Shadowing Practice: Podcast Nâng Cao - Cùng Mình Nói Về Tiền | Học 37 Từ Vựng Hàng Ngày | Tập 23 - Learn English Speaking with YouTube
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What's up everyone?
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What's up everyone?
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In this video you're going to learn a ton of useful English words and phrases about money through three incredible stories.
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Learning English through stories is extremely effective not only
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because the stories are interesting but because it activates the emotional part of your brain which creates stronger connections to new vocabulary.
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When you hear words used in exciting situations that make you feel something,
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your brain is far more likely to remember and recognize those words later.
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And by the way, all the money-related vocabulary plus the entire transcript of this podcast is available totally for free.
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Just put in your name,
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email, and English level, and I'll send them right to your email.
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You can either scan this QR code here or click the link below to sign up.
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All right, let's get started with the first story.
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In May 2010, a computer programmer named Laszlo Hanyek's was sitting at home in Jacksonville,
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Florida, feeling pretty hungry.
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He was craving pizza, but instead of just picking up the phone and ordering like what most people would do,
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Laszlo had a different idea.
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See, Laszlo was really into this brand new digital currency that had just appeared on the internet.
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It was so new that almost nobody had heard of it yet and it had virtually no real world value.
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Laszlo had been mining this digital currency for a while.
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Mining is basically using your computer to solve complex math problems and you earn these digital coins as a reward.
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So from mining he had thousands of these coins sitting in his digital wallet but he couldn't really do anything with them.
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Nobody accepted this new internet money as payment for anything.
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So, Laszlo decided to try something new.
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He posted online that he would pay 10,000 of these digital coins to anyone who would order
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and deliver two pizzas to his house.
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Think about that.
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He was trying to spend this digital money that most people had never even heard of.
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So for several days, nobody took him up on his offer
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because who would want to spend their real money to get this made up internet money?
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But then a guy named Jeremy Sturdivant saw the post and thought, why not?
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So Jeremy spent about $25 of his own cash to order two Papa John's pizzas and had them delivered to Laszlo's house.
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By the way, Papa John's is just a famous pizza restaurant in the USA.
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So in exchange for those two pizzas,
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Laszlo transferred 10,000 digital coins to Jeremy's account.
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At the time, this seemed like a pretty normal transaction.
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Laszlo got his pizza and Jeremy got some of this weird internet currency that might be worth something someday.
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The price of each coin at that point was about a quarter of a penny.
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So 10,000 coins was worth maybe like $25,
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which was the same as what Jeremy paid for the pizzas.
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But here's where the story gets crazy.
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As the years went by,
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the value of these digital coins,
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or what we often call cryptocurrency,
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didn't just increase a little bit.
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They skyrocketed in a way that nobody could have ever predicted.
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So those 10,000 coins, well,
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you can probably guess what they were.
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They were Bitcoin.
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Now, the value of a single Bitcoin at the time of me filming this is around $84,000,
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which means that those 10,000 Bitcoin that Laszlo spent on two pizzas could be worth around $800 million today.
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So in a nutshell, Laszlo essentially spent what would become $800 million on two pizzas.
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This transaction was probably the most expensive meal in human history.
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And the thing is, when they talked to Laszlo years later,
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he didn't seem too upset about it.
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In interviews, he said he has no regrets because at the time,
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the transaction helped prove that Bitcoin could actually be used to buy things.
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Meanwhile, what about Jeremy, the guy who accepted the Bitcoin?
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Does he have $800 million now?
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Well, unfortunately for him, he didn't hold on to those 10,000 Bitcoin for very long.
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He spent them when they were still worth just a few hundred dollars,
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as what probably most people would have done.
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Now, every year on May 22nd,
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Bitcoin fans celebrate Bitcoin Pizza Day to mark the first real-world transaction using Bitcoin.
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And as for Laszlo, he does have a place in financial history books.
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as the guy who made possibly the worst deal of all time.
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By the way, if you're enjoying this video and you want to support the channel and improve your English,
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then check out my product,
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The Thousand Most Common Words in English.
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For every single word in this product,
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you'll get the IPA pronunciation in American English,
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the meaning in Vietnamese, and example sentences in both English and Vietnamese.
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It also comes with slow and clear audio files read by me,
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so you can practice both your listening and pronunciation skills.
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Just scan the QR code on the screen or click the link below to check it out.
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If you decide to buy it,
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I really appreciate it, thank you so much to everyone who has supported me.
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Okay, let's go to the next story.
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Back in 1995, a woman named Osceola McCarty from a small town in Mississippi made national headlines.
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But her story began much earlier,
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way back in 1908 when Osceola was just a little girl.
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Osceola grew up poor in Hattiesburg, Mississippi.
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When she was in sixth grade her aunt got sick and Osceola dropped out of school to take care of her.
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She never went back to school after that.
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Instead she started washing clothes for people by hand to earn money.
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Now this was a long time ago
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so back in those days there were no washing machines just a scrub board soap
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and your own two hands
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that was Osceola's daily routine for over 75 years she'd wake
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up early collect dirty clothes from her customers wash them hang them to dry iron them and then deliver them back.
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All for just a few dollars.
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She charged very little for her services because that's what people could afford to pay.
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Sometimes it was just a few dollars per load of laundry.
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Her income was small but it was steady.
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She never married, never had kids,
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and lived in the same simple house her whole life.
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However, what nobody knew was that Osceola had a secret.
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Every time she got paid she would take her cash to the bank and deposit most of it into her savings account.
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She kept just enough to pay her bills and buy cheap groceries.
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She lived so frugally that she never even owned a car.
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She just pushed the shopping cart to get her groceries and walked everywhere else.
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Year after year, decade after decade,
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she continued this simple routine.
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Wash clothes, earn money, save money, repeat.
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As interest accumulated in her account, her savings grew.
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But nobody, not even her closest neighbors,
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had any idea that this washerwoman had built up a small fortune.
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They just knew her as the friendly lady who washed clothes and kept to herself.
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Then, in 1995, when Osceola was 87 years old,
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she made a decision that shocked everyone.
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She met with her bank and told them she wanted to set up a special account.
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She carefully counted out a hundred and fifty thousand dollars,
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which was a big chunk of her life savings,
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and she created a scholarship fund for students at the University of Southern Mississippi who couldn't afford to pay for college.
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When the bank officials asked her why she was giving away
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so much of what she'd saved she would simply say
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that she can't spend it all and she can't take it with her
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when she passes away so she wants to help some people go to college.
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Of course the news spread fast
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because how could a washerwoman who never made more than minimum wage possibly afford to donate a hundred and fifty thousand dollars.
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People were amazed by her generosity and no one had any idea that she was that wealthy.
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Osceola's story shows that it's not just about how much you earn but also how much you save.
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She never had a high salary but she budgeted carefully and didn't spend money on expensive things she didn't need.
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She didn't invest in stocks or have fancy financial knowledge.
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She just consistently put money away in a bank account and let it grow with interest over time.
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Osceola McCarty passed away in 1999,
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but her legacy lives on through the students who can afford college because of her incredible gift.
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All from a lifetime of washing clothes and saving every penny she could.
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Okay now let's look at a story that goes completely in the opposite direction of Osceola's.
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In 2002 a 19 year old garbage collector named Michael Carroll was working his normal route in Norfolk, England.
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Michael earned a modest salary,
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about 200 pounds a week, collecting trash.
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By the way, the pound is the currency in England,
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and it's worth more than a U.S dollar.
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Anyway, Michael was a high school dropout with a bit of a rough past.
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He'd been in juvenile detention for some bad behavior
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and he had a reputation as a bit of a troublemaker in his small town.
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But Michael's life took an unbelievable turn when he decided to spend one pound on a lottery ticket.
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Against all odds, literally one in 14 million,
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his numbers hit and he won 9.7 million pounds which at that time was worth about 15 million dollars.
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So suddenly this teenager who had been living paycheck to paycheck was now one of the richest people in his town.
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When he collected his check Michael was wearing an electronic ankle bracelet
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which was from crimes that he did in the past
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so with his newfound wealth Michael went on what can only
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be described as an epic spending spree he bought a massive mansion
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and filled it with luxury things he purchased multiple cars including BMWs
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and Mercedes he had really crazy parties that often ended with police being called He spent thousands of pounds on,
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let's say, partying and unhealthy habits.
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And one of his most notorious purchases was a racetrack
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that he built in the backyard of his mansion where he would host demolition derbies with his friends.
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And a demolition derby is where they would literally crash their cars for fun.
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So neighbors, understandably, were not very happy with this.
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Michael also dealt with people constantly asking him for loans or trying to be his friend just for money.
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He was honestly very generous.
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Like he gave away huge sums of money to friends and family,
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many of whom took advantage of his kindness and lack of knowledge about finance.
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So within just a few years,
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Michael's spending habits and poor financial decisions caught up with him.
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He didn't pay his taxes.
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He made risky investments that failed.
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He faced lawsuit after lawsuit from neighbors and other people.
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And the value of his home went down when the housing market crashed.
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So by 2010, just eight years after he won the money,
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Michael Carroll was broke.
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The money was completely gone.
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He had to sell his mansion for much less than what he paid for it,
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and all of his luxury expensive things were auctioned off to pay his debts.
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After all that, Michael went back to the only job he really knew,
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which was collecting garbage.
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So he went back to earning a wage of around £200 per week,
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which was exactly where he started before winning the lottery.
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But here's the surprising twist.
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Michael says he's actually happier now than when he was rich.
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He felt that all that money brought nothing but stress and fake friends and trouble into his life.
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So these days, Michael lives quietly in Scotland where he works as a cold delivery man.
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When asked if he regrets how he spent his fortune,
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he says no because he had fun while it lasted.
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Now I know that was probably a lot of vocabulary for you,
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so remember you can download the PDF for the podcast with this QR code or from the link in the description below.
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And speaking of money, if you want to hear about the first time I got scammed,
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then check out this video right here.
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Thanks so much for watching and I'll see you in the next video.
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About This Lesson
In this lesson, you will delve into the fascinating world of money-related vocabulary through engaging stories. By focusing on dramatic real-life situations, you will learn essential English words and phrases that are not only relevant but also memorable. The stories enable you to connect emotionally with the material, making it easier to recall vocabulary in future conversations. This is particularly beneficial for those who are preparing for IELTS speaking practice or simply want to enhance their overall English speaking practice.
Key Vocabulary & Phrases
- Cryptocurrency - Digital or virtual currency that uses cryptography for security.
- Mining - The process of validating transactions in a cryptocurrency network and creating new coins.
- Digital Wallet - An application or device that stores private and public keys for cryptocurrency transactions.
- Transaction - An exchange of money or services that occurs between two parties.
- Value - The monetary worth of an item or currency.
- Delivery - The act of bringing goods or services to a specific location.
- Offer - A proposal for a transaction, often involving terms that the parties can agree upon.
Practice Tips
To maximize your learning through this lesson, consider practicing shadowspeak. Shadowing involves listening to the audio while simultaneously repeating the words and phrases. This technique not only helps improve pronunciation but also aids in memorizing vocabulary effectively. Given the dynamic pace of the storytelling in the podcast, try these tips:
- Listen actively: Play the audio at a comfortable speed and follow along with the transcript to understand the context.
- Pause and repeat: After each sentence or key phrase, pause the audio and repeat it aloud. Focus on mimicking the tone and emotion of the speaker.
- Record yourself: Use a voice recorder to capture your shadowing practice. Listen back to evaluate and adjust your pronunciation and intonation.
- Consistency is key: Integrate daily practice into your learning routine, ensuring that you engage with new vocabulary regularly.
By embracing these shadowing tips, you will enhance your fluency and confidence in English speaking practice. Remember, the stories presented in this lesson serve as an entertaining and impactful medium for your learning journey!
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.
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