📕 Part 1: Public places

How often do you go to public places? I suppose almost every other day since I need to go out in the street to shop or walk to my yoga studio or something like that. I also live close to a public park and the city centre as well. So I'm there for a stroll rather often too.

What are the busiest public places where you live? At this time of year? Probably the centre since all the shops are there and people are picking up their shopping for Christmas and stuff like that. Apart from that, I'm not sure. It's getting colder so people aren't out much. I think the park might be more popular in the summer, but it's pretty deserted at the moment.

Have you ever talked with someone you don't know in public places? Yeah, especially if I bump into someone I know. It's not happened in a while though. Oh, actually no, that's a lie. I ran into a friend the other week at the gym. That was a nice surprise.

Do you wear headphones in public places? Usually, yeah. It's either that or listen to the sound of the traffic and that's not as entertaining as listening to music or an audiobook or something like that. And with my earphones in, I don't run the risk of disturbing other people.

Would you like to see more public places near where you live? I'm not sure there's the space to be honest. It's a city and it's already a very well-developed area and we're pretty lucky to be blessed with quite a few common areas already. It's not like it's a big city and everyone is rammed into tightly packed buildings.

So, dear listener, a new topic, public places. So as we've discussed, a public place is any place where you have people. So outdoor places, banks, parks, shopping malls, anything. So we usually go to public places and you can say, well, I usually go shopping or I walk to yoga, I go to my yoga studio or I live close to a public park. I live downtown, so close to the city centre and I usually stroll there. So that's your word.

Casual walk.

Yeah, so you walk casually in a park, you just stroll in a relaxed way, you know, listening to our podcast, to my stupid jokes, to Rory's stories and like you say, yeah, I sometimes take a stroll in a park or I stroll where, where can you stroll? Can you stroll in a shopping centre?

I suppose you could stroll around a shopping centre. Ooh, is that a phrasal verb?

Ooh, it is a phrasal verb. Stroll around a shopping centre. Public places could be quite busy. So for example, I live near the street, which is very busy during the week, like all the shops are busy because people choose their gifts or they pick up their shopping. So they choose their shopping, they do their shopping or they pick up their shopping for Christmas, for example. And you can say that the shops near the place where I live are quite busy, but they can get deserted at any moment.

So a nice antonym.

So if there are not many people, the place is deserted. Or if there are no people, the place is deserted. C1 word. So it's band 8. For example, a deserted street.

Is it?

Yeah, it is C1. Empty. A deserted street or a deserted building, for example. So empty, an empty building. A very strange question, you know, have you ever talked to someone you don't know in a public place? Like, oh, have you ever talked to strangers in the street?

Yes, all the time. It's one of my favourite hobbies.

Yes, like, my hobby is talking to strange people or just like strangers, people I don't know, random people in public places. Yeah, you can use the phrasal verb bump into. So if you bump into people, you just, you know…

You meet them!

Yeah, but kind of like suddenly, you know, like you stroll around and then bam, you bump into somebody interesting or not interesting, like it's not planned. Or, for example, you walk down the street somewhere in Dundee in Scotland and then bam, you see Rory. So you can bump into Rory in Dundee, Dundee is a place where Rory lives somewhere in the middle of nowhere in Scotland, like a tiny little village.

I don't live in a tiny village anymore.

No, but seriously, Rory, we don't know where you live. Dundee, where is it?

I live in Dundee, it's the fourth largest city. What would be the equivalent in Russia? Volgograd, I suppose.

I don't know. We just don't know this place, Dundee.

Well, not many people know about Volgograd, but a million people live there. Anyway, the important thing is that I live there. That is where I live.

Just Google Dundee, okay? Yeah, so if you go to Dundee, you can bump into Rory. Yeah, so it's like, wow.

Reason enough to go on a holiday there.

Another phrasal verb is run into somebody. So you bump into people, or you bump into someone I know, or you run into a friend somewhere in the centre. Yeah, you're just like, oh, I see your friend, suddenly. It was a nice surprise, for example. Listening to the sound of the traffic is not entertaining. So it's not fun.

It is not.

Yeah, entertaining. That's why I prefer listening to an audiobook or to IELTS Speaking for Success podcast while commuting to work or on my way to school. And I wear headphones.

Maybe not for me.

No, Rory, you don't listen to all podcasts?

I like to listen to the sound of my own voice.

No? Aw. Yeah, because Rory listens to all premium episodes, yeah. Speaking Pod 2 and 3. And you can say, I have my earphones in, like inside my ears, or you can say, I usually wear headphones, or I wear earbuds. So like, what do you have? I don't like disturbing people. That's why I wear headphones.

Disturbing must be an advanced word, surely, and if not, then bothering people.

So I don't like playing loud music. Oh, C2, Rory.

Is it?

Proficiency, band 9.

Yeah. Disturbing. Yeah.

A very nice word.

Nice.

So actually, disturbing as an adjective is C2. So listening to loud music is disturbing. So making people feel worried or upset. So it's disturbing to people.

Well, I have never made anyone upset or disturbed them on purpose.

Disturb as a verb is B2. So like, interrupt somebody. Like, I don't want to disturb people. So dearlistener, you should use disturbing. But here Rory used it as a verb, like I have my earphones in, so I don't run the risk of disturbing other people. So disturb, interrupt other people. Here Rory's answer is pretty nice, like, I'm lucky to be blessed with quite a few of public places where I live.

Well, we're lucky to be blessed.

I'm lucky to be blessed. So that means that I do have some public places where I live. So I have, like, facilities, right, shops, banks, hotels, theatres, museums, squares, parks, all this jazz. But instead of saying just, yeah, I have some public places, Rory, as an educated super native speaker says, I'm pretty lucky to be blessed. I'm just lucky to have many public places. And Rory, what did you mean by saying everyone is rammed, rammed into?

Well, if you're rammed into a place, it's like you're crammed in there. There's not much space for you.

So, for example, in a huge city where you don't have much space, everybody is rammed into packed buildings. Could you give us another example with the phrasal verb ram into?

Well, if we talk about crowded places, for example, around about Christmas time, everyone is rammed into shops or everyone is crammed into shops because they are trying to get the deals and they're trying to prepare in advance.

Yeah, also, dear listener, you can talk about public toilets. They're also public places.

Maybe you don't want to talk about the people you meet in public toilets, though.

Why not? Yeah, you can meet up, you can bump into some interesting people.

In public toilets? I hope not.

Yeah. Also, public baths or public pools, for example. Have you ever been to a public pool?

Yeah, but not for like a long time. There's one in my hometown, but I cannot remember the last time I was there. On the subject of not being able to remember things, I had difficulty remembering the last time I bumped into someone, but then I suddenly remembered. And if you do that, too, in your exam, you can say, oh, no, that's a lie or, oh, no, actually, and then change the story. I ran into a friend, I bumped into a friend. I did that when I took my exam because I realised I was talking absolute nonsense about something.

Yeah, dear listener, if you find yourself talking nonsense, you just say, OK, sorry, I'm talking nonsense. Let me rephrase that. Yeah, and just continue.

I don't know. I like to say that's a lie. It's funny. My yoga teacher does that all the time. Whenever he makes a mistake, he always just goes, and I'd like you to do this. And then he realises the mistake and goes, oh, no, that was a lie. And then moves on to the real…

Yeah, yeah, dear listener, yeah, if you said something stupid, you say, oh, sorry, that was a lie. The truth is.

The actual truth is.

Sweet. Thank you very much for listening. And we'll get back to you in our next episode, OK? Bye.

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