节目资讯
刊物:空中英语教室
日期:2012-06-28
难易度:Low
关键字:elementary school, expose, hopeful, meanwhile, divorce, demo tape
Hi, everyone.
Welcome to Studio Classroom Worldwide.
My name is Steve.
Thanks for joining us today.
Well, you know there are some entertainers who spend many years knocking at the
door of fame and fortune.
And when it finally opens, they discover it's not all like what they expected.
Making it to the top doesn't answer problems of loneliness or the big questions
like: What's my purpose in life?
Our PROFILE personality this month is just such a person.
He's the talented singer, dancer and actor, Vanness Wu.
Wu had everything the world could offer.
But for him, it wasn't enough.
Let's read his story now starting on page 50.
Vanness Wu.
How this talented singer, dancer and actor found his purpose.
In 2001, Vanness Wu took a risk.
He left his job in California and traveled to Taiwan, hoping to become a
performer.
Wu was born in the U.S., but he had been to Taiwan before.
During his first few years of elementary school, he had traveled between Los
Angeles and Taiwan.
This let him visit both parents, who were divorced.
He eventually had settled in California.
Wu's sister, a professional musician, first exposed him to show business.
Hello, everyone.
Thank you for joining us.
My name is Ryan.
And my name is Kaylah.
And today we are talking about our PROFILE article.
Now this month we're covering a well-known Taiwanese American.
That's right.
We're talking about Vanness Wu.
Now we're going to be learning a little bit about how this talented singer,
dancer and actor found his purpose.
That's right.
Now Vanness Wu is really very well-known in Taiwan right now.
That's right. Yeah, he, uh... he's, like you said, he's Taiwanese, but he's also
American.
He was born in America, so.
We're going to learn a little bit about how he got his start and where he is
today.
That's right.
Now in 2001, Vanness Wu took a risk.
So he'd left his job in California and traveled to Taiwan hoping to become a
performer.
OK. Now when you take a risk, that means you do something that could be a little
bit dangerous if it doesn't work well.
So maybe he... we saw he moved to Taiwan from California.
So he was hoping to become a performer.
But if that didn't work out, then it would have been bad.
That's right.
His risk that he was taking was leaving his job moving to another country.
Well, he wanted to become a performer.
But where did he start?
OK. Well, like we said, he was born in the United States, but he had been to
Taiwan before.
During his first few years of elementary school, he had traveled between Los
Angeles and Taiwan.
Yeah. OK, no...
Now we're talking about "elementary school." And that is school for kids between
the age of 5 and 12, or 11 years old.
That's right.
So elementary school, another way of saying that is primary school.
Now in the United States, that includes kindergarten, usually through 5th or 6th
grade.
So he would have been between the ages of 5 and 12 as he traveled between the
two countries.
OK. So he was pretty young, and already he was getting the opportunity to travel
between the United States and Taiwan.
And this gave him another opportunity.
That's right. But because he was traveling, it allowed him to visit both
parents, who were, in fact, divorced.
So he had one parent living in the United States, and another parent living in
Taiwan.
OK. The word "divorce" there is an unfortunate word, but it happens a lot.
That means when someone is... or was married but are no longer married anymore.
That's right. And that's legally.
That's not just they are separated and are not living together.
It's when they have legally ended their marriage and both of them are still
alive.
OK. So Vanness Wu he's able to go and travel between Los Angeles and Taiwan to
visit his mother and his father.
But you can't do that through all of school, so he had eventually settled in
California.
So instead of going back and forth all the time, he decided to live in
California with whichever parent was there.
We're not sure which one.
But he decided to live there and finished his school in the United States.
Right. Now you kind of talked about this a little bit, Kaylah, but what does the
word "settled" mean?
To "settle" means to stay or to live.
So here we know that instead of going back and forth all the time, he decides to
live, to stay in one place permanently.
OK. So he's decided after a while to stay in California.
Now we're going to look a little bit at his sister.
She was a professional musician.
And she... she first exposed Vanness Wu to show business.
That's right.
So we see that maybe he even decided to stay in California because he had a
sister there.
We're not sure.
But I... Ryan, I assume that maybe that was a good thing for him.
I know I would do that too.
If my sibling, if my brother or sister were in a certain place, I would probably
want to be with them too.
And it's hard when your parents are divorced to know which one you should live
with.
It's always a terrible decision and one that kids unfortunately are forced to
make sometimes.
And it's never easy.
But it does make sense to choose to live near another sibling.
And a sibling is a brother or a sister.
And they could be older or younger, it doesn't matter.
OK. In this case, his sister is a professional musician.
That means she sings or plays music and gets paid to do it.
So she's probably pretty good.
And that's why it's a good thing that she exposed him to show business.
That's right.
Now if you're thinking about it, Ryan, they're living in Los Angeles.
And if she's already a professional, that means she has to be pretty good
because Los Angeles is full of people who want to be professional musicians.
Yes, it is.
I should know. I came from Los Angeles.
And it is... there are a lot of people there that understand show business.
And so it makes sense that he would have been exposed to it.
Now to be "exposed" to something means that you have been... it's been made
public.
You have experienced it for the first time.
So for Vanness, in this situation, we would say he was introduced to it.
He got to experience what show business would be like.
Yeah. He got to see what it actually is and got to learn a little bit about it.
And show business, of course, we know, is referring to performing, to movies and
music and television.
That's right.
But that also includes dancing, that includes acting.
So it has all different kinds. It's all those different entertain...
We would say the entertainment industry is also known as show business, or
sometimes we even shorten it to showbiz.
Yeah, I was just going to say that.
Sometimes we call it "showbiz." And so he is now been exposed to this,
thankfully, through his sister in Los Angeles.
So now we know he is now very famous.
He's an actor, he's a singer, he's a dancer.
And it's all thanks to his sister exposing him to this in California.
That's right.
And she exposed him at a fairly young age.
Well, we're going to talk more about Vanness Wu and how his career is
progressing after we visit the Chat Room.
So I wasn't sure what to do.
I was sure my boss had made the wrong decision.
But he didn't like being criticized.
That's a tough decision.
What did you do?
Well, I decided that this was important enough that I should take a risk and
tell him my opinion.
Good for you.
What happened when you told him?
He was upset at first.
But then he decided I was right and reversed the decision.
Wow! You were really going out on a limb there.
I'm glad it worked up.
Uh, going out on a limb? I don't think I've heard that expression before.
Oh. In that case, let's see what Doris has to say about this idiom.
OK.
"To go out on a limb" means to take a risk or do something that puts you in a
dangerous position.
If you're climbing a tree, the farther along a limb or branch you go the thinner
it gets.
Therefore, when you go out on a limb, there's a greater risk of the branch
breaking and you falling down from the tree.
Oh, I see.
I guess I was going out on a limb when I told my boss I disagreed with his
decision.
Hey, what about risking my neck?
Could I also say that?
That wouldn't be a standard use of the phrase.
Normally to risk your neck means to do something physically dangerous.
If it's not a physical danger, it has to be a more serious risk, like risky
going to jail.
I see. So driving dangerously would count as risking my neck.
Right.
But trying a new food without being sure whether you like it or not is just
going out on a limb.
I get it.
You know, that experience taught me that going on a limb is sometimes helpful.
But it gave me the confidence to take some risks in later jobs.
Thanks for sharing about your learning experience, Ken.