Hello, and welcome to bonus episode number 149 of the Q -Loops English podcast. How's it going?
My name's Andrew. I'm your host and your English study buddy, and I'm back here for another week of learning English with you.
Let's do it together.
If you're new to our series, let me quickly explain what I do here each and every week in the bonus episodes.
I just hang out with you, and I tell you a story from my everyday life.
I'm a Canadian guy, but I live abroad in Seoul, South Korea and have for many years.
And the goal here, what I'm trying to help you do is Big B.
That is our motto for this series.
It stands for build your fluency, increase your cultural knowledge, grow your vocabulary, and become a clearer and better English communicator.
So if those are some of the things that you want to do with your English, then I'm going to try my best to help you achieve those goals.
Don't forget there's a free interactive transcript and vocabulary glossary for this episode that you can get by following the link in the description.
Plus, if you're a Q -Lips member, you'll also get a comprehension quiz.
Visit our website, Q -Lips .com, to sign up and become a member today.
And thanks to all the members out there for your support.
Guys, we couldn't do Q -Lips without you, so thank you so much. Okay, it's time to get started with this week's story.
And this one is all about my eyes.
My eyes. If you're watching the YouTube version of this episode, then you can see that I don't wear glasses and I also don't wear contacts either.
Although I'm 41 years old, I guess I've been kind of lucky with my eyes that I see pretty well.
And to be honest with you, that's always been a little bit of a disappointment to me.
I always thought that it would be cool to wear glasses, especially because I work in education and I'm kind of nerdy.
So I thought that wearing glasses would give me that sophisticated, refined, academic look.
And so I always wanted to wear a pair of glasses, but never have had the bad eyes to be able to justify doing that.
So I guess that's a good thing in the end that my eyes are healthy.
But this week, I had an eye health scare.
So as many QLips listeners will know, I'm a runner and I really enjoy running.
These days, I've actually been running about seven days a week.
I'm out there each and every day.
And yeah, I love it.
I'm really trying hard not to talk too much about running on QLips.
But it takes up about an hour to an hour and a a half of my every day usually like the free time that I have in my day is spent running actually so I do do it a lot and I've just been really really enjoying running lately here in Seoul the weather is getting pretty hot actually today is like 30 over 30 degrees celsius I think so it's getting right to the point now where it's a little bit uncomfortable to run but for the last six weeks or so it's been perfect.
Not too hot, not too cold, no rain, nice just great running weather.
So like I mentioned I've been out there each and every day and as I've talked about on Qloops before I often go running on these paths that are throughout the city that run beside these little creeks or streams and these streams I think are mostly just like drainage systems but they also double as really wonderful places to go for a walk or a bike ride or a run.
And because these running paths are beside the streams, that means that there are many animals and birds and insects that live in the streams and the surrounding ecosystems. So actually, you know, Seoul is a really big mega city and unfortunately there are not too many opportunities to see wildlife in the city.
However, running by these streams each and every day, I get to see some animals and birds and insects that I wouldn't see in other parts of the city.
I've seen big herons.
I've seen raccoon dogs.
I've seen rats. I've seen all sorts of interesting creatures that I don't think I would see in other parts of the city.
I even saw a deer one time, so that was pretty incredible.
Anyways, my point here is that because the running paths are near Near the streams, then there are plants and animals and insects that occupy these areas as well.
We have to share the paths with nature.
And as it turns from winter to spring and into summer, then the insects come out.
And I guess last week while I was out for a run, I ran through a swarm of these little tiny bugs.
I have no idea what these bugs are called.
You get these big swarms of them.
almost like a cloud of these really, really tiny flying bugs.
And they suck because you can't really see them, they're almost invisible.
And you don't really know that you're among them until you're into the swarm.
So they're like this invisible cloud, maybe hundreds or 1000s of them flying together.
And it's not until you're in the midst of them in the middle of them that you realize, oh my god, there's bugs all over the place.
and now they're not like everywhere on the paths they're just in certain areas so usually when I go out for a run maybe I'll encounter one of these swarms sometimes and usually I know where they are too like it seems like every day they hang out in the same spot so sometimes I'm able to know where they are and predict where they are and run around them but the other day I went running on a path that I don't usually go running on and not very often at least and it was just around 7 p .m when I was running so the sun had set or was setting and it was turning dark and becoming the evening and the night
and so I wasn't wearing any sunglasses usually if I go running in the day sometimes not usually sometimes I'll wear sunglasses if it's really sunny out but otherwise wise i don't wear any sunglasses especially at like 7 p .m late at night i don't know just kind of looks silly right to wear your sunglasses at night and then also it's more difficult to see so really there's no function other than to try and look cool and i don't think it looks cool so why would i do that so yeah of course i don't have any sunglasses on i'm on a path that I don't usually run.
And what happened? Boom, I ran through one of these massive swarms of little insects.
And they got all over me.
It was terrible. Like, after I ran through this big insect cloud, I could see on my arms and on my forehead and on my legs, I had these little dead bug bodies.
Now they're super, super small, like just a millimeter across.
But you can see them on your skin.
They're like these little black dots.
So I had to brush all of the dead bugs off me.
I guess I killed a bunch of them running through their swarm.
So sorry to the bugs.
I would have preferred if we both hadn't run into each other, but that's just the way it went down.
So yeah, I actually ate some of them too.
Like some of them went in my mouth, all my skin, all my forehead.
And of course I'm running, so I'm quite sweaty.
So they all stick to me.
So So it was really disgusting, this terrible experience, eating a little bit of extra protein that I wasn't intending, getting them on my skin.
But worst of all is I felt like some went into my eyes.
And now I have rather long eyelashes.
Maybe if you're watching the YouTube, you can see, I'm not sure, but my eyelashes are quite long.
And so I thought that my eyelashes did a pretty good job at like filtering the bugs out because because I could feel them in my eye.
But I didn't think that they actually went into my eyeball area that they just sort of got caught in my eyelashes.
And I was trying to get them out, but was a little bit difficult.
Because of course, I'm sweaty, and I got sweat on my forehead, sweat on my everywhere pretty much when I run.
And so I tried my best to like get them out of my eye.
And I felt like I got them out of my eyes.
Okay. And then of course, as soon as I got home, I took a shower and cleaned up and didn't really think any more about it.
I thought the problem was totally solved that I was now fresh and clean.
And yeah, I moved on with my life.
Well, the next day I woke up and my eyes, both of my eyes were extremely, extremely bloodshot, like super, super, super red bloodshot is what we call when the white parts the regular parts of your eyes that are white when those eyeballs turn really really red that is bloodshot so my eyes were extremely bloodshot and I actually didn't notice I guess it's not one of my habits in life to wake up and look in the mirror so I didn't really notice I woke up first and had some coffee and walked the dog and came came back home and I think my wife was waking up and she saw me and she's like, what happened
to your eyes? I was like, oh my gosh, I went into the look in the mirror.
And I was surprised as well, because they didn't feel irritated or dry or anything like that.
They were just extremely, extremely bloodshot.
So my wife has like some eye drops, some artificial tears.
She recommended putting some in my eyes.
And so I tried that and didn't really improve at all.
They were just bloodshot.
And so my wife suggested that I go to the doctor to see the doctor and get my eyes checked out.
And my natural instinct whenever my wife says go to the doctor or anybody tells me to go to the doctor is usually like, okay, but I'm going to give it a day first. Like I don't really feel too bad.
They probably just got irritated from the run and it doesn't look so bad.
So yeah, Yeah, if they start to become itchy or painful or any problem develops, then of course, I'll go to the doctor right away.
But if it's just red, I'll just wait a bit and see how the situation develops.
If it doesn't get better after a day or so, then I'll go to the doctor.
That day, I also had a pretty full plate on my schedule and couldn't really make the time to go to the doctor to be honest with you.
So it was kind of a two for one.
I had two reasons not to go to the doctor my stubbornness and also my schedule.
So I went about my day and everybody that I met that day was like, Andrew, what's up with your eyes?
Are you OK? Did you stay up all night partying?
Did you sleep like they were concerned?
And it looked like I just hadn't got any sleep at all.
And yeah, everybody told me, Andrew, you must have an allergy or something like your eyes look extremely irritated, you should go to the doctor.
And so I decided at that time, okay, I must go to the doctor as soon as I possibly can.
Because everybody's concerned about me.
And honestly, I looked a little crazy.
Like when I looked at myself in the mirror, I was like, this is not good.
This really doesn't look natural.
Like it looked really, really strange just to have all the white parts of your eyes be that kind of dark red color that super, super bloodshot look.
And so I looked pretty scary.
And I started to feel self conscious as well.
Like I had things that I couldn't change in my schedule that day.
So I had to do them.
But I was very self conscious.
And I wish I could have just worn my sunglasses the whole day.
But yeah, anyways, by the end of the day, the situation hadn't improved.
But luckily, the next morning, I had some free time in my schedule.
So I went to bed and was hoping that maybe if I just got a good night's sleep that they would clear up on their own however when i woke up the next day situation was still the same and they started feeling itchy and dry as well and so i thought okay yeah we must go to the doctor so i think i've talked about this here on culips probably many times in the past but one thing that i really really love about living in seoul and And probably many places in South Korea are like this, but Seoul is hyper like this, is that everything is so close to your home.
Every amenity that you need from shopping to banking to going to a hospital or seeing a doctor, everything is so close.
And so I went to my map app and I looked for the nearest eye clinic and it was 190 meters from my front door.
So I only had to walk like a minute and a half and I got to the eye doctor.
This was my first time visiting the eye doctor here in Korea, although my wife had been to this clinic before and she said the doctor was good, so I trusted her recommendation.
And yeah, this was, in English we say an ophthalmologist, an ophthalmologist. And I'll just quickly explain three words that we have in English that can describe different kinds of doctors or eye care providers.
And if you guys don't know these words, don't worry, because I also didn't really know the exact difference.
So I had to search and find what is the exact difference between all of these words.
But an ophthalmologist is a medical doctor who specializes in eyes.
And then there's another kind of medical care provider called an an optometrist. And an optometrist can do like eye tests and maybe fit you for glasses and that kind of eye care.
Whereas an ophthalmologist would do more serious eye problems. Maybe if you need surgery or specific medical care with your eyes, then an ophthalmologist will do that.
Whereas an optometrist is more about seeing, I think, and fitting you for glasses and that kind And then we have a third word, which is optician.
And an optician is somebody who will actually make the lenses and contact lenses and fittings for glasses and all of those kinds of things.
so yeah three words that we use to talk about eye care providers ophthalmologist optometrist optician okay and the ophthalmologist i learned they have to study at university and do a residency for about 12 years 12 years of specialized training so it's no joke to become an ophthalmologist it's it's very impressive medical position.
So I went to the ophthalmology clinic.
It was very hard to say.
I think in English, many people would just say eye doctor.
I went to the eye doctor, went to the eye clinic.
Okay, we could say it like that if we want to avoid saying this big, difficult word. I went to the eye clinic.
And at first I thought it was closed because when I arrived at the clinic, it was all dark.
The clinic was on like the sixth or seventh floor of a bigger building.
And you know, it's like a big office building.
And the whole front of the clinic is glassed off.
So it's like a partition section on a bigger floor of an office building.
And all of the front part of the clinic is glass.
So you can like look in and see, and everything was dark inside.
And so I was like, is this place even open?
There was nobody at the reception desk at all, anything like that.
And so I thought, unfortunately, maybe it's closed, and I'll have to go find a different clinic.
But just as I was thinking that there was a different patient who walked in.
And then a doctor popped out from behind the front desk.
And I was like, Oh, it's open.
And then I realized, Aha, yeah, it's an ophthalmology clinic.
Of course, people are probably going there with with serious eye problems, with maybe sensitivity to light or headaches, something like that.
And so it would make sense that it would be rather dark in there.
This was my first time going to one of these styles of clinics.
So I didn't really put two and two together until that moment.
And then I was like, aha, this is why it's so dark.
This is why it looked closed.
So anyways, good news is that it was open.
Now, because I kind of hesitated at the front door for a minute, and that other patient went in first before me i had to wait and but they just got their eyes checked they did like the classic sight test where the doctor tests their eyes by asking them to read some signs and numbers and letters off one of those charts that gets progressively smaller right the the symbols on the chart get smaller and smaller and smaller to test your eyes so that's what they went there for and that didn't take very long and then it was my turn so I went and met the doctor and he asked me what was up and I explained
that I went running the other day and I ran through this swarm of bugs and I think some got in my eye and although I tried to wash them out in the shower I think they're still in my eye because they're extremely irritated and red and bloodshot and itchy and dry all of these symptoms and so the doctor hooked me up to a kind of device.
I have no idea what it was, but I had to push my head in the device and I rested my chin and put my forehead up against some bar and then he was able to like shine a little laser in at my eye and then push some air into my eye and take a look.
And he said, yeah, your eyes look pretty red.
And I said, I know they're pretty irritated right now.
and so he said we need to take a closer look so he took me over to some other device i have no idea what these devices are called in english i'm sure they all have specialized names but it doesn't really matter some other device for looking into my eyes i actually went to two or three different machines where he zoomed in and looked at my eyes with these kind of specialized eye examining Examining tools and equipment.
And he said, actually, there's nothing in your eyes.
Like, your eyes are clean, but they are very bloodshot.
And so I asked him, do you think it was because of the insects?
And he said that he didn't actually think it was because of any insects going into my eyes, which I guess is good, maybe.
But still, I wanted to know what is the cause.
So I asked him, why do you think they're so red and irritated?
And he said, probably you're just too tired and exhausted.
And this is your body's way of telling you that you need to relax and take a break and slow down.
But I thought, OK, like you're the doctor.
I'll trust you. I'll believe what you say.
But lately, I've been sleeping super, super well because I enjoy running.
I wear a watch that is a Garmin watch. It's a watch made for runners that's designed to give you a lot of information about your body and track your runs and track your health info and stuff like this.
And so it tracks my sleep every night.
And over the last month or so, I've been sleeping over eight hours a night on average.
And my watch also gives me a daily score about my condition called my body battery.
And lately, I've been killing it with my my body battery.
I'm over 90 and almost at 100 points each and every day, which is pretty good, and I feel great as well.
So when the doctor told me, like, are you exhausted?
Are you working too hard?
I mean, you can always say you're working too hard, right?
But I actually don't feel exhausted or feel tired.
And my sleep data and my body battery say that I'm in good shape.
So So I thought, okay, maybe that's the case.
Maybe a bug went in there.
I kind of thought it might be 50 -50.
Anyways, I thought the doctor knows better than me.
So I'll take it easy for the next few days for sure.
Try to relax and focus on my health and not overdoing it.
And at the same time, he wrote me a prescription to get some eye drops.
I guess some prescription level eye drops that I could put in my eyes.
and i had to put in two drops every four hours around the clock for the next few days and he said you know give these drops a try for the next three days it might take a while for the redness and the irritation and the bloodshot eyes to clear up and if it's not better after three days then come back and we'll take another look so i paid the doctor my fee which was i think 7 000 won which is around i don't know four and a half dollars american like a pretty good fee and oh by the way the doctor did an eye test on me he's like while you're here let's check your eyes and see how good your sight is and i
killed it on the seeing test he was like very impressive but i could feel in that test that my left eye is definitely much weaker than my right eye my Right eye, I could just see everything that he was thrown at me.
He had this computer screen, and he would put different symbols and things on the screen, and I had to read them and tell him what they were.
My right eye, I was just nailing it, but my left eye, once it got pretty small, I was kind of guessing.
He still said that I got them right, but there were a few instances with some numbers.
I was like, is that a one?
Is that a seven? I can't really tell.
Maybe I just got some lucky guesses.
Maybe in the end, I'll be wearing glasses sooner than later and I can get my, my dream can come true.
My glasses dream can come true.
Who knows? But anyways, yeah, I paid the doctor.
I said goodbye, thanked him and went down to the pharmacy in most areas where there's clinics here in South Korea.
Almost every building where there are clinics will have a pharmacy in the same building and this one did as well so I just had to go down to the first floor went to the pharmacy got my prescription filled in about 30 seconds it was extremely quick I think I paid another 5 ,000 won so another few dollars American to get the prescription level eye drops and then came home put those eye drops in and continued to do it just like the doctor told me every four hours, put a couple of drops in and it did take about two days to clear up.
I mean, they started getting better slowly, but surely it wasn't like they were still at that extreme bloodshot red irritated level, uh, the whole time they started to slowly, slowly, slowly clear up.
And after about three days, then I felt like they were back to normal and they felt less irritated as well and less itchy as well.
So I think I learned my lesson.
I think now going forward, I'm going to have to wear sunglasses every day that I run if I run in the daytime.
And at night, I'm still pretty hesitant about wearing sunglasses at night.
But I think I'm just going to buy some of those clear glasses, you know, like sunglasses with clear lenses instead of tinted lenses.
And that's going to look stupid, but it will look a lot better than having bloodshot irritated eyes like I had all this week.
So yeah, to make a long story short, this week was kind of an eye adventure for me.
In the middle of it, it was kind of scary to an extent because you're like, at first, once I realized the severity of the issue, then your mind goes to the darkest places, Right?
Immediately, you're you're always thinking worst case scenario, or at least I am.
So I'm like, what happens if I have a bad eye infection?
What happens if I'm going to lose my eyesight?
What happens if my eyes won't return to their normal color?
All of these thoughts raced through my mind.
And I did get pretty concerned there for a moment.
But yeah, thankfully, nothing happens.
And I'm back to normal.
I'm back to good. So that was like the the big event of this last week everyone was going through this ordeal with my eyes but I'm happy to report that I'm back to full health and I'm going to be more careful going forward and I recommend to any runners or bike riders or motorcycle riders or anybody that could potentially go through a swarm of bugs please be careful because yeah it's just you can save yourself some hassle by just wearing some goggles or wearing some glasses something something like that.
Take it from me. I've lived through it.
And I know what it's like now.
Anyways, guys, that's going to bring us to the end of this week's bonus episode.
Next week will be bonus episode 150.
Amazing already 150 episodes of the bonus series.
So that's really cool.
And I don't know what I'll talk about, but I'm sure it'll be good.
Before I let you go, I want to tell you this week's completion code.
And for this week's completion code, let's go with the idiomatic expression to keep an eye out for something.
Keep an eye out for something.
And keep an eye out for something means to be careful or keep your guard up or to be cautious so that you don't run into some problems. So for example, I could say if you go out running in Seoul, keep an eye out for the bugs, meaning be careful that that you don't run into any bugs like I did because they can go in your eyes and cause a lot of problems. So I thought this idiomatic expression to keep an eye out would be a good fit for this episode because of the eye connection.
So what I'd like you to do is leave an example sentence in the comments for this episode on our social media or our YouTube or our Discord community, and that will signal to me and all Q -Lips listeners that you finished this episode and And you completed a study session with me today.
You can feel proud of yourself, by the way, for making it all the way to the end of this episode because this is what you need to do to improve your English fluency.
You need to spend a lot of time getting the language into your brain.
And you did that here today.
So job well done. Okay, guys, I'm gonna take off for now.
It's actually time for me to go for a run, speak of the devil.
So I'll enjoy that.
I'll wear my glasses and I'll catch you next time.
Take care, bye -bye.
