节目资讯
刊物:空中英語教室
日期:2012-02-27
难易度:High
关键字:lush, province, majestic, pillar, shroud, geological
(Music).
Hi, everybody. Welcome to Studio Classroom Worldwide.
Thanks for joining us.
My name is Steve.
And my name is Ryan.
Well, everybody, from Argentina to Zimbabwe, from Canada to Korea, the world is
sprinkled with beautiful, natural national parks.
Since the early 1800s, national governments realized that it's good to set some
land aside for the purpose of preserving beautiful natural scenery to protect
wildlife or to remember a significant historical event.
Some national parks are under water, like the U.S.'s Biscayne Park in southern
Florida, but most are on land.
Today in our TRAVEL feature, we travel to a forest park that this year
celebrates its 30th birthday.
We're talking about China's Zhangjiajie Forest Park on page 50.
(Music).
Zhangjiajie.
This odd and otherworldly natural landscape is closer than you might think.
There is a world of dense, lush forests, winding streams, crashing waterfalls,
towering mountains and strange stone columns, all shrouded in mist.
It lies in the northwestern part of China's Hunan province, and it's home to
some of Earth's rarest plants, animals and rock forms.
This world is Zhangjiajie.
Zhangjiajie's semitropical climate makes it suitable to visit at any time of the
year, and the landscape changes colors with the seasons.
(Music).
All right. We are now back in our TRAVEL article for the month, looking at a
place a little closer to home called Zhangjiajie.
That's right.
Now this exciting place is otherworldly, but the natural landscape is closer
than you might think.
OK. Let's take a look at this word "otherworldly." That means it is very
strange, it seems like it doesn't belong on Earth.
That's right. It... it seems like it belongs in another world, but it's closer
than you just might think, Ryan.
Yeah. So now let's take a look at Zhangjiajie.
There is a world of dense, lush forests, winding streams, crashing waterfalls,
towering mountains and strange stone columns.
This sounds like a beautiful place.
These are just list of wonderful adjectives to describe such a beautiful place.
Now friends, if you're in your writing and you're practicing your writing,
using adjectives like this to describe a location is a great way to keep your
reader interested and hopefully to bring them into the same place.
Yeah. OK. And so we start off talking about these forests, we're saying they're
dense, which means they are very crowded or very thick.
There are many trees and there are also lush.
And "lush" is that dark green beautiful color.
It's when there's a lot of green because there are so many plants around.
So there are lush trees in a very dense area.
That makes sense.
Yeah, very green, very healthy plants all over the place.
But we also see we use the word "strange" to describe Zhangjiajie.
We're talking about strange stone columns.
Now "columns" are towers.
And since they're stone, they would be natural towers.
And these stand out. This... is what really makes this place such an incredible
view.
It's very unique.
Yeah, very unique, very special-looking.
And we see that all of this is shrouded in mist.
Now the word "shrouded" means to be covered or hidden by something.
In this case, it's hidden by mist.
That's right. "Shrouded" is a wonderful adjective to use to describe something
that is covered; or a verb, because it's just... it's really a good mental
picture.
It makes you think of something more than just being covered, it's shrouded.
Well, all of this lies in the northwestern part of China's Hunan province, and
it's home to some of Earth's rarest plants, animals and rock formations.
OK. So now we know where it is - near China's Hunan province.
Now a "province" is an area that is ruled by another country.
So in this case, it is China's province, so it's ruled by China.
That's right.
And it's home to some of the rarest plants and animals and rock formations.
So this is a place where something... lots of the things around here are very
unique.
They're very special.
The rock formations, I think, really stand out.
Yeah. They're very cool-looking rock formations.
You can see pictures of these in your Studio Classroom magazine.
Now this world we call it is Zhangjiajie.
That's right.
Now remember, Ryan and I are English teachers, so our pronunciation may be a
little bit off.
But we know that Zhangjiajie is just beautiful.
It's a semitropical climate, and it makes it very suitable to visit any time of
the year.
So no matter what time of year you're traveling, this would be a great option
to... a place to go visit because it's going to be about the same.
Right, yeah. We see it's semitropical.
We've talked about the word "tropical" before referring to an area in the world
that is very warm and gets a lot of sun.
So this area is only half there.
The word... or the prefix "semi-" means half.
OK. So does that mean they get half sun?
Ooh, no. That just means it is only half in that part of the world.
OK. So the weather there is... it doesn't get very, very hot, and it doesn't get
very, very cold either.
It stays kind of in the middle.
Now it's a good place, it's... but it's going to have a lot of rain.
That's also one of the semitropical areas that... they have a lot of rain in
them.
That's true, yeah.
And of course, like we saw in the article, it changes colors with the seasons.
What does it mean if an area is changing colors?
Well, if you think about plants, a lot of trees and plants change colors.
Their leaves, their flowers change colors with the seasons.
So as time progresses, summer, winter, fall, the colors will change.
And this place does.
Right. Yeah. The seasons are referring to summer, winter, spring and fall.
And so you can go any time of year see something completely different.
No matter what you see, it's going to be beautiful.
Now for right now, let's visit the Chat Room.
Hey, Bryan.
Hi, Ken.
Did you see that terrible accident on the highway on the way here?
Oh, yes. It looked awful.
Do you know what happened?
I think one of the drivers couldn't see the other one because of all the mist.
That's possible.
It was very foggy this morning.
Yes, it was.
Fortunately, no one was hurt in the accident.
That's good.
Hey, is there a difference between mist and fog?
Not really.
They're both words for one type of weather that makes it hard to see.
The word "fog" is a little stronger, though.
It suggests that the mist is really thick.
But in most situations, either word is fine.
So you said this morning was foggy to emphasize that it was really hard to see.
That's right.
So what about smog and haze?
Do they mean the same thing as "fog"?
Not exactly.
Why don't we have Doris explain the difference.
OK.
The term "smog" is a combination of the word "smoke" and "fog." It was coined in
1905 to talk about the weather in London where fog was mixing with smoke from
factories.
Now it is used to describe any air pollution that makes it hard to see.
The term "haze" is more general.
It can describe anything in the air that makes vision difficult, so it includes
both mist and smog.
Hmm. That's interesting.
So mist and fog are natural weather conditions, smog is air pollution, and haze
could be either.
That's right, Ken.
But "hazy" also has another meaning.
What's that?
A hazy idea is one that isn't clear or well-defined.
So if I only have a hazy idea of what my boss wants me to do, I don't really
know what he wants.
Oh, OK.
Well, thanks for the lesson.
Thanks to you, my understanding of English is becoming less hazy every day.
And thanks for letting me know what happened in the accident.
I'm so glad no one was hurt.