Interviewing Paul Taylor about his comedy projects, including “What the F*ck France” on Canal+ / Youtube and his stand-up shows #Franglais and The Paul Taylor Comedy Night. Video available.
Search for Luke’s English Podcast and click on it.
Vote using your email address – they won’t send you spam, they’re just trying to stop multiple votes by the same person.
You will be added to a free prize draw as well – you could win tickets to the award ceremony.
The comp closes at 23:59 on the 14th April 2017.
Paul Taylor on the Podcast
A few days ago Paul came over and we sat on the terrace to do a podcast. I thought I would interview him all about his TV show and find out how it’s all going.
We talked about his writing process for the show “What the F*ck France?”, about how the success of the show has changed his life in some ways, about the reactions he gets from people he meets these days – including people who recognise him in the street or on public transport, about the differences between performing on video and performing in front of a live audience on stage and about his plans for other projects in the future.
I also asked him a few questions sent in by listeners on the website.
Questions for Paul
Do you remember a couple of years ago, you’d come back from the fringe, and we talked about some dodgy reviews?
Now you’re successful with the TV show and the web series.
Has it changed your life?
Do you get noticed?
Do you prefer doing the videos or the stand up?
What’s your favourite episode?
What are the topics you’ve covered?
Website comments
Chris Benitez What are you doing next, and are you going to do WTF for other countries?
Laura Fisher Paul speaks fluent french, ask him to pronounce this tongue twister : ” Un chasseur sachant chasser sans son chien est un bon chasseur ” Amber could try this too.
Cristina Ricciardo I’d like they to tell about their very first performance. Good luck to you all!
Jack Hello Paul hello Amber, how art you guys My question is when and where did you first meet King ? King please film this episode if possible, fanks.
Talking about restaurant culture in the UK, an introduction to one of the UK’s most famous chefs and a chance to learn some authentic English from a popular British TV show featuring Gordon Ramsay. Video available. Includes swearing.
This video is a combination of part 1 and part 2, with vocabulary on-screen and the TV show video clips included 👇
Video – Episode 432
Introduction Transcript
Hello, and welcome back to this podcast for learners of English. Here is a new episode for you to listen to and indeed watch, because I’m videoing this one. You’ll be able to find the video on the page for this episode on my website, or by visiting the YouTube channel for Luke’s English Podcast.
A lot of what I am saying here – particularly in this introduction is written on the page for this episode. So you can read it with me, or check it for certain words you hear me using. The best way to get access to these pages is to subscribe to the mailing list.
In the last episode of this podcast you heard me talking to Amber about restaurants and hotels and some crazy TripAdvisor reviews.
At one point in the episode we talked briefly about Gordon Ramsay – one of the UK’s most famous chefs, and his TV show “Kitchen Nightmares” which was a really popular show in the UK a few years ago, and I thought it could be interesting to do a whole episode about that.
So in this one I’m going to talk a little bit about Gordon Ramsay and then we’re going to listen to some YouTube clips from one of his TV shows and I will help you understand all the language that you’ll hear. No doubt there will be some new vocabulary in the process – probably on the subject of food, cooking, restaurants and kitchens but lots of other natural language that just comes up, including plenty of swearing, because Gordon Ramsay is known for his frequent use of swear words.
Yes, there will be quite a lot of swearing in this episode, and you know my position on this. I’m choosing to show you the language as it is really used and that includes the rude words, but don’t be tempted to start throwing swear words into your everyday English. Don’t make the mistake of thinking that swear words are a short cut to sounding exactly like a native speaker. Often it just gives people a bad impression of you. We’ll go into it more later, because there are quite a lot of unwritten social rules around swearing that you need to be aware of – the main one being, that with swearing it is much much easier to sound rude and inappropriate than it is to sound cool. Think of swearing as a motorbike – you might think it’s cool but unless you really know what you’re doing you’re likely to seriously injure yourself. Similarly, swearing can be cool when it’s done in movies or even by someone like Gordon Ramsay, but if you try and do it in your normal life there’s a good chance you’ll just offend people.
So anyway, we’ll listen to some of the English in these YouTube clips and analyse the things they’re saying so that in the end you can understand it all just like I do, which should help you learn some real English in the process. You’ll also learn a thing or two about restaurant culture in the UK and about Gordon Ramsay who is one of the most well-known people in Britain.
Who is Gordon Ramsay and what’s the TV show?
Gordon James Ramsay, is a British celebrity chef, restaurateur, and television personality.
*Difference between a chef and a cook? Basically, a chef is someone who’s had professional training – at least a culinary degree, but a cook is just someone who cooks food. Both might work in a kitchen, but mainly being a chef is about having the status of culinary qualifications and experience.
Ramsay is one of the most famous chefs in the UK and probably in the world too. He has a reputation for being an excellent restaurateur and chef, and also for his extremely strict and direct style. He’s often very rude, saying exactly what he thinks about the people he’s working with in the strongest most colourful language. Imagine an army captain shouting at a platoon of soldiers during military training, but with really good food.
Ramsay was born in Scotland, but he grew up in Stratford-upon-Avon, which is in fact not far from where I grew up in England). So, he is Scottish but doesn’t speak with a Scottish accent.
Ramsay now has restaurants all over the place – in London, in Paris and in New York. During his career he has trained at the highest level with French chefs in the UK and in Paris. He specialises in Italian, French and British recipes, and his cooking is known for being simple, unpretentious, high quality and delicious.
His restaurants have been awarded 16 Michelin stars in total. The term “Michelin Star” is a hallmark of fine dining quality. Michelin stars are very difficult to win and restaurants around the world proudly promote their Michelin Star status if they have one. His signature restaurant, Restaurant Gordon Ramsay in Chelsea, London, has held 3 Michelin stars since 2001, which is a mark of extremely high quality in restaurant dining.
As well as being a top chef, Ramsay is also a TV presenter. He first appeared on TV in the UK in the late 1990s, and by 2004 Ramsay had become one of the best known celebrity chefs in British popular culture, and, along with other chefs like Jamie Oliver, Nigella Lawson, and Delia Smith, he has influenced viewers to become more culinarily adventurous.
As a reality TV personality, Ramsay is known for his fiery temper, strict demeanour, and use of expletives. He often makes blunt and controversial comments, including insults and wisecracks about contestants and their cooking abilities.
Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares used to be on British TV a few years ago – probably around 10-15 years ago now. These days you can find most of the episodes on YouTube.
Local restaurants vs manufacturing companies and processed food
Ramsay is actually very passionate about local restaurants in the UK.
In the UK our eating out culture is vibrant and successful but it is being undermined by a number of factors. One is the industrialisation of food culture. THis means that big businesses are involved in preparing food at an industrial level and then selling it to restaurants as part of a large corporate chain.
These chains might be restaurants which are all owned by one company, or food manufacturers who dominate the wholesale market, driving down their prices and pushing out competition such as local producers who sell fresh products.
In these industrial food manufacturing companies, the food is prepared in high quantities and then sold off to other companies and restaurants as part of a corporate supply chain for food.
There’s a big infrastructure for food purchasing in the UK which is dominated by these big food manufacturers. As a result, many smaller restaurants are forced to buy industrialised and mass-produced food because it is cheaper and more convenient than fresh food which you can buy direct from farms or markets.
If you were a struggling restaurant owner in a town in the UK, what would you do? Buy your food fresh from a local producer and then make sure you sell it in a short-term period, or buy similar products from a mass producer but at a lower price, and it’s food which you can store for longer because it has been processed to stay fresh.
In the end, people choose to eat at home, especially during an economic crisis.
So, economic factors are having a negative effect on the restaurant culture in the UK to an extent. Family owned restaurants should be where you get proper traditional and delicious local food, but these restaurants are being squeezed economically and forced to go along with the industrialised food manufacturing process.
Also, there are many chain restaurants which you find on high streets in the UK. These are not locally run, but are owned by big companies who have a single business model which they apply to all their restaurants. The fact that these places are part of a big corporate chain means that they can drive down their prices, making it very hard for local restaurants to be competitive. As a result, these smaller places suffer, struggle and often close down.
Gordon Ramsay believes that these local restaurants are the backbone of our restaurant culture in the UK, and he strongly believes that they need to be supported so they can compete with the corporate chains, and given training so they can serve the best food possible. Essentially that’s the concept behind Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares, but also it’s just entertaining watching him shouting at incompetent chefs. You sort of let him get away with the way he bullies people because you believe that really he’s just trying to help them to learn the discipline you need to run a really good restaurant.
But he does seem really passionate about proper restaurant culture in the UK and I like that about him. Even though he’s making this reality show and he’s making money from doing it, I think he really does care about improving restaurant culture in the UK.
On the other hand, he is very good at TV. He knows how to make entertaining TV, and he’s got a good formula for it. Basically, this means that he takes the harsh discipline and the no-nonsense brutally honest approach that he applies to his kitchen management, and uses it when giving feedback to the restaurants which he visits.
Let’s listen to a few scenes and I’m going to make sure you understand everything that’s going on and everything that’s being said.
Let’s learn English with Gordon Ramsay
The TV Show
Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares used to be on UK TV about 10-15 years ago.
The format is this – Gordon Ramsay visits a failing restaurant somewhere in the UK. So, restaurants that are failing – e.g. losing money, getting terrible reviews etc. He goes into the restaurant and spends a week there, observing the way the owners run the kitchen, how the business works and what’s going on at all levels. Usually he starts by sitting down to eat the chef’s speciality dish, and it’s nearly always disgusting, and Ramsay comments on how it tastes, how it looks, and also the decor of the restaurant and the service from the staff.
Then Ramsay gives his feedback to the owner and the chef, and it’s always a massive reality check, and it usually involves very strong words and lots of swearing. This is what happens when a top-level chef enters the world of a crappy low-level restaurant.
Then over the course of the week, Gordon helps the managers turn the restaurant around. It’s almost always a huge challenge and often the most difficult part is dealing with the psychological aspects – the stubborn chefs, the relationship issues in the kitchen, the fact that these people have personal issues which are causing the business to go horribly wrong.
It is car-crash TV. We see arguments, meltdowns, unhappy customers and so on.
In almost every episode Gordon seems to go hopping mad as he can’t believe the incompetence or shockingly low standards of service shown by the people in the restaurant. He then tries to help them change everything and turn the business around. It all makes really great telly.
And by the end of the episode, with Gordon’s help they have usually turned the restaurant into a successful business again.
There’s a UK version and a US version.
If you search for Kitchen Nightmares on YouTube you will probably find the US version first, but I think the UK version is better!
But really, it is better because the US version is horrible. It’s full of really fast editing and there’s loads of music which is added in order to tell you how you should be feeling about what’s happening. It’s distracting and patronising.
Example of the US version (just listen to all the distracting sound effects and music)
The UK version just has some rock music in the background at the start, but then during the show it’s more simple and you can just focus on what’s happening without constant sweeping sounds and tense music.
Let’s listen to some scenes from one of the episodes.
These scenes actually come from an episode called “Gordon Ramsay’s Great British Nightmares” which was shown on TV between series 5 and 6 of Kitchen Nightmares. It’s basically the same as any other episode of the series.
Gordon Ramsay’s Great British Nightmare – Dovecote Bistro
Summary
Gordon goes to visit a restaurant in Devon called Dovecote Bistro, which is run by a guy called Mick.
Mick is a former truck driver and burger van operator who has opened this bistro with his wife and adopted daughter, Michelle. Ramsay is firstly appalled by the psychedelic wallpaper decorating the restaurant, and then his attention turns to the food and the way it is cooked. While Ramsay is impressed with the simple menu, he is furious to find that Mick has very little cooking ability, using orange squash to make a sauce and using vacuum-sealed pre-cooked lamb shanks in a microwave bag. Not only does he show little responsibility in the kitchen, he is also secretive with his spending and is hugely in debt. Mick is adamant that the problems in the kitchen are not his fault, and his stubbornness causes a rift with his wife and daughter. Ramsay solves the crisis by taking the business matters out of Mick’s hands and kicks him out of the kitchen. His daughter, Michelle, is placed in charge of the kitchen despite having no cooking experience. She rises to the challenge, and while Mick is not convinced over replacing his microwave food, the reopening is a success.
Months later, Ramsay returns to find that the restaurant is making profit. He sent Michelle for further culinary training, and she impresses Ramsay with freshly cooked food.
The restaurant was renamed Martins’ Bistro during production.
Video 1 – Flourescent duck cooked in orange squash
Vocabulary
Let’s see what this ex-trucker can do
Lamb shanks
Fuck me! (surprise / shock)
Your blouse matches the wallpaper
I feel like I’m tripping out!
I’ve never touched the stuff but I feel like I just swallowed an E.
The hideous wallpaper
On paper it looks delicious
Orange squash
A spoonful of gravy
Fuck me do I need sunglasses!
That’s worse than fucking Benylin
They’re actually vacuum packed
They can last for about a year
They’re bought in, they’re vacuum packed
They’ve got a shelf life of about a year
Well, fuck me!
That might be the worst food I’ve ever come across
He might be beyond my help
It doesn’t need refrigerating
How in the fuck could you charge 11 pounds for that?
E numbers, like Tartrazine
Do you feel like having a shit?
Thank fuck I didn’t eat it.
I’m surprised you haven’t killed off half the population of Okehampton
Hello email subscribers and website users! This is not an episode of LEP but keep reading because I have 5 cool things to share with you (below).
In this post you will find 5 episodes of a podcast. It’s not my podcast but I am featured in the episodes.
It’s a 5-part series of interviews between English teacher Zdenek Lukas and me on his podcast, “Zdenek’s English Podcast”, including 2 episodes of language analysis. You’ll hear lots of conversation between us about teaching, learning and behind-the-scenes information about Luke’s English Podcast. Also in the language analysis episodes Zdenek will help you pick up 50 features of English grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation from the interview.
You can listen to and download the episodes below.
Part 1
We discuss our experiences of taking the Cambridge DELTA qualification (it’s seriously challenging!) and then we try to break the commonly-believed stereotype of a native speaker teacher of English being superior to a non-native one.
Part 2
In part 2 we talk about each other’s podcasts and I give some behind the scenes information about some popular episodes of LEP, including some stories about the episodes Sick in Japan, Travelling in Indonesia and California Road Trip. At the end, we also talk about our experiences of teaching English for specific purposes, namely business English and English for engineering.
Part 3
In this part you can hear us talk about what we both like teaching the most in classrooms, some of my favourite teaching techniques, what it was like recording Pink Gorilla Story 1 & 2, and also what episodes I enjoy doing the most on the podcast. Also, you can find out more about the secret of Paul Taylor’s success and what it would take to do a live LEP meet-up with listeners.
Part 4 – Language analysis
Zdenek picks out 25 features of grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation for analysis. He applies his knowledge of linguistic features of English to clarify meaning, highlight usefulness, correct some of his own errors and help you to avoid common mistakes.
Part 5 – Language analysis
Zdenek picks out 25 more features of grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation for analysis and gives them the teacher treatment.
I’m really impressed by what Zdenek is achieving with his English as a second language.
He’s from Czech Republic and he has learned English as a second language in adulthood. He’s now a teacher of English, just like me and he does his own podcast, just like me.
He has a masters degree in English language teaching. He’s got a CELTA and DELTA (pending) in English teaching to adults. He’s really well qualified.
Also, he’s been doing Zdenek’s English Podcast for years and it’s still going. Admittedly he says the podcast is influenced by my podcast, and I’m ok with that. It’s his way of pushing his English and it seems to be working for him.
You’ll hear in our interview that Zdenek has just passed a significant part of his DELTA qualification with a really good grade. That is not easy to do. You need to be a good teacher to get a good result in your DELTA and you really need to know about grammar and linguistics.
So, don’t underestimate Zdenek. He’s achieved a hell of a lot, just like many of you have also achieved a lot in your language learning. Sometimes it’s worth taking a step back and realising how much you’ve achieved.
I was very happy to be interviewed by him and I really hope you listen to the episodes, and in fact check out his other episodes too. A lot of them contain interviews with other interesting people, many of them English people he knows. Other episodes cover Zdenek’s personal journey with English and also you can hear him interacting with his students too.
The other day I was on Facebook and I came across an article called “21 Really Strange TripAdvisor Reviews”, which was a collection of funny and strange reviews of restaurants and hotels on TripAdvisor, a website where customers can leave reviews and ratings for restaurants and hotels.
I opened the article and I read a couple of the reviews and found them funny, bizarre and in some cases quite horrifying, and generally just amusing.
For example, one of the reviews goes:
Eugh! He scraped off the mayonnaise with his hand!
A: Hello, I’d like a chicken burger please, but with no mayo. Thanks…
B: OK sir, here’s your chicken burger.
A: Oh, sorry, I said no mayo.
B: Oh right. Here… (scrapes off with hand) That’ll be 1.99 please.
There are about 20 other reviews like that on this page I found, and most of them are much stranger and more horrible than that one.
I thought “This could be a fun thing to talk about on the podcast. Restaurant and hotel experiences.”
Now, I’ve worked in hotels and restaurants before, in my time. I’ve had various dead end jobs working in kitchens and bars and restaurants and hotels and stuff, and so has my friend Amber Minogue who you know from this podcast. I did ask Paul to join in as well but he was too busy filming so it’s just Amber and me.
I went over to her place to talk about this and to see what she thought of some of these bizarre TripAdvisor reviews that I’d found, and that’s what you’re going to hear in this episode.
You’ll hear lots of conversation about that subject, which will of course include vocabulary relating to the hospitality industry in our descriptions of working in restaurants and hotels. You’ll hear some bizarre and slightly disgusting anecdotes and various tangents in our conversation as we end up talking about all kinds of other things, as usual.
Some of the scenarios that are in these reviews are quite disgusting, so just bear that in mind. Some of the stuff is a little bit gross.
You should also know that the episode does contain swearing. There’s quite a lot of swearing in this one and that’s for various reasons, partly because we imagine the scenarios, imagine the situations that these people were in these reviews and act them out, and that does just involve some swearing, plus we talk a little bit about the British TV chef Gordon Ramsay and Gordon Ramsay is famous for his bad language. He’s probably one of the world leaders in swearing. He’s probably the best in Britain. He’s one of the best swearers in Britain I would say. So, talking about Gordon Ramsay also involved using some ‘F words’. And also, for some reason, Quentin Tarantino, the Quentin Tarantino movie Reservoir Dogs comes into our conversation as well and that naturally involves lots of swearing as well. So, the episode contains swearing.
I know that you might not expect a teacher to use swear words, but on this podcast (as you know if you’re a long-term listener) I do try to present you with the kind of normal informal English that friends use when they’re talking to each other in private, and people do swear when they’re together with their friends, and that is the kind of English that I’m choosing to present to you on this podcast. Now, it’s usually not appropriate to use swearing in public situations like in classrooms, at work, with host families, in comments on public social media forums etc. I feel like I should say that because sometimes learners of English aren’t completely aware of the rudeness and inappropriacy of swear words in English and how swearing fits into the culture of the English language. Just bear that in mind before you decide that swearing is a sort of short cut to sounding natural in English.
Before we get onto the subject of restaurants and hotels there is a bit of rambling chat about some English phrases that Amber keeps noticing recently. Amber has been doing some research for her own upcoming podcast project about the history of Paris. Apparently she’s been preparing an episode about a famous murder that happened, and in her research she came across the word “burlap sack” – something about a couple of murderers hiding a body in a burlap sack. If you remember, this word “burlap” came up several times in our recent episode about the Victorian detective story. In that one, a kidnapper wore a burlap sack over his head to hide his face. So, burlap is a kind of material which is used to make sacks, like the kind of sack or bag that you would use to carry loads of potatoes.
Burlap is quite an obscure word and you’ll hear us laughing about this because neither Amber nor I were aware of that word until we did the Victorian detective story on the podcast recently (“hessian” is the word we knew) so it’s sort of a coincidence that Amber read the word again in a book recently, and that leads us to talk about how it’s strange that when you learn a new word you suddenly start to notice it everywhere. I don’t know if you’ve ever experienced that. You learn a new word that you didn’t even know existed before, and then suddenly you notice it all the time.
Amber then gives a couple of other examples of that happening to her recently, with the phrases “Hobson’s choice” and “gaslighting”. “Hobson’s choice” basically means “take it or leave it” – it’s a choice of one thing, or nothing – so it’s basically an illusion of choice. It’s not really a choice at all because there’s no alternative – either you take this one thing, or you take nothing, and that’s known as Hobson’s choice. To be honest, it’s not a very common phrase so I wouldn’t worry about it too much. The other one was “gaslighting”, which means to psychologically manipulate someone into doing something by making them doubt their own sanity – so you make someone think they’re going insane in order to then take advantage of them. Like, stealing biscuits from your housemate by somehow convincing him that he’s just going mad and that maybe he’s just been eating the biscuits and forgetting about it. We give a couple of examples in the conversation.
The point is, you’ll hear us talk about how Amber recently became aware of these phrases and then started noticing them everywhere, and we have a laugh speculating about how they came into the language in the first place, but then we do start talking specifically about restaurant and hotel experiences after all that!
Right then, that’s enough of an introduction, now let’s get started properly and by the way, you can see a link to all the TripAdvisor reviews we’re talking about on the page for this episode.
From the collection “How to be British” by LGP http://www.lgpcards.com/cards-1.html
Outro
So, that was Amber and me talking about hotels and restaurants.
I’d just like to say a couple of things and ask a couple of questions at the end of the episode here.
What is your best or worst restaurant or hotel experience? Let us know in the comment section.
Thank you to all the members of the Orion Transcript Collaboration team – you’re doing a fantastic job. A google document for this episode should be available soon so you can put your name next to a 3 minute chunk and start transcribing it. We spoke pretty quickly in this one, so – may the force be with you! If you want to join the transcript collaboration then you are welcome to – everyone’s welcome. Just go to my website and click Transcript Collaboration in the main menu, all the information should be there.
We mentioned Gordon Ramsay in this conversation and since then I’ve started preparing an episode about him and his TV show “Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares” – I have used clips from his TV show in my lessons before and it was very successful, entertaining and interesting and Ramsay is quite an interesting and impressive person, not just for his approach to cooking and restaurant management, but because of his creative and compulsive use of swearing. So, expect a Gordon Ramsay episode of this podcast soon (although I haven’t actually recorded it yet).
I’m glad to see that the episodes about Limmy were popular. Do check out more of Limmy’s videos on YouTube. You’ll get used to the Glasgow dialect after a while, and I kind of think – if you can understand these different dialects of English your listening will become a superpower. Imagine being able to understand all the different versions of English, it would be amazing, and it is possible – it’s just a question of exposure and practice.
How’s your English coming along? If you set a new years resolution in January, are you keeping it up? Sometimes we all need a bit of support with our language learning, so I hope to do something motivational about that soon.
OK, time to end the episode or it’ll never end will it?! Nice one for listening to the end, have a biscuit or three, and next time you go to a hotel, make sure you check inside the kettle before you make a cup of tea…
Oooh, what a weird thought. Perhaps it’s best not to leave you with that thought. Instead you can just imagine being in the safety of your own home, where you know the kettle is completely safe and you can gaslight your housemate into buying some cake or biscuits or just cook a delicious Gordon Ramsay recipe and then settle down to watch Reservoir Dogs on the TV and then go to sleep in your own bed and just dream the night away.
On the podcast today I am talking to a friend of mine called Fred Eyangoh. English is not Fred’s first language but he’s learned it to a proficient level – enough to complete a Master’s’ program in Business Management and Marketing in English and to do regular comedy shows in English too.
I’ve invited Fred onto the podcast because I want to talk to him about, how he develops and maintains his English, what life is like in the country that he originally comes from, and we do talk about those things – Fred says some interesting points about how he’s has pushed his English on his own, but also we ended up talking about lots of other things like history, geography and cutlery (that’s knives, forks and spoons).
You’ll hear that Fred speaks with an accent which is quite difficult to put your finger on – it’s hard to identify exactly where he comes from, and I’m not going to tell you right now, because I want you to guess, based on his voice. Where do you think he comes from?
You’ll see that although it’s his second language Fred’s English is precise and accurate in terms of grammar and he uses a wide range of vocabulary, and to a large extent that is down to the way he has applied himself to his acquisition of English.
We ended up talking for about an hour and fifteen minutes in this conversation, and I’ve decided to publish all of it in this one single episode, rather than dividing it into two episodes because I think it’s best enjoyed without interruption, as one continuous flowing conversation.
OK, let’s begin. The first thing you’ll hear us talking about is the First World War, because Fred has been listening to a podcast called Hardcore History, and he’s been listening to an episode of that podcast about the First World War. Click here to check out Hardcore History with Dan Carlin about World War I.
And that is the first thing that we talk about.
Recap – What Fred said about Learning English
Let’s recap some of the things Fred said about improving your English.
Now, I know some of you are thinking – but he had some English lessons when he was 4, that’s cheating! Sure, that must have helped, but I know people who had English lessons from childhood at school but they still don’t have a great level of English. It’s not just that, it’s also the other things you do in your life.
Immerse yourself in English content that you really like – in the case of Fred it’s comedy and films. We all know about this, but it’s worth repeating. Get some English into your everyday life and make it some content that you’re fascinated by.
Notice/Track vocabulary and go the extra mile. This doesn’t just mean watching films with subtitles on. That bit of advice has been said a million times, and it is true. But while you’re watching, listening or reading you should ‘track’ the language or ‘notice’ the language while you’re consuming it. Make a point of noticing specific bits of English, like vocabulary items and then research that language by investigating it online, reading around it, finding more active examples of it using google or wikipedia. As Paul Taylor has said “Just Wikipedia it!” and it’s good advice of course when you’re doing self study. Find examples of new words and expressions, not just definitions and read plenty of examples (e.g. by using the News tab in Google search results, or by exploring Wikipedia) until you’ve made plenty of connections and associations with that new word and you know it well enough to start using it.
Work with audio and transcripts. Listen and then check out some words that you don’t know by circling or highlighting them and then researching them as we just said. For example, most TED talks have transcripts on the TED.com website. Now, we all watch TED talks from time to time, but how often are you playing around with the interactive transcripts and really exploring the vocabulary that you can find there?
Broaden your range. Push yourself to use the language you’re picking up by finding new ways to say the same thing – e.g. avoid just using the simple verbs like ‘be’ or ‘have’.
Be creative – write down your ideas. You could write some comedy, some poetry, some stories and if you feel like it, find a place where you can share your work, like a spoken word open mic night or something like that.
Socialise and be outgoing. Go out and meet people who you can speak English to. Find your own peer group for socialising in English.
OK, that’s it! Go the extra mile and push your English, but do keep enjoying it – that’s one of the most important things.
Check the website for some videos of the comedians Fred mentioned.
Join the mailing list!
Speak soon, bye!
Comedians Fred Mentioned
Fred is a great fan of comedy, and I always think that stand-up must be a great source of English you can listen to, and there’s so much of it on YouTube, and if you have Netflix you can find lots of great stand up comedy shows and they all have subtitles, so switch them on and go for it!
Here are some of the comics Fred mentioned.
Maria Bamford
She’s one of the top comedians in the USA right now. She tells stories using different voices to let us understand (and laugh at) the problems she experiences in her everyday life. She has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and obsessive compulsive disorder, and she deals with both of those subjects in the most adorable and hilarious way, changing her voice to represent the different people in her life, cleverly revealing their attitudes and treatment of Maria. This video is a good example of the way she changes her voice to become a different person in her routines.
Chris Rock
An absolute mega-legend in comedy. Brave, sharp, honest and one of the funniest stand-up comedians ever. *Warning: rude content*
Louis CK
He’s generally considered to be one of the hottest standups in the world at the moment. Comedy is a question of taste of course (and Louis talks about some quite dark, edgy and offensive subjects) but Louis is really great. *Warning: rude content
Hello and welcome back to this podcast, this ongoing project which aims to help you to improve your English by presenting you with listening content which is not just useful for practising your English listening skills, vocabulary and pronunciation but also useful for broadening your horizons just a little bit by presenting you with content you might not have otherwise discovered.
This is part 2 of a 2 part episode about British Comedy. This time I’m talking to you about one of my favourite TV shows, called Limmy’s Show – a series of bizarre and amusing sketches written and performed by Brian Limond aka Limmy, who comes from Glasgow in Scotland.
In the last episode we listened to a few sketches on YouTube featuring Limmy’s character Mr Mulvaney, the businessman who seems convinced that the police are on his tail for committing some petty shoplifting. We heard some English spoken with a Glaswegian accent and picked up a few words and expressions along the way.
This time we’re going to continue with another of Limmy’s sketches which you can find on YouTube. Whereas the Mr Mulvaney sketches featured fairly formal sounding spoken English in a Glasgow accent, the sketch in this episode features a character who speaks in a more informal way and with an accent and speech pattern that I expect you will find even stronger and more difficult to understand, which is precisely why I’ve chosen to analyse it here on the podcast. In my effort to push your English into new areas, I’m choosing to focus on some speech that you might not have been exposed to before in order to close the linguistic and cultural gaps that might exist between you and this TV comedy, which won a Scottish BAFTA twice.
The sketch we’re going to listen to now is called “Dee Dee – Yoker” which involves a character called Dee Dee who takes a bus trip to a town called Yoker.
Sketch: Dee Dee goes to Yoker (video below)
The Dee Dee sketches are possibly the best thing about Limmy’s Show. Dee Dee is basically an unemployed guy who never really leaves the house and is lost in his own world.
The sketches featuring Dee Dee are funny, but they’re perhaps closer to pathos than comedy.
Pathos is the quality in a film or play that makes people feel sadness or pity. Sometimes comedy can become pathos when it is not just funny, but also quite sad or pitiful. For example, Charlie Chaplin’s films are full of comedy, but what makes them extra special is the pathos – those moments where you feel pity for Chaplin’s character, who is basically a poverty-stricken tramp.
It’s a similar case with Dee Dee. His sketches make me laugh, but they are also terribly sad because Dee Dee is isolated, quite disturbed and unable to fully operate in society.
He basically never goes out, he spends all his time on his own at home, watching the TV and sleeping. It’s a bit sad really, because his state of mind is pretty messed up and he’s losing touch with reality. I don’t know if you know how that feels.
Imagine you’ve come down with the flu and you’re off work, sick, just staying in the house on the sofa for a long period, like a week or two. You don’t see anyone. You hardly do anything, you’re just getting over your flu, sitting on the sofa or sleeping the whole time. It starts to mess with your head a bit. The days drag on, morning drifts into the afternoon, which drifts into the evening and you haven’t left the house or even had a shower and got dressed, you’re just wrapped up in your blanket from your bed all day. Your mind starts to go a bit weird and you’re living in a daydream while everyone outside in the real world is going out working and living their lives. You’re just indoors all the time, slowly drifting away from reality.
That’s what DeeDee is all about, but I’m not sure why he’s in this situation. I think he’s just an unemployed stoner – someone who smokes too much weed or something. So, it might be about the condition of someone who smokes too much weed and as a result has lost the motivation to leave the house, get a job or sort his life out.
Every sketch with Dee Dee is like a glimpse into his spaced out mind as he completely over analyses quite trivial details in his every day life, like things he’s seen on TV or stuff that happens in his kitchen. In each episode, these trivial details become blown up into hugely significant events because of his paranoia and delusion.
In this one Dee Dee actually goes outside, in order to pick up his giro (unemployment welfare check) but takes a risk and takes an opportunity to get a free ride on a bus going to a place he’s never been before and it becomes a big adventure, even though in reality it’s not much of an adventure and most of the drama is in his own head.
With this one I’m going to read it out in my voice first so that you can understand the story, then we’ll hear the original version with Dee Dee from Glasgow.
Again, I’ve no idea what you’ll think of this, but at the least it’s just a fun little story.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jfectchNtQM
Adapted transcript (written in ‘English English’)
[So, I was walking along the street the other day to pick up my welfare check. And I passed by a couple of buses at the side of the road. Everybody’s crowding off the front and into the one behind. Old folk’ were all like, “This is ridiculous. Never used to be like this with the city buses.” I was like all like, “I see. We’ve got ourselves a breakdown.” I check to see where they’re all heading. ‘Yoker’. And I just pissed myself laughing.]
Dee Dee: “Haa~!”
[Because Yoker’s one of these places I only know from the front of a bus. I’ve never been there. Don’t know what it’s like. Just this crazy fairytale land that sounds like kinda an egg yolk. So I was watching everybody getting on, trying to show their tickets to the driver. But he wasn’t having it. Just waving them on, all like, ‘Alright I know where you all came from. I can see the other bus, what do you think I am, stupid?’ And I see the opportunity for a free ride, and a little voice in my head says, “Dee dee, I know you’ve got to get your welfare check, but that money’s always going to be there. But this, on the other hand, is a once in a lifetime opportunity. Go for it”. So I was all like…”]
Dee Dee: “Fuck it”.
[And I joined the queue. As soon as I do, the driver starts checking people’s tickets. I was all like, “Pffft, forget it”. But I just got completely caught up in the slipstream, rushing towards the moment of truth at a hundred miles an hour. Heart pounding. Pulse racing.]
Dee Dee: “I…..uh…..”
Driver: “Go ahead mate.”
Dee Dee: “Thanks, dude.”
[I did it.
So there I was on the top deck of the bus. I had a bird’s eye view. Whizzing by the unemployment office, all like – Ta ta, welfare check, maybe some other day, hmm? Because I’m on the bus. To Yoker. Couldn’t believe what I was hearing in my head. Seriously. This was actually happening! But then I thought, hold on. Don’t get too excited. There could be someone looking at the back of your head right now thinking, “Hey, who’s he? He’s not from Yoker. He’s got no business being on this bus. Let’s beat him up!” I turned round to see if anyone was looking.
Nobody. Got away with it. I totally got away with it. So I loosened up, and started chatting. ‘Thought I’d get a little bit of local knowledge before I got there.
Dee Dee: “So is this ‘bus for Yoker, right?”
Yoker Passenger: “Yep”
Dee Dee: “I’ve just moved there. Is it a nice place?”
Yoker Passenger: “Yes, it’s a wonderful place. I’ve lived there all my life. Yoker born and bred.”
Dee Dee: “So you’ve never once wondered what Yoker’s like? Mind boggling…”
[Half an hour later I start seeing the signs. Yoker newsagents. Yoker post office. Yoker F.C. Yoker everything. They even had a barber that rhymed with Yoker. “Hair by Les Porter”. What are the chances of that?]
Dee Dee: “Hey, listen. Wouldn’t it be, like, totally crazy if his name used to be Smith, or something, and he just changed it to fit in?”.
Yoker Passenger: “What?”
[Gets to the terminus. Everybody starts crowding off. I decided to ask the driver for a favor.]
Dee Dee: “Driver, when do you leave?”
Driver: “5 minutes.”
Dee Dee: “I fell asleep and missed my stop. Would it be possible for you to print me out a ticket while I go out and catch a smoke real quick? Thanks.”
[And I put my first step on to Yoker soil. I was in Yoker. I thought this day would never come. Is it really this easy? Is it really this easy to get the things you want in life? You just need to hold out for it? All of a sudden I just had the urge to be all like, “Listen, I’m not from Yoker, I’ve got no business being here”. I was like, “Calm down, Dee Dee. That’s no laughing matter. They’ll tear you to shreds. Now, you’ve got five minutes. Where do you want to go? What do you want to do… in Yoker? …I knew exactly what.
I had to. I had to find out. I couldn’t leave without finding out what this is all about. Bus was a million miles away. I thought, “Dee Dee, you are truly on the outer reaches here, dude. Middle of nowhere.” And I went into the great unknown with a fucking ding; to ask the one big question on everybody’s lips.]
Dee Dee: “Les Porter?”
Les Porter: “Yes?”
Dee Dee: “Has your name always rhymed with Yoker, or did it used to like, be like Smith or something or-?”
[And then I thought, “Dee Dee, you’ve just blown your cover. Big time. ‘Fuck you doing, dude? Go. Go!” Got out of there before they started throwing their scissors at me like Ninja stars. Before Big Les scalped me and stuck my head on the wall. Ten seconds to get to that bus man, that’s your lifelife! What does it start doing? It starts moving. I was like that, “No way, bro!” I felt like giving up. “Hey, I’m not from Yoker, I’ve got no business being in Yoker”. Let them finish me off like a pack of crazy wolves. But I just kept running for my life like I had Leatherface on my tail. I get to the bus but he wouldn’t let us in. I was all like, “Set up! ‘Whole thing’s a set up. Those people that were on that front bus? Actors. Actors! ‘Every single one of them, actors.” Door opens and I bolt upstairs. Right under the seat. Didn’t dare poke my head up for the next half hour in case they were going by in a minibus. Eager to feast on me like a group of crazy zombie pirates.
Picked a moment. Up the road. Up the stairs. In the house. Lock. Lock. Lock. Scary, dude. Scary.
Original transcript (in Glaswegian English)
[Fucking, heading to the brew, heading to get my giro. And I pass this couple of buses at the side of the road. Everybody’s piling off the front and into the one behind. Old folk’ like that, “This is ridiculous. Never used to be like this with the corporation buses.” I was like that, “I see. We’ve got ourselves a breakdown.” I check to see where they’re all heading. ‘Yoker’. And I just pissed myself laughing.]
Dee Dee: “Haa~!”
[Because Yoker’s one of these places I only know from the front of a bus. I’ve never been there. Don’t know what it’s like. Just this pure, mad fabled land that sounds like
a pure, mad egg yolk. So I was watching everybody getting on, trying to show their tickets to the driver. But he wasn’t having it. Just waving them on like that, ‘Alright I know what you’s came from. I can see the bus, what do you think I am, daft?’. And a wee voice in my head says, “Dee dee, I know you’ve got to get your giro, but the brew’s always going to be there. But this, on the other hand, is a once in a lifetime opportunity. Go for it”. So I just went like that…”]
Dee Dee: “Fuck it”.
[And I joined the queue. As soon as I do, the driver starts checking people’s tickets. I was like that, “Oh here, forget it”. But I just got pure caught up in the slipstream, belting towards the moment of truth at a hundred mile an hour. Heart pounding. Pulse racing.]
Dee Dee: “What it is is-”
Driver: “On you go, mate.”
Dee Dee: “Cheers.”
[I did it.
So there I was. Bird’s eye view. Whizzing by the brew like that. Ta ta giro, maybe some other day, eh? Because I’m on the bus. To Yoker. Couldn’t believe what I was hearing
in my head, man. Seriously. This was actually happening! But then I thought, hold on. Don’t get too excited. There could be someone looking at the back of your nut right now thinking, “Here, who’s he? He’s not from Yoker. He’s got no business being on this bus. Get his head kicked, man.” I turned round to see if anyone was looking.
Nobody. Got away with it. Just pure got away with the lot of it. So I loosened up, and started chatting. ‘Thought I’d get a wee bit of local knowledge before I got there.
Dee Dee: “So is this ‘bus for Yoker, aye?”
Yoker Passenger: “Aye”
Dee Dee: “I’ve just moved there. Is it any good?”
Yoker Passenger: “Aye, it’s a lovely place. I’ve lived there all my life. Yoker born and bred.”
Dee Dee: “So you’ve never once wondered what Yoker’s like? Mind boggling…”
[Half an hour later I start seeing the signs. Yoker newsagents. Yoker post office. Yoker F.C. Yoker everything. They even had a barber that rhymed with Yoker. “Hair by Les Porter”. What are the chances of that?]
Dee Dee: “Here y’ ‘are. What’s the betting his name used to be Smith, or something, and he just changed it to fit in?”.
Yoker Passenger: “What?”
[Gets to the terminus. Everybody starts piling off. I hit the driver with my charms.]
Dee Dee: “Driver, when do you leave?”
Driver: “5 minutes.”
Dee Dee: “I conked out and missed my stop. Any chance you could print us out a ticket so I can nip off for a fag? Cheers.”
[And I put my first step on to Yoker soil. I was in Yoker. I thought this day would never come. Is it really this easy? Is it really this easy to get the things you want in life? You just need to hold out for it? All of a sudden I just had the urge to go like that, “Here, I’m not from Yoker, I’ve got no business being here”. I was like, “Calm it, Dee Dee. That’s no laughing matter. They’ll tear you to shreds. Now, you’ve got five minutes. Where do you want to go? What do you want to do… in Yoker? …I knew exactly what.
I had to. I had to find out. I couldn’t leave without finding out what this is all about. Bus was a million miles away. I thought, “Dee Dee, you are truly on the outer reaches here, man. Middle of nowhere.” And I went into the great unknown with a fucking ding; to ask the one big question on everybody’s lips.]
Dee Dee: “Les Porter?”
Les Porter: “Aye?”
Dee Dee: “Has your name always rhymed with Yoker, or did it used to like, be like Smith or something or-?”
[And then I thought, “Dee Dee, you’ve just blown your cover. Big time. ‘Fuck you playing at, man? Go. Go!” Got out of there before they started chucking their scissors at us like Ninja stars. Before Big Les scalped us and stuck my head on the wall. Ten seconds to get to that bus man, that’s your lifelife! What does it start doing? It starts moving. I was like that, “No, man!” I felt like giving up. “Here, I’m not from Yoker, I’ve got no business being in Yoker”. Let them finish me off like a pack of mad wolves. But I just kept running for my life like I had Leatherface on my tail. I get to the bus but he wouldn’t let us in. I was like that, “Set up! ‘Whole thing’s a set up. Them that were on that front bus? Actors. Actors! ‘Lot of them, actors.” Door opens and I bolt upstairs. Right under the seat. Didn’t dare poke my head up for the next half hour in case they were going by in a minibus. Gasping to feast on me like a shower of mad zombie pirates.
Picked a moment. Up the road. Up the stairs. In the house. Lock. Lock. Lock. Scary, man. Scary.
But the best day of my life.]
Here’s a version with subtitles in ‘English English’
If you can’t see the subtitles, you can switch them on using the little button at the bottom of the video – the one that looks like a little white box with some dots and lines in it.
Nae Clue (No clue)
How I would say it (English RP version)
Do you ever get the feeling that you don’t really know what you’re doing, in general? Has anybody ever asked you, “What did you do that for?” and you’re like “I don’t know”. Have you ever worn something that you thought looked good, and everyone else thought looked crap? Have you ever said yes to something, to which you should have said no? Something you really didn’t want to do. You were asked the question and you thought “No, no way” but out came “Yeah, alright, why not?” In fact, do you ever get the feeling that from the day you’re born until the day you die, you haven’t got a clue what you’re doing? Do you? Yes, well, join the club.
Limmy Version (Glasgow dialect)
Do you ever get the feeling that you don’t really know whit yer dain, in general? Has anbody ever asked you, ‘whit did ye dae that for?’ And yer like that ‘a dunno.’ Have you ever worn something that you thought looked good, and everyone else thought looked crap? Have you ever said aye to something, to which you should’ve said naw? Someting you really didny wantae dae. You were asked the question and you thought ‘naw no way’ but oot came ‘aye awright, why not.’ In fact do you ever get the feeling that from the day you’re born till the day you die, you hivny got a clue whit yer dain? Dae ye? Aye well here, join the club.
Talking to Andy Johnson and Ben Butler about teaching English to millennials, cross-cultural experiences we’ve had as English teachers and some funny stories about Andy.
Before we get started here I would just like to remind you that The London School of English, where I used to work, is running a promotion for my listeners, and for a limited time you can get 10% off all their online courses, and those are proper, extensive, professionally developed courses for general English, business English, IELTS and TOEIC exam preparation, legal English and English for other specific purposes. So, if you or perhaps someone else you know is looking for a decent online course that will arm you with practical skills and language you need to be competitive in English – check out London School of English Online at www.londonschoolonline.com and use the offer code LUKE10 at checkout to get your discount.
Intro
OK here is part 2 of this conversation which I recorded with Andy & Ben in a hotel lounge recently. If you haven’t listened to part 1 yet, you might want to check that one out first. At the end of part 1 we paused the podcast in order to buy another overpriced and undersized beer from the hotel bar, and in this part we’ve bought our tiny, expensive beers and we then continue the podcast by discussing Andy’s presentation on the subject of millennials. Millennials – that generation who came into adulthood in the 21st century. This generation that so many people have written about and done management training seminars about. This generation of young people who have been labelled by some as lazy, entitled, self-centred, distracted by technology and hard to manage. This group of people that probably makes up the majority of my audience. This generation of people that probably includes you! What do you think? Is that a fair assessment? Are millennials lazy, entitled, self-centred, distracted by technology and hard to manage? Or is this just small-minded prejudice against a younger generation that’s facing just as many challenges as previous generations, but just in ways that are harder to notice?
And, how should we be teaching this generation in our English language classes? So, there’s some discussion on that – because that’s how we like to spend our Friday evenings, clearly! As you’ll hear the conversation does turn into a kind of anecdote sharing session about some cultural misunderstandings we’ve experienced as English teachers and then there are plenty of other tangents, including some detailed descriptions of what we all look like and how we’re dressed and one particularly funny story from Andy near the end of the episode … you know what? I don’t need to tell you everything you’re going to hear in this episode, do I? I don’t need to go into all the details. All you need to know is that it’s going to be brilliant and even more amazing and awesome than the last one, so strap in, let’s fly back the hotel lounge in Paris on a Friday evening, in the not too distant past, with some mini bottles of beer with giant prices and here we go.
***
Moby and Richard Ashcroft
I have to say it was a lot of fun to have Andy & Ben on the podcast. I hope you enjoyed it too.
London School Online
Don’t forget that you can get 10% off all the online courses run by The London School of English by going to www.londonschoolonline.com and using the offer code LUKE10 at checkout.
Andy & Luke’s Presentation at The BESIG Symposium 2012
Andy’s Presentation about Millennials
Here are the slides which Andy used in his presentation about millennials. This might not make sense without Andy talking, but you can see some of the statistics, quotes and facts that relate to this subject. Click the –> arrow to move between the slides.
Talking to Andy Johnson and Ben Butler from The London School of English about many things including teaching English for specific purposes, and a couple of funny anecdotes.
This episode features a conversation with my good friends Andy Johnson and Ben Butler who I used to work with at The London School of English. You’re going to hear us talking about lots of different things in this episode, including a few funny old anecdotes, some descriptions of the unusual location in which we were recording and then some discussion about English teaching methods.
The London School of English, where they both work, is known as the world’s oldest accredited language school and they’ve been teaching English as a foreign language to adults there for over 100 years (not Andy and Ben, but the school itself) LSE is generally known for the high standards of its training courses and in my experience it was a good place to work as a teacher. I was there for over 6 years and it’s where I had some of my best and most formative English teaching experiences. I’ve worked at a lot of English schools, some of them good and some of them not so good, and LSE is definitely one of the good ones. I learned a great deal about English teaching from my colleagues there and from my time spent in classrooms teaching various courses.
Andy, Ben and I all joined London School of English as teachers at around the same time and we regularly worked together on projects, sharing classes, developing courses, writing material and just hanging out in the pub a lot after work. I imagine that some of you listening to this might have studied at London School of English too, perhaps with me or with Ben or Andy. If you are a London School of English student, then hello!
Andy and Ben were both really helpful when I started doing this podcast back in 2009, by generally giving advice and ideas. I left London School of English in 2012 when I moved to France so these days I don’t get to see Andy & Ben as much as I would like so I was very glad to see them and have them on the podcast again as you will hear in this episode.
In the last few years Andy & Ben have both been promoted to senior positions at the school. Ben is now the Academic Manager at their centre in Hammersmith, which is just a couple of minutes walk from where I used to live in London. In fact my flat was so close to the school that I could actually see my own front door from inside one of the classrooms when I was teaching. I could actually stand inside my own flat, and look through the peephole in the door and see the school. You might think that’s living a bit too close to your workplace but it had its advantages. It certainly cut down my commute in the mornings. I would sometimes even take my breakfast to work with me in the morning if I was running a bit late. I’d literally walk to school with my bowl of cornflakes and finish it in the teachers’ room to save time. I felt like I practically lived in the school. So, Ben is now in charge of that centre near Hammersmith, and Andy is now in charge of London School Online, and that’s their web platform, because you don’t actually need to go to London to study at London School of English, you can take one of their online courses, and if you’re looking for a good quality and reliable online course in general or business English you might consider a course on London School Online.
And as a matter of fact since recording this episode, Andy and I have managed to work out a little deal that you might be interested in. “What’s the deal, Luke?” you might be asking. Well, Andy is offering you a 10% discount on all their online courses. So, for a limited time you can get a 10% discount on all online courses at London School of English.
Now, that’s not the reason Andy & Ben are on this podcast today, we worked out this offer after doing the recording, and I’m just telling you about it now before the episode starts properly because I think you genuinely might want to check that out. They have fully-developed and in-depth courses for general English, business English, legal English, IELTS and TOEIC exam preparation, and more… So, these are carefully prepared online courses, from a really good school – and if you or someone you know is looking for an online course in English then this might be for you, and that discount is available for you because you know about this podcast.
All you need to do is go to londonschoolonline.com and use the offer code LUKE10 at checkout to get a 10% discount, and that works on all their courses.
http://www.londonschoolonline.com and use the offer code “LUKE10” at checkout.
Alright, now let’s start the episode properly!
***
Outro
Actually, this is a natural place for me to divide this episode. So that’s the end of part 1.
Part 2 should be available very soon for your listening enjoyment.
That pretty much wraps up part 1 of this episode.
Thanks for listening, and as ever, thank you for your messages. I’m glad to hear from random people from around the world who get in touch every day. Sorry if I don’t get a chance to get back to you all.
I’m quite curious to know if any of my former students from London School of English are listening to this episode. If you are, then get in touch! It’s been over 10 years since I started working there and I met loads of different students from around the world – so many interesting people from different backgrounds. If that’s you then get in touch.
Lots of people told me they enjoyed listening to Korean Billy in the last episode. Nice one.
Episode Length
Episodes are getting a bit longer again! Judging by comments on the website and emails I receive, people are fine with that. To be honest, most of the time it’s people who haven’t listened to the podcast who tell me that episodes are long. People expect podcasts for learning English to be short. Anyway, most people who actually listen say they like the longer episodes, but maybe that’s because they actually listen! Those people who stop listening because episodes are a bit long for them probably wouldn’t write a comment. Anyway, I go back to my original position on this: I feel longer episodes are completely normal in other podcasts (in fact many of my favourites have episodes of 2 hours or more), radio shows are usually about an hour long or more, many listeners tell me they like the longer episodes, I think it’s better for your English to listen for longer, you can use the pause button if you want, most podcasting apps will save your position so you can continue later, the most popular episodes of last year were all more than 75 minutes long, and in any case – why would you want less of this!? Maybe that sounds a bit self-important or something, but whatever – if you like it you like it and so that’s that. OK, enough rambling – this is the end of part 1, and this will all continue in part 2 – which you should look forward to because there are some good moments, particularly a couple of stories from Andy which I always enjoy hearing.
Part 2 should be available really soon
Join the mailing list on the website to get an email in your inbox whenever I publish a new episode. That’s a good way to stay up-to-date with the podcast. Also, you can subscribe on iTunes or any other podcasting app, although if you’re in the mailing list you’ll get instant access to the website page for the episode where you’ll find notes, transcriptions, links, videos, the comment section and other extra details.
Talking to Billy from Korea about his videos about regional British dialects and accents.
[DOWNLOAD]
Today on the podcast I’m very glad to be talking to the one and only Korean Billy.
You might already know about Korean Billy because he has recently made a name for himself on YouTube by producing videos about British English dialects showing and explaining specific words, phrases and accents you might hear in different parts of the UK, and they’re proving to be very popular, especially with people in Britain. I think the appeal of his videos is that although Billy is from another country, he’s really managed to identify a lot of the specific dialect words and pronunciation of these forms of British English that even some Brits aren’t that familiar with. Also, he just seems like a really nice guy who is not only enthusiastic about understanding different local dialects of British English but also helping other people to understand them too.
Billy used to live as a student in England. In fact he studied at university in Preston in the north of England for a few months where he met people from many parts of the country and then he started making YouTube videos about British dialects last year.
In the last few months his videos have gone viral, particularly in Britain, and he’s been featured on websites like BuzzFeed as well as on various radio and television programmes in England including several BBC programmes. He’s most famous in the UK for his videos on Scouse, Geordie, Mancunian and “Roadman” dialects. The Scouse dialect is from Liverpool, the Geordie dialect is from Newcastle, the Mancunian dialect is from Manchester and “Roadman” is a kind of dialect associated with groups of young people in London. Since recording this conversation Billy has uploaded videos about Hull dialect words and Birmingham dialect words. He’s also got some videos which feature some good clear advice for other people learning English as a foreign language, based on his own learning experiences.
I’m interviewing him on the podcast because I think he’s a really clever guy who has learned English to a good standard and he knows a lot about British accents and dialects. I want to know more about how he has done that, and I just love regional accents so I think it could just be a lot of fun to talk to Billy about this whole subject.
Let’s now talk to Korean Billy.
* * *
If you want to hear Billy doing those British regional dialects and learn about them yourself, then check out Billy’s YouTube videos. Click here for Billy’s YouTube channel
What do you think?
As a Brit, I’m interested in Billy’s work, but I wonder what you think, because you’re approaching this subject from a different point of view, as foreigners who don’t have English as a first language (most of you) and who might not be so familiar with these specific versions of British English.
How do you feel about this? What I hope is that you feel inspired by Billy, and you feel like he’s a good example of an English language learner, and that he shows that if you’re enthusiastic and outgoing about learning English and if you apply yourself to your learning that you can make heaps of progress. I also hope that although you might not want to speak with a Scouse accent or a Geordie accent, that you’re still curious about these different varieties of British English. I think that knowing the different versions of the language helps you to develop a fully rounded and solid English, and that involves not only listening to different accents but also trying to copy those accents. It’s all good for raising your awareness of features of pronunciation and improving the range of your English in general.
Jimmy Carr explains how to do some British accents, including Scouse “I want some chicken and a can of coke” (Billy mentioned this in our converstion)
Also mentioned
Misfits (TV show) – Features lots of different UK accents and some *explicit content*
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bow2df3rOls
Attack the Block (Film) – South London youth dialect
What have you been thinking while listening to this episode?
Whoever you are, wherever you are – let us know your thoughts in the comment section.
Thanks to Korean Billy for taking part in this episode.
POST-RAMBLE
Some more thoughts, from me to you, at the end of this episode…
I just want to mention a few other things that might make you think a little bit.
LEPster Get-Togethers
I recently got this message from Nick Wooster, one of the guys who has been organising Get Togethers with other LEPsters in Moscow. This is basically his report about the get togethers.
Thanks for your interest in our meetings, Luke! It’s really important and pleasant for us! Almost like a virtual participation :) Actually, on average 10 people “get together” in our meetings! And it’s nice to know that there are already some regular LEPsters who come almost every time! BTW, are there really 50/50 males and females among your listeners?! According to our modest stats we have 80 males to 20% females here in Moscow:) Probably the fact that you are already married somehow influences, doesn’t it?
Activities. At the very beginning newcomers tell the rest of the group about themselves and how they happened to start listening to you:) After that we shift to the main topic mentioned in the agenda – each one shares his/her opinion and the others ask several questions or give comments if they have some. Usually the discussion is quite lively and not a mess. I mean, we do without loud interruption or arguing, while the talk is quite interactive itself, which is surprisingly good for people from diverse backgrounds who hardly know each other! We also share our own life stories connected with the topics. Next time we are going to play a lying game (to guess if smb.’s story is true or false) at the very beginning – it should be fun and also a good chance to work on our speaking skills. Also, Luke, if you have some ideas, pieces of advice, maybe just interesting and effective games or whatever we would be grateful to you for sharing best practices:) with us!
We also publish on FB and VK the links to useful resources discussed at the get-togethers.
Most of the participants have known about these meetings due to your announcement of the first one. That’s why we were thinking if we could ask you to announce that our Get-Togethers are already regular! Currently we meet every Sunday at 6 pm. The best way to be informed of agenda, place and time is to join our groups on FB https://m.facebook.com/groups/734996946664425?ref=bookmarks and VK http://www.vk.com/clubnu1
Previously as far as I remember we and you posted links for a particular event, if LEPsters join the group, they will be always aware of all the events. Everybody is welcome!
All in all, current Moscow LEPsters are really glad that we have such a club now and can share their thoughts on topics you have raised in your episodes and generally just speak English with like-minded people! Thank you, Luke, for such an opportunity;)
Nick.
P.S. Regards from my friend Dmitry who also contacted you!
Hello Nick, hello Dmitry and hello to all the other listeners who have got together recently in a conversation club. It’s odd, normally I imagine my listeners as individuals on their own, but I suppose there are some people out there who listen as a shared experience with other people, not necessarily at the same time, but there are other people you know who also listen – so I just want to say a special hello to listeners who listen with other people – like, if you listen with a brother or sister “Hello”, if you listen with your husband, wife, boyfriend of girlfriend “hello”, if you listen with your kids or parents, “hello” and if you listen with your teacher or some classmates or something, then “hello” to you too. If you listen with a pet animal or even a wild animal “hello”, and if you listen with friends or indeed any other living beings, then “hello” to you – the communal LEPsters out there.
My thoughts on LEP Get Togethers
I want to encourage this sort of thing in general. Meeting publicly, or meeting online. Let’s be clear about it – what you’re doing is creating your own peer group for improving your English, and that’s a really important part of your English learning.
The more I speak to people who have learned English to a proficient level, the more I notice that one of the habits or features of their learning was the fact that they spent regular time with a group of friends who talked in English. For example, there’s Kristina from Russia – a good example, but also Korean Billy and plenty of other people. Another thing worth noticing about this is that you don’t necessarily have to be hanging around with native speakers. Just spending meaningful and enjoyable time in the company of others and doing it in English, building friendly relationships and all that – it’s all very good for your English, even if you’re not mixing with native speakers. If you’re getting exposure to English in your life, having a peer group to interact with is going to allow you to develop your communication skills as a natural social process. So I fully agree with the idea of these get togethers and I think it’s great!
Also, the more my listeners get together in local communities like this, the easier it might be for me to come and visit at some point and put on a show or have a live podcast recording or something. So, carry on everyone, you’re doing it right!
Several Get Togethers have also happened between LEPsters in Tokyo and in London if I remember correctly. So it’s not just the Moscow LEPsters. And you could do it too in your town. Just set up an FB page and let me know, I’ll give you some publicity if I can.
What to talk about or do?
Playing a game or having a topic – good ideas, definitely. I recommend using all your creativity, playing the lying game for fun or any other parlour games like the name game for example. Also, consider playing different board games in English too. As long as you’re having a relaxing and pleasant time and you’re exchanging information in English, it’s good.
One idea is simply to agree on your topic beforehand and simply write down a load of discussion questions relating to that topic. Then you can fall back on those questions if you need to. You can just let the conversation go wherever it feels like going, but go back to the questions if you want.
Be interested in what the others are saying. Really interesting people are interested in others. It’s important to create an atmosphere in which people listen to each other – this is really important because it makes people feel valued, and when you really listen to what people are trying to say and you show your interest in those people, it’s like giving water to a plant – it just helps it grow. Imagine you’re in a social situation. If you feel like people are interested and listening, you’ll feel far more comfortable and ready to talk. So, listen to each other and remember that everyone’s got a story to tell, you just need to be ready to notice it. So, your get-togethers are not just speaking sessions, they’re listening sessions too.
It might be worth assigning a leader to each session who is generally in charge of things, but also each participant should take the initiative to ask questions and start conversations and things, but of course it shouldn’t feel like a role or a job, just let it happen naturally.
Just have fun and keep me informed about how it’s all going!
I encourage other people to set up their own conversation groups. I’m calling them “Get-Togethers” – what do you think of that? Do you think the name works? You could call them Meetups, or Gatherings or Meetings or whatever you like really.
I just want to remind you that this sort of thing used to happen every week online on Skype in the ChatCast which was setup by Guillaume from Switzerland. It was basically a Skype group that recorded their group conversations and also published it as a podcast. I appeared on it a few times. They picked a different topic each week and just discussed it in a friendly and open way. The ChatCast is having a break at the moment but you can hear some of the episodes in the ChatCast archive at http://chatcast.ch/
There was also an LEP Whatsapp group and an LEP Skype group that used to share contact details in my website forum. I have closed the forum now because I streamlined my website recently, but I don’t know if the WhatsApp group and Skype groups are still running. So, if you are still chatting to other LEPsters as part of a conversation group on Whatsapp or Skype, please let me know because I can find a way for you to continue to share your contact details with each other on my website. I still have an archive of the Forum posts about the skype and whatsapp groups by the way.
There are lots of LEP related projects going on and I think it’s cool.
The comment section, with lots of friendly chatting about episodes, the topics of episodes and other tangents.
The LEP Get Togethers.
The Transcript Collaboration – run by The Orion Team – an awesome band of podcast listeners who work together to transcribe episodes of this podcast and proofread each others’ work.
Podcasts done by listeners to this podcast (although I can’t claim credit for all of them of course) but still, it’s great that they’re doing it. Notable ones of the moment are Zdenek’s English Podcast and Daniel Goodson’s My Fluent Podcast. There was also Chriss’ English Podcast and Guillaume’s Engilsh Podcast as well as the Chatcast and I’m sure I’m forgetting someone else.
Podcasting is brilliant anyway and of course I recommend that you try it, experiment with it and have fun. And of course Korean Billy could be an inspiration to you. You could consider sharing your learning experiences on your own YouTube channel. You might catch people’s attention, and who knows what cool things could happen to you. At the very least you’ll practise your English a lot.
All right, thanks for listening. This podcasting thing is pretty amazing isn’t it? Yes it is. OK good, I’m glad you agree. I’ll speak to you soon. Bye!
Here’s the final part in this trilogy of episodes recorded at my parents’ house on Boxing Day. In this one my mum, dad and brother tell us a few more anecdotes about their encounters with some well-known people.
The conversation you’re about to hear was recorded with my family on the same day as the last couple of episodes. It was quite late in the evening, after my uncle and aunt had gone home and after dinner and number drinks had been consumed. Picture a very warm and cosy living room with a wood burning stove going in the background.
After listening to Nic describing his encounters with some famous rock stars earlier in the day, the other members of my family wanted to get in on the action too with their stories about brushing shoulders with the stars. So here are a few other anecdotes from my dad, my brother and my mum.
It turns out that my family have met some genuine legends. I didn’t even realise that a couple of these things had happened. You’ll have to wait and see who they are. But here are some slightly cryptic clues.
Can you guess which people I’m talking about?
One of the UK’s favourite authors who wrote a series of beloved books which have also been made into successful films.
A British comic actor who likes eating ice-creams and fighting zombies, criminals and aliens, in his movies (not real life of course).
A small but very important woman who often appears in public but is also a very private person.
A nonagenarian who once said that he was “the only man in the country not allowed to give his name to his own children.” A nonagenerian is someone in their nineties – also, septuagenarian (70s) and octogenarian (80s).
There are others too, including an American punk rock star with lots of tattoos and muscles, a Shakespearean actor who has become a successful film director and an actor who had a bit part in the British TV series The Office.
I should perhaps remind you of several other anecdotes which you might have heard on this podcast before, which are mentioned in this conversation.
The time my brother ended up lost in Hastings and slept on a stranger’s sofa and woke up to discover the guy sitting in a chair next to him. Was the guy just friendly and welcoming, or slightly creepy? Originally told by my bro in this episode https://teacherluke.co.uk/2016/08/09/372-the-importance-of-anecdotes-in-english-narrative-tenses-four-anecdotes
The time my mum met the King of Tonga. Originally told in this episode too https://teacherluke.co.uk/2016/08/09/372-the-importance-of-anecdotes-in-english-narrative-tenses-four-anecdotes
The time I met comedian Eddie Izzard and was a bit lost for words. I sort of went to pieces a bit and made it really awkward and weird by saying “You’re in my head!” – not the right thing to say at all. Originally told be me in this episode https://teacherluke.co.uk/2014/06/10/184-lukes-d-day-diary-part-2/
Anyway, you can now sit back and enjoy some more time with The Thompsons.
***
Outro Transcript + ad-libs
Funny, isn’t he? My brother. I would like him to be on the podcast more often, if he’s up for it. The thing is that he’s a bit modest really and isn’t the sort of outgoing person who likes to broadcast his thoughts and opinions over the internet, although he obviously should because he’s got a lot to offer. He ought to do a podcast or something like that, right? He does have a YouTube channel but it’s mainly skateboarding. https://www.youtube.com/user/VideoDaze/videos
*All the background music in this episode was also made by James*
The people mentioned in this episode
J.R.R. Tolkien, author of The Lord of the Rings
Nick Frost, actor from the Cornetto Trilogy of films with Edgar Wright and Simon Pegg and other great work too on TV and in films
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