Category Archives: Culture

317. The Lying Game 2: The Rematch (Part 1) with Amber & Paul

Welcome to LEP. I hope you’re well, I hope you’re fine. This episode of the podcast is a rematch of the lying game with Amber, Paul and me. Check below for show notes and other links.

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A couple of announcements before we go further.
Thanks for your photos for the LEP photo competition. This is a chance for you to send in your photos for a chance to win some LEP merchandise including mugs, t-shirts and bags. You can still send your photos to podcastcomp@gmail.com, until 15 January 2016. Your photo should show the environment in which you listen to LEP. Feel free to get creative. The only rule is that there has to be some evidence that you’re listening. E.g. a headphone in the photo somewhere. The idea is for us all to see the different situations that people are in while they listen. Once all the photos have been sent in I’ll display them in a mural on the website and you can pick the one you like the most.

Please do take my business English survey.
Just go to the menu and you’ll find it under the contacts button.

A note on subscribing by email.
On the right under the logo you’ll see a field that says SUBSCRIBE BY EMAIL. Put your email address in and click subscribe. Then check your inbox to confirm the subscription. Then you’ll receive an email every time I publish a new episode, and you’ll get direct access to the page for the episode, with all the show notes, videos, transcripts and other stuff.

Thanks also for different comments I’ve had recently. It’s awesome to hear from you all. You now have the option to send me voice messages. There’s a button on the side. Click it, get your mic ready and send me a message. It could be a comment or a question. I’ll receive it in my inbox and I might play it in an episode of the podcast, especially if you ask a good question.

OK, so now let’s get down to business.

This episode is called “The Rematch”.

It’s one of those episodes that involves a competitive game between Amber, Paul and me. In the last one of these, called The Lying Game, this happened:
The scores were level between Luke and Paul.
Even stevens.
They then played a tie-breaker.
Luke told a story about the tooth fairy.
Paul talked about burning down his house.
Luke identified it.

Since then, it has come to light that I may have cheated. I swear that I didn’t, but some clever listeners noted that a story Paul told in The Lying Game was one he’d already told on the podcast before. So, I admit that a rematch is necessary, and here it is. This is The Lying Game 2: The Rematch.

Do you remember the rules of The Lying Game? They go like this:
One person says a statement, it can be true or a lie. Then the others ask lots of questions to investigate the story. Then they decide if they think it’s a lie or the truth, justifying their responses. Then the truth is revealed. If a competitor gets it right, they get a point. If a competitor gets it wrong a point is awarded to the storyteller.

So, this is the rematch. We’re going to play another round of The Lying Game. Listen carefully to the stories and the questions and try to predict if they are lies or the truth.

Also, listen all the way to the end of the second episode to hear about a new interactive version of the lying game that we plan to play next time, and that will involve your input. We’ll tell you about that at the end of part 2.

At the beginning of this episode you’ll hear us chatting a bit about our recent news including a couple of stories about doing comedy shows, Amber shares something about an interesting podcast she listened to, and Paul tells a story about how a girl lost one of her teeth on stage during a comedy performance recently. After our little ramble chat we then get properly into the lying game, which will continue in part 2 of this episode.

So, yes I am glad to say that Amber and Paul are on another episode of the podcast, so let’s get started, here we go.

*Jingle*

Round 1: Statements
Luke: I once hit a teacher when I was at school.
Paul: I nearly died in a car accident.
Amber: (story in part 2)

Scores at the end of part 1:

Luke – 1 / 0 /
Paul – 0 / 2 /
Amber – 1 / 0 /

Paul is winning as we end the episode.

Listen to part 2 to find out what happens next.

316. British Comedy: Tim Vine (Part 2)

Listen to Luke explain the rest of Tim Vine’s stand up routine from the video “One Night Stand”. Learn some natural phrases and bridge the linguistic and cultural gap between you and native speakers of English. Click here to listen to part 1 of this episode. Watch the video below.

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Photo Competition
Send your photos to podcastcomp@gmail.com

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Click here to take the survey.

British Comedy: Tim Vine (part 2)
In episode 313 I played you part of a ten minute stand up routine by Tim Vine, who is a much loved British stand up comedian who specialises in telling one liners – those are very short jokes which usually involve some kind of word-play.
I played you 3 minutes of Tim’s routine.
I expect you didn’t get all the jokes.
I explained them all for you.
I expect you still didn’t find them all funny because explaining a joke often kills the humour of the joke.
BUT at least you learned a lot of language in the process.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: it’s difficult to understand jokes in another language. You might go to a comedy show or watch it on TV and everyone else laughs but you’re the only one who has no clue what’s going on. This is because there’s a linguistic and cultural gap between you and everyone else who gets the jokes. Maybe it’s hard for you to hear exactly what’s been said as the lines of a joke are usually delivered quickly and with naturalistic speech patterns. Also, there’s the general cultural difference, which includes certain reference points but also the general mindset of British humour, like the fact that we enjoy laughing at ourselves, and we also enjoy the ironic fun of self-consciously bad jokes. I’m interested in closing that linguistic and cultural gap. The result, I hope, will be that you’ll learn some key bits of language and culture, and you’ll be a few steps closer to understanding natural British English like a native speaker.

In episode 313 I promised that I’d play you all of Tim Vine’s routine and explain it all. In fact, I only managed to get through 3 minutes in that episode. You might be wondering – what about the rest of Tim Vine’s routine? I want to understand that too! Well, that’s what I’m going to do now. In fact, I had one Japanese listener in particular who was very keen to hear me explain the rest of the routine. I’m sorry – I can’t remember your name or how you got in contact with me – it could have been an email, a FB message, a comment on the website, a tweet or some other way. I can’t keep up with the different ways people contact me sometimes – so if you don’t get a reply, I’m very sorry. My email address and other inboxes are often completely swamped by different notifications and messages. I do read everything, but then I don’t always get the chance to immediately respond, and then the message just gets forgotten about. So, I’m sorry if you have contacted me and I haven’t replied.

Anyway, this particular listener was quite desperate to understand the rest of Tim Vine’s routine, so here we go.

Bear in mind that there are some visual jokes in the routine and you’ll have to watch the video to really get them. I’ll explain it all for you step by step in just a moment. This routine is about 10 minutes in total. We’ll start by listening to the first 3 minutes again, which should work as a reminder of what you heard before. Then I’ll let you listen to the next 3 minutes, then I’ll pause it and explain everything before letting you hear the rest of the routine with my explanations.

OK? Got it? OK, let’s go. And remember, if you don’t understand anything at all – just hang in there because all will be explained in the fullness of time.

Let’s go. Ladies and Gentlemen, please welcome onto the stage again, the one and only, Mr Tim Vine – let’s hear it for Tim Vine everybody! Take it away Tim!!!

Full video: Tim Vine – One Night Stand

313. British Comedy: Tim Vine (Part 1) + LEP Photo Competition

In this episode we’re going to listen to some stand-up comedy by a popular British comedian called Tim Vine, which should be pretty challenging because he tells lots of puns and fast jokes.

But before that, I just want to tell you about a new competition that I’m launching today for listeners to this podcast. This is the Luke’s English Podcast photo competition. See below for all the details, to download this episode and to watch a video of Tim Vine.

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The LEP Photo Competition
It’s been a great year for Luke’s English Podcast with loads of new episodes. All kinds of things have happened this year and I’ve talked about a lot of them on the podcast. I’ve had lots of responses from you my listeners and the podcast is still going from strength to strength in terms of audience numbers.

One of the things that’s made it great for me is that I have such awesome listeners all over the planet. It’s great for me to imagine people listening to my podcast in different situations, in different places all over the world. But I’d like to do more than imagine those situations, I’d love to actually see them. I think it would be really cool if you, the listeners of this podcast, could all share photos of your surroundings while listening to LEP.

Maybe you’re on a bus or train, maybe in your car, maybe just walking around, maybe you’re at home with your pets or a cup of tea, maybe you’re climbing a mountain, maybe you’re on the international space station orbiting the earth or something.

Whoever you are, wherever you are, whatever you’re doing – send me your photos. I want you to take a photo that shows the situation you’re in while you listen. Now, you might think “Nah, you don’t want to see a picture of my surroundings…” Yes, I do! Even if you think it’s boring – I want to see it. If you’re on the bus, take a pic of the bus or your view from the window. If you’re walking along a street, take a pic of the street so we can see what it looks like. If you’re on an alien spaceship listening to this from outside the earth’s atmosphere, send me a photo of the spaceship or your view of earth from a distance. Just take a picture of what you can see while you’re listening.

There’s just one rule – the photo has to contain something that shows you’re listening – so include in the photo the LEP logo or some headphones or a screen with the logo on it or some other indication that you’re listening. You don’t have to include a picture of yourself, but you can if you want to. It’s up to you. The main thing is – I want you to show us something that you can see in your surroundings while you listen to LEP and your photo should contain something that proves you’re listening. So if you’re taking a photo of the street, or the view from your hike in the mountains, make sure there’s a headphone in the photo or the LEP logo or even you listening. Yes, just a headphone in the photo is enough for me.

Send your photos by email to podcastcomp@gmail.com. Closing date for photos is Friday 15 January at midnight London time.

When I’ve collected all the photos, I’ll put them all up on the website and you all the LEPsters can vote for their favourite. Then I’ll pick 3 winners. The top winner will get an LEP mug plus another gift of their choice (another mug, a t-shirt or a bag). The two runners up will get LEP mugs. 

OK, so start taking some photos to show us what it’s like where you are while you’re listening to the podcast. Feel free to get creative! Just make sure you insert something in the photo to show that you’re listening. I want it to be a real picture, not a faked one. OK!

Mailing list
From messages I receive it seems that some of my listeners just can’t wait for me to upload new  episodes and they keep going to my page to see if there’s new content there. You should join the mailing list and then you’ll get an email whenever I post a new episode on the website. On my website near the top on the right there’s a field that says “Subscribe by email” just enter your email address there and click confirm.

Top 10 countries this week (number of ‘plays’ in the last 7 days)

Russia 12254
Japan 10443
China 10428
Spain 7434
United Kingdom 6175
Germany 5588
Poland 4740
United States 4570
Italy 4068
South Korea 3038

Do you want your country to go up in the list? Tell your friends!

British Comedy: Tim Vine
Tim Vine is a British stand up comedian who is famous for doing lots of one-liners. He’s one of the UK’s favourite stand-up comedians. His jokes are all clean and family friendly with no rude language or explicit content. He’s a self-deprecating cheeky chappie who makes everyone laugh. The thing that makes Tim Vine different to other comedians is that he always does a succession of one line jokes in his performances. It’s just joke after joke after joke and often they don’t relate to each other at all, it’s just a relentless and rapid stream of unrelated gags and puns.  British audiences love him, but I wonder what you’ll think of his comedy.

I think to an extent, his comedy is quite challenging for non-native speakers of English. By that I mean that he’s the sort of guy that, if you’re a learner of English, you’ll be watching TV with a group of native English speakers, and Tim Vine will come on TV, and all the native speakers (let’s say youre with an English family or some English friends) all of them will suddenly say, “Oh, I love Tim Vine, he’s soooo funny, you’ve got to check this out, you’ll love this, all his jokes are so clever – they’re all based on double meanings and word play, you’ll love it.” You then watch his set, and he tells joke after joke after joke, the audience on TV is loving it, the other people in the room are all laughing, but to you he’s just saying lots of really quick little sentences without pronouncing the words properly, and he’s acting like a total amateur, and he looks all shy and apologetic on stage, and you think – I can’t believe these English people find this guy so funny, what’s wrong with everyone. Or, what’s wrong with me?

There’s nothing wrong with anyone of course, it’s just a language and culture gap that might stop you from enjoying his jokes, and it’s a big pity because there is a lot of joy and pleasure to be gained from watching Tim Vine do comedy.

So, in this episode I’m going to do something a bit ambitious – I’m going to try to help you understand and enjoy one of Tim Vine’s comedy performances. We’re going to listen to about 10 minutes of Tim Vine’s act, and then I’ll break it down and help you understand exactly what he’s saying and why the audience is laughing. If you laugh at his jokes too – fantastic, that’s wonderful. If laughter happens, then success has been achieved. If laughter doesn’t happen – no problem, we’ll still have success because I will explain the language and you’ll learn some really natural English.

I expect that while we listen to Tim Vine some of you will start thinking – this just isn’t funny. Well, let me just say – Tim Vine definitely is funny and many many people agree with that. In fact, I think that  The only reason someone won’t find him funny is because they just don’t get the jokes. He’s not offensive, he’s not rude, he’s a lovely man who just wants to make people laugh. There’s no other reason for not liking him other than the fact that you don’t understand his jokes.

A few facts to prove my point: Tim Vine is the holder of the Guiness World Record for most jokes told in an hour. He told 499 jokes. The criteria for the record is that the jokes received a laugh from the audience. So, 499 jokes got laughs in one hour. That’s over 8 jokes a minute.

He has won the “Joke of the Year” award twice. That’s the prize for the best joke at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.

My Mum and Dad are both huge fans of Tim. They went to see one of his live shows, and absolutely loved it. And, you should know that my parents have exceptional taste in most things.

Now, if those three things don’t convince you that Tim Vine is funny, then I don’t know what will.

Alright, so now we have agreed that Tim Vine is definitely funny, and that if you don’t find him funny then it’s almost certainly because of the language and cultural gap – let’s listen to Tim telling some jokes and then we’ll work on closing that linguistic and cultural gap. Hopefully the result will be that your understanding of English will be significantly raised in the process, even if it requires a bit of work. In fact, this could be the perfect test – teach – test model for learning English.

I’m not saying that you’re not going to understand any of this – I’m sure many of you will get a lot of the jokes without any problem, but honestly I think that if you’re not proficient at English you’ll struggle to get them. And watch out – don’t assume you’ve understood the joke because you understand the words. There’s always a double meaning.

So, let’s go.

Let’s now listen to the first 3 minutes of Tim Vine’s stand up routine from a show called One Night Stand, which is a popular stand-up comedy show on a British TV channel called Dave.

Stop listening after Tim’s song called “It’s easy”.

Then go back through the jokes one by one. If you already got these jokes, then sorry if I’m telling things you already know.

Cultural point: Tim knows, and the audience knows, that the jokes are pretty stupid and crap. On their own they have pretty much no value. But when the jokes come one by one, relentlessly, so fast they build into a rhythm. You don’t get a chance to think about how silly they are, you just laugh at the pun and the next one comes along immediately. That  part of the enjoyment – and if you don’t understand them, or if you think about the individual jokes too much, that can kill the fun. So, analysing the jokes like this is probably the best way to KILL the humour, but anyway…

Now, you should watch the whole video on the page for this episode. You should do that so you can actually see Tim performing the jokes, including the expressions on his face and everything.

That’s it! Remember – don’t give up even if it’s difficult.

And, remember, the force will be with you, always…

Tim Vine – One Night Stand

The video is no longer available – it was removed from YouTube. :(

Tim Vine’s jokes – explained

A listener called Viviane sent me a list of all the jokes in this episode, with explanations. Here they are.

1. Let’s hear it for my internal organs,
let’s hear it for = invite the audience to applaud
Tim plays his body as you hear the sound of an organ. “organ” has two meanings – something in your body (e.g. your liver or kidneys) and a musical instrument.

2. This bloke said to me: “I’m gonna dress up as a small island off the coast of Italy.”
I said: “Don’t be so silly. (Don’t be Sicilly.)”

3. I think a parachute jump is the scariest thing that I have ever, ever… refused to do.
(You expect him to say “that I’ve ever, ever done.”)
Actually I once did the parachute jump. They got you attached to the instructor, and you jumped out of it together. So in this airplane, they attached me to this bloke, and we jumped out, and it was really frightening, because half way down, he asked me “how long have you been an instructor?”

4. But we’ve all heard the theory that people look like their pets. Well tonight I’m going to test this theory out. You, sir, have you got a llama(秘鲁 骆马)?
The suggestion is that the person looks like a llama.
Just so you know, whoever sitting there I always say “have you got a llama?”, I just got lucky tonight.

5. I went to Sooty’s barbecue, and had a Sweep steak.
hand puppet bear, Sweep is Sooty’s best friend. He’s a dog.
a sweepstake = a sort of bet in which you can win all the money
The suggestion is that Tim ate Sooty’s best friend. This joke isn’t very good because the situation doesn’t make sense. Why would he have a sweepsteak at a barbecue?

6. I met the man who invented the window sills, what a ledge! (what a ledge/legend)
A window sill is a type of ledge.
“What a ledge!” is a way to say that you think someone is brilliant, or a legend.

7. This antique dealer came up to me. He said, What do you think of the Chinese Dynasty? I said, it was very badly dubbed.(配音)
Dynasty: a famous American TV show during the 1980s.
This is because most of the Chinesr movies, for example, kungfu movies from the 80s were always very badly dubbed, so the movement of the person’s mouth and the voice you’ll hear would be completely out of synchronization.

8. I said, I would open a shop in Saudi Arabia. He said, Dubai? (Do you buy?) I said, yeah, and sell!

9. My grandfather was a very controversial artist, he designed the lion in Trafalgar Square. It doesn’t sound very cutting edge, but at the time, it really put the cat amongst the pigeons.
Cutting edge: innovative
Put the cat amongst the pigeons: totally upset the situation.
Trafalgar Square is famous for having lots of pigeons.

10. Someone said to this New Zealand bloke, I’m going to a Swidish furniture shop. He said, Does it look like I care?(IKEA)
“I care” and “IKEA” sound quite similar in a Kiwi accent.

11. I’m going to buy some furniture polish (comes in an aerosal can).
He said, “Pledge?”
I said, “I will give you my word.”
pledge: a brand name. It also means  = to promise

12. You probably think this was all very well, but when do we get to sing with you Tim? The answer is now.
I might be totally deaf, I never thought I’d hear myself say that! (“I never thought I’d hear myself say that” means “I’m surprised that I’m saying that” but it also means that he’s surprised to actually hear himself saying it because he might be deaf.

~It’s easy.~ (It sounds like the introduction to the song, but then you realize that that’s the song. Songs typically will lay down a theme, the introduction will probably be about 4 bars long)

13. This song is called Subtraction, take it away! (What you say in a performance before a song, Let’s start the song!) Hit the music please!
“subtraction” is also the act of subtracting numbers in maths, or ‘taking things away’.

14. ~It’s easy~
Blimey that was hard work, wasn’t it? (so, it wasn’t actually easy)

15. Bnag! That’s bang out of order.
“That’s bang out of order” is what you say when someone is behaving in an unacceptable way.
He’s also talking about the word “BNAG” which is the word “BANG” but with the letters in the wrong order.

16. I don’t know why I put myself through this. (Tim has taken a piece of cardboard, and put his head through the hole.)
To put yourself through something = force yourself to have a difficult experience
He is also literally putting himself through a piece of cardboard.

17. Hello, My name is Bruce Willis, and I was in a diehard film, I shoot people and people shoot back at me. Yes, I am BruceWillis, I was in The Sixth Sense, I am a film star. I’m Bruce Willis. Sorry, I think I might give you the wrong impression.
To give someone the wrong impression = to make someone think the wrong thing about you.
Also “to do an impression” means to copy the voice of someone.
In this joke he has copied Bruce Willis, but with the wrong voice. He’s given us the wrong impression.

18. So I went to the binocular shop. I’ll tell you what, they saw me coming.(“They saw him coming” = They gave him a bad price, they ripped him off – but they literally saw him coming because of the binoculars)

19. Of course, binoculars is plural, and the singular is — telescope!

20. But I love language.
Does every sentence have to contain a vegetable?
I said, “Not nece-celery.”
“Necessarily” can sound like it contains the word “celery”, which is a vegetable.

21. And then there is the word “mortar” 石灰/迫击炮. Mortar has two different meanings, as I discovered when the house I bought exploded.
Mortar = the stuff that attaches the bricks to each other. “bricks and mortar”
Mortar also means a kind of weapon which launches a grenade into the air.

22. So I went down to the local pub.
“Do you like the local jokes?”
“Yeah, me too. They are right up my street.”

affirmative: It’s right up my street. = It’s my kind of thing.
Negative: It’s not my cup of tea.

23. I walked in, there was a very drunk man slumped in a chair. He looked at me and said what do you do for a living? I said, comedian. He said, “I admire anyone who can stand up…”(leave it hanging)

We expect him to say that he admires anyone who can stand up and try and make people laugh, but this man is drunk and he just admires anyone who can just stand up.

24.I said, “I bet you can’t name a single subject I don’t have a joke about.”
You said, “Beavers.”
I said, “Damn” (Dam = a house made by a beaver on a river)

25. I did a gig the other day, and it went very badly. Yeah cheers. And I walked out of stage, and all I could hear was one person clapping. And then I remembered, I was wearing flip-flops 人字拖.

26. I did a gig the night before to a whole bunch of reindeers, and I slayed them!

In comedy, when you make the audience laugh, you can say you kill/slay/smash the audience.
A slay is also a kind of large sled or vehicle that a reindeer would pull, like the kind of thing that Santa uses. So “slay” has two meanings.

27. But you know, the first job I’ve ever had was playing the back part of a pantomime Wasp, and I thought I was the bee’s knees.
the bee’s knees = fantastic
He also thought he was literally the bee’s knees (because he was wearing the back part of a wasp costume, and wasps look like bees)

28. Do you know the other day I got lost in the jungle. Luckily I had a compass 罗盘/圆规 with me, so I was able to draw a perfect circle with a pencil.
“compass” has two meanings – a device for navigation, and a device for drawing perfect circles.

29. A small blue garden bird made of mahogony! It’d be great if I had a related joke, wouldn’t it? (wooden tit)
Tit is the most common kind of garden bird in the UK. (Look at the tits!)

30. ~Waiting can sometimes be lots of fun~ (Every time you expect him to sing, he doesn’t.)
~But not always~

31. Do you know I have a friend who always takes the mickey out of me for having a “pay as you go” phone, who’s always go like “~You’ve got a pay as you go phone~” So eventually I took out a contract, and had him killed.

In the UK, you’ve got two kinds of phone contract: pay as you go (lower status people who don’t have much money), and monthly contract (don’t need to top up your credit)
take out a contract: to ask an assassin to kill sb.

32. So I said to this bloke: “Me and some friends were just talking about you.”
He said, “You disgust (discussed) me.”
I said, “Yes we did.”

33. He said, “Next time you are asleep I’m going to wake you up!”
I said, “That’s disturbing.”
disturbing his sleep, but also disturbing in an emotional way meaning worrying.

34. (visual joke) I’ve nearly finished filling in my CV, it’s got a little bit there.
fill in a CV = complete your CV
fill in = fill something with colour

35. I think my worst invention was this rubber band wind chime 风铃. All right, pipe down.

36. Ladies and gentlemen, I will leave you with this. (meaning “I will say this and then I will leave”. But as he said that, he had his hand on the microphone stand) Because I’ll be honest with you, it doesn’t belong to me, I don’t bring it with me.

37. I was standing on the beach, I walked into the wave holding a tub of Taramasalata ( a kind of dip), and a man said, “What are you doing?” I said, “I’m taking a dip in the sea.”
take a dip: take a short swim
a dip also means a sort of sauce

38. I was steering a yacht with my stomach muscles — ab sailing!
abseiling means climbing down a mountain backwards via a rope

39. This farmer came up to me and said, “I got 68 sheep, can you round them up for me?” I said, “Sure, 70.”
to round up some sheep = to collect all the sheep together into a group
to round up a number = to raise or lower the number to the nearest round number. E.g. 4.9 – round it up to 5

40. But I’m going to be honest with you, ladies and gentlemen, I don’t think I’m going to do this job for much longer. (the audience goes “aahhhh” in sympathy and disappointment) Not enough of you and too long a pause. But what concerns me is that one day, I’ll wind up an old man… and he’ll attack me.

I’ll wind up an old man = I’ll end up being an old man
I’ll wind up an old man = I’ll make an old man angry

 

312. The Words of the Year (Part 3) with Amber & Paul

Here’s the third part in this series about the Collins Dictionary Words of the Year 2015. Listen to the episode to hear Amber, Paul and me discuss the rest of the words in the list. I’ll also explain and clarify some vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation from our discussion. There are vocabulary notes below.

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Welcome back to another episode of LEP. We’re still talking about the Collins Dictionary Words of the Year.
This is the third episode on the series, and we still have about 7 words to deal with.
I think we can wrap this up inside one episode, but let’s see.
I’m going to keep this intro as short as possible because recently my introductions have got out of control.
So, let me keep it short and simple.
This is the 3rd part in a mini-series about The Collins Dictionary New Words of the Year.
I’m joined by Amber and Paul and we’re talking about this list of new words that Collins are putting into their dictionary this year.
These are new words and their use in both spoken and written form has increased significantly over the last 12 months.
Collins consider them worthy of addition into the dictionary.
But what are these words? What do they mean? And why have we been using them a lot lately?
Amber, Paul and I are going to explain them for you and just ramble on a bit as well.
I’ll play you all of our conversation but every now and then I’ll pause the podcast to explain things you’ve heard in our conversation.
That way you get the best of both worlds: you can listen to us talking to each other naturally, but also you can pick up a lot of new language when I break it down and explain it to you.
Alright, so without any further ado, let’s get started, and here’s word 7 in this list of 10 new words.

Word 7 – “manspreading”
manspreading (noun): the act or an instance of a male passenger in a bus or train splaying his legs in a way that denies space to the passenger sitting next to him
To take up space
well-contained within my seat allocated space
Not spilling over
You’re obliged to sit there, coyly, between his legs
Splaying his legs
You’re sitting there, minding your own business, not taking up much space…
His leg is pressing up against your leg.
If they were a bit too scary I probably wouldn’t say anything. I’d probably just cower.
He went out into the, whatchacallit, into the corridor.
whatchacallit
whatsisname
a thingamajig
a thingamybob
a widget
The corridor in the bus (or the aisle)
Suddenly the bus put the brakes on and he went flying.
Small kids, the metro stops suddenly or people get on and they crush them, they don’t even notice them, so they stand on them.
Children aren’t that strong holding on.
They’re hyperactive. They want to, like, run around.
A grumpy tired child is not good for anyone.

Word 6 – “ghosting”
Ghosting
The act or an instance of ending a romantic relationship by not responding to attempts to communicate by the other party
You’re not manning up or womaning up if you do that (to ‘man up’ = to be strong and act like a real man, or woman)
We got jiggy with it (like the Will Smith song, but in this case it means that we’d had sex, or ‘sexy time’)
Ghosting someone as a way of finishing a relationship is lame. All it takes is a bit of honesty.
It did do my head in for a while. (expression)

Word 5 – “dadbod”
Dadbod
An untoned and slightly plump male physique, especially one considered attractive
Broad shoulders
well-toned muscles
six-pack
I’m a bit more laid back
Comparatively, you’ll feel all saggy and not attractive
Landscape gardener
“Don’t all rush out at once!” (Sarcasm – Paul’s saying that nobody’s going to come. This is a typical way to be sarcastic. E.g. “Don’t all rush out at once!” or “Don’t sound too enthusiastic!” or “Don’t get over excited” or “Don’t everyone rush to my help or anything”)

Word 4 – “corbynomics”
Corbynomics
The economic policies advocated by Jeremy Corbyn, leader of the UK Labour Party from 2015
Reaganomics

Word 3 – “contactless”
Contactless
Referring to payment systems which use RFID technology and do not require the customer’s signature or pin number
To type in a pin or sign
contactless payment
Card details
We’ll be floating around in pods
It’s all going to become fingerprint eyeball scanning, thing.
That’s probably what’s going to happen

Word 2 – “clean eating”
Clean eating
The practice of following a diet that contains only natural foods, and is low in sugar, salt, and fat
If the WHO comes up with it
Audiobook recommendation: Salt Sugar Fat by Michael Moss

Word 1 – “binge-watch”
Binge-watch
To watch a large number of television programmes (especially all the shows from one series) in succession
I can’t help myself
Flipping heck
Flippin’ ‘eck
I find myself pushing the pram around
YOu’re so tired you can barely stay awake to watch it!
Jack Bauer’s Power Hour (what does this mean? N.Irish accent)
The Beatles book – hefty, fat, an extremely large tome, an exhaustive book,
How much of it have I actually read? (pron – weak form of ‘have’)
I finished the whole thing in no time
Audiobook recommendations: David Copperfield by Charles Dickens, read by Martin Jarvis, The Beatles – Tune In: All These Years, by Mark Lewisohn, The Dummies Guide to British History and You Say Potato by David & Ben Crystal.
(stop after I mention “You Say Potato” )

Add some negative comments from The Guardian’s comment section
Here’s a comment from a Guardian reader who basically disagrees with the implied suggestion that there’s some guilt involved in watching many episodes of a TV show back-to-back. RayMullan (pointing out the negative association with the word ‘binge’)
Given that I spent most of my free time last weekend working my way through A Brief History of Seven Killings by Marlon James, was I binge–reading? Of course not. That’s the only way to enjoy a good book. The beauty of bulk access to serialised film and television productions is that we can view an interesting programme in much the same way.
The requirement to follow a serial at a fixed point in the day over several weeks or months are long gone, thankfully. I was barely able to follow the broadcast of Wolf Hall last year, missing one and a half episodes quite simply because I had other things to do. In fact I’m sorry I didn’t just wait for the DVD release and enjoy the production in my own good time — no “binging” about it even if I choose to watch all six parts in a single evening.
Collins should really take a leaf from le livre de l’Académie française and exploit some discretion when it comes to faddish language patterns of teenagers and inarticulate young adults. Most of these new “terms” reflect lazy intellects blunted by the networked chatter of buzzfeeds and will amount to little but crude embarrassment a couple of years from now.

But I think that’s the point – Collins will see if we’re still using these words in 2018 when the printed dictionary comes out. Some of them might survive, some of them might fall away. It depends on what we’re all doing in a few years.

Listen to the post-chat – You’ll hear a quick memory test for the words. Can you remember them all? See if you can guess them from memory.

OK I’M GOING TO STOP NOW! :)

Final thing: I’ve done a lot of explaining in this episode. I want to know if you like that or not. You know I think it’s useful but I want to know what you think.
So, a couple of quick questions:
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I will take your comments into account, but in the end it’s Luke’s English Podcast – I’m the boss and I have the final word!

Thanks for listening to the end, you are a wonderful human being and the universe is smiling on you right now.

Remember, the force will be with you… always…

Bye

Here’s some other stuff you heard in the final part of our conversation:
I’m a bloody bloke (bloody – just an old swear word for emphasis, and a bloke is a man of course)
To nationalise the railways (when the state buys something which is privately owned, like the railways for example. The opposite is to privatise something)
Some more chat about drinking games you could play while binge watching, if you want to binge drink and binge watch at the same time (not recommended).
What’s a drinking game? It’s just a fun way to get drunk. There are various games with different rules. I dread drinking games these days because I can’t drink much alcohol any more. People sometimes play drinking games while watching films or TV shows. E.g. taking a drink every time a character in the TV show does something in particular. We mention House of Cards (Frank talks to the camera), Homeland (Claire Danes’ character cries), The X-Files (Scully expresses scepticism etc) and The Walking Dead (when someone kills a zombie, or when you see certain kinds of zombie).
One of the last phrases you’ll hear is “and on that bombshell!” (this is how a comedy character called Alan Partridge ended one of his shows, and then it was taken by Top Gear presenter Jeremy Clarkson as the way to end a TV show. It is used as a sensational end to a broadcast. A bombshell is a sensational moment – for example, a sudden piece of news or a shocking moment. POW! And that’s the end!
words of the year 3

311. The Words of the Year (Part 2) *contains some rude language

Welcome to part two of this series about the Collins Dictionary Words of the year 2015. In this episode you’ll hear me discuss these words with Amber and Paul. I’ll also explain and clarify a lot of the things you’ll hear in our conversation. You can listen to the episode, download and also read vocabulary notes below.

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***This episode contains some rude language and explicit content.***
Recently I had Amber and Paul over to the flat and we talked about this list of new words that Collins are introducing into their online dictionary this year. These are all new words we’ve been using a lot this year. Collins have judged them to be worthy of recording in the dictionary. They all relate to new trends in our culture over the last year.
In this series I’m playing you chunks of the conversation with Amber and Paul, and then pausing that and clarifying some of the grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation that you heard.
So, you’re getting to hear some natural conversation, but also you’re getting some intensive language teaching too. Hopefully this is the best of both worlds for you as a listener.

Now, without any further ado, let’s carry on. Let me now play you the next conversation chunk. Here it is – this is word 10 in the list of 10 words. Here we go…

Word 10 – “transgender”
transgender (adjective): of or relating to a person whose gender identity does not fully correspond to the sex assigned to them at birth
He’s transgender.
She’s transgender.
Transgender issues.
He was held up as a great example of an American athlete. (to be held up as something)
He identified as female. (to identify as – this is the expression used to say that someone feels like they have a particular identity, particularly in relation to ethnicity, gender etc – e.g. the case of Rachel Dolezal, who worked as a civil rights leader in Washington. She was criticised in the media (shamed) for lying about her ethnicity – she basically tried to pass herself off as black while campaigning for equal rights issues – but she was actually white. Even her parents were in the media saying “yeah, she’s caucasian”. Pretty weird thing to do, and lots of people got angry saying “you can’t just say you’re black and pretend to be a victim of discrimination, when you’re blatantly white!” When criticised for this, she just said “I identify as black” – not “I am black”. This was also a trending story this year. http://www.buzzfeed.com/claudiakoerner/a-civil-rights-leader-has-disguised-herself-as-black-for-yea#.tiM247b0q
Transvestism / Transvestite (a transvestite is different to a transgender person. Transgender = a man who identifies as a woman even though physically he’s a man – or the other way around, and a transvestite is a person who enjoys dressing as a member of the opposite sex, for whatever reason – usually this is a man who likes dressing as a woman. For some reason this is far more shocking than a woman dressing in male clothes, which nobody seems bothered about)
3 positions (basically): 1. It’s a good thing 2. It’s a bad thing 3. I don’t really care either way.
She’s old school (Germaine Greer). She’s an old school feminist. (old fashioned)
Her position about what feminism should be and how we should address it was important but it has changed and I think she’s not changed with it.
(I talk over Paul quite a lot when he’s talking about same-sex marriage – sorry Paul)
Cisgender (adj)
To misgender someone (not some sort of transgender competition, it’s a verb which means ‘to wrongly gender someone’)
Mx (Mr, Mrs, Miss, Ms and now Mx)

Word 9 – “to swipe” (there’s some rude language and rude content here)
swipe (verb): to move a finger across a touchscreen on a mobile phone in order to approve (swipe right) or dismiss (swipe left) an image
Swipe was already a word, but this is the specific use of ’swipe right or swipe left’ to mean “accept or reject someone on a dating app”.
Tinder (app)
“Tinder” (“TINder??” pronunciation with surprise and disdain)
to sign up
The unwritten rule
To make a match
I will “do” anything (“do” here means “have sex with”)
Naughty pictures.
Dick-pics
Tit-pic?
‘Pussy’-pic?
Don’t go there.
You’re going there.
He’s dipping his toe in.
He’s taken pictures of his phallus. (other words for a penis. Medical/clinical words: penis, phallus. Informal but not rude: willy. Suggestive but not swear words: tadger, member, private part(s). Rude words: prick, cock, dick.)

Jon Ronson - So You've Been Publicly Shamed
Word 8 – “shaming”
shaming (noun): attempting to embarrass a person or group by drawing attention to their perceived offence, especially on social media
To be publicly shamed
She was trying to be funny by awkwardly implying that it’s very unfair.
There is this massive problem in Africa, and it’s less of a problem in Europe.
If you put that on Twitter the chances are people are going to misunderstand and they’re going to have a knee-jerk reaction, and they will respond in a very angry way.
An Über driver got beaten up by an executive of Taco Bell.
He was completely wasted and completely off his face.
He was slurring his words (remember that one?)
There’s something un-just about it.
You’re making a judgement call on the way someone looks, or what someone does.
You know there was that whole thing about slut shaming.

Book recommendation: Jon Ronson “So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed” www.audibletrial.com/teacherluke
His voice is a bit off-putting at the beginning but he really draws you into the story.
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words of the year 2

310. The Words of the Year (Part 1)

In this series of three new episodes Amber, Paul and I talk about a list of the 10 Words of the Year which have been added to the Collins English Dictionary. We’re going to explain the words and discuss the issues behind them and I’ll also explain and clarify a lot of the language you’re going to hear in our conversation.

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Links
Article in The Guardian about the 10 Words of the Year
Collins Dictionary Q&A about the Words of the Year

Transcript to the Introduction and some notes for language analysis
Hello everyone – welcome to another episode of LEP. I hope you’re doing well… etc.

This introduction is being recorded on 18 November, on a Wednesday, but the rest of this episode and the other 2 episodes in this series were recorded a couple of weeks ago.

This episode is all about the Collins Dictionary Words of the Year 2015.

What’s that?

let me break it down.

First of all, Collins are a publisher of dictionaries, and so it’s their job to monitor the usage of words in order to decide which words should be added to the dictionary every year. They do this by noticing new words and seeing how often they have been used in the last 12 months. They then pick some of the more commonly used new words and add them to the dictionary. These are their ‘words of the year’.

How do they monitor the words? They have a special database of word usage called a Corpus. This is a quote from the Collins website:

“This evidence is based on our 4.5-billion-word database of language called the Collins Corpus. The words in the Corpus are taken from a huge range of sources of spoken and written English, including newspapers, radio and other types of media, from all over the world.” Link here.

The ‘words of the year’ list is an interesting way to identify trends in language, but it’s also quite revealing about modern British life because these are the things we’ve been talking and reading about.

Some people complain that these words aren’t serious enough, and that adding them to the dictionary is an example of the decline of language in some way. I think it’s fine to add these words into the dictionary because they just reflect changes in culture and in the end with new words needed to explain new concepts. Also, we need a record of the words people are using – especially if you’re a learner of English. You want to be able to learn the real English that people actually use, don’t you? Then you’ll want the dictionary to include the words that people really use. It’s not Collins intention to decide if people should or shouldn’t use these words, rather to see which words are being used a lot just so that they can be added to the dictionary to reflect the language as a living thing.

As ever I’m curious to know what you think about these new words. What do you think of Collins’ list? How is the dictionary managed in your country?

In this episode, Amber, Paul and I are going to go through all the words in this list, explain what they mean and discuss the issues that relate to them. This episode is also going to be a kind of review of the trending issues of the year.

As usual our discussion is pretty fast and busy, which is normal when friends discuss things.

To help you to understand everything and to give you a chance to maximise your learning from this episode I’ve decided to break up the discussion into chunks.

What’s a chunk? It’s just a substantial piece, a part, a lump. Like, a chunk of meat, tear off a chunk of bread from a loaf, a chunk of rock, you can also talk about chunks of language – like fixed expressions or phrases. In this case, we’re talking about chunks of a conversation.

What I’m going to do is play you each chunk of the discussion and then explain some of the language you heard. That way you’ll understand and learn much more.

I really think this is the best way to do it because you’re getting the best of both worlds – you can listen to our natural and spontaneous conversation, and then I’ll break it down to help you understand everything and learn even more from our conversations.

This episode contains just one conversation chunk, and it’s just the pre-chat we had before we even talked about any of the words of the year! In fact, I started recording and said hello to Amber and Paul, asked them how they were, and we started chatting about different stuff like the weather and the November 5th and we talked before dealing with the words of the year. However, this pre-chat is so full of language content that it has taken up the whole of this first episode.

It’s a bit ridiculous – you won’t actually hear us discussing the words of the year in part one! So, before we listen to the pre-chat, let me just list the words of the year for you now, even though you won’t hear us discussing them until part 2 of this series. I like to make things complicated.

OK, so the Collins Words of the Year are (in reverse order – and all these words will be explained and discussed in this series of 3 episodes – you might not understand them now but you will by the end of the series I promise)

transgender, manspreading, contactless, swipe (left or right), ghosting, clean eating, Corbynomics, shaming, dadbod and binge-watch.

I will only say those words once. You will hear them again, and hear explanations, later in this series, but for now, let’s listen to the pre-chat I had with Amber and Paul

Pre-Chat
This includes stuff about climate change, November 5th, and some other things. So, let’s finally start listening to the conversation shall we? (I do go on a bit don’t I?)
Listen to the pre-chat

Language Analysis: Pre-Chat (The bits in brackets are notes for my comments)

Conspiracy theories (Paul talks about climate change as if it’s a conspiracy theory)
It’s a hot topic.
Is it a conspiracy theory? (upward intonation for surprise, doubt)
Some people say that climate change isn’t a thing.
some people deny climate change.
(climate change deniers / to deny climate change)
We are exacerbating the environmental trend.
We’ll be dead before anything bad happens.
We might not be (elision).
Would it be bad if we were still alive in 100 years? (pron – weak sounds)
There are already too many people (pron)
China – they’re getting rid of the one baby ban (a ban on having more than one baby)
Old people who are in retreat (he means in retirement)
China should open it’s arms to Syria (an interesting political idea – but I didn’t want to talk about it because it’s a sensitive topic and I didn’t want to go down a rabbit hole – get sidetracked).
It’s unusually warm, which is kind of nice in a way because we don’t have to wear big coats and everything. (pron, but also using a relative clause to refer to a while clause).
There was a plot to blow up the houses of Parliament.
1605 (how to say years – normally divide it in two, except: when it’s 05 06 etc, 1900 1800 etc, 2000-present = “two thousand and…”)
Passives – Guy Fawkes and his gang were caught in the act of trying to blow up Parliament. He was sentenced to be hung, drawn and quartered.
And we’ve never forgot. (Nursery rhyme. “Forgot” isn’t it “forgotten”. Amber is referring to the old rhyme. Forgot here is poetic licence – it should be “forgotten” but that’s ok because of the poem and it’s old)
Words of Nathalie Portman there (Paul is referring to the film V for Vendetta which takes place in the future and has a character similar to Guy Fawkes. You hear the rhyme in the film. Obviously the quote is not from Nathalie Portman. In fact it’s an old rhyme from English folklore – we don’t know who wrote it)
http://www.potw.org/archive/potw405.html
Amber talked about the Lewes fireworks. http://www.lewesbonfirecelebrations.com
They make effigies and burn them. It’s very pagan.
Didn’t life change after that? (downward intonation – it’s a rhetorical negative question – it means – “life changed a lot after that, didn’t it”. “Didn’t she do well?” “Didn’t we have a good time?”)
(Obviously, 9/11 changed more than just the bottles of water not being allowed on planes and it was a very tragic event)
(Everyone laughed – not because 9/11 was funny, but because I was stuck in a serious topic suddenly and it was difficult for me to somehow get from this serious topic to the main topic – The Collins New Words of the Year.)
“How do I transition this to the actual theme of the podcast?”
“How do I get away from this potentially sensitive subject, which obviously is very serious, you know I don’t mean to make fun of THAT” (Features of spoken English – unfinished sentence, relative clauses, connected speech – all of it, and sentence stress)
2018 is when the next physical dictionary will be brought out. Some of these words may end up in that dictionary too. (phrasal verbs)
It depends if the words stand the test of time. (expression)
Article link: http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/nov/05/binge-watch-2015-word-of-the-year-collins

End of the pre-chat.

End of Part 1: We haven’t even started talking about the words of the year yet!

Part 2 will be available soon.

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Words of the Year 1

309. The Lying Game (Part 2) with Amber & Paul

Welcome back to the second part of this double episode. In part 1 you heard me playing a speaking game with Paul & Amber. Go back to part 1 for the details of the game, including the rules. Part 1 ended on a cliffhanger, with the scores even at 2-2-2. Even stevens! Listen to this episode to find out more. TEACHERS: At the end there’s a 15 minute section in which I explain exactly how to use this game in your English classes. You can download a simple .pdf worksheet (below) which you can use in your classes (just tell your students about LEP, or send me a little donation). Listen until the end of the episode to get my full instructions on how to use this awesome game to teach your students grammar, pronunciation, vocabulary and speaking skills in a really awesome way.

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The Lying Game Part 2

Amber: I used to be a performer at The Rocky Horror Picture Show at Prince Charles Cinema in Soho.

Tie-break round:
Luke: I used to be afraid of the tooth fairy.
Paul: I almost set fire to my parents’ house as a kid.

Final scores:
Luke – 2 / 0 / 1 / 2 / 1 Total = 6 points

Amber – 1 / 1 / 0 / x / x Total = 2 points

Paul – 0 / 2 / 1 / 0 / 0 Total = 3 points

Here’s an example of a Rocky Horror Picture Show Shadowcast (below)

For Teachers – How to use The Lying Game in class

Small Donate ButtonClick here to download a .pdf worksheet to use in Class – The Lying Game Worksheet for Teachers by Luke Thompson teacherluke.co.uk

Listen to the last 15 minutes of this episode of LEP (The Lying Game Part 2) to hear me give detailed instructions on how to use the game in class, including details of the level, procedure, specific language and skills work you can do with students. I can get about 2 hours of class time out of this game, and it’s useful for teaching grammar, pronunciation and vocabulary.

In fact, here are the last 15 minutes of the episode  if you’d like to listen to them again or download for later. :) [DOWNLOAD]

303. The Battle of Britain

This year marks the 75th anniversary of The Battle of Britain, and since this is such a pivotal moment in British history, I thought it would be appropriate to cover it in some way in an episode of this podcast. Also, I was asked recently by a listener in the comments section of my website to talk about the story of the Battle of Britain, specifically the role of one particular group of Polish pilots known as Squadron #303. So, here it is – the story of one of the most important moments in modern British history – The Battle of Britain, and the contribution made by a small group of pilots from Poland.

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The Battle of Britain is often cited as a proud moment in British history, particularly by nationalistic Brits who also believe that we shouldn’t let any immigrants into our country. Squadron 303 killed twice as many German fighters as any other squadron, and one pilot in particular became something of a flying legend, with a record number of kills. But the thing is, these heroes of the Battle of Britain weren’t actually British, they were foreigners, fighting in British made Hurricanes and Spitfires. Where did these brave and skilful pilots come from? Poland. So, this episode is not just a history lesson about Britain, but also a bit of a shout-out to my Polish listeners out there – I know there are quite a few of you. If you’re not Polish, then I hope you appreciate the telling of this story of danger, bravery and global warfare.

The Battle of Britain
First of all, this is Churchill speaking, before the battle of Britain begun.
*Churchill speech 1 – “Their finest hour”
So, what was the situation?
It was 7 September 1940.
Northern France was occupied by the Germans, and airfields everywhere were covered in bombers, loaded up and ready to begin bombing raids on strategic targets all over the UK. Hitler was about to take a bit crap all over Britain.
This was a year after Britain had declared war on Germany after Hitler invaded Czechoslovakia and then Poland. It had been a pretty good year for Hitler. He’d basically marched across most of Western Europe and seized it, just like Napoleon and the Romans had done before. Hitler had a pretty effective strategy which we now call Blitzkrieg, or ‘lighting war’ which involved using planes to bomb the crap out of an area before sending in infantry and tank divisions to quickly mop up enemy troops. It was devastatingly effective as it took advantage of speed, mobilised mechanical heavy weapons, surprise and the general disorganisation of the enemy as a result of the air bombing. He used this approach to great effect in the invasion of Poland and then The Netherlands, Belgium, and France. In just one year Hitler’s troops were in control of large parts of mainland Europe.

British forces had been forced to evacuate the continent after effectively being chased away by the Germans. There was a big retreat and escape from France at Dunkirk. It was a military defeat for the Brits who ended up in a pretty desperate situation. The Nazis controlled the continent. The USA wasn’t in the war yet so we couldn’t rely on their full assistance. Britain was basically alone, cut off from the mainland, just separated from the enemy by a few miles of water, waiting to be attacked and invaded by the Germans. Not a good position to be in.

Perversely, this is often the moment that many Brits feel very nostalgic about. As I said, it’s often referred to as our finest hour. I think there may be something in the British consciousness that actually enjoyed the idea of being completely separated from the rest of the continent, as if it clarified the ‘us against them’ attitude of some people. This was perhaps our darkest hour. We faced total oblivion and invasion by the nazis. Certainly, thousands of Brits were going to be killed. Beloved properties and national monuments would be destroyed in the bombing, but for some Brits looking back on the Battle of Britain, this was a moment to be proud of, like it made us a great nation. I suppose the reason people say that is because it was a time when Britain showed some character and spirit. The whole country sort of pulled together and formed a united front. Churchill made his famous speech.
*Churchill Speech 2 – “We shall fight them on the beaches”

It was rousing stuff. Ultimately, Britain survived the invasion attempt. People feel proud of that.
But, it’s ironic that many of the people today who are still nostalgic for that moment are also the ones who preach a certain kind of politics – anti-immigration, nationalistic values, something approaching a kind of English or British fascism. They’re the ones who love that moment when Britain was alone, facing the invading hoards from the continent. It’s ironic because during that battle we were fighting against fascism. Now it seems that it’s the fascists at home who like to remember it.

Anyway, it looked pretty bleak for Britain.
Hitler decided that before attempting any kind of land invasion, he would attempt to thoroughly smash The UK from the sky. He planned to target industrial centres in the big cities, key points of infrastructure and even some national monuments and residential areas. The aim was to cripple the country, both physically and mentally. Ooh, scary stuff.

So, on 7 September 1940 the Luftwaffe were all ready and prepared to launch operation.

Britain at this moment was steadily making weapons from anything they could get their hands on. All heavy metals were being thrown into factories. All the money was being spent on defence and weapons. A lot of Brits felt the squeeze. Obviously it wasn’t as bad as in the occupied countries, I imagine. I don’t know, I wasn’t there. But I imagine having a bunch of nazis from another country marching around your home town making themselves comfortable was rather difficult to take. So the Poles, the Czechs, the Belgians, Dutch and French (well, most of them anyway) were no doubt having a pretty awful time too, not to mention any other nations that I haven’t mentioned. This was a world war of course – so if I don’t mention your country in this episode I am sorry. This is after all the Battle of Britain.

Anyway, Britain was preparing itself for a rather bad time. A lot of planes were being constructed, men were being trained to fly and fight in the air.

The Germans were feeling pretty good about themselves. Morale was high. They’d just walked all over Europe and felt on top of the world. They basically felt absolutely superior. Whipped up by the rhetoric of their charismatic (albeit completely insane) leader, they’d been led to believe that the world was theirs and this was the natural order of things. Wrong.

So, the nazis were pretty chuffed and probably couldn’t wait to have a go at Britain, this global superpower of the time.

This was the biggest aerial attack of World War 2 so far. At 5pm on 7 September the first wave of bombers reached their targets in London. Apparently the sound they made was pretty scary. A kind of low, depressing drone sound. Ominous.

It was a Saturday afternoon in London. When I think of Saturday afternoons back home I think of tea, sandwiches, football with my Dad. I don’t imagine death from above, or death from any direction for that matter. The planes targeted the industrial areas, but a lot of workers lived right next to them and their homes got bombed too.

But that was just the beginning. What followed was a rain of bombs that no other city had ever seen in history. 12 hours of bombing without a break, continuing through the night. A lot of people died, and others were convinced they would follow.

How did the pilots feel? According to interviews they just hoped that they’d hit their targets, but they knew that civilians were probably getting killed. Really, they were a bit cut off from what was happening on the ground. I expect they didn’t feel too proud of themselves.

For the British people, particularly Londoners I think this bombing created hopelessness in some, but also a gritty determination in others, as well as a visceral hatred of the germans.

The fires caused by the bombing lasted for 57 nights, and in fact these fires were more damaging than the bombing raid.

The Nazi strategy was to continue to bomb, terrorise and demoralise the nation. Hitler expected Britain to give up and surrender to Germany, so he could then turn his attention on the East. He knew that it would be unwise to attempt to invade Russia (correction: The USSR) while also fighting on the Western front. So victory in the west was a crucial part of his plan. He expected Britain to surrender. He underestimated us.

It became a battle of wills, embodied by two men – Hitler and Churchill. It was Churchill who rallied the British people. He inspired them to carry on. He echoed the sentiments of the nation, that they would never ever surrender.

*Churchill Speech 3 – The Blitz*

Hitler didn’t expect Churchill to refuse to deal with him. This may have been a bit of a surprise. Britain was not going to be a walkover.

The German air force had already knocked out a lot of our warships in the English channel and planned to launch surprise air attacks on England, but England had a technological advantage: radar. This is now used in airports all over the world. It’s a kind of tracking device to monitor the skies. Radar was used as an early warning system, to let the RAF know if German bombers were on their way to England on missions. This allowed the RAF to scramble fighter planes into the skies in order to engage the German parties in combat. The Luftwaffe had no idea that radar even existed, so when RAF planes suddenly turned up to meet them in the skies it must have been a bit of a surprise. The fighting in the sky was essentially a duel of fighter pilots in single-man planes. Dog fights, one on one battles. Tracers from bullets flying through the sky. Chaos and destruction in the air.

It must have been incredibly frightening for the pilots. So many people were killed. Dogfights lasted seconds. It was a question of being aware of your surroundings and planning your attacks. If you had the right strategy you’d have the advantage and you’d find the enemy in a vulnerable position from which you could open fire and take out the plane. If your strategy was bad, you’d leave yourself open to attack.

The Germans were flying Messerschmitt 109s, the Brits in Hurricanes and Spitfires.

There were so many deaths during these fights that the pilots accepted that they would almost certainly die sooner or later. Everyone just expected to die. Imagine how that felt for these men. Living like that, in the knowledge that tomorrow or the next day, would be your last. What would that do to your mind? I’m sure it was the same for both sides. For the Germans there was the added fear that they would run out of petrol, or that they would be forced to crash land in enemy territory and then taken captive. The German pilots were forced by their superiors to always accompany the bombers, even if their smaller planes were running out of fuel. Sometimes these amounted to suicide missions for the fighter pilots who simply didn’t have enough fuel for the whole mission. Many pilots drowned as they had to bail out of their planes, landing in the English channel, miles away from the land.

Many wives, mothers, sisters and girlfriends lost men who were close to their hearts, again on both sides.

Women didn’t all stay at home worrying though. In the RAF the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force were an integral part of the British defences. They worked in the operations room and helped to coordinate the fighters.

So, in the summer of 1940 the Germans failed to break the RAF. That’s when Hitler decided to launch the large scale bombing attacks on London and other locations, and that was the true beginning of the battle of Britain.

Like on 7 September, waves of German bombers came across the channel, and RAF planes took off to meet them, engaging them in mid-air. The German bombers were well armed with machine guns, and also flanked by fighter planes too, which engaged the RAF in more one-on-one dogfighting. There were a lot of bullets in the air. The German escorts managed to keep the RAF at bay, allowing the bombers to continue to London. Large parts of the city were reduced to rubble. To this day, it remains one of the characteristic things about the city – there are gaps in the old buildings in which more modern buildings have been constructed. It doesn’t have the consistency of a city like Paris, because large parts of the city were completely destroyed during the war and then re-built later. Of course it wasn’t just London. All the main industrial cities took a beating, particularly Coventry in the midlands which got absolutely smashed in a huge bombing raid. It’s very sad. It was a beautiful and proud city with a magnificent cathedral. That’s now gone and is replaced by more modern structures, but something essential was lost, and for years Coventry was like a ghost town for the people growing up there in the aftermath of the war.

Londoners had to hide from the bombing in cellars under houses, or in specially made bomb shelters, even in underground stations like Oval in South London.

Between September and November 1940 London was bombed over 300 times. Thousands of individual bombs were dropped. London’s children were evacuated, meaning they were sent away for their own protection. Most of them went north into the countryside, away from the industrial targets. That must have been a very emotional moment, having to say goodbye to children and parents. I expect many of the parents thought they’d never see their kids again. Some children were taken all the way to Canada from Liverpool, and many were killed when their ship was torpedoed by a German submarine.

Back in London, the RAF with their radar and the brilliant Spitfire fighter plane had something of an advantage in the air, although it was a very slight advantage. Goering the military commander did not achieve the results he’d hoped for and decided to carry out all his bombing raids on London at night. The skies were lit up with fire as London burned, and with the lack of accuracy in the dark many residential areas all around London were hit and many civilians were killed. Nevertheless, Londoners kept their morale and managed to carry on as normally as possible during the day. Clearing up bomb damage but also attempting to go about their daily business. This is one of the things that kept the Germans at bay. The spirit of the people of Britain. Perhaps that’s what makes people so proud and causes them to say that this was Britain’s finest hour.

But the normality of daily life came to a sudden stop at approximately 5pm every day when everyone got into bomb shelters and the raids began again. Even though many people managed to carry on, I’m sure that many of them were basically walking around like zombies, expecting it all to be over by the end of that day. Many of them were ready for surrender, but they didn’t.

*Audiobook recommendation – “The Battle of Britain: From the BBC Archives”

The bombing continued all the way into the next year, until May 1941. Hitler called off the attacks on Britain, choosing instead to focus his attention on the east and Russia (Correction: USSR). However, that proved to be a problem for him because it left him open in the West, and later when America joined the war, Britain became a vitally strategic position for the allies. It was from the south coast of England that the allies launched their major counter attack against the Nazis with a land invasion in Normandy, Northern France which ultimately led to allied forces getting all the way to Berlin. Despite being a hero to the Brits, Churchill didn’t emerge from WW2 completely clean. There were large scale bombing raids on Germany from Britain, including the destruction of Dresden and massive damage to Berlin, largely as a response to the attacks on British cities.

In the east the Nazis struggled through bitterly cold and tough conditions fighting against the Russians (I mean Soviets). Many many Russian (Soviet) lives were lost as well as Germans. Ultimately Hitler couldn’t sustain a war on two fronts. The size and resilience of the Russian army (Red Army) in the east proved too difficult for Hitler, but also his inability to crush the spirit of the Brits left him open on that side too. The Battle of Britain proved to be Hitler’s first major defeat and was a decisive moment in World War 2, representing a turning point in favour of the allies. Nazi soldiers didn’t put a foot on British soil. The invasion never happened.

But that’s not the end of the story, because I’d like to turn my attention to a particular squadron of pilots who made an extraordinary contribution to the Battle of Britain, a contribution that could have made all the difference. During the battle, Britain was hanging on by its fingernails. Every single day of combat, British resources were stretched to their absolute limit. Dozens of pilots and planes were lost every day over British skies. They couldn’t have carried on much longer. If Hitler had continued, he would probably have crushed the British spirit, but he didn’t and Britain managed to hold on just long enough to keep the Germans at bay.

Churchill called it Britain’s finest hour, and famously said that “Never was so much owed by so many to so few”.
*Churchill Speech 4 – “Never was so much owed by so many to so few”

What gave Britain the edge? Well, it was partly radar, partly the brilliantly engineered Spitfire – which was specifically made as a bespoke fighter to keep up with and out-speed the German planes, while holding extra fuel to keep pilots in the air longer. The Spitfire is now a national icon, and it has to be said, is a rather beautifully designed plane, with its rounded and curved wings and fuselage.

But also it was the individual pilots involved in the fighting. There was one squadron which stood out, the 303rd. You might imagine them to be a band of plucky young British gentlemen, but in fact they weren’t. These men who may have saved Britain were in fact foreigners, from Poland.

303 Squadron
303 squadron was one of 16 Polish squadrons who flew with the RAF during the Battle of Britain. They were pilots who had flown against the Germans previously, but who had escaped to England when Poland was invaded. They turned out to be the highest scoring RAF squadron during the Battle of Britain. One of the pilots in particular was not in fact Polish but of Czech origin and was called Josef František. He is perhaps the most famous member of the squadron and is famous for being one of the highest scoring allies in the Battle of Britain.

The squadron chose its own name, The Kościuszko Squadron – named after another flying squadron that had taken part in the Polish/Russian war of the 1920s. In fact the 303 contained some members of that squadron. So they were already a pretty distinguished flying team. It was made up of about 21 pilots and a number of ground staff, and what was the prime reason for their success during these air battles? Anger and a vicious hatred of the nazis. This was like a high-energy fuel for these men, who just couldn’t wait to take down Nazi planes at the earliest opportunity.

But their opportunities were slow to come. The team was based in Northolt in England, and were assigned two RAF officers to look after them. The officers were responsible for training the Polish pilots in RAF protocol, but also in the basic English necessary to follow orders and instructions. So, before the pilots even got a chance to take to the skies, they were forced to sit through weeks of English lessons, and I imagine in those days it was pretty mind numbing stuff! There was no LEP that’s for sure.

Apparently the Polish pilots were so desperate to get at the Germans that during a training flight, when a party of German planes was spotted in the vicinity, one of the Polish pilots, called Ludwik Paszkiewicz, broke formation and tore after the German planes engaging them in combat. He shot down a German Messerschmitt Bf 110. The RAF officers were convinced and the next day the squadron was immediately put into action. This was the beginning of an incredible run of missions in which the 303 squadron scored a record breaking number of kills in the air. Apparently, these guys were absolutely incredible. Again, fuelled by a bitter hatred of the Germans, the pilots just pushed everything that bit further, going out of their way, taking incredible risks to take down as many planes as possible. But also, their use of British Hurricane fighter planes was a big advantage for them too. Previously they’d flown planes that were less powerful and less well-engineered. This had honed their flying skills considerably. IN their previous planes they’d been used to having to fly much closer to the enemy in order to get accurate hits. In the Hurricanes, with their increased speed and firepower the pilots continued to fly very close to enemy planes like they had done before, but this time the results were devastating. The German planes didn’t stand a chance. Later the squad were equipped with Spitfires and this made all the difference.

No. 303 Squadron claimed the largest number of aircraft destroyed of the 66 Allied fighter squadrons engaged in the Battle of Britain, even though it joined the fray two months after the battle had begun.

Josef František was a particularly successful pilot. He was considered by his commanding officers to be ill-disciplined and a danger to other pilots when flying in formation, but he was devastatingly successful at taking down Germans. In the end, he was given the right to break formation and go out on solo missions to pick off as many enemy planes as he wanted. In this way František was able to fight his own private war against the Germans, allowing him to take down at least 18 planes in one month, and was awarded the Distinguished Flying Medal.

Sadly, on 8 October 1940, František’s Hurricane crashed in Ewell, Surrey during a landing approach after a patrol. Reasons for the crash are not known, but according to some theories, he may have been making aerobatic figures to impress his girlfriend, or it might have been a result of battle fatigue and physical exhaustion. So he never lived to see the end of the war.

The success of 303 squadron in combat can be mainly attributed to the years of extensive and rigorous pre-war training many of the long-serving Polish veterans had received in their homeland, far more than many of their younger and inexperienced RAF comrades then being thrown into the battle. Tactics and skill also played a role, as well as a daring commitment to bringing down the enemy; on one occasion, No. 303’s Sgt Stanislaw Karubin resorted to extreme tactics to bring down a German fighter. Following a prolonged air battle, Karubin was chasing a German fighter at treetop level. As he closed in on the tail of the German fighter, Karubin realised that his Hurricane had run out of ammunition. Rather than turning back to base, he closed the distance and climbed right above the German fighter. The German pilot was so shocked to see the underside of the Hurricane within arm’s reach of his cockpit that he instinctively reduced his altitude to avoid a collision and crashed into the ground.

After World War 2, Poland was occupied by Soviet forces and its borders were redrawn as part of the 1945 Potsdam Conference. Poland became enveloped in the Soviet Union (correction: Not the Soviet Union, but the Soviet controlled Eastern Bloc), behind the iron curtain. I’m not sure how many Polish people feel about what happened after world war 2. I understand there is some bitterness at the allies, and probably Britain in particular about this, that perhaps we sold-out the Polish or forgot them, or betrayed them by not securing their freedom. Many sad things happen at an international diplomatic level during or in the aftermath of war. They’re regrettable. I wonder how the Poles generally view Britain these days. Is there resentment there? Or is that just a thing of the past. I hope we can all let bygones be bygones.

Nowadays a lot of Polish people live and make their living in the UK. In London for example there is a very large Polish community. Where I used to live in Hammersmith there is the Polish cultural centre just up the road, and many Polish people live in the area. I guess for many of them it’s a chance to get more opportunities for living in the UK, and I’m pretty proud to be part of a country that offers opportunities for people from other countries, and it’s clear to me that residents from other nations can bring a lot of skills and benefits to the country they move to. I’m not one of these people who complains about immigrants stealing people’s jobs. Immigrants are often skilled people who can contribute a lot, as we saw from the example of the 303 Squadron, who might have given the RAF an edge over the Germans in the Battle of Britain. Maybe they saved the day and helped Britain stay free, allowing us all to indulge in these nostalgic memories about our “finest hour” in which we stood up to the Nazis when all hope was lost.

That is the end of the story and that’s the end of this episode. Please leave your thoughts on the page as usual. Have a good day.

Luke
BR2

7 Reasons Why The Brits Should Love the Poles (Thank you Piotr Perliński)

302. Bad Dentist / Star Wars / Adam Buxton / Headphone Jams / Jarvis Cocker (A rambling episode)

Hi, this is the second part of a two part episode in which I’m telling you a few things about recent trending news stories, some anecdotes and other things that are in my head at the moment. There’s no specific language focus this time. Instead I’m focusing on general cultural information. Last time I talked about David Cameron and the pig, a story of a bad gig, and who the hell is Ronnie Pickering? In this one I’m going to ramble on about a bad trip to the dentist, some rising excitement about the new Star Wars film, Adam Buxton’s new podcast, some music that has been bouncing around inside my head, some news about a new jingle which is in the pipeline and how I want to hunt Jarvis Cocker for my podcast but I don’t know how to do it! If you don’t really understand those things, then listen on! All will be explained! All you have to do is listen. :)

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In the previous episode:
1. The UK political situation, and trending news relating to it – this is less boring than you might expect because it seems from recent reports that our Prime Minister David Cameron once had sex with a dead pig. Seriously. (Did PM David Cameron really have sex with a pig? What’s all this about Jeremy Corbyn? What’s going on?)
2. “Sorry, we’re English”
3. Tell a story or anecdote about something.
4. Who is Ronnie Pickering?

In this episode:
5. A trip to the dentist in Paris.
6. Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens – I can hardly contain my excitement, but I am attempting to avoid the hype.
7. OPP: The Adam Buxton Podcast
8. In my headphones recently: The Juan MacLean “A Simple Design”, The Who: “Who Are You?”, Erland Oye: “Lies become part of who you are”, DJ Krush & Ronny Jordan: “Bad Brothers”, Leyla McCalla: “Heart of Gold”. (Plus, the intro song: “Groove Holmes” by Beastie Boys)
9. Jingle news: Possible new jingle in the pipeline
10. Jarvis Cocker
11. That’s probably it, isn’t it?
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301. David Cameron & The Pig / Bad Gig Story / Who is Ronnie Pickering? (A rambling episode)

In this episode I’m going to have a bit of a ramble about some stuff that’s in the news at the moment and a few other things that have come into my brain. I’m not going to teach you anything specific in this one, no language anyway – just some bits and pieces about modern day British life. So generally I’m just going to keep you company for a while and talk to you one to one for the duration of the episode. Just you and me, and perhaps a bus load of commuters.

Small Donate Button[DOWNLOAD]
Download “The In Sound from Way Out” by Beastie Boys on iTunes, here.
Here’s a made-up agenda for the episode:

1. The UK political situation, and trending news relating to it – this is less boring than you might expect because it seems from recent reports that our Prime Minister David Cameron once had sex with a dead pig. Seriously. (Did PM David Cameron really have sex with a pig? What’s all this about Jeremy Corbyn? What’s going on?)
2. “Sorry, we’re English”
3. Tell a story or anecdote about something.
4. Who is Ronnie Pickering?

In the next episode:
5. A trip to the dentist in Paris.
6. Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens – I can hardly contain my excitement, but I am attempting to avoid the hype.
7. OPP: The Adam Buxton Podcast
8. In my headphones recently: The Juan MacLean “A Simple Design”, The Who: “Who Are You?”, Erland Oye: “Lies become part of who you are”, DJ Krush & Ronny Jordan: “Bad Brothers”, Leyla McCalla: “Heart of Gold”. (Plus, the intro song: “Groove Holmes” by Beastie Boys)
9. Jingle news: Possible new jingle in the pipeline
10. Jarvis Cocker
11. That’s probably it, isn’t it?
301b
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