Shadowing Practice: Chatterbox #202 - Christmas traditions - Learn English Speaking with Video
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You're listening to the Q-Lips English Podcast.
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To download the study guide for this episode, which includes the transcript, detailed vocabulary explanations,
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real-world examples, and a quiz, visit our website, Q-Lips.com.
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C-U-L-I-P-S dot com.
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Hey, everybody.
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My name is Andrew. And I'm Suzanne.
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And you're listening to Q-Lips.
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Hey Suzanne.
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Hey Andrew, how are you?
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I'm doing very well.
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How about yourself?
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Whoa, I'm pretty good.
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But it's so busy these days, right?
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Gearing up for the holiday season?
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Yeah, it's a busy time of the year.
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And so I know you and I were both teachers, instructors, and this is a busy time for us as well.
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Yeah.
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You know, the courses that we teach are kind of winding down and it just adds to the craziness, right?
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Yeah.
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It's like everyone and everything has a deadline and the deadline is at the same time.
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So it's pretty busy.
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I'm happy that this year, Christmas and New Year's Day, both fall on a Monday.
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Why is that?
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So there's two long weekends for me.
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Oh, nice.
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Yeah, because I don't get any holiday vacation time.
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Oh, no, that's true.
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Because both of these days fall on a Monday means I get two long weekends.
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So this is great.
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That's great.
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I really relate.
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I'm self-employed, so I don't really get an actual holiday either.
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Just the days that are the holiday.
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Right, right.
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Just the actual holiday days, not totally weeks off.
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This is one of the disadvantages of being self-employed is that there's no real holidays, right?
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You're always working.
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That's true.
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And because of that, you kind of have to get creative with your holiday season and spend your time wisely.
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And sometimes that causes you to create your own alternative holiday traditions, right?
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Actually, Suzanne, that is the topic of today's Chatterbox episode.
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We are going to talk about how we spend the holidays and what our Christmas and holiday traditions are.
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If you don't know, Chatterbox is the series where we have a natural conversation and we let you listen in.
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We create an immersive environment for you to practice your English listening in.
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And yeah, today our topic is Christmas and holiday traditions.
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We have a study guide for this episode on our website, QLips.com.
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That includes the transcript, some detailed vocabulary definitions and explanations, real world examples, and also a quiz.
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So if you want to study along with our study guide, head over to QLips.com to download it right now.
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Andrew, I had a question for you.
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Yeah, go for it.
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What were some of your family or holiday traditions back when you were younger with your family?
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You know, it's interesting.
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This week I had a snack and it made me think about Christmas because my snack was a tangerine and peanuts.
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And I was laughing at myself about how different my thinking is now compared to when I was younger.
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Because now when I eat peanuts and tangerines, I love it.
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I think, wow, this is a kid every Christmas Eve I would go to church with my parents, my family.
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There was a Christmas Eve candlelight service at the church that I went to when I was younger.
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Nice.
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And at the end of the service all of the children would receive a goodie bag.
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Nice.
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It was a paper bag filled with candy.
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Wow.
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Which was great.
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I always looked forward to receiving this goodie bag on Christmas Eve
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and so I would eat the candy first loved it loved the candy
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and then at the bottom of the candy bag would be some loose peanuts shelled peanuts
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and a tangerine and
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when I was a kid on Christmas Eve I always didn't like this part I liked eating the candy
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and then when it came to the peanuts
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and tangerine I turned my nose up
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and was like ah mom dad you have this I don't want it of Of course.
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Yeah, that's the boring part.
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That was the boring part.
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But this week when I had my snack of peanuts and a tangerine,
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it made me think of that goodie bag that I used to receive on Christmas Eve.
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And you realized, wow, I've grown up.
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I like tangerines and peanuts.
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Yeah, now I think it's the best.
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You can't get any better than that.
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well speaking of peanuts i think watching snoopy and charlie brown christmas oh yeah
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on specials on tv was one of my favorite traditions as a kid
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and the music i really loved the theme of the charlie
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brown christmas special um i think it was written by a composer
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and is kind of included in many Christmas carol CDs or compilations.
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It's a famous song.
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I can't sing it for you right now because it's an instrumental and it kind of slips my mind,
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but I think that's one of my favorite songs and one of my favorite traditions to watch Snoopy and Woodstock.
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It's
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a really beautiful song, actually, the Charlie Brown Christmas theme.
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Yes.
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That was always part of my Christmas tradition, too.
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You know, on the days leading up to Christmas, usually the 21st, 22nd, 23rd these days,
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there are a lot of Christmas specials on TV.
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So Christmas themed TV shows, Christmas themed movies.
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And every year I would watch a Charlie Brown Christmas.
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And that theme song from that episode is really beautiful.
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Yeah, it's true.
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I think as I grew older, I really appreciated it for a very good composition and a really beautiful song.
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I think when I was younger, I pretty much liked those cheesy songs like Jingle Bells
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and all of those kinds of stupid-ish Christmas carols like Frosty the Snowman, you know.
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Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.
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These songs were more my childhood loves now I appreciate the more handcrafted, stand the test of time kind of songs.
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And yes, always watching that special and being in like the foot pajamas.
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Do you know what foot pajamas are?
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Foot pajamas.
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So it's like a onesie, right?
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Right.
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It's like socks that are attached to your pajamas kind of.
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It's like a big onesie for a kid or an adult.
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Right.
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So it's pajamas, a pair of pajamas.
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Actually, it's not a pair.
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It's a one piece piece of clothing that you get into
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and it has the socks attached to the leg of the pants.
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So it's really comfortable and cozy for the wintertime.
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Right.
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And then you sit there with a hot chocolate, maybe with some marshmallows.
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and watch Snoopy and Charlie Brown.
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There you go.
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One of my family traditions is that, well, we don't do this anymore, but when I was younger,
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we always opened one Christmas present on Christmas Eve.
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Nice.
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Did you do this as well growing up?
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Yeah, we did do that as kids.
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Yes, because we couldn't wait.
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We really wanted to get right in there and open up gifts.
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So, yes, my parents would allow us to open one gift.
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But since we got older and we stopped believing in Santa Claus, we started opening up gifts,
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I would say, almost all of our gifts at night on Christmas Eve.
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And then just go to sleep and sleep in.
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I like it.
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I like it.
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Yeah.
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Well, my hometown of Kelowna, British Columbia, has a fairly large population of European immigrants.
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Oh, nice.
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Especially people from Northern Europe.
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So the Nordic countries, Germany, Poland, these places.
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And now I'm not exactly sure if everybody from these countries does this and listeners out there from northern Europe,
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please send me an email and correct me if I'm wrong.
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But I believe that it's a tradition to open all your presents on Christmas Eve in these countries.
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A lot of my friends opened all of their presents on Christmas Eve growing up.
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So my family didn't do this.
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We waited until Christmas morning.
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And I remember being really jealous of my friends that got to open their presents, all of their presents on Christmas Eve.
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You know, they would open their presents and then call me on the phone.
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Be like, Andrew, I just got the new Super Nintendo game I wanted.
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And I was like, ah, I'm so jealous.
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And then did you get your Nintendo the next day?
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Oh, probably, probably.
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I was always spoiled.
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You couldn't wait that one night.
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Yeah.
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You know, when you're nine or 10 years old, 12 hours is a lifetime.
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I know.
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You can't sleep.
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I always had trouble sleeping Christmas Eve.
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Yeah.
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Well, something funny that my dad would do, and it became a tradition in our house,
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was he would eat the cookies and the milk or coffee that we left for Santa,
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and he would make crumbs all over the table and near the plate and on the chair.
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And then he would take the red felt from the stockings that we hung up and the white felt as well.
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And he would put them around the chair like little tufts of felt and fuzz.
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And then he would take his boots
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and he would scuff the wall around like the chimney
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or around the chair to make it look like Santa was there for real.
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Whoa.
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And he even took my dog whose name was Pee Wee, which is a funny name.
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Yeah.
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And he would put her feet in like,
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I don't know, mud or maybe ink and make footprints around the house.
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Okay.
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Okay.
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So you thought it was a reindeer?
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Really?
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A reindeer?
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Yeah.
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Like there was a reindeer and Santa actually came.
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So I really believed it.
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I mean, he made it sound and seem like Santa really was there.
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But lo and behold, it wasn't true.
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Wow.
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Your dad went to a lot of work to make it look like Santa actually visited your house.
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I know.
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It was a grand lie.
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Suzanne, you used a really interesting word a couple sentences ago, and I think maybe it would be a new word for many of our listeners.
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That word was scuff.
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You said your father scuffed the wall.
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What does this mean, scuff?
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With his boots.
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So he would rub the boot on the floor or the wall and create a mark.
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so when you rub your shoe or a rubber sole on a wall
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or on a floor that's a hard floor maybe hard wood it will leave a mark
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and that you would call a scuff yeah a mark
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that you leave behind or a sort of abrasion like a rough spot
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that you leave behind with your with your shoe totally
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and i think this is why sometimes
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when you go to a gym to exercise or a gymnasium to play a sport like badminton or basketball,
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you'll see a sign that says no outside shoes.
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Why the sign is there is they don't want you to scuff the floor.
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They don't want you to leave a mark on the gymnasium floor with your dirty shoes.
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Yes.
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Yes.
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Yeah.
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So this is a good word to know.
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Scuff.
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Suzanne, we will leave it at that for today.
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Thanks for sharing some of your Christmas traditions with us.
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Sure, thank you.
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Yeah, and everyone, once again, please visit our website, QLips.com.
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That is the place where you can download the study guide.
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and it's also the place where you can listen to our previous episodes
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if you're just dying to hear more of us in between our releases
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and if you have any questions
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or comments for us our email address is contact c-o-n-t-a-c-t at qlips.com shoot us an email
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and let us know how you are spending the holiday season.
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We love hearing from you.
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So send us a message.
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Your feedback is priceless.
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Suzanne, I think this will be our last episode of the year.
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So I want to wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
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We'll talk to you in 2018.
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Oh my gosh.
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You too, Andrew.
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Thank you.
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And Happy New Year to everybody.
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Happy holidays.
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Bye, guys.
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Happy holidays.
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Bye.
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Rate and review today.
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This B1 speaking lesson is built on the video “Chatterbox - Christmas traditions”. The speaker keeps coming back to these words: christmas, holiday, Eve, tradition, peanuts. This video has 235 sentences and 2098 words to shadow. The speech runs for 16:35. The speaker talks at a steady 126 words per minute, a comfortable pace for shadowing. Only 81% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English, so the vocabulary is demanding.
Key vocabulary in this video
The 15 most advanced words in the video, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| peanut noun | /ˈpiˌnʌt/ | A legume resembling a nut, the fruit of the plant Arachis hypogaea, native to South America. |
| scuff verb | /skʌf/ | To scrape the feet while walking. |
| pajamas noun | /pəˈd͡ʒɑ.məz/ | Clothes for wearing to bed and sleeping in, usually consisting of a loose-fitting shirt and pants/trousers. |
| tangerine noun | /ˈtæn.d͡ʒəˌɹiːn/ | A slightly ovoid, orange-coloured citrus fruit with a rough peel and a sour-sweet taste which is larger than a clementine and sometimes classed as a variety of… |
| candy noun | /ˈkæn.di/ | Crystallized sugar formed by boiling down sugar syrup. |
| reindeer noun | /ˈɹeɪndɪɹ/ | Any Arctic and subarctic-dwelling deer of the species Rangifer tarandus, with a number of subspecies. |
| shoe noun | /ˈʃu/ | A protective covering for the foot, with a bottom part composed of thick leather or plastic sole and often a thicker heel, and a softer upper part made of… |
| goody noun | /ˈɡʊdi/ | A small amount of something good to eat. |
| snoopy adjective | Given to snooping. | |
| listener noun | /ˈlɪs(ə)nɚ/ | Someone who listens, especially to a speech or a broadcast. |
| snack noun | /snæk/ | A light meal. |
| boot noun | /but/ | A heavy shoe that covers part of the leg. |
| gymnasium noun | /d͡ʒɪmˈneɪ.zi.əm/ | A large room or building for indoor sports. |
| onesie noun | /ˈwʌn.zi/ | A one-piece garment for an infant or small child, generally worn over a diaper. |
| sock noun | /sɑk/ | A knitted or woven covering for the foot. |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| grow up verb | To mature and become an adult. | |
| open up verb | To open. | |
| lead up to verb | To set in motion; to act as a causal or preparatory event or sequence of events. | |
| leave behind verb | To abandon. | |
| look forward to verb | To anticipate, expect, or wait for, especially with a feeling of approval or pleasure; to be excited or eager to. | |
| wind down verb | /waɪnd ˈdaʊn/ | To lower by winding, as with a crank or windlass. |
Sentences worth repeating
Short, complete lines from the video that you can reuse in everyday conversation:
- You can't get any better than that.
- Do you know what foot pajamas are?
- Did you do this as well growing up?
- Yes, because we couldn't wait.
- You couldn't wait that one night.
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | is now compared · was written · are attached |
| Verb + -ing enjoy, keep, stop… + -ing — verbs that are followed by the -ing form | stopped believing · love hearing |
| Present continuous am/is/are + -ing — something happening right now or around now | You're listening · I'm doing · You're always working |
| Future with “will” will + verb — a decision, promise or prediction | will leave · you'll see · will be |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 33 contractions and reduced forms, such as don't, I'm, you're. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: shoe /ˈʃu/, abrasion /əˈbɹeɪ.ʒən/, marshmallow /ˈmɑɹʃˌmɛl.oʊ/, compilation /ˌkɑm.pɪˈleɪ.ʃən/, gosh /ɡɑːʃ/
- Long words — get the stress right: gymnasium /d͡ʒɪmˈneɪ.zi.əm/, vocabulary /vəˈkæb.jə.lə.ɹi/, disadvantage /ˌdɪsədˈvæntɪd͡ʒ/, compilation /ˌkɑm.pɪˈleɪ.ʃən/, instrumental /ɪnstɹəˈmɛntəl/
How to practise with this video
- Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
- Shadow it sentence by sentence at normal speed, repeating each one until your rhythm matches the speaker.
- Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like peanut, scuff, pajamas.
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.