Welcome to English as a Second Language podcast number 597, Describing Touch and Textures.
This is English as a Second Language podcast, episode 597.
Visit our website at eslpodcom to download a learning guide for this episode to help you improve your English even faster.
This episode is called Describing Touch and Textures.
It's a dialogue between Tommy and Louisa that will use a lot of vocabulary related to the way things physically feel.
Let's get started.
It's just our luck that there's a major power failure while we're shopping in this outdoor bazaar.
How are we going to find our way back to the hotel?
Follow me and stay close.
I'll lead the way.
This road is so rough.
I keep tripping over the stones.
Ah!
What happened?
I just fell into something wet and sticky.
Gross.
I don't know what it is.
It has a weird texture.
Don't think about it.
If you're not hurt, then try to get up and keep moving.
Give me your hand.
Ugh, it's all slimy.
Yeah, and my dress is all greasy too.
You know what?
I think I did hurt myself.
My foot feels all tingly, like it's asleep.
Try to walk the best you can, and let's try to make it back to the hotel.
The road is smooth, not too bumpy, on this side.
Let me help you.
Thanks.
I think I'll be okay.
Well, I guess if we don't get to see very much more of the city, we'll at least know what it feels like.
Tommy begins by saying.
Tommy begins by saying that there's a major power failure while we're shopping in this outdoor bazaar.
It's just our luck is a phrase used when something bad has happened, you have been unlucky and you want to show your frustration.
Perhaps it is one of many bad things that have happened.
Well here, the bad thing that has happened to Tommy and Louisa is that there has been a power failure.
In other words, there is no electricity, perhaps because there is a storm, that Bad weather may have interrupted the power lines, that is, the wires that bring electricity to your house.
Well, this is a major power failure, meaning a large one, usually one that is over a large area.
A whole city, for example, could have a power failure.
Tommy and Louisa are shopping in an outdoor bazaar.
B-A-Z-A-A-R.
A bazaar is a large market, usually outdoors, where people come to sell things and buy things.
It's unusual that they would be complaining about a power failure for the outdoor bazaar unless, of course, it is nighttime, in which case they wouldn't have any light unless the moon was full.
But, well, we'll just go with the story here.
Louisa says, how are we going to find our way back to the hotel?
Tommy says, follow me and stay close.
Follow me.
Walk behind me and stay close.
Make sure that you are physically close to me.
Tommy says, I'll lead the way.
The expression to lead L-E-A-D the way is means to walk in front of someone, showing where they should go, so the other person follows you.
You will lead the way.
Louisa says, Rough, R-O-U-G-H, is the opposite of smooth.
A rough surface is where there are many bumps and holes.
It is the opposite of smooth.
Something that is smooth has no bumps, no holes.
It is straight.
The word rough has some other meanings in English that can be found in the learning guide for this episode on our website.
Louisa says she keeps tripping over the stones.
To trip over is a two-word phrasal verb meaning to accidentally hit your foot against something and to fall down or almost fall down.
In this case the stones, which is a kind of material that the street is made of.
Tommy says what happened.
Louisa says I just fell into something wet and sticky.
Something that is sticky, S-T-I-C-K-Y, is something almost like glue.
Something that is sticky is able to hold two things together, like glue.
We sometimes, at least in my family, refer to the small yellow things, pieces of paper that you can use to put on things, and they will stay there.
They will stick.
They're called post-it notes.
We sometimes call them stickies.
I don't know if other people do that.
Maybe it's just my family.
Well, poor Louisa fell into something that was wet and sticky.
She says gross.
Something that is gross is something that is disgusting.
Something that is very unpleasant.
Something that is icky, we might say.
I-C-K-Y.
I don't know what it is, she says.
It has a weird texture.
T-E-X-T-U-R-E.
The texture of something is the way it feels, whether it's hard or soft, rough or smooth, for example.
Tommy says don't think about it.
If you're not hurt, then try to get up and keep moving.
Give me your hand, he says.
Oh, it's all slimy.
Slimy.
S-L-I-M-Y is something that is slippery, something that is wet, but it's also thick, sort of like a thick liquid.
Slimy as a texture is very unpleasant to touch.
Slimy can also be used as an adjective to describe a person who is very unpleasant, someone who perhaps does illegal or unethical things.
Tommy as touched Louisa's hand and it is slimy because remember she tripped and fell into something wet and sticky.
Louisa says, yeah, and my dress is all greasy, too.
Something that is greasy.
G-R-E-A-S-Y is something that is oily, something that has a lot of oil or fat.
If you go to a restaurant, a diner, a particular kind of restaurant, traditional restaurant in the United States, you can get hamburgers.
And the hamburgers have a lot of fat in them.
So they may taste greasy.
They have a lot of fat.
Of course, that's also what makes them taste good.
Sometimes we call these diners, these small restaurants, greasy spoons.
The idea is that because they use so much grease, everything has grease on them, including the spoons.
It also implies the restaurant isn't very clean.
I think that's what it means or why we say it.
I could be wrong.
I often am wrong.
My wife tells me that every day.
Louisa goes on to say, you know what?
You know something else, meaning I'm going to tell you something else.
I think I did hurt myself.
Notice she uses did here for emphasis.
She could just say, I think I hurt myself.
But she says, I think I did hurt myself.
Because Tommy had said earlier, if you're not hurt, then try to get up.
She's saying that I am, in fact, hurt.
She says, my foot feels all tingly, like it's asleep now.
Tingly, T-I-N-G-L-Y, is this unusual feeling on your skin as if someone is taking a small pin or needle and touching you rapidly many times.
That's a tingly feeling or a tingly sensation.
Louisa says that her foot feels like it is asleep.
When we say my arm is asleep or my foot is asleep, we mean that it feels strange because it was sitting in or staying in one position and suddenly we move it and the blood needs to flow again and Sometimes, if you put your foot underneath yourself when you sit, your foot might fall asleep, so that you need to give it time to have the blood to keep flowing in there so you don't have that strange tingly sensation.
Tommy says try to walk the best you can, as best as you can, And let's try to make it back to return to the hotel.
The road is smooth, not too bumpy, on this side.
Let me help you.
The road is smooth.
Remember, smooth is the opposite of rough.
Not too bumpy. is how Tommy describes the road.
A bump is when you have a flat surface but there are some parts of the surface that go suddenly up and then down, almost like a little hill.
To be bumpy then means to have lots of bumps.
Louisa says, thanks, I think I'll be okay.
Well, I guess, if we don't get to see very much more of the city, at least we know what it feels like.
Now let's listen to the dialogue, this time at a normal speed.
It's just our luck that there's a major power failure while we're shopping in this outdoor bazaar.
How are we going to find our way back to the hotel?
Follow me and stay close.
I'll lead the way.
This road is so rough.
I keep tripping over the stones.
Ah!
What happened?
I just fell into something wet and sticky.
Gross.
I don't know what it is.
It has some weird texture.
Don't think about it.
If you're not hurt, then try to get up and keep moving.
Give me your hand.
Ugh!
It's all slimy.
Yeah, and my dress is all greasy, too.
You know what?
I think I did hurt myself.
My foot feels all tingly, like it's asleep.
Try to walk the best you can, and let's try to make it back to the hotel.
The road is smooth, not too bumpy on this side.
Let me help you.
Thanks.
I think I'll be okay.
Well, I guess if we don't get to see very much more of the city, we'll at least know what it feels like.
We hope you didn't find this script too gross.
It was written by Dr. Lucy Say.
From Los Angeles, California, I'm Jeff McQuillan.
Thank you for listening.
Come back and listen to us next time on ESL Podcast.
English as a Second Language Podcast is written and produced by Dr. Lucy Say.
Hosted by Dr. Jeff McQuillan.
Copyright 2010 by the Center for Educational Development.
