Hey guys, I'm Connor.
And I'm Tara.
And we know a lot of you guys like travelling around the world. And when you're traveling, you need to get around and often you need a taxi.
Or a Uber.
Or a Uber. Yeah, exactly. So today's dialogue has some useful ways you can talk to a taxi driver to get where you need to go.
Right, we have a girl who is talking to a taxi driver when she gets into a taxi, and then when she wants the taxi driver to stop. So let's listen.
Hi, Where are you headed你要去哪里?
I'd like to head downtown.
Do you know the exact 准确的 address or cross street?
It's at the intersection of Robson and Howe.
Is there a specific特定的 route路线 you want me to take?
Well, it's rush hour now, and the roads seem pretty backed up堵车. Do you know a shortcut捷径，快捷键?
I'll take the freeway高速公路 and get off at the closest exit. That'll be faster.
Sounds good. Whatever you think is best.
We're almost there. What's the street number again?
Let me pull out抽出 my phone and check. It's 800. Oh, it's across穿过，在对面 the street. Can you do a U-turn here?
No. It's a one-way street. I'll have to go around the block我得绕着街区走一圈.
That's ok不用了. You can pull over, and I'll get out here. How much is it? I can't see the meter.
That's $17.50.
Here's a twenty. Keep the change.
Alright. So we just heard the taxi driver and the girl talking about where she wants to go and the taxi driver asks her where she's headed前往.
Right. So this is like your direction head, your head is at the top, your head goes first, so it kind of means go or direction. We can also use this as the verb "heading".
Right. So where you headed, where you are heading, both mean where you are going.
Exactly. Yeah.
Where do you want to go and where does she want to go?
She wants to go down-town. She's heading down-town.
Right. So downtown is basically just the business center, the busy area of a city.
Yeah. And the interesting thing about downtown is we don't use a preposition. We don't say "to downtown". Um, other word like "home","here" and "there", we don't use the preposition "at" or "to" before those words.
Right. Just I'm going downtown. I'm going here. I'm going there. I'm going home.
Yeah. Or where are you? I am downtown.
Right. It's like I'm home.
Exactly.
Yeah. So he asks her if she knows the exact address or another useful word here," cross street".
Yeah. So exact is like just the detailed information信息 about...
Specific.
Yeah, specific, yeah. And "cross street".
Right. It's basically where two streets cross基本上就是指两条街交叉得地方.
Yeah, like an "X".
Exactly. So where one street meets another street is often how we give directions.
所以一条街和另一条街的交汇处通常是我们指引方向的方式
Yeah, yeah. If you don't know the address, you can say the two crossing streets.
Uh-huh, right, like the intersection十字路口 of Robson and Howe.
Right. that's how she says that her answer --the intersection where Robson street and Howe Street meet.
Right. And notice here that she doesn't say Robson street and Howe street. Just Robson and Howe.
Yeah. Because we're talking about streets. You don't need to say Robson Street, Howe Street, Main Street. Yeah, you just say "Robson" and "Howe".
Exactly. And then he asks her if there is specific route she wants to take, so "specific" is the same as "exact".
Yeah, it's like the detail. The detailed information.
Right. And this word "route".
Yes. So is it route or route"
It's both I think.
Yeah. For example, my dad is Canadian but my mom is American. One of them says route, the other says route. And I can't remember which one says which.
And it doesn't really matter. It just means the way.
Yeah. I think I say route more, though然而，不过.
I sometimes say routes and one famous one is Route 66.
Ah, yes, right.
In the U.S.. Um, both work.
Yeah. Both are fine. So then the girl says it's rush hour now. Now we all know rush hour. That's the busy time. In the morning and around 6 P.M.
Yeah. And when it's rush hour, there's a lot of traffic交通会拥挤. And cars aren't moving.
Cars are not. They are trying to rush but they can't because a lot of these cars are backed up堵车.
Right. So it doesn't mean they're going backwards向后倒adv.
Yeah, I know. It means the lines is growing back.
Yes. And it's just more and more busy and congested堵塞的adj.
So when you are... If you are stuck卡住动不了倒 in the traffic, because there are lots of cars and you can't move, use this word.
Right.
The traffic is backed up.
And it's an expression we really use a lot when we are talking about rush hour and traffic. Traffic downtown. And then she asks him if he knows a shortcut.
Yeah, so you can look at this word. If there's a long way, you can cut it to make it short.
Right. And it's kind of a quick way or cheating way or ...
Yeah. If there's some people making or building a big tower and they take a shortcut, that might make that building a little more dangerous.
Yes. It's cheating. It's taking the easy way这是走捷径.
The easy way. Yeah. Quick way.
And so he says he'll take the freeway.
Yes, so freeway, now these are different words for this. It's a really fast road with lots of cars. Sometimes we say highway or?
Expressway[ɪkˈspresweɪ] ?
Expressway.
It's just a busy, busy way and lots of traffic. Usually a bigger road. Maybe you can drive faster a little bit.
Yeah. I'd like to say expressway. That feels really fast.
Sometimes the freeway doesn't move at all and it's really backed up. And when you get to the exit or the place where you want to get off, the word "exit" can also be used as a verb or a noun. And this is in our expansion扩展 points today, so take a look at those.
Yeah, yeah. Like I'm exiting the freeway or I'm exiting the building.
Or I'm taking the exit我要去出口.
Exactly. I'm taking the exit.
Yes. So that was getting into the taxi, deciding on where you want to go, giving instructions 指令，说明 and the next section章节，地区 is arriving.
Yeah. Because when the taxi gets close to your house or the destination, you need to tell him.
Yes, when you are almost there, the driver wanted to make sure that he knew where he was going and he asked for the specific明确的，详细的 street number agin.
Yeah, and the girl, she forgot the exact number, so she pulls out her phone to check.
Right. So she just took out her phone to look.
Yeah. Take out, like pull out your phone from your bag or your pocket. Or pull out your wallet.
Exactly. And she says it's the number. It's 800. And it's across在...对面 the street.
Right. So across the street means the other side.
Right. So you may often say it's on the opposite side of the street.
It's a little more common to say across the street.
Exactly. And it's a little shorter, too.
Yes, it's shorter, too. Yeah, exactly.
And she asks him to do a U-turn.
Yes. So this is when you turn 180 degrees on the same road.
Right. And you just have to be careful that there's no police around.
Yeah, in Canada it's it's illegal on most roads. But you can do it on smaller roads.
Smaller and if there's no traffic.
And of course if there's no traffic. In America you can do it in a lot of places.
Really?
In the U.S.A, yeah."
Okay. And we call it a U-turn because it looks like a "U", the letter "U".
Yeah, exactly.
You just look around.
So then the driver says no, it's a one-way street. That's a street I can only go one direction.
Right. and if you turn down the wrong way you will get people really angry with you.
Yeah, really angry. yeah.
And it's very dangerous. So you have to look for those one-way streets. And often downtowns have a lot of one-way streets.
They do, absolutely. So the taxi driver has go around the block.
So has to go around the block which is the opposite to taking a shortcut. It's the long way.
Yeah, like doing a circle and coming back to the same place again.
Exactly. And he has to go around the block.
The block is like a section or a street.
So when a lot of people come to North America, they don't really know what a block is. And it's basically just one street.
Yeah. It's not far. You just go to the next intersection十字路口, the next street.
Exactly. And some of them are shorter, some of them are longer. But it's just between intersections交集.
Exactly. Yeah. So it looks like they're arrived at where the girl wants to go and she says you can pull over.
Right. So we saw earlier "pull out" meaning to take out. Now we see pull over.
Yeah. This is very different meaning, completely different meaning.
And it just means to stop or go to the side of the road.
Yeah, stop on the side. Now sometimes if you're going really fast, you're speeding and the police catch you ,the police pull over your car.
Exactly. You don’t want that.
You don’t want that.
No. And then she says I’ll get out there. So this is our grammar point.
Ah, yes.
Get out. And earlier we saw “get off”. So you get off the freeway at your exit and you get out of a car.
So basically it’s…when you’re getting off something, it mean to leave something bigger.
Yeah, yeah, exactly.
And when you get out, it’s to leave something smaller.
Yeah, cause you’re in the car and get out of the car.
It’s like being on or in something.
And then she says how much is it? I can’t see the meter.
Yeah. The meter is this machine, this little screen at the front that tells you how much it costs.
Right. It calculates how much you owe欠，应给予. So it’s the same spelling as like a kilometer, one meter, same spelling.
Yeah. I hate watching the meter go up.
No. On a taxi you don’t want it, especially when you’re in rush hour.
Yeah.
And she then gives him money and she says here’s a twenty.
Yeah and take note here, it uses the word “a” before twenty. That’s kind of strange.
Right. And all it means is a twenty dollar bill.
Yeah. Twenty dollar bill. So we don’t have to say dollar, bill every time. We can just say “a twenty”, “a ten”.
Or do you have a five?
Do you have a five? Yeah.
Right. and then she says keep the change.
Yeah. I know change is that like change my clothes.
No, it’s basically like the coins, the leftover money of the twenty.
Yeah.
So we…It’s kind of like the tip, when she says keep the change.
Yeah, yeah. so she gives a twenty but it didn’t cost twenty. It costed seventeen dollars fifty cents. So, yeah, she’s giving him a tip and change is also uncountable.
Yeah, like sugar. It’s just stuff.
Right. you don’t want to say a change.
Yeah. I don’t say a change or don’t keep the changes.
Yes, exactly.
Keep the change.
And this is our culture section all about tipping today. So take a look at that and you can see maybe what you should do or not do when you want to tip your driver.
Yes. Sometimes it’s confusing.
It is. So, great. We’ve learned a lot of useful language about giving directions to our driver. Let’s listen to the whole thing again.
So we’ve learned a lot of useful words and expressions about how to give directions to a taxi driver.
Yes. And how to give tips.
Exactly.
So if you have any questions or comments about this topic we’d love to hear from you. Or if you have any experience traveling abroad, please leave it in the comments section.
Yes. And if you’d like to know more about this topic, we’d be happy to do future lessons on it.
Absolutely.
Have a great day!
