📙 Part 2: Describe a prize you received

This episode's vocabulary

Trophy (noun) - a prize, such as a gold or silver cup, that is given to the winner of a competition or race, and often returned after a year to be given to the winner of the competition in the following year.

Prepubescent (adj.) - relating to the period before children start to develop adult sexual characteristics.

Boy Scouts - an organization for boys that encourages them to take part in activities outside and to become responsible and independent.

Oversight (noun) - systems or actions to control an activity and make sure that it is done correctly and legally.

Regardless (adverb) - despite; not being affected by something.

Conscious (adj.) - awake, thinking, and knowing what is happening around you.

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Questions and Answers

M: Rory is going to describe a prize he received. He's going to say what the prize is, when it was, and he's gonna say what he needed to do to get it, and explain how he felt about it. Rory, are you ready?

R: Yes!

M: Fire away.

R: I won a trophy for shooting once. Although it was a long time ago when I was a young teenager. Actually, I might have been a prepubescent there, now I think about it. Um, anyway, we used to go shooting with the local Boy Scouts. That's like the sort of British equivalent of the pioneers or the Komsomol, whether the government oversight. Anyway, we were shooting air guns when one of the troop leaders hit upon this idea to create a point system. It wasn't pre-planned or anything, it was just something we came up with on the spot. Anyway, once it was all agreed on, we decided every week when you went to the firing lanes or went to the ranges and shot at target sheets of different shapes and sizes, then you get different points or different quantities of points for these things. I think there were some solid targets in moving ones too, now I think about it, if I'm not mistaken. Regardless, we were going there fairly regularly and I did surprisingly well for someone who had never held a gun in their life before. But it wasn't a conscious effort. I was just having fun, really. I didn't realize there is actually a trophy involved. So when I was awarded it, I was actually taken completely by surprise. And then I was extremely happy naturally. A few of the guys that we were with were a bit too out, which bothered me a little since they were quite good too. But the scores didn't lie. And I was the best, so why not celebrate in style a little bit. But yeah, it was, um, it's not something that I've done a lot since shooting or indeed winning trophies. But it was quite an interesting thing to win, I suppose. And I think quite a unique achievement for most teenagers, I'm not sure that many people do things like this.

M: Do you often win prizes?

R: Oh, like I said it's not common for me.

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Discussion

M: Well done. Rory.

R: Was I on target?

M: So we talked about prize. Yes. A prize. But you said the word trophy?

R: Yeah. So a prize could be anything that you're given as a result of winning a competition. And

one of the things is a trophy, which is like a physical thing. It looks like a fancy cup.

M: Yeah. Yeah, but you can say I won a cup. A cup, a trophy. What else can you win? You can win a medal.

R: You can.

M: Yeah, and they're all like different kinds of prizes. Yeah. And Rory won a trophy for shooting. Hmm. Okay. He was shooting solid targets, moving targets. People. No, not people.

R: Well, not people. There were targets that were shaped like people.

M: First you eat dog. And now you should targets which look like people. Rory-Rory. And this all happened when Rory was pre pubescent.

R: Yeah.

M: What did you say?

R: Pre pubescent is just like before you're a teenager before you hit puberty. I think I was 12 or 11. I can't remember, that's before puberty hits for sure.

M: Okay, okay. So we know that what puberty. So like the period of, well, becoming a man or a woman. Yeah, puberty. And then like pre-pubescent.

R: Pre-pubescent is when you're in that stage beforehand.

M: And then you just used this word naturally like, well, actually, I might have been a pre-pubescent.

R: Well, I was trying to think of like another way of saying it. Maybe you'd say like preteen, for

example.

M: Okay, it was in my preteens. Right. Pre-pubescent. Dear listener, with you want to be really cool...

R: Talk about pre-pubescent.

M: Wow. Yeah. So you talked about Boy Scouts, and that's an American thing, or a British thing?

R: It's both actually. There are Boy Scouts of America and their British Boy Scouts as well. I think it was founded in Britain, though, if memory serves,

M: Yeah, we had pioneers in Russia. So it's kind of British pioneers.

R: Do you have pioneers now?

M: No.

R: What's the equivalent?

M: Now we don't have pioneers.

R: No, but like, what's the equivalent of pioneers? Is there one?

M: Boy scouts?

R: Do you have Boy Scouts in Russia?

M: No, no, we have pioneers.

R: Still?

M: Now we don't have pioneers.

R: Anything for young people?

M: We have? No, we don't know. A reliable source tells me now that we don't have pioneers

anymore. We used to have them but now no. But you do have Boy Scouts.

R: We do, yeah.

M: Yeah. Okay. Anyway, so, and then to start a new idea Rory goes like, anyway, we were

shooting air guns.

R: Another way to start a new idea is regardless.

M: Yeah, how can I use regardless thing?

R: Just like, regardless of what's come before, this is what I'm going to talk about now.

M: It doesn't matter what you've said before. So regardless, and then you start a new idea. Or

like anyway, by the way, so yeah.

R: Bla bla bla bla,.

M: Yeah. Bla, bla bla bla bla. So nice, like linking devices. Yeah, cohesive devices.

R: Another cohesive device is actually I might have been.

M: Actually I have been pre-pubescent.

R: Pre-pubescent. Oh my God, just say it. And you can throw in a conditional structure there, if I'm

not mistaken.

M: And you did use lots of past continuous forms like we were shooting, we were going there.

And then you did use the past perfect tense. And I did surprisingly well, for someone who had

never held a gun before.

R: Someone who had never held a gun.

M: Who had never had. What did I say?

R: Never held. It's OK. You said the same thing. I just expanded it.

M: Okay. who'd never held, who had never held, past perfect. Yes. A trophy. Okay. And, yeah,

with a price. I'm awarded a price. Right. I was awarded.

R: Did I say that?

M: Yeah, I was awarded it. I was awarded it.

R: You are always awarded the price.

M: Okay. Yeah. An Oscar. Is an Oscar a prize? Would you like to have an Oscar?

R: No.

M: Why not?

R: Because I'm not an actor.

M: No, but you're gonna be like an Oscar for podcasting. And we're going to be on stage pretty

much we. Not Vanya.

R: No one else.

M: No one else, yeah. So we're going to go on stage and they're going to give us this podcast

Oscar, we're going to be like, oh, thank you. Thank you so much. I wanna, I want to say thank you. It's all my parents.

R: I feel like the stream is more developed in your head than mine.

M: I would just develop ...

R: I'm fine with not getting any attention.

M: Yeah. Or I'm going to be holding the Oscar and going like, oh, I wanna thank Rory, Scotland

freedom. Not Vanya. Okay, so you've used another one, which is quite good put out. So he said like a few guys will be put out, put out like they were putting out fires?

R: No. put out as in they were a little bit annoyed or taken aback by it. However, taking it back to the great phrasal verb for talking about people who are somewhat annoyed or surprised by a turn of events. And if you like phrasal verbs, then you'll just love our phrasal verb Podcourse.

M: We are getting good at it, ha.

R: I'm very good at this whole marketing thing.

M: So, dear listener, you should now think of a situation when you won a prize. Okay? Again, a cup or a trophy or medal doesn't matter. Even if you won some money. Also, some money is kind of prize, right? Or maybe you won a bottle of some alcoholic beverage in a lottery. It's also a prize. Yeah. So think about your school days at university or just make it up. Okay. Rory, over to you.

R: And then fit all of this helpful vocabulary and these phrases for structuring your answer into the story. However, I think that's enough award winning vocabulary and grammar for now. Bye!

M: We'll see in speaking part three! Bye-bye!