节目资讯
刊物:空中英语教室
日期:2013-12-17
难易度:Medium
关键字:disaster, quality, tuition, volunteer, diabetes, staple
Hello, and welcome to Studio Classroom.
My name is Gabe.
And my name is Carolyn.
And your English will improve today as we continue to learn about 1919,
this project, this fundraising event that the Chinese Christian Relief
Association puts on every year.
Actually, they put on many of these events every year.
And it is a bike riding event that is put on basically to help poor people or
people who are in need.
Now have you ever been involved in any of this kind of work, any relief work?
Carolyn?
Well, I was involved in some relief work that's similar to what we'll be talking
about in our lesson today.
After the big tsunami that hit Japan, there was a big call for donations and
fundraising to help the people that were suffering,
who had lost their homes and were just dealing with so many different things.
And so I actually put on a bake sale and helped raise money to donate to that
effort.
All right.
That is a creative way to get involved in some kind of relief work, a way to
help make people's lives easier after a disaster.
That's what relief work is.
OK, so 1919 does this, 1919.
So let's get started.
Let's continue to learn about 1919.
(Music).
1919.
The "1919 Relief and Service Network" can be found throughout the island of
Taiwan.
All of the 1,000 churches involved help with one or more of the following
programs.
Disaster relief program.
In a matter of minutes, earthquakes and floods can destroy not only people's
homes but everything they have.
In times of disaster, people have found help and support through this program.
Emergency family relief program.
What does an already poor family do when it doesn't qualify for government help
but runs into an emergency situation?
(Music).
All right. Let's go back to the beginning of our lesson here.
We read:
The "1919 Relief and Service Network" can be found throughout the island of
Taiwan.
All right.
So it's not just in one city, not just Taipei where you can read or know about
1919, but it's all over the island of Taiwan.
That's right.
It can be found throughout, so not just in one place but throughout the whole
island.
All of the 1,000 churches involved help with one or more of the following
programs.
So this is a huge network that assists with the 1919 programs.
And there are many different programs that they can be involved with.
And I think this is great - all of these churches are getting involved.
Well, one of these programs is disaster relief. OK.
We read about the disaster relief program.
And right there in that little title, we see a word from our Word Bank:
disaster.
This is something horrible, something terrible that happens.
Often it is unplanned, it's unexpected - a disaster.
That's right.
And a lot of times the news we will hear about natural disasters:
forest fires that are burning down areas or earthquakes that hit or tsunamis or
hurricanes, typhoons...
Those are all natural disasters.
OK, so that's a natural disaster.
But this word can be used to talk about other smaller things as well.
Maybe you planned a party, and you thought it would be really great.
But it didn't go as planned.
Actually, it turned out horrible.
You could say it was a disaster.
The party was a disaster.
Nothing went as planned.
Well, I hope that does not happen to you.
And if you are faced with a disaster, 1919 may be there to help.
We read:
In a matter of minutes, earthquakes and floods can destroy not only people's
homes but everything they have.
This is very true.
When a natural disaster strikes, something you don't plan, it can destroy
everything in just a matter of minutes.
And that's something we want to talk about, that phrase: in a matter of
something (a period of time).
You could say: In a matter of seconds, something happened.
Or as we read here: in a matter of minutes.
This reminds me of what happened on 911 in the United States.
When planes crashed into the Twin Towers, they came down in a matter of minutes.
That means it didn't take that long for them to crash down.
That was a big disaster.
But how else can you use this phrase: in a matter of something?
Well, it's used to show that something didn't take very long to happen.
And so maybe something might usually take 10 years, but it only took 2 or 3.
So you could also use it to say in a matter of years.
So if you think about maybe starting a business, you might think it takes 5
years to really get established.
But in a matter of years, maybe just two years, he was able to get everything
under control.
All right. And of course that's a great thing to have something under control in
just a matter of years.
But it's a horrible thing to have your lives destroyed by natural disasters in a
matter of seconds or minutes.
Well, it's time for us to learn something with Steve and Ken in the Information
Cloud about unforeseen circumstances like disasters.
Whether or not you believe in God, we need to understand what acts of God are,
especially if you own property.
"Acts of God" is, in fact, a legal term that's mostly found in contracts.
It covers any unpredictable event caused by natural forces that cannot be
controlled, like earthquakes or floods.
Right. Acts of God is often a clause in an insurance policy.
It basically deals with unforeseen circumstances or unpredictable events.
If your home suffers damage as a result of an act of God such as an earthquake,
you should immediately contact your home owner's insurance company to determine
whether the damage will be covered.
Another term we often hear is contingency, which refers to an accident or
emergency.
It's a good idea to always have a contingency plan, a plan or procedure that we
can put into action if an emergency occurs.
So a contingency plan is an emergency plan, which is something that we might use
as a backup should a worst-case scenario occur.
A scenario is like a story.
But in this case, a scenario refers to an outline of a sequence of events.
And a worst-case scenario is a situation where everything that can go wrong does
go wrong.
(Chinese).
Thank you, guys.
It is always difficult when we are faced with unforeseen circumstances.
But as we continue reading:
In times of disaster, people have found help and support through this program -
so the disaster relief program that 1919 puts on.
All right. And of course this is in times of disaster.
You could use that phrase "in times of" in other ways as well.
Often I hear this phrase when people are talking about times of war, when there
are a lot of battles going on and people and countries are fighting each other.
And of course we all hope and love the times of peace in our lives.
OK. But of course sometimes there might be times of disaster.
And that's when 1919 steps in.
That's right.
And we learn about another great relief program that they have: the emergency
family relief program.
And we are faced with a question.
What does an already poor family do when it doesn't qualify for government help
but runs into an emergency situation?
It can be very serious.
And we see a word there from our Word Bank: qualify.
Now if you qualify for something, that means that you meet the requirements to
get something.
OK. For example, in a positive way, maybe you are running in a race or you want
to participate in a race.
But you need to run at a certain speed in order to qualify for that race. OK.
So you want to qualify to enter the race or to enter into the Olympics.
You need to qualify.
That's right.
Well, we will get back to answering this question after we spend some time with
Michelle in the Language Lab.
(Chinese).