Friday, July 25, 2014

Podcast Episode 1 – Segment 2 – Questions and Answers



Okay, it’s the time for our Q&A section. And today we have a question from Michael, Michael is from Moscow, he wants to know everything there is to know about subways. And that’s a terrible question, Michael, How am I supposed to answer this question. Well, I decided I’ll talk about vocabulary. 
Now actually,
I haven’t been a subway in America. And that was in San Francisco. And San Francisco subway system is called BART, B-A-R-T, and that stands for Bay Area Rapid Transport, Transport or transportation. I’m not sure. Anyway, BART.  
Now I do live in Soul, South Korea. Well, near Soul, And In Korea, some of subway lines are called SMART- Soul Metropolitan Area Rapid Transport. So each city, we have the different name for their subway’s systems. London has a different name; New York has a different name; Chicago has a different name, so depending on the city you go to, some of the vocabulary might be a little bit different. 
 So make sure you do some good research. Of course, when you go to the subway station, you need have a ticket. And in San Francisco, they have the BART card, that card that looks like a credit card. But in the card you have money; you can charge the card by putting money into the card - 10 dollars, 20 dollars. And every time you want to use the subway, and even the buses, you swipe your card over the reader. 
So when you enter the subway station, there is a gate, and the gate is usually called a turn-style and on the top of the turn-style, there is the area where you set your card and you just put there for seconds, and take it away. And subway fee is automatically deducted from your card. If you don’t have enough money, then you need to go to a machine, looks like a vending machine, and it will charge your card, just like charging the battery on your phone. So you put your card into the machine, and then you add 10 dollars or 20 dollars, and your card is good to go.  
And every city, the name of the card is different.  I think in London, it’s called an Orchestral (Oyster?) card. Why orchestra (oyster)? I don’t know. Also in London, when they talk about the subway, they have 2 words - underground and tube. So the tube is actually the subway.  
In America, we just say subway. We get on the subway, and we get off the subway, sometimes we need to transfer trains or transfer the subway. So we start on one train, and then we transfer to another train. Transfers’ station can be very confusing. In New York City, several different trains will go to the same station, to the same track, so you really have to pay attention to the front of the train where they have the final destination printed.
In some cities, the trains or subways are named by colors: the blue line; the green line; the orange line…In some cities, they are named by the final destination, which can be a location, and can be a street name. For example in New York City, the Lexington line, I highly recommend that you go to the city’s subway site online, take the best information. But that’s not that complicated. It’s actually very easy and I hope I’ve answered some of your questions. 

Podcast Episode# 1

  1. Segment 1 -- interesting news
  2. Segment 2 -- questions and answers
  3. Segment 3 -- Fact, English tips and audio program for your listening skills 

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