📕 Part 1: Museums

This episode's vocabulary

Buff (noun) - a person who knows a lot about and is very interested in a particular subject.

Jute (noun) - substance that comes from a Southeast Asian plant, used for making rope and cloth.

Mill (noun) - a factory where a particular substance is produced.

Showcase (verb) - to show the best qualities or parts of something.

Poignant  (adj.) - causing or having a very sharp feeling of sadness.

Plaque (noun) - a flat piece of metal, stone, wood, or plastic with writing on it that is attached to a wall, door, or other object.

Verdant (adj.) - covered with healthy green plants or grass.

Excursion (noun) - a short journey usually made for pleasure, often by a group of people.

Storehouse (noun) - a large building for storing things, often before they are sold, used, or sent out to shops.

Treasure (noun) - anything of great value.

Treasure trove -  a place that is full of something good.

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Questions and Answers

M: Do you like to visit museums?

R: Um, actually not overly so. I just suppose it might be a fun idea for a date, but I wouldn't go there as part of a hobby or something like that. I think they're a bit boring and dull, to be honest with you. It's not exactly something that I would enjoy doing just by myself.

M: How often do you go to museums?

R: Like I said, um, not really very often. I'm not the biggest history buff these days, although I used to be. So I think I went to the last museum was probably in Volgograd or something like that. But I usually prefer books these days. Like I said, I'm not a big fan of museums at all, to be honest with you.

M: Are there any museums in your hometown?

R: Actually, yes, there's loads. There's this old jute mill called the Verdant Works, which showcases how, well, fabric was produced back in the Victorian era. And then on the subject of the Victorian era, there's the, I think it's the RMS Discovery, which is an Antarctic exploration ship, which was captained by, well, Captain Scott. It was recovered from Antarctica after they got stranded there. So it's a museum now and there's loads more besides that. But that's not such a surprise because it's the fourth largest city, so a concentration of museums is to be expected.

M: When is the last time you visited a museum?

R: Well, I said it was Volgograd there, but actually, I just realised that after that, I went to the state historical museum with my friend Lena in... Well, the state historical museum is in Russia. And I think it was about two years ago now, actually. It was, it was a very poignant experience. On the inside there are loads and loads of pictures and portraits of monarchs long since passed. For example the members of the royal family and the, well, the aristocracy in general, really. And the ones that were of the last royal family in Russia were quite, they had quite an emotional impact because, of course, you understand what happened to them. But on the flip side, it was also kind of entertaining because there were translations from Russian to English on the plaques next to them. And that was quite funny because of all the mistranslations that had happened. And to be honest with you, it was really, they were really silly mistranslations. Like if I had been asked to do the translations, I wouldn't have made those mistakes.

M: Did you visit museums when you were a child?

R: We used to go to the Natural History Museum quite often. And in Scotland, when you're younger, I think it's the same everywhere, to be honest. You have school trips to different museums. So I talked about the verdant works before when I was talking about the museums in our hometown. There was lots of excursions there, I suppose so, yeah. It was definitely a much more common experience when I was younger. Now it's not so much because I have less time and different things to do at that time.

M: Do you think museums are important?

R: Well, for me personally as an individual, no. But they're important storehouses for artefacts and good places to display various exhibits, and they hold a lot of our nation's sort of cultural treasures as well. So while they are important to me, now that I'm a grown up with a job and different interests. They are like key treasure troves to whatever nation they belong to as a whole, particularly if you talk about children. That's why they exist to impart this knowledge to the kids.

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Discussion

M: Thank you, Rory, for your treasure answers!

R: Hopefully they will be treasured and they don't belong in the museum.

M: We're going to have a museum of super words and gramma. Rory, would you like to have, like Rory museum, the Museum of Rory, huh?

R: It'll be the smallest museum in the world. Are you filming me? Have you got a license for that camera? Sorry.

M: Oh, my God. Dear, listener, we are getting distracted. Vanya is here sitting on the floor filming. So if you had, if we had the Museum of Rory. So the solution shower would be there. Your pajamas, your black pajamas would be there, your bottles of whiskey. What else?

R: I don't have bottles of whiskey. I have like one and I haven't opened it, because I don't drink whiskey.

M: Ok, what else would be there? In your museum?

R: I don't know. Like I'm not really interesting.

M: Your backpack.

R: You can see from the examples that you're coming out with now that I'm really boring.

M: What about all the cans of energy drinks? So different cans of energy drinks. Empty.

R: If we had all of the cans of energy drinks that I have drunk in my entire life in the museum, we could just make the museum out of them.

M: Yes. So the Museum of Rory's energy drink cans.

R: The museumof Rory destroying his heart, basically. That's really sad now that I think about it.

M: So the examiner won't know if there is this the Museum of Rory.

R: They won't know if you have a heart either. They would hope you do.

M: You can say I often go to the Museum of Rory. OK. Anyway, now, Rory, you've mentioned historical museum. Right. And historical museums can also be like local museums, archeological museums, folk, military museums, science museums, war museums.

R: Yes.

M: Can you spell archaeological?

R: No, I probably could. I can spell it. Do you know, there must be a word for this phenomenon. Do you know, when you can spell the word, but you can only spell it while you're writing it. Like I can spell most words just by saying them, but like some words like archaeology, I need to write. There must be a word for that.

M: Yes, dear listener, so if you feel bad that you can't spell words in English, it's OK. Native speakers can't spell words in their mother tongue. It's fine!

R: I can spell the words. I just can't spell it without a pen and paper.

M: Ok, ok, I'm joking.

R: You're so mean to me.

M: I'm nice and sweet, aren't I? OK, museums. So museums can also be local, fascinating, public, private. And Rory you said a nice one. I'm not the best history buff.

R: Well I'm not a big history buff anymore. I'm not the biggest history buff. I used to be.

M: Yeah. But a buff. A buff. What is it, a buff?

R: History buff is someone that knows a lot about history. You can be a history buff or a science buff, this kind of thing. Usually it's history buff. That's the collocation.

M: Oh, but can I be films buff? And when you talk about museums, we say we go to museums or we go to a museum. Do we need an article or no article?

R: Well, you go to a museum, but you go to museums, plural.

M: OK, visit museums.

R: Yeah. And if you've only got one museum in your hometown, which is highly likely. Most hometowns are not like mine, they have one or even zero museums. Then you would say visit the museum because there's only one in the universe that is your hometown.

M: But when you give the name of your favorite museum, you should use the definite article. For example, Rory said the Natural History Museum.

R: Because there's only one.

M: Yeah, the museum. The museum. At a museum or in a museum? Both are possible?

R: If you're using museum as an adjective, then you don't need an article like at museum exhibits, for example. But that's like, well, that would be like band nine level article control. Because most people would just say the museum exhibits and that's correct. It's just not very common.

M: A museum exhibit?

R: Well, or the it doesn't matter. But you could say at museum exhibits to speak generally. But we're talking about grammar. We need to talk about museums. And the kind of experiences you have there. So talking about grammar is boring, but a museum can be a poignant experience.

M: Yeah. What is it, this a poignant?

R: So it's actually not very positive, unfortunately. It just means like it's something that causes you to feel very sad about something. So if you see pictures of the old Russian royal family, you feel sad because at the time they were having their portrait taken, they didn't know they were all going to be horribly murdered by communists. So that wasn't very nice.

M: Well, if you go to the Museum of Titanic, you can experience this poignant.

R: See, I can spell that word. I can't spell archeology, but I can spell the word poignant.

M: Yes, you guys. So make sure that you do know what your favorite museum is.

R: Know how to talk about your feelings as well.

M: Yeah, inside this museum.

R: In general.

M: For example, while speaking about his favorite museum, Rory used very specific vocabulary, like all the jute mill, fabric, Victorian era. Wow.

R: Yeah. You can have a Victorian era, the Roman era. If you're from Russia, you could talk about the Romanov era. Sorry, we keep circling back to the royal family, but that's fine. The Communist era, the current era, whatever that's being called, post communist era. And then, well, an era is a different period of time that's dominated by a particular idea or group of people, and then you talked about artifacts.Artifacts are usually old things like old objects, which are connected with a particular period.

M: In a museum we have exhibitions.

R: Exhibits.

M: Yeah, like an arts exhibition. Right. And you see exhibits. So they are basically objects which are being exhibited. Oh God. Which are being shown. Exhibits. And museums hold our nation's treasures.

R: Cultural treasures.

M: Cultural treasures.

R: So obviously treasure is something that pirates have and it's very valuable. Cultural treasure, on the other hand, is something that is very important to a nation's culture. So, for example, if we talk about, well, if we talk about Scotland, we have the stone of destiny. That's the thing that all the Scottish kings are crowned on. And that is an important cultural treasure because without it, we don't know who the king is. Well it's more egalitarian now. We have a queen.

M: How old is the queen?

R: That is a very good question. She's old.

M: If a person is very old, you can say they're ancient. That's why at the beginning of the episode, Rory, what did you say about yourself?

R: Nothing positive.

M: I said that your hair is getting grey.

R: And I say I belong in a museum because I'm so old. Some people say the royal family belongs in a museum because it's a very old institution. But I disagree.

M: So if I say like I belong to a museum, it means I am very old.

R: I belong in a museum. Oh, actually, that's a good point. You can belong to a museum in terms of being a member of staff or society. Yeah. So you need to be careful with that. It's belong in a museum.

M: I belong in a museum.

R: Well, you don't, but I do.

M: Rory belongs in a museum. So he's old or he's very old. He's ancient. Okay. Come on. Stop drinking those energy drinks.

R: I can't help it. It's a problem.

M: OK, hypnosis could solve all your problems. OK, we're going off on a tangent here.

R: You just spent the last minute talking about, like, talking to yourself. I'm waiting here for you to finish.

M: OK, right, you guys. So we have exhibitions in museums and also we have collections of something. So a museum can hold a collection of...

R: Things, artifacts. Don't say things, say artifacts, objects.

M: Yeah, artifacts.

R: But it can also hold treasures or be a treasure trove, which is another kind of collection.

M: What is a trove?

R: A trove. It's a collocation, treasure trove. It just means well, a place where the treasure is.

M: Give us a sentence, please. An example with this trove thing.

R: No, I can't think of one.

M: You said like there are key treasure troves.

R: Yeah. Like it is a, like, for example. Yeah, there we go. The Russian State Historical Museum is a real treasure trove of art from the pre-revolutionary period. And you can use that in your speaking tests, if they ask you about art or revolutions, which is unlikely, but, you know.

M: No, they won't ask you about revolutions. Come on. They will ask you about museums. And Rory, when you went to this museum, you had fun with translations and translations were written on Plex.

R: Yeah, I don't know if that's the right word, to be honest with you. Maybe placard is a better one. But basically what I meant was these small squares that are under pictures, or exhibits, or whatever is there that explain what the thing is. I'm pretty sure it's a, I would call a plaque, but you could call it a placard or an information card, if you want to be very boring.

M: But this is a very specific word, that you can use. Like I always read plaques. I always read information on plaques. Now, I have a quiz for you. Are you ready? A pop quiz on this podcast. There's a pop quiz. So I give you the city, the name of the city and you give me the museum. OK, three, two, one go. Paris.

R: Wait, that's the name of the city. But there's lots of museums in Paris.

M: OK. OK, once again. So I give you the name of the city and you give me the name of the museum. Paris, go.

R: The Louvre.

M: Bravo. New York.

R: The Guggenheim. Oh, what else is there. Oh the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

M: Well done. London.

R: Natural History Museum.

M: Uh, one more.

R: In London? Science Museum. Why?

M: The British Museum.

R: Oh, well, there's a science museum there too.

M: Right, Saint-Petersburg.

R: The Hermitage?

M: Yes, the State Hermitage Museum. Amsterdam.

R: Amsterdam. There's a there's the sex museum. There is a sex museum in Amsterdam. I've been there. It's not very good. I'm sorry if you're looking to learn anything.

M: What did you see there Rory? Let's talk about it.

R: Nothing terribly interesting. It was all stuff that I knew about already. So I don't really, I think it was a tourist trap, to be honest with you. A museum can be a tourist trap, which means that it's designed just to get tourists and it doesn't actually do anything of any note. And that's what they say. Well, in my opinion, that's what the sex museum in Amsterdam does. People can disagree with me, but I didn't find it a particularly enlightening experience. Did you read all the information on plaques? I think that was about the only thing my eyes could look at. That was vaguely interesting.

M: So you guys, if you are in Amsterdam, don't go to the sex museum.

R: There's a nice palace in the middle of the city that everyone could go to. And on that note, the sex museum might not be interesting, but our sexy vocabulary should be.

M: Oh, yes, we have, we do have some sexy vocabulary on museums.

R: Which is a phrase that you never thought you would say, but there you go.

M: No, sexy vocabulary, I like it.

R: No, sexy vocabulary about museums. We've said the word sex 300 times.

M: Sexy museum vocabulary. There you go.

R: But anyway, everyone enjoy our museum of vocabulary.

M: Thank you very much for listening. For more updates on the podcast and Rory's private life follow us on Instagram and Telegram. Success with IELTS. Bye!

R: Bye!

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