La Palma: Volcano erupts: BBC News Review

72,472 views ・ 2021-09-21

BBC Learning English


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A volcano has erupted on the Spanish island of La Palma.
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Thousands have been forced to evacuate.
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I'm Neil and this is News Review from BBC Learning English.
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Joining me today is Roy. Hi Roy.
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Hello Neil and hello everybody.
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If you would like to test yourself on the vocabulary around this story,
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all you need to do is head to our website
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bbclearningenglish.com to take a quiz.
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But now, let's hear more about this story from this BBC News report:
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So, a volcano has erupted on the Spanish island of La Palma,
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which is one of the Canary Islands off the coast of Africa.
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It is home to around 80,000 people
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and at the moment 5,000 people have been evacuated.
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Now, this volcano has not erupted for the last 50 years
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  and at the moment, fortunately, nobody has been seriously hurt
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and we really hope it stays that way.
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Yes, we do. Now, you've been looking around the various news websites
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and picked out some really useful vocabulary we can use to talk
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about this story and other things. What have you got?
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We have: 'spewing', 'streaming' and 'scramble'.
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'Spewing', 'streaming' and 'scramble'. OK.
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Let's start then with your first headline please, Roy.
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So, our first headline comes from right here in the UK,
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from The Mirror, and it reads:
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'Spewing' – coming out in large amounts.
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Yes. So, this word is spelt S-P-E-W-I-N-G
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and it means to expel a large amount of liquid or gas,
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often used with... often with force. So, it's like a pressure...
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a pressured release of liquid or gas.
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Now, if you think in the case of the volcano,
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you can imagine that lava is just forcibly coming out of the
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top of the volcano and going all down the sides of the volcano.
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Yeah, and lots of it – that's key, isn't it?
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Yes, it really is.
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So, another way we can use it as well is to talk about smoke.
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Now, you can also imagine that the volcano
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is 'spewing' smoke into the atmosphere,
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but we can also use it in terms of, for example, cars.
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Can you think of an example where a car was 'spewing' smoke?
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Yeah, absolutely. I was driving last night actually –
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I was coming home from some friends... a friend's house
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and every time we stopped at the traffic light, the car in front –
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when it started again, loads of exhaust 'spewed' out of the pipe –
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the exhaust pipe at the back.
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You know, there's lots of this smoke. It was going into...
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into my car and it was very smelly. It wasn't very nice.
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Oh no, it sounds horrible. And it was 'spewing' out black smoke.
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So, again, it's that forcible and... release of liquid or gas.
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Now, we don't only use it for liquids and gases, do we?
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We have another meaning: we use it with paper.
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So, for example, maybe you're printing a lot of documents
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and your printer has a malfunction
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and it just 'spews' out paper everywhere,
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just continuously 'spewing' out paper
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and you're trying to press the button, but you can't stop it.
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That's another way that we might use 'spewing'.
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Yeah, and you can imagine that maybe with a cash machine as well,
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where the money doesn't stop. It just comes...
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comes flying out as if it's a continuous flow.
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Sadly, that's never happened to me.
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I've always hoped that the cash machine would spew out lots of cash...
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Me neither! ...but it's never happened.
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There is... there is another meeting – a far more...
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well, not very nice meaning. It can be used,
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particularly in British English, to mean to vomit.
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Absolutely. So, again, it's this same idea –
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if we go back to the volcano with the...
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the 'spewing' of lava: the forced... the forced expulsion of lava.
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We use it as well to talk about a person who is vomiting.
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Maybe you're not very well and you 'spew'
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and it's commonly used with the preposition 'up' – to 'spew up'.
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Absolutely. Let's move away from that, Roy.
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I'm beginning to feel a little bit ill.
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Let's get a... let's get a summary please:
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Unfortunately, it seems there are lots of natural disasters going on
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in the world at the moment. We have a story about the California wildfires,
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which you might want to watch. Where can our viewers find it, Roy?
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All you need to do is click the link in the description below.
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OK. Let's move on now to our next headline please.
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OK. So, our next headline comes from the UK,
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from the Guardian, and it reads:
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'Streaming' – flowing continuously. Now, Roy – 'streaming'.
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Everybody knows what 'streaming' is. When I listen to music these days,
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I don't put on a CD, I don't put on a record;
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I 'stream' it. I 'stream' it.
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What's the connection between my listening habits
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and the use of the word here with a volcano?
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Well, this is a great example. Now, when you're listening to music,
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do you like it to be continuous or do you like it to be interrupted?
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Maybe there's a problem with it. How do you... how do you prefer it?
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Continuous.
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Absolutely. So, we use the word 'streaming'
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to talk about a continuous flow of something.
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So, in this case, we're talking about data
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or information across the internet –
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that music 'streaming' across the internet.
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It's a constant flow of that information
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and another good example of this, using information across the internet,
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is to talk about video gamers.
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You know, there's a lot of people who 'stream' content on various
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sites on the internet, showing off their playing of video games.
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They are 'streaming' their content across the internet –
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a continuous flow of these video games.
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Yeah. And a very simple way to remember this
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is that the name of this, sort of, little river.
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A little river is a 'stream', isn't it?
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And what... what happens in a river?
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There is a flow – a flow of water – a continuous flow.
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Yes, definitely. Very much the origin of that word.
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So, the continuous flow of water down the 'stream'.
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The water is 'streaming'.
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Also we can use this word 'streaming' to describe
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what happens to your nose when you have a very bad cold.
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So, first we had 'spew' for vomit
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and now we're talking about problems related to noses and eyes.
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So, yeah, when you have maybe a heavy cold,
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quite often your nose will expel or flow with a lot of liquid.
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Likewise, your eyes... we sometimes say your eyes are 'running',
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but you can also say your nose is 'streaming'
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when it's a constant flow of liquid,
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thanks to a heavy cold or your eyes are 'streaming'.
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And likewise, when you're very upset, you're very emotional – you cry
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and you can say tears are 'streaming' down your face.
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Absolutely. It's like, sort of, rivers – 'streams' coming down your face.
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Yeah. Especially when you have a cold,
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sometimes it can be really heavy.
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Or an allergic reaction.
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Absolutely.
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  OK. Let's get a summary:
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OK. We've been talking about 'streams', liquids, water
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and we have a story about water and the moon.
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Where can our viewers find it, Roy?
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All you need to do is click the link in the description below.
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Let's have a look at your next headline.
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So, my next headline comes from the UK,
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from the Daily Mail, and it reads:
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'Scramble' – move quickly in response to a dangerous situation.
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Yes. So, this word is spelt S-C-R-A-M-B-L-E.
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And it can be used as both a verb and a noun
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with the same spelling, but in the headline it is being used as a verb.
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Now, when we 'scramble', quite often it's talking about a quick response.
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There isn't much time to plan and it's just a very rapid response.
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So, in the... the case of the headline,
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the rescuers are 'scrambling' to help people.
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Yeah, it's... there's a lot of action.
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It can seem disorganised. It's urgent, isn't it?
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It's all about being unplanned. Time is of the essence. It's...
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it's a bit of chaos. A lot of maybe loud shouting and movements.
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But, fundamentally, these people – the rescuers – are highly trained.
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They know what they're doing, so they're able to cope with these
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unplanned situations and likewise, when you think of a fire:
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if there's a fire – a house is on fire... at the fire station,
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the fire officers will 'scramble' into their fire engine.
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They'll – very quickly, they'll go down their pole.
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I'm not sure if they still do that, but they'll get into their vehicle.
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They're highly trained for these unplanned situations,
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but they 'scramble' to respond to the dangerous situation.
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Yeah, likewise, airplanes – if there's some kind of attack or something,
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you hear about planes being 'scrambled'.
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Yeah. This is quite commonly used in the military.
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So, it's a military response. They 'scramble' their fighter jets,
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or they 'scramble' their fighter planes
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to deal with a threat that may be coming towards them.
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Yeah. We also used the word 'scramble' with a...
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there's a connection, but it's a slightly different meaning,
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when you're climbing a hill or a mountain.
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Yeah. So, again, it's about this fast paced movement.
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Now, I'm not very good at climbing mountains or hills,
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so I 'scramble' up them.
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My hands and my arms and my legs are going everywhere.
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It's a kind of chaotic and erratic movement,
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to try and 'scramble' up a hill.
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Have you... have you 'scrambled' up any hills recently?
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Not recently, but I'm planning to this weekend.
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I'm going to visit the English Lake District,
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where there are plenty of hills to 'scramble' up.
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Very, very nice.
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Yeah. And one further meaning of 'scramble',
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which you may well have heard, is connected to eggs.
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I love 'scrambled' eggs.
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What connects this idea of 'scramble' to the ones we've been talking about?
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OK. So, when you 'scramble' your eggs,
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you cook your eggs and then you take a fork or a whisk and you rapidly,
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sort of, beat these eggs – without, sort of, a plan.
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It's kind of chaotic movement – very fast to mix these eggs together.
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So, you can 'scramble' your eggs, mixing them together and that idea
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of it being fast and quite chaotic is carried over from the meaning,
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but this case – it's about mixing something.
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Yeah, OK. Yeah. Alright, let's get a summary:
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Time now then, Roy, for a recap of our vocabulary please.
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Yes, we had 'spewing' – coming out in large amounts.
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We had 'streaming' – flowing continuously.
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And we had 'scramble' – move quickly in response to a dangerous situation.
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If you want to test yourself on the vocabulary,
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go to our website bbclearningenglish.com
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and there's a quiz you can take,
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and plenty of other stuff to help you improve your English.
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Thanks for joining us. See you next time. Goodbye.
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Bye.
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