News Exercise #53

Posted on Posted in News Exercise

This week’s video from the BBC is a little out of date, but I wanted to introduce the BBC iPlayer Global on YouTube, which has many interesting and short topics.

Visiting Japan

Questions:
1) What did his friend recommend? (His friend is ‘an old Tokyo hand’, which means he has experience of living in Tokyo.)
2) What did the British Ambassador to Japan recommend to him?
3) “These are barbecued chicken intestines, which taste better than they sound.” What does he mean by that?
4) At 0:34-0:42 he describes the great atmosphere: “Little…” What did he say?
5) When looking at the window display he says: “Look at that Kobe beef there, all ____ ____ ____ ____ ____ ____ ____, which is a much ____ ____ ____ ____ ____ ____ ____ ____ ____.”
6) 0:55-1:11 What was his impression of the artificial food in the window display?
7) 1:16-1:35 He describes the two different images he got of Tokyo. What did he say?
8) He said that the restaurant’s image is quite different to the eating experience. From 1:42-1:50 he described the customers.
9) From 1:51 he describes the food: “And the food is excellent, and the beer… Japanese beer is a revelation.”
What did he mean about the beer?
10) How did he manage to order the food?

Answers:
1) What did his friend recommend? (His friend is ‘an old Tokyo hand’, which means he has experience of living in Tokyo.)
He said “Don’t bother going to all the upmarket restaurants.”

2) What did the British Ambassador to Japan recommend to him?
He recommended going to the little restaurants in the business quarter (area) which specialize in different dishes.”

3) “These are barbecued chicken intestines, which taste better than they sound.” What does he mean by that?
He means that “intestines” does not sound appetizing, at least to the British ear.

4) At 0:34-0:42 he describes the great atmosphere: “Little…” What did he say?
“Little groups of office workers having a few pints before the long train ride out to the suburbs.”

5) When looking at the window display he says: “Look at that Kobe beef there, all done in sort of shiny plastic, which is a much better idea than just having pictures of the food..”

6) 0:55-1:11 What was his impression of the artificial food in the window display?
He said, “#This is eminently collectible, this stuff, so bright and cheerful… I’ve just got to take these all back to my cottage and start a collection.”

7) 1:16-1:35 He describes the two different images he got of Tokyo. What did he say?
“I was looking out of my hotel room on the 18th floor, earlier on and it just looked like big, high-rise office blocks and a massive city, but I got down on the street and I sort of realized it’s not like that at all. There’s a whole honeycomb of little streets leading off everywhere.”

8) He said that the restaurant’s image is quite different to the eating experience. From 1:42-1:50 he described the customers:
“There’s lots of people here in city suits; I mean it’s not, like, down market, but it just looks so, sort of, informal.”

9) From 1:51 he describes the food: “And the food is excellent, and the beer… Japanese beer is a revelation.”
What did he mean about the beer?
He meant that Japanese beer is not famous worldwide, so Westerners have no special image of it.

10) How did he manage to order the food?
He pointed to the pictures on the menu, and also said “pickles”.