one year, third year, finally got it, Superman costume, not surprisingly. Mask included in the set! Remember the rubber band on the back of that mask, that was a quality item there wasn’t it? That was good for about 10 seconds before it snapped out of that cheap little staple that they put it in there with. Thinnest grey rubber in the world. You go to your first house, “Trick or SNAP – it broke, I don’t believe it. Wait up, I’ve got to fix it you guys! Come on! Wait up!”

That’s a kid thing, “wait up!”. Kids don’t want other kids to wait, they must wait ‘up’. “Wait up!”, because when you’re little life is ‘up’, you’re growing up, everything is ‘up’. Wait up, hold up, shut up! Mom, I’ll clean up! Let me stay up!

Parents of course are just the opposite. “Just calm down! Slow down! Come down here, sit down, put that down. You are grounded! Now keep it down in there.”

So I had my superman Halloween costume, I was physically ready, I was mentally prepared, and I assumed when I put this costume on I would probably look exactly like the Superman I had come to know on television and in the movies. Now you remember these costumes, it’s not exactly the super fit that you are hoping for! You look more like you’re wearing superman’s pyjamas, is what you look like. It’s all loose and flowing. Neck line kind of comes down to about there. You’ve got that flimsy little ribbon string holding it together in the back. Plus my mother makes me wear my winter coat over the costume anyway. I don’t recall superman wearing a jacket!

So you’re going out there, you know, and the mask keeps breaking, so the rubber band keeps getting shorter, it gets tighter and tighter on your face, and you can’t even see, you’re trying to breathe through that, remember that little hole that gets all sweaty in there? And the mask starts slicing into your eyeballs, “I can’t see, I can’t breathe, but we’ve got to get the candy, let’s keep going!” About a half hour into it you take that mask off “Oh to hell with it!” BING BONG” “Yeah it’s me, give me the candy! I’m superman look at the pant legs, what the hell’s the difference?”

Remember those last few Halloweens, getting a little too old for it. Just kind of going through the motions. BING BONG “come on lady let’s go, Halloween, doorbells, candy, let’s pick up the pace.” You come to the door, they always ask you those same stupid questions, “What are you supposed to be?” “I’m supposed to be done by now, you want to move it along, we’re the three musketeers. I’ve got 18 houses on this block alone. You just hit the bag, we hit the road, that’s the routine, let’s just pick it up”. Sometimes they give you that white bag, twisted on the top, you know that’s going to be some crap candy. It’s got to have those official Halloween markings on it. “Hey old lady, wait a second, what is this, the orange marshmallow shaped like a big peanut? Do me a favour, you keep that one. Yeah, we’ve got all the doorstops we need already thank you very much. We’re going for name candy only this year.”

And I think about how I used to eat when I was a kid, I remember Halloween, I would get, you know I would have like a punch bowl, and I would fill it with candy. The top of it would be curved, that’s how much candy would… And I would consume the entire punch bowl that night! Next day? Feel fantastic.

That’s it!

What’s Halloween like in your country? Do you have a traditional festival at this time of year? Leave your comments below.

53. Discussing Grammar with My Brother

Can an ordinary native speaker of English (my brother) explain the rules of English grammar? That’s the question in this interview. I wanted to know how much my brother James knows about the rules of grammar which learners of English study every day. The results are quite revealing.Transcript available below.

Right-click here to download this episode. 
At the end of the interview I explain the grammar rules which we discuss

Here are the lyrics to James’ rap at the beginning of the episode!
It’s Luke’s English Podcast
We’re sitting in his flat
We’re discussing English
and shit like that
We’re getting educated
because that’s the way we do
so listen up close
because his name is Luke

TRANSCRIPT
Here’s the first part of the transcript. The beginning of this transcript was sent in by Bettina from France. Thanks again Bettina ;)

You’re listening to Luke’s English Podcast. For more information visit teacherluke.podomatic.com

Uh… say what
Uh… what what what what

It’s Luke’s English Podcast
We’re sitting in his flat
We’re discussing English
and shit like that
We’re getting educated
because that’s the way we do
So listen up close
because his name is Luke

Yeah, we’re learning English
Luke’s English Podcast
Learning some English
Luke’s English podcast
with Luke’s English podcast, yeah

Good evening Ladies and Gentlemen and especially you Ladies,
you’re in safe hands, it’s Luke’s English podcast.

This week Luke takes a long slow lingering linguistic look at the English language.
So lay back, run yourself a deep bath and relax to the smoothing sounds of Luke’s English podcast.

Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of Luke’s English podcast. In this episode I talk to my brother James, err, about grammar. We have a little grammar discussion in which I ask James to try and answer some questions about English grammar. Now the idea of this episode is that I wanted to show people who are learning English, what most normal English native speakers really know about grammar.

Now my brother is a fairly ordinary Londoner. Um, he works as a graphic designer . Um, he is very good. He did the logo for my podcast, the Luke’s English Podcast logo. He designed that, so he is very good. He went to University, and so he is a normal educated professional Londoner. Umm, but as a native speaker, I wanted to ask him some questions about grammar because often learners of English are really surprised that native speakers don’t really know anything about the rules of grammar even though they speak the language perfectly. So here’s the conversation. I’ll explain some things at the end.

Erm, right, okay, so I’m with my brother Jim, and erm… would you say that you’re, like, an average man on the street?
James: Yeah
Luke: You are. Are you on a street now?
James: Erm, I’m very near one. I’m not on a street, no. But I quite often am on the street.
Luke: Okay, so you’re, sort of, typical person
James: I’m the average person, in the world
Luke: You are the most average person in the world
James: Yeah
Luke: Is that what your girlfriend says? …he hey… That’s just a joke. Wasn’t very funny. Umm, anyway, so my brother is basically, sort of, the average man on the street. Umm, right, so, how much, kind of, English grammar did you study at school?
James: Don’t really remember to be honest.
Luke: Don’t remember, okay.
James: Probably… a fair amount but I’d say more of it was just picked up in speech than learned, err, in a classroom
Luke: Ok, so you just, you didn’t really study any grammar. We don’t really study grammar at school.
James: Well, we did, but, yeah I’m sure we studied it. I remember that stuff happening. I just don’t know if I was paying any attention
Luke: Ok, so if I asked you for example, what’s the difference between a noun and adjective and a verb? Can you tell me?
James: An adjective is …erm…
Luke: Yeah, an adjective
James: An adjective is a doing word
Luke: A doing word. For example?
James: For example, erm, err, to run.
Luke: To run. So, you’re saying ‘to run’ is an adjective. Ok, I’ll come back to that.
James: Can we delete this?
Luke: No no! This is brilliant! No this is perfect because, the fact is that students don’t know that most English people don’t know…
James: Yeah, but I’m more stupid than most people
Luke: No you’re not more stupid than most people.
James: Most people know this
Luke: No, most people don’t know this. A lot of people don’t know this. I didn’t know this until I started learning to become a teacher.
James: No, an adjective would be, erm, ‘flying’
Luke: No, that’s not… well, ‘flying’ could be an adjective, but, that’s actually…
James: Fat
Luke: Fat is an adjective, yes.
James: Right, yeah
Luke: So, it’s a describing word. Right, what about a noun?
James: A noun is a… a descriptive word like ‘a plant’
Luke: Right, so it’s like the name of a thing, like ‘a plant’, okay. What’s a verb?
James: To run, to fly
Luke: To run, to fly, okay. That’s a doing word.
James: To drive
Luke: To drive. Okay, what’s, err, what’s an adverb?
James: Describing the person, a ‘driver’
Luke: No, that’s a noun.
James: Dunno (don’t know)
Luke: An adverb describes a verb, so ‘he drives well’, so ‘well’ is an adjective [adverb].
James: right
Luke: Err,
James: Oh, it’s all coming back to me now.
Luke: But the fact is that most
James: Thing is though I think I speak quite well
Luke: Yeah, well of course you do
James: I generally make myself understood, I just may not know the exact correct definition of everything.
Luke: That’s the thing for native speakers of English. It’s like “well I don’t need to know the rules, because obviously I know that, basically …
James: I’m confident enough that I know the language well enough to speak it well, and to make myself understood and to be clear
Luke: I think that’s…
James: and I speak, I think I speak quite well but I just don’t know the exact definitions of all the words
Luke: Okay, well that’s exactly what English native speakers. That’s their whole attitude, and that’s totally fine, because the fact is they know how to speak English of course, because they were born in an English speaking environment
James: You’d definitely notice if someone got it wrong though
Luke: Yeah, but if you got it wrong, you notice, that’s right, but you just instinctively know what’s right and what’s wrong
James: but it feels like it’s instinctive but I’m sure it was learned
Luke: No, it is instinctive because we don’t learn
James: No, but it’s picked up isn’t it, through practice
Luke: Yeah, it’s picked up through experience of just speaking and, for example, your parents correcting you and things like that. But learners of English have got to learn all these rules, and it’s like, it’s the language of the English language for them, because in order to take apart the language, they use all this other… all these other terms and I often think when I’m teaching that my students know English grammar, like, ten times better than how most native English speakers do, right?
James: yeah
Luke: So, I’ve got here a book, which is called English Grammar In Use by Raymond Murphy and it’s the most popular grammar book for learners of English. It’s sold millions of copies all around the world, it’s a famous book, it’s known as ‘the blue book’, ‘the blue grammar book’
James: and you’re saying it’s basically useless
Luke: No, I’m not saying it’s useless! I’m just saying it’s interesting that most native speakers have got no idea what any of this stuff means. You talk about present continuous tense and third conditionals and things like that
James: Wouldn’t have a clue
Luke: You’ve got no idea, right. What I’m quite curious to do is, another thing is, that in English language classes teachers are always asking students to explain what things mean, right, so they always say things like “what is present perfect and how do we use it?” or “what’s the difference between these two sentences?”, right, and it’s interesting to see what a native speaker, someone who’s already able to speak English perfectly and functionally would answer those questions, because sometimes
James: You’re probably going to get them wrong
Luke: Well, you, it’s, the point is that, a lot of the exercises you do in class are, kind of, unrealistic, and unnatural so even if you were a native speaker you wouldn’t be able to do it, you know?
James: Yeah
Luke: So, like, if I said to you what’s the difference between, ‘I painted the house’ and ‘I have painted the house’? What’s the difference in meaning?
James: ‘I painted the house’ implies that you’ve just done it
Luke: You’ve just done it
James: and ‘I have painted the house’ could be any time
Luke: Ok. Couldn’t you say ‘I painted the house last year’?
James: Yeah, you could say that
Luke: Right, so ‘I painted the house’ could be any time
James: But you couldn’t say ‘I have painted the house last year’
Luke: Ah, right. Why not?
James: Because it’s too… it’s, it’s… I don’t know. There’s two levels to it. Once you say ‘I have painted the house’, you’ve already established the fact that you’ve painted it.
Luke: Right
James: Err, I don’t know! It just sounds wrong!
Luke: It just sounds wrong, yeah, that’s exactly it. The fact is, ‘I have painted the house’ means, you were right originally, you don’t know when it happened, it’s just that it happened in the past some time, and it’s connected to now, because you’re relating it to your whole experience of your life up to now, so there’s a connection to now, ‘I have done it’, like, I’ve got that experience. ‘I have painted the house’. You can’t say ‘I have painted the house yesterday’, because we just don’t use that tense
James: But you’ve already said, ‘I have painted the house’
Luke: Which implies that there’s no time, or that it’s an unfinished period of time.
James: Or just… it just doesn’t work, I don’t know why
Luke: But you can say, “I have painted the house today”, but you can’t say “I have painted the house yesterday”
James: ‘I have painted the house today’, would you say that?
Luke: At the end of the day, ‘so what have you done today?’, oh well…
James: You’d say ‘I painted the house’
Luke: Ok at the end of the day
James: Or ‘I’ve been painting the house’
Luke: But at lunchtime, “what have you done?”
James: Oh, I’ve painted the house
Luke: yeah, exactly
James: What have you been doing this morning? – I painted the house. I don’t know if you’d say ‘I’ve’
Luke: Well if it was finished you would
James: “well, I’ve come in, I’ve picked up the paint brush”
Luke: NO, that’s, that’s
James: I’ve run in, I’ve grabbed the ladder, I’ve put it up against the wall and I’ve painted the house.
Luke: That’s what native speakers say as an error. That’s what footballers do. They say things like, “Well, yeah, I’ve got the ball”… what they should say is “I got the ball outside the penalty box, right, I passed it to Wayne Rooney, he passed it back to me, I beat the defender and I shot and I scored. But what they’d say is “Well, I’ve got the ball outside the penalty box, and I’ve passed it to Wayne Rooney and he’s passed it back to me, and I’ve looked up, and I’ve seen the open goal, and I’ve shot and I’ve scored”, so all this weird present perfect, but it’s kind of wrong isn’t it.
James: Yeah
Luke: They’re actually speaking completely incorrectly
James: Because he’s kind of talking about the present and the past at the same time. “I’ve picked up the ball, passed it to Rooney. You know, I’ve collected the ball and passed it to Rooney”
Luke: So he’s talking about, it’s like, it happened just now, it’s like, in the moment
James: But he’s using “I’ve”
Luke: “I’ve” to, sort of, create that link to ‘now’ somehow
James: It’s like he’s running through it in his head.
Luke: It’s kind of like…
James: This isn’t going to be any use to anyone
Luke: It is. No, it is it is, it’s exactly
James: No-one’s going to listen to this
Luke: No, it’s not true, it’s not true. People will be interested to hear this
James: If you’re listening to this, I’m very sorry
Luke: No, people will be interested to hear about how a native speaker understands,
James: or doesn’t
Luke: or doesn’t understand grammar. Just let me ask you two more things and then we’ll call it a day. Right, er, another one is, what’s the difference between ‘for’ and ‘since’. That’s a question that students ask all the time. What’s the difference between ‘for’ and ‘since’?
James: In what context?
Luke: So, ‘I have done something for…’ and ‘I have done something since…’
James: for?
Luke: For, yeah, f-o-r. “i’ve been doing something for…”
James: 10 years
Luke: Yeah, I’ve been doing something for 10 years. I’ve been doing something since…
James: 1990… 2000
Luke: Yeah, since 2000, so what’s the difference between ‘for’ and ‘since’?
James: …erm… well you say ‘for’ when you’re about to describe the length of time that you have spent doing something. ‘Since’ sets the date that you started.
Luke: Yeah, exactly, yeah. Perfect. Yeah, you’re quite good.
James: That blew your theory out of the water
Luke: No no, it’s just interesting. I don’t have a theory. Right, here’s another one, ok. This is a classic one. What’s the difference between saying, okay this is conditionals. What’s the difference between saying “If I…” now you’ll get this because this is easy… “If I had bought a lottery ticket, I would have won the lottery” and “If I bought a lottery ticket, I would win the lottery” What’s the difference.
James: One’s talking about the past and one’s talking about the future.
Luke: Right, okay, yes, spot on. Nailed it. Yeah. Okay, I need to give you a really difficult one. Erm, hmm, I’ll go to the back of the book. Ok, prepositions, right? Let’s go for, what do you want? Let’s have adjective + preposition, which is, prepositions are the thing that learners have the most difficulty with, and they’re little words like ‘of’ ‘to’ ‘at’ ‘in’, stuff like that
James: Ok, go on, first question
Luke: So, you’ve just got to complete the sentence, erm, hmm,

LUKE: Erm, hmm, wait a minute. Right, wait a second

JAMES: I think you should edit this down.

LUKE: Yeah, okay, right, here we go. I’ll give you a sentence. You’ve got to put the prepositions in the right place, in the gap, okay?
I was delighted ….. the present you gave me. I was delighted … the present you gave me.

JAMES: ‘ with ‘

LUKE: Yes, well done. Brilliant.

JAMES: I don’t know why ? But…

LUKE: I’ve just had an idea whenever you get anything right, I’m gonna do this (ping!), okay? Right, so here’s the next one.

JAMES: This is bad.

LUKE: It was very nice … you, to do my shopping for me. Thank you very much.

JAMES: ‘ of ‘ but I don’t know why it’s ‘ of ‘. I couldn’t tell you the rules behind that. I just know that’s what it is.

LUKE: Why are you always so rude … your parents? Can’t you be nice … them.

JAMES: ‘ to ‘

LUKE: ‘ to ‘ yes, well done !

JAMES: Can you not do that? (referring to the BING)

LUKE: Okay, hmm, but why is it nice to, be nice to the parents?

JAMES: Well, because they brought you up and I dunno, bought you stuff at christmas

LUKE: No, I’m meaning, why do you use the word ‘to’? Nice, be nice to your parents.

JAMES: Because, you’re sort of, I don’t know.

LUKE: Yeah

JAMES: You’re giving some kind to them. You’re kind of, just doing something for their benefit, I suppose or something towards them. Something towards them. A big nice towards them. Now, it’s that
your parents, I couldn’t tell you.

LUKE: You’ve to look up, to look toward them.

JAMES: I couldn’t tell you.

LUKE: The fact is, it’s just impossible to create a rule about it. In fact, you’ve just got to learn that some words go with other words. Just got know it’s ‘ be nice to someone ‘ . You’ve just to learn ‘nice to’. So,
you have to see words existing together in little partnerships.

JAMES: Well, learn how they work together.

LUKE: Yeah, that’s it. It’s just learning two words together. Not just one on its own. So, that’s it. That’s the end of the experiment. Have you learnt anything from this, from this experience?

JAMES: No, no.

LUKE: No?

JAMES: Hm, I just hope that you get something out of this. You know making me look stupid basically.

LUKE: No, I think you got quite a few questions right. Didn’t you?

JAMES: Hhhh yeah,

LUKE: Okay, well, congratulations anyway. I’m gonna give you a certificate now which just shows that you’ve, two certificates, want to show that you completed the course.

JAMES: So, I’ll keep the certificate. Can I have this bit of chewing gum?

LUKE: Yeah, you can have the chewing gum.

JAMES: Sorry, thanks.

LUKE: Hmm, and the second certificate is just something I like to give to all the guests that I have on a program. It’s a little certificate just proving that you’d appeared on, on an episode of Luke’s English
Podcast. So thanks very much for coming and I hope to see you soon.

JAMES: Thanks very much. Luke’s English Podcast is brought to you by Wrigley chewing gum and Castllero del Diablo wine.

Okay folks, what I would now like to do is just explain some of the grammar points that I spoke to my brother about during that conversation. I asked him some questions about a few areas of grammar to see if he could answer them and I think you can see there that the point is, I guess, that native speakers surprisingly don’t understand or don’t really know the rules of grammar. They don’t know terms like ‘present perfect’ or even words like ‘adjectives’ or ‘nouns’. They don’t really know what those terms mean. So when you’re studying all that stuff at school, you’re in a way more articulate than they are, because you know how to describe the language and native speakers don’t know how to do that. That’s quite interesting but native speakers know, umm, what’s right and what’s wrong by instinct. They just sort of, they learn it as children without thinking about it and then when they get older they know that something is wrong but they don’t know why it’s wrong, they just know it’s wrong. It’s the same for you when you’re learning your language as a child.

Umm, what does that tell us about learning English? Well you could say, that it, some people might say it means that learners of English shouldn’t worry about learning the rules of grammar. That instead they should just try to listen to a lot of English, to read a lot of English and by doing that ,erm, see and hear the language so much that they just learn what’s right and wrong, just by frequency. So they know for example that people will say things, just because they have heard it said so many times before and they know what’s right and wrong just because they have heard and read the language a lot and they’ve started to learn, started to get a sense of all the patterns that you find in English.
Maybe that’s true, maybe that’s a good way to learn or maybe learners of English should study the rules or at least study the patterns and do practice exercises in order to understand what’s right and what’s wrong. I think it’s a combination of both. That you need to study the language , you need to test yourself with it , you need to do exercises but also you need to combine that with high exposure to lots of listening and lots of reading and so the more you see of the language , the more you start to develop a feel for it. Hum, that’s my opinion, um, but nevertheless, um, some of the things that I discussed with my brother there, I think I should just clarify for you, anyway.
Um, so the first thing I asked him was, what’s the difference between a noun, an adjective and a verb and he couldn’t really answer the question, but as you may know, a noun is a word which is used to give something a name. We use things like, you know, a table, a chair, a cat, those are all nouns. They can be plural or singular. Three cats for example.
They can be countable or uncountable. If they’re countable you can, you can count them. For example three, you know, tables. A table is a countable noun because you can say one, two or three tables but a word like sugar isn’t countable, instead we just say some sugar. So it’s like a mass of tiny little granules of sugar that together makes something uncountable. They can also be abstract, for example the names of things you can’t actually touch or feel. Umm, so concepts like ‘love’ is a noun. Umm, it’s also a verb but you could say ‘all you need is love’ and in that sentence it’s a noun. It’s an abstract one there and it’s uncountable. That’s nouns. Obviously there’re, nouns can be very complex, they can be larger, kind of phrases you could say like a noun phrase like for example, hum, let’s see, umm, like mobile phone technology is a kind of noun phrase and you can use that as the start of a sentence. Mobile phone technology is developing very quickly, right? So nouns can also be sometimes a number of words together.

Umm, right, the next one is a adjective. Well, an adjective is a word we use to describe a noun. Umm, it’s used to describe a noun, so we would say for example, the food was delicious, right? So delicious describes the food. How was the food ? It was delicious. You could also say delicious food. Like that, of course. Umm, so that’s an adjective.

Umm, and then the next one was a verb and the verb is the doing word. These are words we use to express sort of actions, um, so like play, eat, go, for example. Those are verbs, um, and we also have little verb phrases, which are things like phrasal verbs and that’s a verb in combination with other words and phrasal verbs are difficult because, well, somme of them are easy and some of them are difficult . The easy ones are easy to understand because the meaning is very similar to the original verb. So, if you’re talking about, um, oh, let’s see, hmm, ‘ go on’ , like ‘ go on’, meaning continue. I’s fairly clear what that means because go, we know what ‘ go’ means. ‘ Go on ‘ just means go and don’t stop going, continue. That’s fairly easy but some of them are difficult like if you take the expression ‘give up’. ‘ Give up ‘ umm, meaning to quit. Hum, that’s not quite so easy because the verb ‘ give’ you know, we think, well, ‘ give’ . Give someone a birthday present but in this sentence ‘give up’ has a completely different meaning to give which makes it very difficult and the fact is as learners of English you just have to learn phrasal verbs. You just have to try and learn them because they are all unique words with their own meanings, just a combination of a few words. So that’s, umm, that was the first thing I asked my brother. The next thing was about ‘present perfect’ and ‘past simple’.

So we know the ‘present perfect’. One of the, actually this is one of the most common bits of grammar that you study when you’re learning English. Present perfect of course is like ‘ have’ plus a past participle or ‘ has’ plus a past participle, like I have lived in Japan for example. Umm, she has eaten a pizza, right? And ‘past simple’ obviously everyone knows. I lived in Japan, she ate a pizza, for example. Umm, so the difference, well that’s quite a big one and it’s something that everyone is studying. So the difference between ‘past simple’ and ‘present perfect’ basically we use, we use ‘past simple’ to talk about a finished action in the past but the time period is important and we tend to, with ‘past simple’ express a kind of distance from the act. So there is a distance in time basically, which means that the action
happened in a finished time period. I lived, erm, well let’s say, umm, I ate, no, I drank a coffee. It’s pretty, probably suggests that you that you drank a coffee yesterday or you drank a coffee last week or you drank a coffee, umm, during breakfast, right? So it’s like in a finished time. ‘Present perfect’ is used to describe finished actions which happened in an unfinished time. So there’s a connection to now. That’s the most important thing. So, basically you might say for example, I have drunk three cups of coffee today. Umm, today is not finished, so you can say, I have drunk three cups of coffee today. Hum, so the time period is always connected to now. It’s a bit more complicated than that but that’s is all basic difference.
Hum, to be honest, if I was to explain ‘present perfect’ and ‘past simple’, I’d need to record a completely new podcast and I could do that. So, I might, I might do that.. ‘Past simple’ and ‘present perfect’.

The next one was about 2nd and 3rd conditionals. So we know the 2nd conditional would be for example, umm, let’s see. Err, if I bought a lottery ticket, I would win the lottery. Not a very good example because, it’s not definite that you’d win, so, if I?
Okay, let’s say, if I, if I went outside, I, no, no, no … Okay, if I studied hard, I would pass the exam. So, you’re talking about the future but you use past tense like studied, if I studied, now, we’re not talking about the past , we’re talking about the future. And we know, it’s the future because we’ve said’ if’ . So ‘ if ‘ plus a ‘past tense’ is actually used to describe a kind of unreal future. So you use the past tense not to create distance in time but to create distance in reality. In this sense it’s an unreal or hypothetical future because you don’t think it’s realistic. So, if I studied hard, I would pass the exam but I’m not going to study hard because I don’t want to, right? So compare that with the 1st conditional. If I study hard, I will pass the exam. Umm, ‘present tense’ after ‘ if ‘ , still talking about the future but here we think it’s a realistic future. So, there’s no distance from reality. We think it’s real and it’s followed by ‘ will ‘. Umm, if I study hard, I will pass the exam. So, that’s it, it’s like a definite future with its definite future consequence!

The 3rd conditional talks about the past and there we use ‘had’ plus a ‘past participle’ in the ‘if clause’, in the second clause we have ‘would have’ and a ‘past participle’. So, let’s say, the exam was last week and I failed, you could say, ‘ If I had studied for the exam, I would have passed, right? The fact is, I didn’t study and I didn’t pass but if I had studied, now here we’re using ‘ had studied’ and that’s like, it looks like past perfect, but it’s not actually past perfect, it just looks like it, but it’s used to create distance from reality in this sense, in the past. Umm, so we go from ‘past simple’ I didn’t study, we go one tense back to what looks like ‘past perfect ‘. ‘If I had studied’ and then in the second part ‘I would have passed ‘. Again to refer to a past consequence.

It’s all very complicated and to be honest rather boring but you kind of have to learn it. Again, I could do a completely separate podcast all about conditionals because it’s such a big topic.

The last thing I talked about with my brother was ‘prepositions’ and if you’re learning English you’ll know about prepositions. They’re very, very difficult. They are the little words that we use to connect nouns and verbs and adjectives together and you find the prepositions are linked to other words and there isn’t really a decent set of rules to explain these links. The fact is, you just have to learn them. You just have to learn that we say ‘to be nice to someone’ right? ‘Nice to’ those words go together. You’ve just to learn that you have to remember it and there’re lots of combinations of verbs and prepositions, nouns and propositions and adjectives and prepositions and there are so many lists, really that, it’s just a case of noticing them and then try to remember them. Umm, what you should do, is realize that prepositions are linked to other words and then see these word combinations as separate units of meaning that you should learn. So, you don’t just learn the word for example ‘consist’ but you learn the expression ‘consist of’ right? Okay, so a hamburger , a Big Mac consists of bread, salad, beef and cheese for example. Umm, so, ‘consists of’. Those words always go together.

Umm, so that’s basically it. Those are the things I’d discussed with my brother. I expect, if you’re a learner of English, you understood the rules of grammar a little bit better than my brother did. Umm, in which case you should feel quite good about yourself. Um, remember you’re, you’re learning the grammar of the English language and you’re learning the grammar actually better than most native speakers. So, well done you.
Umm that’s the end of this podcast, I hope you found it interesting. That’s all for me . Bye, bye, bye, bye, bye…

Enjoy.

52. London Video Interviews Part 4

More conversations with native English speakers in the centre of London. Tapescript available below. Enjoy!

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Video Transcript

Luke: So what’s the best thing about being in London for you?
Man with red tie: The food
Luke: Really? That’s interesting. A lot of people who aren’t from England, foreigners, think that the food’s awful. What kind of food?
Man: Indian. Italian. Good food.
Luke: Right, okay, what’s the worst thing about London?
Man: Feeling unclean when you get home. The grime.
Luke: The, sort of, grime, the pollution and stuff. Okay, thank you very much.
Man: You’re welcome.

Girls: Hi
Luke: Hi, where are you both from?
English girl: Nottingham
Luke: Okay
Canadian girl: And I’m from Canada
Luke: Okay, right, but you’ve both lived in London before, right?
Girls: Yep
Luke: I’m just asking people what the best and worst things about London are…
Nottingham: The amount of things to do… the best thing
Luke: Yep
Canada: Free museums and galleries, those are really good things.
Luke: Okay, right, what about the worst things?
Canada: The tube
Luke: What about the tube?
Canada: Too crowded, too hot, doesn’t work very well.
Luke: Right. What do you think?
Nottingham: That’s about it actually, yeah. Travel, yeah, travelling.
Luke: Alright, thank you very much.
Canada: You’re welcome
Luke: Cheers
Canada: Good luck with that
Luke: Thanks very much, cheers.

White t-shirt man: Hello
Luke: You’re from London as well are you?
Man: I am from London yeah. Do you want me to talk to you or to the lens?
Luke: Umm, both, whatever.
Man: Okay, yeah
Luke: Whatever’s more comfortable.
Man: Alright
Luke: So, what’s the best thing about London?
Man: Umm. I would say, the diversity, the culture diversity, the galleries, the fact that you can walk around the city and there’s so many different types of… walks of life you know, culturally and also it’s constantly changing and reinventing itself. It’s got lots of different opportunities creatively. I think that’s what, really, what makes London thrive really.
Luke: Right, it’s the place where you can, kind of, go with a creative idea and make it work
Man: Yeah, it’s a very dynamic city, culturally dynamic, which is what makes it great
Luke: Okay. What about the worst things?
Man: Err, overcrowding, the tube, erm… stress levels, pressure, people not looking you in the eye when they [are] going through their day to day [life]. That’s probably the worst thing about London.
Luke: So there’s a sort of impersonal thing as well
Man: It can be, yeah
Luke: Okay
Man: Alright?
Luke: Great, thanks very much, bye.

51. Luke Answers Your Emails and Questions

It’s back! The return of Luke’s English Podcast. Responses to the comments and questions I have received over the last few months. I haven’t done a podcast for quite a long time, so here it is!

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Luke’s English Podcast is a free service for people learning English as a second language. Use this podcast to develop your listening skills, your awareness of pronunciation patterns, your knowledge of vocabulary and grammar and your cultural understanding too. Each podcast is fairly long, usually more than 30 minutes. There is a lot of content in this podcast. You can use it to develop your English by doing ‘long term listening’ which means you listen for something for a longer period (not just the 5 minutes of listening you do in class), and you listen to it regularly and sometimes more than once. This allows you to ‘get to know’ the podcast, the sound of my voice and the way I teach. You can listen to it anywhere. After a while you will start to pick up lots of things I say, and possibly start speaking like me.

In this podcast I just respond to messages I have been sent recently. If you have sent me a message I might reply to it personally on this podcast episode. I answer some questions too, so it is a good chance to understand some tricky things in English and get some advice.

Cheers.

Luke

50. Good Things Come To Those Who Wait

Useful and natural vocabulary and expressions on the subject of Waiting and Being Patient.

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Good Things Come To Those Who Wait

Welcome back to Luke’s English Podcast. This is Luke, and this is the long awaited next episode! I expect some of you have been waiting for the next episode to be uploaded. Well, here it is! Proof, surely, that good things come to those who wait.

In fact, that is what this episode is about; waiting and being patient. I’m going to teach you some useful words and expressions on the subject of waiting.

Here are the expressions I will be teaching you. First I will list them, then I will talk and use them in context. You will have to listen to the podcast to hear me give definitions and explanations.

Vocabulary and expressions: Waiting and being patient (23 items of vocabulary)

Good things come to those who wait
Persevere
Stick at it
Don’t give up
Keep going
It’s worth it in the end
Hold on
Hang on
Hang in there
Hold tight
Hold your horses
See how things go
Wait and see
Bear with me
All in good time!
Don’t be impatient
I’m looking forward to it/doing it
I can’t wait for it
I can’t wait to do it
Don’t hold your breath
An anticlimax
To queue up for something
To hold out for something

Here are the expressions in context. Listen and notice the expressions. You can read and find them here too:

They say that Good things come to those who wait, and I’m sure it’s true. If you have the patience to wait for a long time, eventually something good will come to you. For example, if you’re looking for Mr Right or Mrs Right – if you want to get married, it’s no good if you just marry the first person you meet. You need to be patient until you find the right person for you. If you’re starting a business, you might need to persevere before you get success. Success might not come immediately – if you think you have a good business idea, just stick at it and eventually success will come along. Good things come to those who wait – patience is a virtue! So, if you’re waiting for something, don’t give up – keep going! This is true for learning English – it is a long term thing. You can’t get big success in a short time, you have to stick at it. Keep listening a lot, keep studying, keep taking risks with English. It is worth it in the end. You’ll improve in the long run. There’s no short, quick solution to learning English, unfortunately. So, if you’re impatient to become a fluent speaker, keep practising and hang in there. Hold on, hang on and hold tight – you’ll get there in the end if you keep trying. Sometimes students ask me what their English will be like in 3 months time, or 6 months time. I usually say – if you work hard and have the right attitude, you could make a lot of progress, but I can’t really predict the future – you’ll have to just wait and see. Sometimes my students are so keen to improve that they ask me to give them extra work to do after school (don’t worry – I have plenty of students who are happy to do nothing after school!) and usually I have to say “OK, I’ll have to go into the teachers’ room to photocopy something for you. Just bear with me, I’ll be back in a few minutes”.
Sometimes if my students do a test in class, they want to know their results immediately, but they have to wait until I’ve checked their answers. “Can I see my score please Luke?” They say. “All in good time! I haven’t checked your tests yet! Don’t be impatient!” I might say.
Often at school, the students work pretty hard and they just want the weekend to come so they can go out and enjoy themselves. They might say “I can’t wait for the weekend!”. Some students get tired of living in London because they’re homesick, and it’s cold here and the food isn’t very good. They might say something like, “I’m really looking forward to going back to my country”.
Sometimes, teachers at my school organize trips out of class (e.g. to interesting places in London). The students often look forward to these and say things like “I can’t wait for the trip into London”, but I might say “Don’t hold your breath! – it might not be that good. It might rain or something, and that would spoil the trip, wouldn’t it?” There’s nothing worse than building something up, expecting it to be great, and then it being an anticlimax in the end.
Some students think that the British are naturally patient people because we seem to enjoy queueing up for things. They always see people standing in lines at ATM machines or outside theatres. Perhaps it’s true – maybe we are quite patient. I think we like to queue up because it makes life easier. Who wants to live in a place where people push and shove and don’t respect each other?
So, are you finding this episode useful? I know some of you have been holding out for this one for a while. I hope it is what you expected, and not too much of an anticlimax.

That’s it. You’ll have to listen to the podcast in order to hear my explanations and examples of the 23 items of vocabulary listed above.

You can also hear me chat with English Robot 3000.

If you listen to this podcast, please donate just 1 dollar to me via PayPal. You can do that by clicking the ‘Donate Via PayPal’ button in the top right of the webpage.

Hang in there!

49. Stand Up Comedy (with Claudia)

Guest presenter Claudia Edwards interviews Luke about Stand Up Comedy. Vocabulary notes are included below.

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Luke’s English Podcast is a free service for learners of English. In a recent made up survey, a group of over 1000 international students were asked what was the best way to learn English. 99% of the students said that Luke’s English Podcast was the best way to learn English. 1% of the students did not understand the question.

London is said to be the comedy capital of the world. There are more comedians here than in any other city. Comedy is a BIG part of our culture here. Going to a stand up comedy show is a very normal way to spend an evening. There are many famous and successful stand up comedians in the UK as well as the USA. But what is stand up?

I’ve recently started doing stand up comedy myself, so in this podcast I was interviewed by my friend & colleague Claudia Edwards. I’m sure you’ll agree, it is very nice to listen to a female voice presenting the podcast for a change. Enjoy!

Here are the questions asked by Claudia, and some of the vocabulary I used in my answers:

Claudia’s Interview Questions + Vocabulary
Can you tell me what exactly is stand up?

stand up comedy = a kind of comedy performance which involves a comedian standing up in front of an audience with a microphone, in order to make people laugh
sit coms = situation comedies – these are TV shows which usually feature a few characters in a familiar situation. The events and the conversation are funny. E.g. Friends

What makes it unique as a kind of performance?
a script = all the words for a play, or a movie which the actors have to learn
dying on stage = being unsuccessful on stage – doing your performance, but failing because nobody is laughing

What are the good things and the bad things about it?
you can’t blame anyone else
to blame someone = to say that someone was responsible for something bad. e.g. “it’s the director’s fault”
time consuming = it takes up (uses) a lot of time
you’re putting yourself on the line
to put yourself on the line = to put yourself in a position in which you might fail

What’s it like? How do you feel?
the palm of your hand = the middle part of your hand (with the lines on it)
you’ve got the audience in the palm of your hand = the audience are completely under your control
it’s paid off = the work you have done is resulting in success
beforehand = before

Have you ever had a mind blank?
a mind blank = when your mind goes blank, and you can’t think of anything

How long have you been doing it?

What exactly do you do, just tell jokes?
the navigational systems of the plane = the computer which helps the plane to go in the correct direction
you wouldn’t be able to take them on as hand luggage

What do you think makes a stand up comic good?

Do any other countries do stand up, or is it just the UK?
they will often pick on the audience
to pick on someone = to make fun of / tease someone (sometimes in a nasty way – like a bully at school)
alternative comedy = subversive, critical comedy
subversive = critical, radical, revolutionary, against the government or the ‘way things are now’

How long have people been doing stand up in the UK, do you know?

If people listening want to see some stand up, what should they do?

Some vocabulary from Luke’s stand up set:
bollocks = a rude British English swear word which is like the American word ‘bullshit’. It actually means ‘testicles’.
shuffle all songs = a function on the ipod which plays all your songs in random order

Some of my favourite comedy clips:

Richard Pryor – When kids lie
Richard Pryor is definitely one of the best stand up comedians ever. Unfortunately he is dead now, but his comedy is still with us. He was one of the people who invented the kind of stand up comedy which everybody does now. In this clip Pryor talks about how children behave when they lie about breaking something.

Steve Martin – Sex Jokes
I absolutely love Steve Martin, but a lot of people don’t ‘get’ it (they don’t understand why he’s funny). Unfortunately there aren’t many good clips of him doing stand up on YouTube, but this one is quite good. Steve’s comedy is not obvious. It’s subtle. He used his voice and his body a lot, and just little physical movements or changes in the way he spoke were hilarious. This clip is a bit old fashioned, but I believe Steve Martin is still one of the best stand up comedians we’ve had.

Michael McIntyre – Live at The Apollo
McIntyre is probably the biggest stand up comedian in the UK at the moment. He is extremely popular. His comedy is accessible (he talks about things which everybody can relate to), he uses a lot of physical humour and different voices, and he is very energetic on stage.
In this clip, he talks about how English people always want to know exactly where you live when you introduce yourself. “Hi, I’m from London” – “Whereabouts whereabouts!”
He speaks very quickly.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Es2l4yUBY6M&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

Eddie Izzard – Computers
One of the top comedians in the world. Yep. He has a unique, surreal style, but he talks about every day things like the problems we experience with computers.

Flight of the Conchords – Business Time
These guys are a musical comedy duo from New Zealand. They sing comedy songs. This one is about ‘making love’! Oh yeah, it’s business time! In the song, Jemane sings to his girlfriend about making love on a Wednesday evening. Listen carefully to the lyrics and you’ll understand that Jemane is not a very good lover!

Here’s a clip of some Japanese comedy. It comes from a BBC TV show called “Adam and Joe Go Tokyo” in which British comedians Adam and Joe go to Tokyo to learn about Japanese culture. It was broadcast about 6 years ago.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nf7V-Fuqtak&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

There are many many more comedians and videos that I love, but I can’t recommend them all. To be honest, I think that it is very difficult to understand the humour if you don’t understand the English perfectly. This is why I think comedy is one of the best ways of improving your English. Think of it like this:
1. Watch some comedy that you don’t understand
2. Realise that other people are laughing, so it must be funny
3. Think: What am I missing?
4. Watch again and try really hard to understand what is so funny about it. Is it the specific words? Is it the subject? Is it something specific to the culture that you don’t understand?
5. If you can understand comedy in English – you are making a lot of progress!!

I totally believe in comedy as one of the best things in life – and of course I think comedy in English is wonderful, and there is SO MUCH of it. Don’t miss out on English language comedy. GET INTO IT TODAY!

48. Useful Expressions for Travelling (with Claudia)

A conversation about travelling and backpacking, with plenty of useful vocabulary for talking about this subject.

Right-click here to download this episode. 

Small Donate ButtonVocabulary
Here is the list of expressions which I use and explain in this podcast. It is all very useful for when you are travelling.
You’ll notice a lot of uses of Present Perfect Tense (have/has + past participle) in questions.
You’ll also notice the phrasal verbs – made of a verb + particle combination. They are very common, and there are lots in this podcast. There’s a transcript of the travelling conversation from this episode, just scroll down.

Here are the expressions:

Mind if I join you?
How’s it going?
Whereabouts?
Where in London?
I’m just up the road
No way!
How weird!
That’s right by my work
Really?
It’s a small world
How long have you been here?
I’ve been here about a week now
Are you staying long?
What about yourself?
We’re travelling through the whole area
Just travelling up through Vietnam
Where have you been so far?
I flew into Ho Chi Min City
I saw the sights
I flew up to Hanoi
I’ve got a mate up there
We had a laugh
Are you just travelling down the coast now?
Have you been to Hue?
No, we’re travelling south to north
I’m a bit templed out
They’re worth visiting
Beautiful views on the way
It’s pretty rank
Are you just going to stick around in Hanoi for a bit?
The plan is, just stick around here for a while
and then head down to Nha Trang
Chill out on the beach
I’m going to pass through Dalat
Do you know any good places to stay around here?
Just walk down this street
There’s an ATM on the corner
See you around!

Transcript [12:37] to [16:32]
L – Luke
C – Claudia

[12:37]
L: Excuse me, do you mind if I join you?
C: No, yes, fine.
L: All right. Cool, thanks. How’s it going?
C: Yeah, pretty good, thanks. Yourself?
L: Yeah, not bad, thanks. So where are you from?
C: I’m from England.
L: Yeah, yeah, me too.
C: Oh yeah, whereabouts?
L: London.
C: Yeah, me too.
L: Really? Where in London?
C: Do you know it quite well?
L: Yeah, yeah.
C: West London.
L: Really? Me too.
C: Yeah.
L: Me too.
C: Really? Chiswick?
L: I’m in Hammersmith.
C: Really?
L: I’m just up the road.
C: Yes, literally just up the road.
L: No way.
C: How weird.
L: So, where in Chiswick are you?
C: You know the green where the church is?
L: Yeah, do.
C: Just there. What about you?
L: Really? I’m up the road. Do you know the Tescos up the road?
C: Yeah.
L: I live opposite the Tescos.
C: Really? That’s right by my work.
L: Is it?
C: Yeah.
L: No way. Where do you work?
C: At the London school of English.
L: Really? So do I.
C: (sound of surprise) What the? no way.
L: Yeah. I’ve been working there for about three years.
C: Really? I only started just two months ago.
L: Ok, Are you Westcroft Square.
C: Yeah, just over your flat.
L: I haven’t been there for a while. I’ve been working in the other school.
C: That’s so weird.
L: No way. That’s amazing. It’s a small world.
C: It is. So, how long have you been here?
L: Well, I’ve been here about a week now.
C: Ok, not too long. Are you staying long?
L: I’ve got about a week left. So, yeah, just a couple of weeks.
C: Ok, just a holiday.
L: So what about yourself?
C: We’re travelling through the whole area. Done Thailand, a bit of Cambodia. Just travelling up through Vietnam and then to Loas.
L: Wow, you’re doing the whole thing. Enjoying it?
C: Definitely. It’s amazing. We’re loving Hoi-An. Ho Chi Min was cool too but a bit busy. So, where have you been so far?
L: Well, I flew in to Ho Chi Min and spent a couple of days there and just saw the sights. And then I flew up to Hanoi, because I’ve got a mate up there. And I spent New Year’s Eve there and I took a bus out to Halong Bay and I did that, stayed on a boat overnight.
C: Really? What was that like?
L: It’s pretty funny, really. The boat actually had mice on it.
C: Oh no.
L: And the engine was really loud at night, but it was funny. You know, there was good people on a boat. We had a really good laugh.
C: Cool. So, are you travelling down the coast now?
L: Yeah. That’s right. I fly out of Ho Chi Min City again in about a week. So I’m just going down the coast now by bus and train, visiting the main spots. Have you been to Hue?
C: No, not yet. We are travelling from south to north.
L: Oh right, ok. Hue is really nice. Go and see the imperial city. It’s really interesting.
C: What? Temples?
L: Yeah.
C: A bit templed out, to be honest.
L: A bit templed out. Lots of temples in Cambodia?
C: Yeah.
L: It is more temples, but they are pretty good. They’re worth visiting.
C: Ok.
L: So, after Hue, I took the train down here, beautiful views on the way. Really nice. I definitely recommend the train journey. Don’t eat the food though.
C: No?
L: No, it’s pretty rank.
C: Oh, ok. So are you just going to stick around in Hoi-An for a bit.
L: Yeah, yeah. The plan is just stick around here for a while and then head down to Nha Trang and chill out on a beach for a while and then I’m going back to Ho Chi Min City. I’m going to pass through Dalat as well.
C: Yeah, cool. Oh you’ll like Nha Trang. You should do a boat tour, you’ll have a really good time, yeah. So, do you know any good places to stay around here?
L: Yeah, there is loads of places, just walk down this street and there’s a few hotels. There is an ATM on the corner as well.
C: Oh good. Nice one. Ok. Well, have a great time.
L: Yeah. Thanks a lot. Maybe see you around in Hoian?
H: Yeah. yeah.
L: Ok. Bye, bye.
C: See you.
[16:32]
Vietnam

Here’s a funny video by a pair of musician/comedians from New Zealand. This song is dedicated to English Robot 3000 and English Robot 4000. Which one should I choose to be my number 1 robot? Email me: luketeacher@hotmail.com
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mvrva8NoMLM&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

47. Travelling in Vietnam

EnglishRobot3000 interviews me about my holiday in Vietnam.

Small Donate ButtonRight-click here to download this episode.
I recently bought an English speaking robot from Japan. His name is English Robot 3000, and he’s very nice. In this podcast, English Robot 3000 asks me questions about my holiday in Vietnam and I talk about what I did, where I went and how it felt.

The next podcast will contain lots of really useful language for meeting people when you are travelling.

Hope you enjoy the episode, and happy new year!

Photos
Here’s a slide show of my Vietnam holiday snaps

Here’s a picture of EnglishRobot3000
EnglishRobot