📘 Part 3: Activities

This episode's vocabulary

Extracurricular activity (noun) - an extracurricular activity or subject is not part of the usual school or college course.

To collaborate (verb) - to work with someone else for a special purpose.

Hyper- (prefix) - having too much of a quality.

Isolated (adj.) - not near other things or people.

Nuance (noun) - a quality of something that is not easy to notice but may be important.

In-depth (adj.) - done carefully and in great detail.

Accessible (adj.) - able to be reached or easily got.

Complexity (noun) - the state of having many parts and being difficult to understand or find an answer to.

To consume (verb) - to use fuel, energy, or time, especially in large amounts.

Cognitively demanding (adj.) - demanding you thinking.

Profound (adj.) - felt or experienced very strongly or in an extreme way.

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Questions and Answers

M: What's the most popular outdoor activity in your country?

R: I'm not actually very sure, to be honest. I suppose it would be something involving the legs. So running, walking, hiking, etc. There's so many places to go in Scotland that you don't have to travel far to, so my money would be on one of those options.

M: What activities do young people usually do after school or work in your country?

R: Well, I imagine there are lots of extracurricular activities that you could do. Apparently, we have quite the gymnastics community. And most of the boys, or at least most of the boys that I taught, like either football or rugby. So there are a lot of clubs for that. I imagine many of them also play video games and use social media after school as well.

M: What do young people usually do in groups?

R: Well, anything social, really. They have discussions, share ideas about what they're doing, and maybe who they're listening to, if they're talking about music, or even podcasts, I suppose. Online, they probably do much the same. Or they collaborate on various video games and social media projects. To be honest, it might be easier to say what they do alone quite frankly.

M: And do you think young people prefer doing something alone or in groups? Like more people enjoy doing what?

R: Oh, I read somewhere that young people are, well, not young people, teenagers, in particular, are hyper-social. So they probably prefer doing things in groups, I imagine there are some isolated individuals out there who either can't or choose not to. But for the most part, teenagers, and younger people will prefer to do things in groups.

M: Is it the same with adults?

R: I think there's a lot more nuance there. I think they will prefer to do certain things in groups. And they will prefer to do other things alone. But in the case of teenagers, they probably prefer to do most things in groups.

M: Do you think that the activities people do after school work are different now than in the past?

R: Well, the underlying concept will probably be the same. So if we talk about social activities, then clearly the idea is to do things together. So they're probably still doing things together. But how it's manifested is probably different. Because of, well, if we think about the current situation with the pandemic, a lot of people are doing social things online, for example. But even the fact that we actually have technology means that they're doing social things, using or through or with the aid of technology in some way, shape, or form.

M: And what about the future? What kind of activities would be popular for people to do after work or school?

R: Well, like I say, the concept will probably be the same. People will still want to do things together or in groups. But what those activities will be I can't possibly say. That would require me to have an in-depth knowledge of what's coming out of the tech industry, which I don't have.

M: And could you just give me some examples of such activities?

R: That I don't know about? They're going to happen in the future.

M: No, like people usually do now, for example, these days.

R: Well, you wanted to talk about the future. So which one is it?

M: No, the present, the present.

R: Okay. So some more examples of things that people do at present?

M: After work or school.

R: Okay. They play video games together. They like have games, like Among us, for example, or I think you can play Minecraft together. And if you can, and there are various competitions for building things that people get stuck into.

M: Do you think people prefer movies over books?

R: Well, I suppose so since movies are generally more accessible than books in terms of time and content. By that I mean, you can consume them in a shorter space of time. And a visual image with spoken words is easier to understand. And now we can even change the language settings on most films. So that makes it easier to share ideas across cultures and countries than with literature because you have to go through the trouble of translating everything and that takes time and not every book is translated and it's just the accessibility is not really that great for literature.

M: How do you think books can help people over movies?

R: I'm not sure. I suppose the complexity of the ideas in books can be greater, since they can be consumed over a longer period of time. But that also makes them more cognitively demanding. And you have to really try to understand them. Despite that, I think people are more likely to turn to a book for advice. Like in comparison to a movie, unless it was like a documentary or something extremely profound. It's much easier to take a book seriously compared to a film.

M: Rory, thank you for your answers!

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