Definitely NOT Lucy coming down a ski slope.
Here in Southern California, we don’t take part (participate) in a lot of winter sports. The reason is obvious: there is little ice or snow. In other parts of the country — such as Minnesota, where Jeff was born — a lot of winter sports are popular.
Among the most popular winter sports is skiing, both downhill skiing (down a hill) and cross-country skiing (on mostly flat land). Ice skating is also popular, although few of us can figure skate (the sport of skating in patterns on ice) like Michelle Kwan or Dorothy Hamill (Does anyone remember her other than me?).
I’ve gone skiing a few times, although I stayed on the bunny slopes (the gentle and not very steep hills for beginners) most of the time and was scared to death when I tried mogul skiing, which is when you ski down a slope with bumps and on it. It took me a long time to get down that hill and I’ve never been back since!
I’ve done a little better with ice skating, although not much better. For someone raised in the sweltering (very high temperature) heat of Arizona, any temperature under 60 degrees Fahrenheit (15 degrees Celsius) is cold to me. Whether skiing or skating, I’d rather be sitting in the warming hut (room or building where people can get a warm drink and take a break from the cold of the snow and ice) sipping (drinking a little at a time) some nice warm hot chocolate.
There are many more winter sports, including sledding, snowboarding, snowmobiling, ice fishing, and hockey. Which winter sports are popular where you live? Do you participate in any winter sports yourself?
~ Lucy
Photo credit: Skier carving a turn from Wikipedia
I would like to be enough strong and agile as to practise a winter´s sport, but despite there are mountains with snow close near to
Madrid I have never have done such a thing.
I have been on the snow several times being young but always I was scared to practice ski.
Throwing snow balls to the friends, yes, that was my favorite sport and also to slide on a sled dow from a not too high slope, that´s
all.
I have to cofess that sports are my never approved subject, I have been always a disaster about this matter.
Swimming is the only one I practiced along my life and doing it I wasn´t bad.
Thank you Lucy, nice topic for our northern friends.
emiliano
i am so interested in winter and its all beauty but i have never done ski. i think its so hard to do but i and my freind usually use a big tube to slip down from the top of a big hill near my hometown. its alot of fun for us
thank you so much
Dear fellow-forum,
First experiencies count a lot as they say, and a couple or so of bad experiencies on sport winter at early stage can count even more and even to affect at one keeping on doing it. You guys take it for sure!.
Among the wide variety of sport winter described by our wonderful script-writter (..all of you know for sure who she is) maybe the last one is my favorite, I don´t know whether they still have named it with a genuine name or not. The involved activities on it are a combination of snowed landscape sightseing, friends conversating, outdoor sun bathings, in-hut fire-front gatherings, in-bed reading, dvd movies watching, fine homemade sandwiches eating, cafeteria coffe drinking, night gintonic and dancing, people meeting and socializing ..and so forth.
Could somebody guess any appropriate name for this sport winter that does not involve itself in any kind of serious personal injury?
Sport yes but also be safe.
I live in Vladimir region of Russia and here there are very popular winter sports such as skiing, snowboarding, hockey and skating. In our small town there is a winter ski resort where you can ski down the hill or snowboarding. This resort was opened only 5 years ago but it is already extremely popular not only among people who live in the town but also among tourists from other cities. The hills are quite small and easy (in comparing with big resorts in Europe and USA) but this allows beginners (who can’t ski at all or haven’t enough experience to ski on the resorts for the advanced riders) to make their first steps in the learning of skiing and snowboard.
I learnt to downhill skiing quite quickly three years ago and now I ski down quite well. In my nearest plans- to learn snowboard.
But downhill skiing and snowboarding require from people not only the wishes but also financial opportunities for these activities. Unfortunately, these activities are not cheap. You have to have certain equipment to do them and money for buying ski-pass (special card that you use for going through turnstile during certain period of time or certain amounts), and many people can’t afford these equipment and ski-passes. Even renting an equipment is quite expensive here.
Cross-country skiing is also popular in out town. There is the park where you can ski on the equiped lines or you can go out the town in the forest and do skiing there. I prefer the last variant to the first one because in this case you enjoy fresh air and nature and don’t hear any town noises. The line is about 10 kilometers and it is free. So you have to have only skis which aren’t very expensive.This variant is very popular among the elders.
Children and teenagers likes to spend their time by skating. There are 2 skating rinks in the town that work as a rule in the evenings. So young people go to schools in the mornings and afternoons and go to the skating rinks in the evenings.I used to skate when I was at school.
Also hockey is popular winter sport in Russia and in our town. but I don’t like it too much, because this game is for the team and you have to collect partners to play. So you depend on them when you choose the time and the place for game. I prefer to watch hockey on the TV.
In general, it’s very important to do winter sports for your health. I wish all of you to be healthy and I invite you in our town to do above-mentioned activities. Best wishes,Eugene
Lucy,
Seems like you can take the cold, so you must drop by here sometime :)))
I am like you I can’t take the cold either. It is physically exhausting. Battling the cold needs a great deal of stamina that I don’t have. 10 minutes in a brutal, bashing wind-chill, I am at my wit’s end already.
The thing is, I live it everyday.
Lucy,
Thanks for the ( bunny slops) I didn’t know the term, thanks for the input
I go skying here sometimes mostly snowboarding
You forgot to mention that there are two kinds of snow for skiing one Is powder snow that is kind of tricky because the snow is not compacted so the snow is not firm,and compact enough so you can stay on it.If you fall while skying you are in big trouble getting back on Ur feet.
Another type is compacted ,or impact snow
People here are into all kinds of winter sports
Lucy,
What is called the one that skiers go up a very steep man-kind slop and Gather Speed as fast as it gets as they sking dwon the slop and then jump up into
air and then land on the snow right down the ramp. They are rated by how far away they land from the steep slop
there is a big pond right in foront of city hall here where people go ice skating on it
In fact, there are a lot of year round, indoor , ice skating track( I don’t know the name of the icy floor on which people go ice skating, what is called Lucy? Track Is a right term for it?) that is for free
It runs on the tax income.
In fact,Girls here are into two things
First and foremost is sushi ( japonies food) , guys a piece of advice for you , even if you hate the food just pretend you love sushi ; if you wanna get a big score by girls here ,you are dating. Never ever make faces implying you don’t like it because the second you do it ,you are thorugh.
The last but not the least is ice skating , agin is a deadly sin if you date a girl here and you don’t know how to ice skate . Because for the most cases the
first date is coffee , the second date is to go ice skating if you are fortunate enough to pass this first two qualifying dates the third date will be a good one hour of suffering and tourturing in a sushi restaurant. The more you gobble down sushi the better score you get.you pass this three steps you got urself a happy ,lasting relationship.
Because ,the heart of every healthy relationship here is: coffee,sushi,and ice skating.
Yours
Peter
Lucy,
If i may
Guys ,
Last night I had somebody asking me about the diffreence between continuation ,and continual. I explained the difference.
Because she brought up a good topic for discussion.
It hit me just know perhaps it would be good for all of us two know the difference
There are a remarkable numbers of these kind of words on English Language
However,
I don’t wanna run with it here.
Because I am not brave enough to come out and say sth when we have Jeff ,Warren, and Lucy here
Yours
Peter
Another words,it is not my place to do so
So, guys look them up and check the diffreence pretty ,it is straight forwad
Shakespear once wrote: “if music is the food of love,play on…”
Let your day be full of music.
Love
Ur blog man
Peter
Hi everybody,
I do not write very often at this blog,this is my second time, but I read it every day. I know all of you , Emilio, Peter, Betty etc…
I am from Montreal ,Quebec, Canada and I like winter sports, I like walking in the snow, I like skiing-skating and sledding.
Early this morning I went to take a walk, I saw the sunrise and the temperature was – 15° C, (5° F). It was beautiful.
Have a good day
Suzanne
Thank you so much, Lucy, for this stimulating topic.
I am afraid Hong Kong does not have snow either, and so we do not have snowy hills for outdoor winter sports.
However, we have indoor ice skating rinks inside a few big shopping centres etc. So children nowadays can learn ice skating on those ice rinks. It probably is not as cold and windy nor exciting as skiing, but it is on ice and thus offers something wintry.
I wish I had the chance to learn all these exciting winter sports when I was younger. I was a daredevil when I was little, so I would not be scare to do all these fascinated sports if I was given the opportunity. Life was very different then – lucky to have enough food and clothing.
With my inflexible body these days, it is better I pay some respect to all these dangerous sports. There is no harm watching them on the TV, but not taking part in them. Even watching all those brave sports personalities doing Winter Olympic Games can send your adrenaline soaring, let alone playing.
Anyway, a good friend of mine in England told me last year that England saw a lot of snow on the hill near her home, so she took advantage of that and went sledging with her children. She enjoyed it so much that she had to tell me almost immediately about the fun.
Hi Suzanne Brassard, nice to meet you.
Thank you for mentioning my name, it is always nice to find that I am not the only reader for my own writing, there are other readers for those silly messages, so I’d better write carefully so that it is not just myself who can understand what I am trying to say..
Before my first message appeared, I used to think: are all these people writing here real people? Or all these messages written by this website pretending they have so many contributors?
Then, one day I submitted my message successfully. My own English writing appears on one of world wide webs? Strange! but true.
I have been trying to write something everyday, in order to improve my English enough to take one of the English tests in Hong Kong.
This afternoon I took the Speaking paper for this test, I was not scared like last time when I took the same test two years ago.
This is strange, I did not have much chance of speaking English, I only had been listening to Jeff and Lucy, and copied them occasionally, and yet I felt I had the power to speak like them. Very strange! I may not pass the test this time, but being calm and confident in the speaking like this afternoon was surely a big prize for me.
I think I should tell people one of the naughty things I did. I purchased the ‘English for Business Meetings’ course from this website last night, downloaded everything and had enough time to just listen to all the ten audios just before heading to the test centre. Bingo, I remembered all the meeting language skills that Jeff and Lucy told me, and used it in the test.
I should have bought the course ages ago and learn everything properly long ago, but was hesitated because I did not know whether it would be useful. God knows why I suddenly became so generous to myself.
Well, there is an English proverb: If a job is worth doing it is worth doing well.
Although I have done the speaking tests this year, I will do it again next year – no matter whether I pass it or not this time. Now I have got all the material, I will learn everything properly once I have completed the whole test (Writing, Listening and Reading papers this Sunday).
Grammar is the most difficult part on the writing paper. Grammar is such a boring thing to learn, yet we have to correct grammatical errors and explain the errors. Yuck! (Sorry, I should not use slang here, but I did not know any other word to express my dislike of this part of the test).
Sorry, I forgot to thank Jeff and Lucy for the ‘English for Business Meetings’ course. Keep forgetting, so absent minded!
Thank you Jeff, thank you Lucy, you are the best of the best of the best.
Hopefully one day you will let us buy another course in which you use your magic English power to make us learn grammar, equip us with the meta-language, and competent enough to do well in the grammar part of the English test that I have been struggling with.
Many thanks again.
Suzzane is it not cold for you?
Just incredible but I think that living in Canada your body is adapted to walk under that freeze temperature. You are really welcome
and it would be nice to see you here often, sure you may tell us lot of things about Montreal and Quebec.
Well, I would like to go to Canada when I was a young man and I am always interested about your country. It has to be so nice
way of living in a country so big and so few crowds………incredibly appealing for me.
Even now Canada is an appealing land to live despite the cold weather and also that I´m not so young…..
Tell us what do you feel walking under – 15 º C degrees, seeing the sunrise and thinking all was beautiful, it has to be interesting
at least for me.
All the best.
emiliano
Eugene, thank you so much, now I know a little about your City Vladimir, and it seems a really nice interesting City to visit with such
large history.
In this moment my feelings are that I know really nothing about so many interesting subjects, cities and history.
Searching the photos of Vladimir in the Wiki I am astonished, you live in quite an incredible place, full of history and monuments
that testifies about it.
Congratulations.
How much I would like to go over there and see those interesting White Monuments of Vladimir and Suzdal, inscribed by UNESCO on the World Heritage List.
Yes, I would like to know more things about this your City and the interesting sites and sports you have described us so well.
Again, thank you Eugene, it´s a pleasure for me to know where are the friends from.
emiliano
Sorry Evgene, here your name is Eugenio…….and I have wrote it badly, thinking in my own language
my mind is going down for moments.
emiliano
Hallo everyone,
I don’t like winter. It is dark in the morning. It is dark in the evening. An if is daylight I have to work. That’s not funny.
I had never the possibility to make winter sports, like skiing or snowboarding than I was younger. I was ice skating and playing ice hockey on a pond in my small village.
Around the village was flat country and only a little snow. I do not live there any more. Now I live in a town and here only a little snow too.
I make some other sports, like jogging and bicycle riding. But this sorts give in winter not so much pleasure.
with best wishes
Andreas
Evgene,
I have been talking with my wife about Vladimir and I asked her if she knows anything about the City…..and the man
who was supposed to gave his name to the City? and yes, of course,
as always Cuca knows a lot about Vladimir City and the Great Prince Vladimir who was the man that implanted The
Orthodox Christianity in Russia, now he is Saint Vladimiro.
Yes, now I could remember that Cuca has told me something about this Prince and by the fact he married Anna
a Greek princese who was ortodoxy christian he studied all the religions of that years and finally he decreted that the
religion of Russians has to be Orthodoxy Christianism and so he married the christian prince who was a daughter of the
Byzantine Imperor, yes an incredible history of how a man or a woman could change the History of a Nation.
Cuca used to taugh me history whe we were living in Alicante looking to the sea, it was a real nice time, and
she talked with me about this great man in Russia History who lived for the thousand years….
This incredible woman, Cuca, never stop of giving me surprises with her knowledge about so interesting history events….
How could she has so incredible good memory and a large interest in countries history and traditions ?
Amazing.
Sometimes History is more amusing that any other story, and she always said that to me, ….. yes I think that´s true.
If we don´t know how History has been how could we understand what is happening now in the world?
Regards.
emiliano
I hope you have a goog coat, Suzanne!
Welcome to this podcast where you will learn a lot of English and enjoy a good time.
Once, in the place that I live the temperature dropped until -16C and it was curious because during the first minutes I only felt the frozen air in my lungs when I breathed but I didnt felt very cold. Things changed fifteen minutes later: my nose was red, my ears hurt terrible, I didnt feell my fingers. Dont worry friends, I got in into the car and I switched on the heater car. The problem is that we are not prepared for this weather in Spain but I am sure that Suzanne is ready for this cold weather, but as Emiliano says it would be interesting for all of us to know how canadian people feel with this temperatures, how they fight against them, etc..
I have practiced cross-county skiing and I can say to us that this winter sport is very interesting, relaxing and you move almost all muscles of your body. Talking about ice skating and downhill skiing, I am a little clumsy.
Thanks Lucy for this frozen topic
Hi Emiliano
Can you imagine both participating in ski jumping contest in Garmisch-Partenkirchen on New Year Day?
It would be funny. Maybe…it would be better watching on tv with Gatufo and Happy.
Best regards
Yes, Roberto I think you are right.
Always I have seen this Ski jumping as an impossible thing to do for humans.
How these persons could do such a dangeros nearly incredible jumps and don´t be scared about flying so long and fast ?
Strong minded people without any kind of fear.
That´s for sure Roberto, we would be better watching the jumps on the tv. with our friendly Happy and Gatufo on our side.
Well, a nice name for your little dog, sure you are happy too being so far from the pollutioned noisy big cities.
Regards friend.
emiliano
Emiliano , thanks a lot for your interest about Vladimir. I am also surprised that your wife Cuca knows about the history of Russia because even many of the russians don’t know the history of his own country and cities and this is of course bad.
I seriously invite all of you to visit Russia and I would be very glad to introduce you with Russian cities and culture and I am ready to organize other interesting activities for you that- I am sure- will be appreciated by you. So, welcome!
Actually, I live not in Vladimir but in Vladimir region. My town is quite small and it is located about 2 hours of driving from Vladimir. But the town where I live also have some interesting places and buildings for sightseeing.
Again, I am impressed that Cuca knows the history of the Vladimir…..
Good luck! be care of you.
Eugene (don’t worry -you wrote my name correctly at first- Eugene)
Hi!
“Skating-rink,
Skating-rink.
A sheet of paper
White and nice
Seems to be spread
Along the ice,
For our skates,
To dance and write
A fairy-tale
In letters bright.
Skating -rink
Skating -rink.”
All the best for you all,
Tania
Suzanne , it means a lot to me that you go out your way to read through my words although they are not well-picked and intellectual.
I know sometimes I am rough around the edges ,but I am trying to be like our dear profs, well-rounded.:)
If some rookie mistakes pop out at you while reading my comments ,please chalk it up to my illiteracy. Well,truth to be told, I am functionally illiterate:))
Again,
It is very nice of you that you take time out of your day to read my remarks.
I have been to Monteral several times. Montreal is a beautiful city . The city structure is more like Europian style. I am telling you guys, city planners down there have done a good job:)
It is not an industerial city ,it is definitely a touristy city with lots of tourist attractions some of them are major tourist attractions like the famouse chatedral situated over a hill in the city limit of the city I guess,
It is humangous chatedral , there are escalators in the church to take you to different levels of the church and a huge balcony with a paramount view.
But, if you are planning to go there , don’t go in winter time , specially you Lucy, don’t even think about it.
It is colder than Toronto. Monteral always beat Toronto by 5 ,6 degrees
And ,winter linger there longer.
But ,in summer time it is a lovely place ,specially in its lake with all marine entertainments,and events
girls ,look away please,
guys,between you and me, lots of beautiful girls:))))
Ok,fun is over
Back to misery ,I have a big exam coming up in three hours
Cramming starts , I must hit the ground running to get a good mark on this. My prof is tough ,and he is not an seasy marker. He is stickler and pinpoint every little mistake,and what make it worse, you get marked down for every one of them even it is a trivial mistake.
So, guys I am down , you have fun:)
I neve think writing sth here guys , so ,sorry if I don’t come off dandy:)) and you track , fly of ideas here. No flow, what so ever.
Basically ,i love the idea of just go about it ,and Let the chips fall where they may:))
Cheers
Hi morteza,
you are welcome to the Blog, little by little a lot of new names are coming what is really good for all of us.
I think you live in the north?
What you said it is what I use to do when I was young and we were on the snow.
Ski has to be difficult and I have seen lot of broken bones doing this kind of sport.
Don´t smile please, my wife Cuca that was very enthusiastic about this sport had an accident in Navacerrada, the mountain
it´s near Madrid, and she broke the head of the femur and needed an operation to restore the bone, in fact she needed two
operations and It was too hard for a girl of nineteen years old.
Just from that moment never she dared to ski again and it´s natural.
All her life she had problems with that bone, even when she had to give birth to our babies there were some problems as she
couldn´t separated completely her legs.
I was really scared about the matter, but at the end all was right may be because the little girls had a nice very small heads.
Betty, I was skimming your comment ,and I realized your concern about Grammer while writing.
Don’t go about it,please
For get about Grammar ,it is too technical.
Writing is not about Grammar is about lots of reading and listening
Trust me on that, Don’t get obsessed with Grammmar that it keeps getting in the way ,every single time you want to come up with something. After a while it will wear you down.
I read your stuff, and I am telling you you know grammar enough.
It is good to study grammar as a free studying , if you are an English freak like me.
But, don’t take to it as a way of improving your writing style ,because it doesn’t.getting too technical, you have doubts about every little word you write.
You have a free style, stick to it
Just read as muchvas humanly possible, and let grammar adjust it self to you , not you assimilate to it.
Take a 5 year old child in any language out there.
They don’t know squat about Grammar yet they talk and even later on when start writing essays at school still they are totally clueless about grammar points.
There is a lot to it, I don’t wanna bore you here
But , do lots of reading and listening then grammar comes to you.
Pick up lucy’s pincushion style instead , best in the business
Trust me, I know what I am talking about
She knows what she is doing, she is the best!
And, I am just stating a hard fact here , I am not playing up to her.
Cheers
Eugene, yes I agree with you about her, Cuca is an odd specimen in extinction that could surprise me after living with her so many
years.
But even here our children / young boys and girls do not know about the history or geography of their own country, so what could
you expect of them if you ask for another cultures?
It´s a pity but except a few of them the majority are not interested about these subjects.
The love for knowledge is lost, that´s real but I can´t say the reason., it seem everywhere is happening the same?
I don´t know.
Thank you very much Eugene, we really would like to visit Russia and other countries but Cuca hasn´t good health and the opportunity
of traveling is off from our lifes now. Often I hope a miracle to happen but still I´m waiting, but as we say here “hope is the last thing to lost”
“la esperanza es lo último que se pierde” so who knows?, may be some day.
Now we could travel with our imagination what is really amusing, also through the web or google we could see the cities, countries
and learn several things that are at hand.
She is always reading, seaching by the web and increasing her knowledge about the subjects she likes more, history, geography, nations,
old cultures, and literature.
She use to read so much that last year I bought her a kindle and now she is really happy with the electronic devise to read books.
Usually to fell asleep Cuca thinks about a different subject every night of the month, so I like to ask her …who is now in the bed with you…
she could reply “the kings of France” or “the 50 Usa States” … capitals of Africa, the oscar movies, Olimpic Cities….The Greeks, or the
Emperors of Old Roma and son on.
Instead of counting sheeps she likes to remember about another cultural subjects she likes and that´s the best way of not thinking about
her own health or problems.
We use to laugh a lot about the matter and as a joke I like to say her, please tell the kings or the old wise men of Greek that I need a place with you too.
As we can´t move out from Madrid I always like to invite friends at home what is really incredible nice.
Thank you again and all the best for you.
emiliano
Congratulations Betty, it seems to me you are highly motivated and that´s really good.
It would be so splendid if you get what you are looking forward and could teach English
to the children as you like….next year may be
In the very good way you impresses me by all means, a strong force who looks to the future with optimism and confidence
that´s really nice, I´m sure that soon you efforts would be rewarded.
It has been good and remarkable your public advice of suscribing the “premium member guides” after being some time
with doubs about doing it.
After giving the step you seems to be happy and that´s real good for the exit of the ESL Podcast.
Yes, I was really happy when I could read your message, and now a new course…. they are really good
my experience is the same as yours.
Well I could say I am too since more than four years and I know quite well that is necessary to be a member if we want
that ESL Podcast may be survive for long.
We need Jeff and Lucy with us, and they need our support or at least the support of the people who can contribute to
keep this site as long as possible.
By my experience here in Spain and the English teaching that is shared in this country, jeff and lucy could be made
themselves of gold teaching English in Europe or Spain, some who are too much less good that them earn a lot of money
doing a not so good work, well in fact the best I know till the moment….yes, ESL team are the one.
But Jeff, Lucy and Warren are not interested in earning so much money, they like to teach and also give free teaching
to the persons who can´t pay for their teaching what is really quite unusual an generous in the world we are living.
For so many money is the first priority, but not for our teachers who are so inteligent that they could understand
the great satisfaction of doing a good job and help so many to learn this marvellous language.
I know what I am talking about, so friends please like Betty everyone of you who can afford some money to support
ESL PODCAST take a step in the same direction like her or like Peter, or like so many who are reading my post.
Thank you Betty, thanks all of you and thanks my dear teachers
you are really the one, another odd specimen not in extiction I hope for the good of us.
emiliano.
Thank you so much, Emiliano, for your encouragement and for your appreciation of my decision to finally invest my money on ESLPOD.com.
I totally agree with you, I am not sure if I have used this quotation correctly, there is a saying: ‘nothing comes from nothing’, if we want to take something from ESLPOD.com, we should give something to ESLPOD.com to keep it going.
Jeff and Lucy might not be waiting for our subscriptions everyday before they start doing their script-writing and podcasting, but they will be able to do their job worry free if they know that there is enough fund in the bank and that they do not have to look elsewhere for funding.
I think you and me are not the kind of people who have so much money that we are busy spending money in a evil way and will not have time and the luck to discover this website. We earn our money and spend our money morally.
It is alright for the many younger learners using this website to learn free here, since Jeff said it would always be free to listen to the podcast. Since I can afford to buy something from here, I should do it, it is money well spend.
Now I own something that many mega rich people in this world still do not own – the Learning Guides, and the English for Business Meetings course, I am so pleased.
***********************************
Thank you so much, Peter, you are right, it will be naturally for me to acquire English Grammar once I have done a lot of reading and listening. I shall do that, I must stop writing here now, start my reading and listening, thank you, and see you.
Sorry, I should not be writing again because I promised to do reading.
But I read something just now and I must write something here, before I forget.
Do you remember Lucy’s blog ‘Name It!’on TUESDAY – NOVEMBER 30, 2010?
I read from uk.news.yahoo.com a news which tells us a ‘Name’ story.
The title for the news is: ‘Kyrgyzstan names mountain Vladimir Putin’
It quoted the lawmaker Narynbek Moldobayev saying: “There’s nothing wrong with giving a mountain the name of Vladimir Putin. After all, we’re not giving him the whole mountain,”
And another lawmaker, Nurlan Sulaimanov, fretted that the diminutive Russian premier might be offended by the relatively small size of the peak, in a country where several mountains tower above 7,000 metres (22,965 feet).
“We should give the Russian politician’s name not to a 4,000-metre mountain but to a taller one,” he told the parliament.
“Otherwise Vladimir Vladimirovich might be offended that we did not value him highly enough.”
However, the country’s nationalist ATA Zhurt or Fatherland party, opposed the idea, arguing that the country’s mountains should only be named after Kyrgyz people.
“We all respect Vladimir Putin as a strong politician and Russia as a strategic partner, but we cannot give his name to a mountain,” said leader Kamchybek Tashiyev, suggesting it be named after novelist Chingiz Aitmatov.
The news also said ‘Kyrgyzstan already has a mountain named after the first Russian president Boris Yeltsin, and analysts said the current leadership wanted to emphasize its closeness to Russia’.
We have so many English names for mountains, buildings, streets and roads in Hong Kong, thank goodness we gave people’s names to mountains, buildings, streets and roads, and not give mountains, buildings, streets and roads to people.
I think “nothing comes fom nothing” means that you have hard to work if you want achieve your goal.
You can also say “There is no pleasure without pain”.
Andreas
Thanks, Andreas, I think you are right, nothing comes from nothing should mean that if people want to achieve their goal, they have to work hard.
It was such a long time ago that I heard the proverb: “There is no pleasure without pain”, thank you for reminding me that.
Yes, you are absolutely right, they say: “no pain, no gain”.
I hope Jeff, Lucy and Warren do not find us a ‘pain’, just joking.
Recently I have discovered a completely automated test of spoken English called Versant Test from the Versanttest.com website. Apparently it has been in existence since 1996. The company say: ‘The Versant tests are the result of years of research in speech recognition, statistical modeling, linguistics, and testing theory. Over the last 13 years, more than 52 million test questions have been delivered, responded to, and automatically scored for individuals from over 100 countries around the world’.
Now I realize that I was very out-of-date with the latest development in new technologies. It sounds fun. So, my next goal is to see if I can take some English speaking and listening test from this company.
My husband who has to pay for the test is to have ‘pain’, I who take the test if passed the test is to have ‘gain’.
Yes,
Betty
Allow me to throw in the following popular ,awfully common ideam for good measure.
Nothing ventured, nothing gained
That is very inspiring idiom
Learning that,I decied to hang out my shingle.
And now,I am well in my way to get a license and to start my owns business
Remember,
Money grows money
So ,you work hard for a short run, then you are financially free for a lung run
Damn my friend ,
My back is out,
I am in excruciating pain
Let me tell you the sega.
I’m helping my friends to reconfigure his furniture ,another word , move them around. They are heavy collectable pieces of furniture. We are carrying this awkward,heavy full-length mirror. I don’t have a good grip,and my end part is the base which is heavier. We are carrying it upsteirs right in the middle of the
Wide spiral stair case leading to bedrooms area, my friend loose his grip and the huge mirror comes sliding back and pushes me back to the land.
I landed on my back on the land between two stair sets and the stupid mirror came shattered like on the top of me.
The frame was too heavy. my friend totally paralyzed by my misfortune trying to help me out of the mirror.eventually,he manages to pull himeseld together and role the thing off me .It was a big mess.
That awakward,bulky ,ugly-looking mirror threw my back out
Now, I can not move a finger with out slurring.
So ,Guys I m out of Vulgar terms
Do you happen to know any.
All will direct to my friend who is sitting right by my bed,with a face that brings out all the sentimental energy insid you
He is one foxy bastered
He can’t get me
He will pay for it:)))
He is very subservient Now.
Next time, he askes me to help him move his stupid ,worthless antique,he got another thing coming for him.
That is for sure:)))
Ah,
My back is killing me
Well,no can do
Peter,
No ,I have all the time in the world to go through Lucian canon.
See, it is not all bad
Guys , have your back out
If you wanna have a good ride with Lucy’s transcripts:))))
Cheers ,
Guys
I just received and invitation for a cultural exhibition about Europe.
U know what, cultural diversity always interests me.
It is fun knowing more about cultural identity and way of life of different ethnic groups
But, I can’t move
What makes it worst is, no cover charge for it.
It is for free
Cheers,
Hi everyone,
my name is Horst and I`m living in a small but beautiful country. In the winter we have lots of snow so we are able to practice all sorts of winter sport. But our national sport is skiing. Alpine skiing (downhill and slalom) and cross-country skiing. Some practice also biatlon – a combination of cross-country and shooting – and ski-mountaineering. Everybody likes skiing and we learn it as a child at the age of 3 or 4 years. Also in school there are courses to practice it.
In our country there are many mountains, the highest one is called “Grossglockner” and has almost 4.000 meters. We are part of the alpine region and our capital is Vienna. I think now you know where I`m living!?
I`m a member of eslpod.com for one year now but this is the first time that I write to this blog. I don`t know why I haven`t done it before but now I`m looking forward to take part of your community!
All the best,
Horst
I just checked my typing.
to take part in sth or to be a part of sth
Sorry,
Horst
Dear Horst, yes I know perfectly well where are you from, in fact Vienna is so nice beautiful city that first and unique time I have been in the city I thought
it was a city I would like to live in. It was love at first sight, as the city fit me perfectly well also Austria and the austrians were nice and
kind to us, I like all the country really very much.
We were also in Salzburg three days, and could see the mountains and my love Mozart´s place of birth. It was like a dream to be in that city, even
better that how I have imagined it or saw it in the movie “The sound of Music”, just last week we were watching the movie again to see Salzburg.
You may laugh but I was talking with a nice woman in English, as we were traveling by the bus in Salzburg, it was so natural and incredible that
people from Salzburg could speak so well English, that not happens here in Madrid, everybody study English but no body speak it.
Also in Vienna nearly every one could speak in English as we didn´t talk a single word of German and English was our tool to be
understood every day.
You are really welcome here Horst, nice to meet you.
emiliano