📙 Part 2: Describe a tall building in your city that you like or dislike

This episode's vocabulary

Namesake (noun) - a person or thing having the same name as another person or thing.

To site (verb) - to exist or be built in a particular place.

Invaluable (adj.) - priceless; extremely useful.

Site (noun) - a place where something is, was, or will be built, or where something happened, is happening, or will happen.

To draw (verb) - to attract attention or interest.

Distinctive (adj.) - Something that is distinctive is easy to recognize because it is different from other things.

Dilapidated (adj.) - old and in poor condition.

To radiate (verb) - to spread out in all directions from a central point.

To reenact (verb) - to repeat the actions of an event that happened in the past as a hobby or as a performance.

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Questions and Answers

M: Rory, fire away.

R: Well, I love the ruins of the Arbroath Abbey in its namesake town in Scotland. They're just in from the sea, and they're sited in the center of the town. You used to be able to see them for miles around. And perhaps you still can if you look carefully enough. I haven't been back in a while, but I was looking at houses there. And it seems, it certainly still seems to be the case. But there's been a lot of building and development in Arbroath recently. So maybe it's not so easy to see the ruins these days. They're literally hundreds of years old and they make up an invaluable historical and cultural site in Scotland. They draw visitors from all over the country, and even all over the world, actually, or they used to before the pandemic shut down travel. The whole thing is made of sandstone, which gives it and the other buildings around it this distinctive red look. This is actually a common thing in Scotland. Many houses in Aberdeen are made of granite, for example. Anyway, I digress. They look like how a huge monastery would look if the roof had collapsed in on itself. And only the main walls and columns, the central columns were left. And you would think that would make it look rather dilapidated. But the council has done a remarkable job of maintaining it over the years. And you can almost sort of feel the air of mystery and age radiating from it even from far away. And that's one of the main reasons I like it. Though, I also really like the reminder it gives us of Scottish culture, and the people who work to maintain and promote that. From the people who reenact ancient characters there to the receptionist in the building itself. It's just great. And if anyone ever visits Scotland then this should be definitely on their tick list of things to see if they go there.

M: What about your friends? Do they like this building?

R: We haven't talked about it actually. We should, we should go there.

M: Thank you, Rory!

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Discussion

M: We're gonna go there. We're gonna get our Scottish visas and yeah, we're gonna paint the town red.

R: It's already red because it's made of sandstone. Sorry.

M: Anyway. I was just wondering, so you were talking about the ruins of Arbro...

R: Arbroath Abbey. It's where the declaration of independence in Scotland was signed.

M: So Scotland had a declaration of independence.

R: Yeah, I think. If I am correct in 1291, I think that's right, hold on.

M: So I'm looking at this Abbey. And it doesn't seem tall to me. Hmm. Interesting. Like you talked about ruins and I picture ruins being not very tall. Yeah, you kind of have this thingy, which is, well, yeah, rather tall.

R: Beg my pardon. The declaration of Arbroath is written in 1320.

M: Shame on you. You should know your history. You should know all the dates which are important.

R: I got the approximate time period correct.

M: Yeah, anyway, so what I'm driving at is how tall should the building be, if the card asks you to describe a tall building?

R: Well, you can see Arbroath Abbey from miles around, which is something that I said.

M: Okay, so like Scottish, to Scottish standards it's tall.

R: Yeah, but remember, like it's a small country, only 5 million people live there. We don't have the need for that many skyscrapers. But if you insist on picking something that's not local and talk about skyscrapers in New York City, maybe you could talk about the Statue of Liberty, for example. America freedom.

M: In your city, you see. So, describe a tall building in your city.

R: Well, you don't have to talk about... You could make it up, you could pretend you're from New York.

M: Right, that's true, dear listener. Yeah, you can say okay, I'm from New York. I'm gonna tell you about the Empire State Building. Yeah. Are there any skyscrapers in Scotland?

R: I'm thinking now, like...

M: Do you have any tall buildings really, like in Moscow? Like a skyscraper?

R: Oh, there's, it's not a skyscraper but we have the Wallace monument. That's a big building. It commemorates William Wallace.

M: In Edinburgh?

R: It's no, it's in Sterling where I went to university.

M: Okay, but it's a monument, it's not a building.

R: A monument is a building. You can go inside. Yeah.

M: All right. Okay.

R: It's got a big sword in there that William Wallace used to carry.

M: What about our students, who are in Asia? And there aren't any tall buildings in their places?

R: What do you mean there aren't any tall buildings in Asia?

M: No, but if you live in a village, you know if you're from a village and there aren't any tall buildings. You can talk about like...

R: A radio mast? They must have some kind of, you know, radio communication.

M: Or maybe like choose the tallest, the biggest house in the village and talk about that.

R: Yes. I mean, like, unless you're from an isolated... The only place where I've been where there haven't been tall buildings was when I lived in Fiji, and we lived in huts.

M: Oh, yes. Okay. So if you are from Fiji, then you have a problem.

R: You don't really have a problem if you could just say like, I'm from a village, but the closest city to me is, oh what is the capital of Fiji? Suva. And they've got skyscrapers there, I think.

M: Yeah. Yes, so you see, dear listener, there are ways around it, right. And a tall building must not be like a skyscraper. It could just like, be a little bit tall. And the examiner maybe doesn't know what building you're talking about. If Rory was to take the exam, and if you were in the real exam, to talk about this Abbey, I don't think the examiner would know what he's talking about.

R: Well, I'm just looking at pictures of Suva there. And I think there's a cathedral. So you could talk about the cathedral.

M: Yeah, you could talk about cathedrals, monuments, just buildings, office buildings.

R: Yeah, the IELTS people haven't really thought that through at all, have they? Um...

M: We should write to Cambridge, let's write to Cambridge and say, listen, Cambridge people. You know what? I live in Fiji. And there aren't any tall buildings there where I live. What do I do? Mhm?

R: Well, they'll just say lie.

M: Yeah.

R: Also Asia... I don't think, like, Fiji is an isolated case. But like Asia's like a hub for development, more skyscrapers are built in China every year than anywhere else in the world. China, give us money.

M: I mean, no what I meant to say was that if you live in a village, okay, in Asia, in Russia, in the middle of nowhere, in the middle of Scotland nowhere, Scottish nowhere. If you just live in a village somewhere in the world, right, and you don't have any tall buildings, what do you do? There are ways around it. Right?

R: But there are, there's like... Well, the tallest building could be a church with only two storeys, but if you live in a village where everyone else has only like one storey tall buildings.

M: Yeah, yeah, that's true. So a church could be a tall building, you see. So dear listener, if you feel that you have to describe a tall building like it must be a skyscraper. No, no. It could be a church, it could be a monument.

R: It could be a mosque. Mosques have the minarets, where they do the call to prayer. That's pretty tall. It has to be so that people can hear them.

M: Shall we talk about the vocabulary, though?

R: Yes. We should. Oh, I just did, but not the vocabulary for the...

M: What's the tall building, where is it, in the village, in Asia, in Russia, in the middle of Scotland? Sorry, dear listener. Okay, let's talk about the vocabulary that you can use about buildings. So first of all, this building is sited in the center of the town.

R: Yes.

M: So sited is like situated.

R: Yeah.

M: I've heard that you shouldn't say that this building is situated. Because it doesn't make sense. You should say this building is in the center. Is it true?

R: I don't think it makes a difference. I used the word sited because it's like an archaeological site. Um, but I suppose if you wanted to just say it's in the center of the town, then that's okay.

M: Yep. You've also said that it makes up an invaluable historical and cultural site in Scotland.

R: Visit Scotland really should pay me for this advertising.

M: Yeah, Scotland, give Rory all your money.

R: Yes, so invaluable means that it has no price. And you can't put a price on this. It's almost, it's almost, it must be over 1000 years old. So that's something, it's priceless. But invaluable is like talks about not just money, but about the value in terms of culture and history. And it is a historical site because it's 1000 years old.

M: A historical site or a historical place or a landmark. If the building is a landmark, right? You can say that it draws visitors. So draws, attracts visitors, attracts people from all over the place. Or you can say it attracts office workers or shoppers, Rorys, many Rorys. How many Rorys are there in Moscow?

R: Too many.

M: Maybe one Rory. And then you talk about the building and what it's made of. You say this whole thing, the thing meaning building, the whole building is made of sandstone.

R: Probably could've said the whole structure.

M: Structure. And that's another synonym. The whole structure is made of bricks, or sandstone, or what else? Concrete glass, for example, right? Granite.

R: Yes, but it's very old and sandstone gets worn away. So no, I don't think they actually, they don't do any religious things in the Abbey anymore. It's not possible. But despite this, it doesn't look dilapidated.

M: Oh, this is another good word. Dilapidated.

R: A house that's been abandoned and the windows are smashed, and it doesn't look very nice. And this is dilapidated.

M: In poor condition.

R: But Arbroath Abbey is not in poor condition. It's amazing.

M: Yeah, but this building you're talking about could be in a poor condition. So it's dilapidated. You can also talk about, for example, your hometown. There are some dilapidated buildings, houses in my hometown. So buildings in poor condition, half-destroyed buildings. And then you said that that's one of the main reasons I like it. That's a nice one. One of the main reasons.

R: And that introduces us to the end. And then I went off on another tangent because I said, I also like it because it's a reminder.

M: Of Scottish culture. Yeah, you see, so, dear listener, now you should really choose a tall building that you can talk about, and be ready to talk about buildings because in speaking Part 3 it's going to be architecture and buildings. So yeah, it could be quite a difficult topic, right, if you're not prepared, but we are preparing you now for it.

R: Thank you for tuning in. I hope you liked this episode. So does Maria, and Vanya.

M: And everybody else.

R: And everybody else. And in the next episode, we'll be discussing buildings. Meanwhile, follow us on social media to see the stuff that we get up to behind the scenes.

M: Bye!

R: Bye!

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