Welcome to English as a Second Language podcast number 671, Vacationing on an Island.
This is English as a Second Language podcast episode 671.
I am your host, Dr Jeff McQuillan, coming to you from the Center for Educational Development in beautiful and I do mean beautiful Los Angeles, California.
Oh, I should mention that our website is eslpodcom and you can download a learning guide to this episode on the website.
This is an episode called Vacationing on an Island.
Let's get started.
I need to get off this island.
I'm getting island fever.
We've only been here two days.
Give it a chance.
We're here to enjoy a slower pace of life, remember?
When you said we were going on an island vacation, I didn't know we'd be so isolated.
There isn't a living soul within five miles.
This isn't isolated.
It's secluded.
We have privacy and serenity.
Isn't that what we wanted?
I wanted a vacation with all of the creature comforts.
That's what we have, don't you think?
We're staying in a very nice house.
Yes, but what about the creature comforts?
I have no internet access and no cell phone service.
This is what I call roughing it.
We agreed that we both needed a little time away to unwind.
The whole point of this vacation is for us to relax.
We begin our dialogue with Mohsen saying to Ella, To get off here means to leave.
Mohsen needs to get off this island.
An island, of course, is an area of land completely surrounded by water.
Great Britain, at least England, Scotland, and Wales, is an island.
Ireland is an island.
Hawaii is a state with a number of different islands.
Mohsen says he's getting island fever.
A fever.
F-E-V-E-R is normally when your body has a very high temperature, too high, because you are sick.
Here, however, it means feeling anxious when you cannot move around freely.
Because of where you are, you feel as though you are trapped.
You can't move and travel the way you want to, because you're on an island and you can only go so far.
And then there's the water.
So island fever is this idea that you need to leave this place because you feel that you are limited somehow.
Now, we have the same idea when we are talking about people not on islands.
We call that cabin, C-A-B-I-N, fever.
Cabin fever is when you are in a place and, perhaps because of the weather or some other reason, you can't leave and you want to.
And so you start getting very anxious about it.
You start getting uncomfortable about.
A cabin is like a small little house that would be outside of the city, near a lake or in the mountains.
Ella says, Meaning, even if it's bad right now, Wait a little longer.
Give it time, we might also say.
Give it a chance.
We're here to enjoy a slower pace of life, remember?
The pace P-A-C-E of life is like the speed that things are done in a particular culture or in a particular situation.
To have a slow pace of life means to be very relaxed.
You don't hurry around.
Or a certain culture, a certain area has a different pace of life.
The pace of life in New York City, in Manhattan, is very different than the pace of life on a farm in Minnesota.
Very different speeds that things happen.
Well, Ella and Mohsen are on this island to relax.
But Mohsen says when you said we were going on an island vacation.
To be isolated means to be far away from other people.
It may also mean you don't have communication with other people because you are so far away from them.
Mohsen says, The expression a living soul, S-O-U-L, just means a human being.
In many philosophies and religions, the human being has a physical body, but also has a spiritual soul.
Sort of your being that is not physical, what is not physical.
That is part of you, that makes you who you are.
That's the idea.
So a living soul would be another human being.
And Mohsen says there is not a living soul within five miles, meaning you could travel five miles from where you are now and you would not see another person.
Ella says this isn't isolated, it's secluded.
Secluded.
Secluded S-E-C-L-U-D-E-D is something that is being used by a very few number of people without other people near them.
It's really the same phenomenon, the same situation as isolated, but it's a positive thing usually.
We're going to a secluded beach.
We're going to a beach that has very few people, that very few people perhaps even know about.
So it's a positive thing, whereas isolated is a negative thing.
Okay, so...
Mohsen is not very happy.
Ella is trying to make him happier by saying that it's not isolated, it's secluded.
We have privacy and serenity.
Privacy is the ability to keep things secret, to not have other people around you in this situation.
Serenity is calmness.
We might also say tranquility.
It's a feeling of peace and relaxation.
Serenity, S-E-R-E-N-I-T-Y.
Ella then asks, isn't that what we wanted?
Isn't that what we wanted for our relaxing vacation?
Mohsen says, I wanted a vacation with all of the creature comforts.
Creature, C-R-E-A-T-U-R-E.
Comforts, C-O-M-F-O-R-T-S, are things that are not necessary to live, but make you feel relaxed.
Things that help you. having a hot shower, having good food.
These are creature comforts.
They're things that make you comfortable, things that make you feel better, feel good.
Ella says, "'That's what we have, don't we?'
Meaning, we have creature comforts here."
We're staying in a very nice house.
I should also mention that the word creature is often used for a living being, not just human beings.
In fact, usually it refers to animals.
Get that creature out of my house.
You know I don't want dogs in here.
The dog is the creature.
It has sort of a negative meaning about it when referring to animals.
Not always, but sometimes.
When I use it, it always does.
Ella says that they're staying in a nice house.
And Mohsen says, yes, but what about the creature comforts?
I have no internet access anywhere. and no cell phone service.
Internet access is, of course, the ability to go online to find information, to read your emails, and so forth.
Cell phone is the same as mobile phone or cellular phone.
It's a phone that you can carry with you.
Service means that you are able to use the phone, that you have the ability to send the electronic signals to the telephone company so that you can talk to people.
If you are out in a very isolated area... the telephone company may not have service there.
That is, you may not be able to use their phone in that area.
Morsen says, this is what I call roughing it.
The expression to rough r-o-u-g-h.
It means means to go camping or spend time outdoors without the nice things you have at home.
To rough it could mean to live without technology that you are used to.
No television, no cell phones, no iPods or iPads or whatever.
That's to rough it.
Mohsen thinks that he is roughing it.
He thinks that this is very uncomfortable.
Ella says, We agreed that we both needed a little time away to unwind.
Away here simply means at a distance from where they normally live and work.
To unwind...
UNWIND means to relax and become calmer, especially after a period of time where you are very stressed.
So you come home from work.
You've had a difficult day.
You sit down in front of the television.
You get a glass of wine or a bottle of beer or something else, and you unwind.
You relax.
You watch the Dodgers on television, the local baseball station, or you watch some other program, or you read whatever.
All of this is part of unwinding.
Ella says the whole point of this vacation is for us to relax.
The whole point means the main idea or objective, the most important reason why we are doing something.
It's a very common expression.
The whole point of going to a restaurant is not having to cook and clean.
That's one example.
Mohsen says, To be cut off from something means to be separated from something.
Civilization here just means the modern world where you have technology and creature comforts.
Mohsen thinks that he's cut off, he's separated from civilization, because he doesn't have email and internet access.
He then says, what could be more stressful than this?
To be stressful means that you are worried, you are anxious, you feel like you have many things to do and not very much time to do them in.
I feel this way all the time.
I guess I need a vacation on an island.
Now let's listen to the dialogue, this time at a normal rate of speech.
We've only been here two days.
Give it a chance.
We're here to enjoy a slower pace of life, remember?
When you said we were going on an island vacation I didn't know we'd be so isolated.
There isn't a living soul within five miles.
This isn't isolated.
It's secluded.
We have privacy and serenity.
Isn't that what we wanted?
I wanted a vacation with all of the creature comforts.
That's what we have, don't you think?
We're staying in a very nice house.
Yes, but what about the creature comforts?
I have no internet access and no cell phone service.
This is what I call roughing it.
We agreed that we both needed a little time away to unwind.
The whole point of this vacation is for us to relax.
I'm cut off from civilization and I have no access to email and my favorite websites.
What could be more stressful than this?
The whole point of this part of the podcast is to thank our script writer, Dr Lucy Say, and everyone else that helps make ESL Podcast possible.
From Los Angeles, California, I'm Jeff McQuillan.
Thank you for listening.
Come back and listen to us again on ESL Podcast.
English as a Second Language podcast is written and produced by Dr Lucy Say, hosted by Dr Jeff McQuillan.
Copyright 2011 by the Center for Educational Development.
