Hello, everyone.
My name is Maria.
And my name is Rory.
And we're the hosts of the IELTS Speaking for Success podcast, the podcast that aims to help you improve your speaking skills, as well as your listening skills along the way.
Right.
The reason we started this podcast is to give you a look at how a native English speaker would answer some of the most common IELTS speaking test questions.
I'm asking Rory questions, he gives answers using vocabulary and grammar for a high score .
Today's topic is patience.
I'm patiently waiting on your questions, Masha.
Beautiful, Rory.
Rory, what do you think patience is?
I think I would define it as how well you control your emotions in stressful situations.
So if you have...
If you're not so stressed out in stressful situations, then you have lots of patience.
But if you're very stressed out, then you don't have much.
Do you have patience?
I like to think so, but it's still rather limited and probably needs some development.
Would you say you're a patient person?
Normally, but I need a greater reservoir of patience, I suppose.
Have you ever lost your patience?
Yes, sometimes I lose my patience.
I don't really like it, actually.
It makes me feel rather nauseous.
It's probably something I need to work on a bit more.
Why?
Because, well, people don't like being around impatient people, do they?
It's not a pleasant experience for you or the people that you're with.
When do you need patience the most?
I think that's mostly when I'm in situations where I constantly have to repeat myself.
Of course, if you have to say the same thing over and over again, then it can become quite frustrating, and then the frustration builds up and you start to lose patience.
Rory, when do you need patience the most?
I think I need it the most when I... Wait a second!
A new question for you.
What do you become impatient about?
Well, this will be quite a stereotypical answer from a British person.
But one thing that really irritates me that's not connected to repetition is waiting for a very long time, especially in queues.
You know, whenever you're on the metro and you're trying to walk up the stairs, but people in front of you are slowing down and you have to wait for them.
That can be quite frustrating and then I become quite impatient.
What do you do when you get impatient?
Well, if you'd asked me before I had a greater sense of what makes me impatient and what I can do to stop it, I would have said that I just become sarcastic and I just use sarcasm and irony until people get the point that I'm becoming impatient and they start to speed up a little bit.
But now I first of all resort to sarcasm, usually in my head, and then I try and calm myself down and remember that people don't deliberately try and make me impatient.
So it's about reminding myself that that's the case and then calmly explaining again, for example.
Beautiful, Rory.
Rory, as always, you've used gorgeous vocabulary and grammar, so let's have a look at some words.
You've used the phrasal verb stressed out.
Yeah.
Could you give me an example?
Answering the same question again and again makes me stressed out.
Yeah, makes me stressed or makes me stressed out.
It's even better.
We've discussed water before, and we've mentioned this word reservoir, reservoir of water, and Rory has just said reservoir of... Patience.
Right, so do you have reservoirs of patience, Rory?
I do, but it's a smaller reservoir than I would like it to be.
So I need to expand the reservoir, make it better and bigger.
Excellent.
When you talk about patience, you can use some adjectives.
So something could be frustrating.
So frustrating, is it positive or negative?
Oh, it's almost always negative, really.
Yeah, you can say I get frustrated.
Yes.
Or you could use it as a verb.
Someone is frustrating my efforts, for example.
Somebody annoys me, right?
Or frustrates me.
Also irritates me.
Yeah, or you can find someone irritating or frustrating as well.
You know, queuing up is really irritating.
Queuing, like a queue stands in a line, basically.
But a line is American English and we are using British English.
The best English in the world.
If you do want band 9 for your IELTS speaking, you can use a phrase, it drives me up the wall.
Yes, we didn't mention that, but we should have actually.
It drives me up the wall is just, it drives me crazy.
It makes me lose patience.
It irritates me, it annoys me.
Like, all these traffic jams, they drive me up the wall.
You can literally imagine, like, they drive me up the wall.
Yes.
You've mentioned the word stereotypical.
So, how can I use it in a sentence?
Stereotypical.
Well, if we talk about stereotypes about British people, you could say it's stereotypical, but lots of British people drink tea because there's a stereotype.
But the reality is also like the stereotype.
So it's an adjective to describe this.
Yeah, it's stereotypical to think that all British people never jump a queue.
But it's probably true.
I don't think I've seen British people ever jumping queues.
Have you ever jumped a queue?
Never in my life, actually.
Wow.
Dear listeners, what about you?
Have you ever jumped a queue?
Jump a queue, basically you don't stand in a line, you just go right in front.
Yes, that's very frustrating.
It drives me up the wall.
Rory, you've used a nice phrase, resort to sarcasm.
Sarcasm?
Yeah, we understand that.
We can figure it out.
But what does it mean, resort?
Resort to sarcasm?
If you resort to something, it's basically saying that you choose to do something, but often it's the final thing that you choose and or you feel it's that way.
In addition to that, you also resort to something negative.
So using sarcasm to deal with your impatience is probably not a very good idea.
So you resort to sarcasm.
Yeah, there's no other way.
So you resort to sarcasm.
Exactly.
But for a high score, you shouldn't say choose.
Resort to is much better.
It carries more meaning with it.
A really precise word in this phrase.
Is it true that some people would say sarky instead of sarcastic?
Absolutely.
So she's sarcastic, she's sarky.
Or why are you so sarky?
Yeah, it's like a very informal way of calling someone sarcastic.
Although if you're calling someone sarcastic anyway, that's probably quite informal.
So why not use starchy?
And again, bringing up the score that shows that you know how to use this word flexibly.
It's informal, but is it like super informal that is slang so you can't use it?
Yeah, you can.
It's pretty informal.
It's not slang.
It's not an F word.
You're not being rude.
So, natural, informal, but really informal.
If you go to a meeting, you don't say sake, you don't say water, perhaps you would say water.
You would try.
Sarcastic.
Or just don't use these words.
Thank you very much, Rory, for your time and for your beautiful answers, as always.
I like to think I was quite patient.
You were, indeed.
Now, dear listeners, you can listen to Rory's answers again and notice all the advanced structures and vocabulary.
Rory, what do you think patience is?
I think I would define it as how well you control your emotions in stressful situations.
So if you have...
If you're not so stressed out in stressful situations, then you have lots of patience.
But if you're very stressed out, then you don't have much.
Do you have patience?
I like to think so, but it's still rather limited and probably needs some development.
Would you say you're a patient person?
Normally, but I need a greater reservoir of patience, I suppose.
Have you ever lost your patience?
Yes, sometimes I lose my patience.
I don't really like it, actually.
It makes me feel rather nauseous.
It's probably something I need to work on a bit more.
Why?
Because, well, people don't like being around impatient people, do they?
It's not a pleasant experience for you or the people that you're with.
When do you need patience the most?
I think that's mostly when I'm in situations where I constantly have to repeat myself.
Of course, if you have to say the same thing over and over again, then it can become quite frustrating, and then the frustration builds up and you start to lose patience.
Any question for you?
What do you become impatient about?
Well, this will be quite a stereotypical answer from a British person.
But one thing that really irritates me that's not connected to repetition is waiting for a very long time, especially in queues.
You know, whenever you're on the metro and you're trying to walk up the stairs, but people in front of you are slowing down and you have to wait for them.
That can be quite frustrating and then I become quite impatient.
What do you do when you get impatient?
Well, if you'd asked me before I had a greater sense of what makes me impatient and what I can do to stop it, I would have said that I just become sarcastic and I just use sarcasm and irony until people get the point that I'm becoming impatient and they start to speed up a little bit.
But now I first of all resort to sarcasm, usually in my head, and then I try and calm myself down and remember that people don't deliberately try and make me impatient.
So it's about reminding myself that that's the case.
And then calmly explaining again, for example.
Thank you very super much for listening.
We hope you enjoyed our contributions and we'll see you next time.
Ta-ta!
Bye!
