节目资讯
刊物:空中英语教室
日期:2013-09-21
难易度:High
关键字:teller, well-being, urgency, thrive, culprit
Hello, everyone, and welcome to Studio Classroom.
My name is Gabe.
And I'm Carolyn.
And you're joining us for the second day of our lesson The Speed of Cities.
So in yesterday's lesson, we talked about how Robert Levine, a social
psychologist,
wanted to figure out how related the speed of people walking in a city was to
that city's prosperity.
Maybe a richer or bigger city had people that were walking faster.
And maybe people of poorer cities, the people there walked slower.
Well, I do wonder about other things.
Also time; time could also be affected.
Maybe you have a watch or a clock.
Do you set your clock fast or slow?
Maybe that could also reveal something about your city.
Carolyn, how accurate is your watch?
Well, I actually don't wear a watch.
Ah, yes. I see that.
Yes, yes. But, um, all of my clocks have different times on them.
One clock is about 17 minutes fast, and the other one's two minutes fast, and...
Wait. Why is that?
And then my computer is synced with the satellite, so.
What!?
It's... it's actually on time.
Is that to help you be on time or maybe be early in some cases?
It's so I'm always early.
OK. That's a good idea.
I used to have a watch that was set 17 minutes fast.
I always hoped I would forget how fast it was so that I could actually be on
time.
Anyway, how accurate is your watch or how accurate are your clocks or whatever
you use to tell time?
That could reveal something about your personality.
Right now it's time for us to get started with our lesson for today.
Let's look at the pace of life.
The Speed of Cities.
Pace of life.
Walking speed is only part of the pace of life in any city.
The pace of life also includes how fast people talk, how quickly a bank teller
gives out change and how accurate everyone's watch is.
Levine also researched some other factors and found that the pace of life was
fastest in Western Europe and Japan.
East Asian economic powers like Hong Kong and South Korea landed in the middle,
along with Canada and the U.S.
The slowest pace seemed to be in Central and South America and in Indonesia.
(Music).
OK. Let's look at this section called Pace of life.
So walking speed is only part of the pace of life in any city.
Of course there are other components, other parts to the pace of life.
That's right.
And we see what those are.
The pace of life also includes how fast people talk, how quickly a bank teller
gives out change and how accurate everyone's watch is.
So earlier we were talking about how accurate our watch is or our clocks are,
and mine are pretty fast.
Uh, Gabe, how accurate is yours again?
Well, it was 17 minutes fast to help me to be on time or to help me to be early.
Right now, of course, I have no watch.
I don't use a watch.
But my cellphone is synced with satellite, so it's exactly on time.
So we're talking here about these different things, and they can reveal a lot
about a city or the pace of life.
Let's take a look at a key word here.
It is "teller." We're talking about a bank teller.
What is a bank teller?
Well, the bank teller is the person sitting at the counter of the bank that you
go to talk to if you want to withdraw money or make a deposit or discuss
something about your account.
And it's very important to be nice to the bank teller because he or she is
holding all of your change.
That's a good point.
Be nice to your bank teller.
Now there is this word "teller" in the letters ATM.
You don't always have to go to a bank to withdraw money.
You can go to the automated teller machine, the ATM.
That's something that you can work with to get your money.
That's right.
Now there is a word in this sentence, the word "change." And it has many
different uses.
So let's go to the Information Cloud and see what Steve and Ken have to say
about this.
As you may know, the word "change" can be used to describe money.
But be careful how you use it.
Steve, are coins the same as change?
Yes, Ken. That's one definition of change.
Even though we say "coins" with an S, we cannot add an S to "change." So I might
have five coins in my pocket,
but together they are called change or loose change.
Also we use "change" to mean not just coins but when we need to break a large
bill for smaller bills.
For example, I might have a $20 bill, but I need to make a phone call, so I can
ask someone if they have change for 20.
"Change" can also refer to the money returned to you after you pay for something
with more money than it costs.
If I hand over a $10 bill on a $9 purchase, I will get $1 in change.
And then there's exact change.
To have exact change means to have the exact amount of money that an item costs.
In some places, public buses require passengers to have exact change.
The bus driver does not give money back.
People must pay exactly what the cost is.
And if you don't have exact change, you can, of course, pay more, but you won't
get any change in return.
(Chinese).
Thank you, guys.
Well, change is good.
Let's continue talking about this pace of life.
Levine also researched some other factors and found that the pace of life was
fastest in Western Europe and Japan.
OK. So Robert Levine discovered this.
The pace of life is faster in Western Europe and the Asian country of Japan.
Well, that is very interesting.
But as we learned yesterday, Ireland had the fastest walkers.
And that would be part of Western Europe.
So I guess that whole area, people have a very fast-paced lifestyle.
They do things very quickly.
And also in Japan.
I know I've been to Tokyo, and things definitely move very quickly there.
Well, you know, I've never been to Western Europe, but I've been to countries in
Eastern Europe where the pace of life is a little slower.
And I've also been to some countries where they're known for not having great
economies.
Their economy is a little poorer.
And it's a little more comfortable to live there because I like that slower pace
of life.
But I guess it... it is related to the economy a little bit.
That's what we are learning today.
And we see that East Asian economic powers like Hong Kong and South Korea landed
in the middle, along with Canada and the U.S.
So they don't have quite such a fast-paced lifestyle.
They're in the middle.
Now where is the slowest pace, Gabe?
Well, we see here the slowest pace seemed to be in Central and South America and
somewhere else - and in Indonesia.
So they're not just in the same part of the world.
We saw the fastest walkers were in Western Europe and in Japan.
We see the slowest walkers are in South and Central America and in Indonesia.
Well, South and Central America and Indonesia, many of those countries are still
developing.
They don't have very strong economies.
And a lot of their economy is based on farming.
So it's a little bit difficult for them to catch up in this technology age where
everything is done so quickly in these larger cities,
especially in the West and in Japan, where everything is so fast-paced.
It is done immediately (That's true...) because of our technology.
Yeah. Well, you know, I find it interesting that some of the countries that I
like visiting or that I want to visit are these countries that have a slower
pace of life.
I think that something that attracts me to these countries is that it's more
laid-back, more relaxed.
People aren't going as fast.
And I kind of like that.
Uh, but it is kind of interesting to see how it's related to these countries'
economies.
Well, that is something that we will be talking about in our next section.
But first, we want to join Michelle in the Language Lab.
Hi, everyone. I'm Michelle.