Welcome to a new episode of English Vocabulary Booster.
My name is Lara and I'm a SALSA certified English teacher.
Learning new vocabulary usually takes a long time, but we'll do it in a way that's easy, quick and efficient.
In every episode, we'll learn how to use five new English words or expressions, so that you too can start speaking like a native.
So let's get learning!
Hello, you guys.
So I got something special for you today.
We're going to do things a little bit differently.
And I actually have someone recording this episode with me.
His name is Martin Johnston.
And welcome.
Hello, Laura.
Thanks for having me on.
Yeah, thank you so much.
So Martin, tell us a little bit about yourself.
So I am originally from England, a city just outside London called Chelmsford, and I now live in Italy.
I live in Sicily, to be precise, and I recently got married and had a baby.
Obviously, I didn't have the baby myself.
My wife gave birth, but we recently had a baby.
And I teach English.
I've been teaching English for 11 years now, basically the exact amount of time that I've been living in Italy.
Because basically, if you ever meet an English speaking person in Italy and you say, what do you do?
That's what they're doing.
The answer is I teach English because there's nothing else we can do.
Yep.
And the cool thing about Martin is that he also hosts a podcast to help you learn English.
It's called Rock and Roll English.
So definitely check that out.
We're going to tell you more about it later.
But for right now, let's just get to the story.
And today we're going to talk about apartments.
Yes?
It's me, Mr. Rogers, your landlord.
Hello, Mr. Rogers.
How can I help you?
You know why I'm here, Lucy.
You can't ignore it.
Listen, Mr. Rogers, can you just give me a couple of extra months?
I'm sorry, Lucy.
But come on.
Aren't neighbors supposed to help each other?
I'm your landlord, Lucy.
The fact that I live across the hall doesn't change anything.
You are the worst tenant in the building.
You're always behind on rent.
I'm sorry Lucy, I've got no choice.
So what?
You're just going to have me evicted?
As a matter of fact, yes.
Yes I am, Lucy.
I'm sorry, but as of right now, you don't live here anymore.
I'll come by first thing tomorrow morning to make sure you've left.
Good night.
What?
What's the matter, Mr Rogers?
I can't.
I think I got locked out.
Oh, no.
You know, I'd let you stay in my place, but it turns out I don't live here anymore.
Good night.
So I don't know if you noticed, but that wasn't actually my voice.
For once, I had a man on the podcast.
Am I the first man to appear on this podcast then?
You are.
I had another guest, but she was a woman.
Okay.
Wow.
What an honor.
Yeah, um.
So, as i was saying before, marting also has a podcast.
It's called rock and roll english.
Um, i've listened to it.
I think it's great.
I think it's super fun and interesting and honestly, a great way to learn new vocabulary.
Uh marting, tell us what is cool about your podcast.
It's difficult to talk about that, to say oh, my podcast is so cool.
But what I think is maybe cool about it is that it's just everyday conversation, basically between friends generally.
Everyone on the podcast the regular guests are like my lifelong friends and we choose a topic.
And the thing that I enjoy about it is the stories that come out generally embarrassing stories about when we were younger.
And I think these embarrassing stories, they make one the stories more memorable and also the vocabulary.
So that helps people to remember.
So that's why I really like your podcast as well because you do it in stories, which keeps it in context, which is something I'm a big fan of, instead of like other people online, let's say that, just say this is a word.
This is the meaning.
This is a word.
This is the meaning.
So, yeah.
I've listened to Martin's podcast and I think it's great.
Again, learning from real life conversations is priceless.
It's what works.
Yeah.
So make sure you go check it out.
And now Martin's going to help me out, explain to you these words.
Okay.
I'll do my best.
Let's begin with expression number one.
Landlord.
It's me, Mr. Rogers, your landlord.
So, Martin, what does a landlord do?
Does he rent an apartment or does he sell apartments?
So a landlord rents an apartment.
Correct.
So he collects the money, you pay him and you can stay where you are.
Does a landlord always own the apartment you are renting?
A tough one, isn't it?
I think i think so, don't they?
They do, or sometimes they don't, because sometimes they can just collect the money.
You know exactly.
Yes, sometimes i think there's a difference between like, who owns the property.
Um, sometimes they're just there to collect the money.
Okay, do you have a landlord or a landlady?
Oh yeah uh, you say landlady if it's a woman.
And are they nice?
I don't actually, because I bought the place where I'm living a couple of years ago now.
So luckily I don't, but I have had many in the past and some nice, some not so nice, let's say.
Any landlord or landlady that was particularly nasty?
One, I think that I actually used to have to write a check.
This was when I was at university.
And I remember he kept saying that the check, like the money, hadn't arrived in his bank account when it clearly had.
That caused quite a lot of stress.
And similar to Mr. Rogers in the story, also threatened to throw me out.
But luckily, luckily, I didn't have to sleep on the street.
I've only had good experiences so far, but I've only had two, so I haven't had as many as you have.
Expression number two, tenant.
You are the worst tenant in the building.
You're always behind on rent.
If you are a tenant, does that mean you have bought the place where you live or are you renting it?
That means that you are renting the place where you live.
Correct.
And can an apartment have more than one tenant?
Yes, of course.
It can have many tenants.
Yeah, if you share an apartment with your friends, with other roommates, yes.
So you've already answered this, but are you a tenant right now or do you know someone who is?
Yeah, my wife.
I get her to pay rent to me.
Really?
No, that's a joke.
Okay.
Yeah no, I mean, I know lots of people that are tenants and yeah, especially for example in London where people have to pay a lot of money to be a tenant.
Yeah.
And I think, especially now among like, even older people, it's more common, especially if you don't have a family, to rent a place as opposed to like buying a place.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
I rented places for like from 18 to 33, so 15 years.
Yeah.
All right.
To be behind on rent.
You are the worst tenant in the building.
You're always behind on rent.
If you are behind on rent, have you paid last month's rent?
No, you haven't.
And maybe you haven't paid the rent the month before either.
Yeah.
Who knows?
It could be two months that you owe, three months.
Exactly.
How would your landlord feel if you were behind on rent?
Pretty angry, I would imagine.
Yeah.
And have you ever been behind on rent in all of your years of renting?
Absolutely no.
That's one thing that I would never do because, like you sign the contract, you know you have to pay that.
So I always made sure I had enough money to pay my rent.
Despite what your old landlord used to say.
Exactly.
Yeah.
Expression number four, get evicted.
So what?
You're just going to have me evicted?
If you get evicted, can you continue living where you live?
No, you can't.
And if you get evicted, do you leave because you want to or because someone makes you?
You leave because someone makes you, generally the landlord or landlady.
And what could be the reasons for someone to get evicted?
If you're behind on rent, maybe you have animals secretly when animals aren't allowed.
You make a lot of noise, the neighbours complain.
I suppose there can be a few reasons.
Have you ever been evicted or have you ever risked getting evicted?
Well, yeah, I got, I risked getting evicted even though I was, it was paying, I was paying the rent.
So, I risked getting evicted then, but luckily that was the only time.
Expression number five, get locked out.
I think I got locked out.
If you are locked out of your apartment, can you get in?
No, you cannot.
And what could cause you to get locked out of your apartment?
You could close the door when the keys are inside.
Yeah.
That's a classic one.
You could just lose the keys.
Someone could steal the keys.
Lots of reasons.
Number one is really the one that's the most frustrating, because if they steal your keys, then really it's not your fault.
But leaving the keys inside and then walking out the door and closing it behind you, then That's a blow, isn't it?
That's difficult.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Have you ever gotten lucked out?
Why?
What did you do?
Yeah, many times.
When I was a child, I specifically remember closing the door and the keys were inside.
And my dad was extremely angry and made me walk with him to where my mum worked to get the keys.
And it was a very, very long walk, especially for like a seven-year-old child, which I was.
Another time when I came back to the apartment I was renting in Sicily from england and then i realized i'd left the keys to my apartment in sicily, in england, and i phoned my landlord and said i haven't got the keys and he said oh, no problem, i'll be there in a minute, i'll give you the keys.
And i thought okay, brilliant.
And then my mum was going to send me the keys and i thought oh, this is, this is fine.
And i think i arrived at like 3 pm and he told me i'll be there basically in a minute.
And then he actually arrived at, I think, midnight.
So I had like nine hours of like standing around on the street with all my bags.
Waiting for him.
Yeah.
So that was a bit of a nightmare.
Do you think that taught you the lesson?
I think it has actually.
I don't let my keys out of my sight now.
Yeah.
Great.
Thanks again, Martin.
And you guys make sure to go check out his podcast Rock and Roll English and his website rockandrollenglishcom.
I'm going to leave all the links in the notes so you can go check it out.
And I'll see you soon.
And that is it for today.
And remember, if you want to access the transcript, as well as lots of other resources, visit enbucom.
That is E-N-B dot com.
Have a great day.
