Shadowing Practice: I moved abroad alone at 20 - Learn English Speaking with Video
Creating lesson...
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About a year ago, I packed my bags and left everything I knew behind.
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Everything.
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I felt stuck and I thought I needed a fresh start.
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But the truth, well, the truth was so much deeper than that.
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Moving abroad is a trending topic with 20-somethings recently, but the 20-year-old Bartek, who was fidgeting on the plane to Porto,
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gosh he had no idea what he was about to get into I had no idea
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that I had just begun the six most important months of my life the six months
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that would change everything forever moving abroad is lonely most of
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the time I really wish my My friends could just pop out of nowhere right now
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and surprise me because I miss them.
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But I do.
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Longing for connection makes you do things that you would not have done otherwise.
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You go samba dancing, go to a pub, sober.
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Heck, you even try to learn the language to fit in.
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And that's a good thing.
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I look for another comic that is popular in Brazil or Portugal.
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Sometimes it works.
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Hey guys!
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So, in the middle of the night, trying to fight some alcohol, but I don't drink but we do it, so it's my fault.
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Sometimes it doesn't.
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I wish I could tell you otherwise, I really do, but the truth is, I'm feeling pretty damn alone this evening.
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And whether you like it or not, you will be spending more time with yourself than ever before.
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When I moved here, I was essentially still a teenager.
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Because when you're a teenager, there is no such thing as self-worth.
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It wasn't in my case, at least.
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Outside of my accomplishments and my grades, my net worth, all that kind of stuff.
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And that's who I was when I came here.
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A set of failures and accomplishments.
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As a teenager, you spend most of your time trying to connect to others.
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But suddenly, there was nobody around.
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I was forced to connect with myself.
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I'm all alone here in this city that I've been to once when I was like what, seven?
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I spent literally hours with no one else but yours truly.
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I was forced not only to acknowledge my feelings but also confront them, to listen to what's going on inside of me.
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I started writing, reading, thinking a lot about who I am, who I'm not, what I enjoy and what annoys me, and what my values are too, to be fair.
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I started exploring my spirituality and my faith because, you know, sometimes when I just didn't want to feel lonely,
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I opened up the Bible and felt a little bit of peace.
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You cannot love someone who you don't know, right?
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This is impossible.
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So getting to know yourself in your twenties could be the single most important thing that you can do.
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And moving abroad can really help with that.
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With time you start feeling main character energy and if you're abroad only for a limited time, you will cherish every single moment.
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When you know that there is going to come a moment when you're not gonna be here anymore, you laugh about walking in the rain,
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you appreciate every second and it's so funny because just, I mean, life is the same, isn't it?
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And we don't do that.
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Everyday life becomes so full of color, full of character, full of excitement.
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Moving abroad also helped me realize that adulthood and responsibility are actually kind of freaking great.
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We kind of prolong our youth for so long and we don't think about becoming adults, we don't want to become adults, but actually it's the natural thing to do.
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It feels good.
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I think it's kind of like driving a car, you know, it kind of is more comfortable to sit in the passenger seat,
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but the whole fun is in actually steering the dang thing.
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is the exact same way and responsibility is the exact same way too.
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You know, driving a car also means that you're prone to accidents and you are going to commit a lot of mistakes.
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At least I did.
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This day was full of accidents.
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This tripod, I was moving it and the camera fell off.
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The lens is fucked up and of course this has never happened to me before
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when I was using my old cheap camera, but now this must have happened, huh?
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Speaking of adulthood and responsibility, being away from your family is paradoxically something
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that really helps you stay closer to them
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and your relationship with them is probably going to be way better than ever before.
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Calling your mom becomes a pleasure and not a chore, although many times are the companies doing chores because setting up the washing machine is surprisingly unstraightforward, at least in Portuguese.
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You learn to appreciate every second spent with them because...
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My time with them is just shrinking right now.
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And it's tough because I love them so much.
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If you're lucky, your friends and family will come visit.
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These are going to be some of the best memories that you've had.
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But funnily, the best memories are still actually on your own.
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Just sitting in the park, reading a book, going on the walk.
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Slowly, the chaos of moving abroad, it turns into something a little bit more orderly.
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And I'm not sure if that's because it actually happens or you just learn to deal with it a little better.
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It seems scary, you might ask, what about my job, what about everything?
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Dude, people are figuring it out all the time millions before you
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and millions after and trust me this is a reminder to myself because I am such a Intense person.
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I'm like stressed out about everything all the time and here.
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It's just like okay.
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Yeah, whatever.
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We'll figure it out We always do always
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Eventually you you even find your own people and
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that does change the entire experience because at the end of the day Human connection is something we all love.
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This is Kaya explaining to me the music in Brazil We have certain Asia that looks like country music.
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Funk, you know funk?
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Yeah.
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Cha-cha! And some.
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I just had the most profound and deep conversation of my entire trip here.
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And it took six months to get to this point.
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Right when you're about to leave.
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Yeah.
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Shame.
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Shame.
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You are going to learn how to truly enjoy your own company.
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It might feel weird at first, but you will stop waiting for other people to join you if you want to do something.
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Every sunny day will turn into a field trip.
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To the beach, to the bridge, to the mountains, or just to the park to read a book.
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And your own company becomes more and more appealing with each such trip.
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Because when there's nobody around, you can do whatever the fuck you want. But you know what?
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This whole moving abroad shebang and everything I mentioned in this video so far, it all leads to something that I never expected to gain from this experience.
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But more importantly, I never even knew I needed.
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And that's self-love.
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Because when you start learning about who you are and who you're not, when you start respecting yourself,
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when you start accepting all that and that you're not perfect and you never will be and that's okay, that's when self-love starts happening.
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I just think that for the first time in my life I'm just truly just at peace with exactly where I am.
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I want to go further, I want to do better, but I just don't put the pressure that I always used to put on myself.
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It's fine, just one step at a time, dude.
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You start living in accordance to your true values
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and you start pursuing what you think is interesting
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and you do what you want to do not what other people want you to do
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and that is such such a game changer gosh i cannot stress this enough now the issues begin
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when you leave it was an adventure of a lifetime man
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so many memories so many cool people so much self-exploration so
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so much growth on the surface level it looks like sadness
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but very deep down like on a very deep
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and fundamental level this is just nothing else but gratitude and joy but I'm still it's still fucking difficult.
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When you get back home into your ordinary reality it's very
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easy to forget everything you've learned here it's very easy to
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stop maintaining your relationship with yourself it's very easy to forget to stop caring what other people think.
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It's very easy to forget that every day is a gift and that you should make the most out of it.
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And self-love, it's like a plant.
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You have to keep maintaining it.
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You have to water it because if you don't, it's gonna die.
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You see, at the end of the day, moving abroad is just a wonderful adventure.
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An adventure full of emotions, full of people, full of contrast, full of paradoxes, full of memories.
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It's like a life concentrate.
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You know, and like all adventures, it has its ups and downs.
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But I don't think I can recommend moving abroad enough if you're in your 20s.
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I don't think anything in my life made me grow as much as living here in Porto did.
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Oh, also, I was this close to forgetting.
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Have you ever done a push-up on the Pont de Deleuze bridge?
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I now have.
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About This Lesson
You're practicing English with "I moved abroad alone at 20" using the Shadowing technique — a method originally developed for professional interpreter training.
Focus on sounding like the speaker — not just repeating words. With 15–30 minutes of daily practice, you'll build real-world speaking confidence.
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | I've been · has never happened · you've learned |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | was forced · is fucked |
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.