Thursday, July 23, 2009

#1099 Rhys Darby 2degrees Ad, Small And Pert, TDES Move, Typical


Show 1099 Thursday 23 July
Watch today’s show at YouTube or BlipTV.

Hi, I’m Sarah, welcome to The Daily English Show.

People have been guessing where our next location might be. Thank you for your comments.

So far people have guessed:

Tubenjunge: America, France, Germany, the apartment next door
82quatro: Russia
adyho07: Australia
Hikosaemon: Korea
stefkova1234: NZ

And I can confirm that … one of those is correct.

I’ll be telling you which one on the next show.

The video we’re studying today is an ad for a new mobile phone company in New Zealand called 2degrees.

I love this ad, I think it’s hilarious. Mostly because it has Rhys Darby in it. You might know Rhys Darby from Flight of the Conchords. He plays Murray.

Have you heard of the idea of six degrees of separation?
It’s the idea that any two people are connected by at the most five people. But people say that in New Zealand, because it has such a small population, there are only two degrees of separation. When two people meet each other in New Zealand it’s not uncommon for the conversation to go something like:
Where are you from?
Oh, I’m from such-and-such a town.
Oh do you know so and so.
Yeah, I do.

… whereas I don’t think that happens as much in countries with bigger populations. So that’s where the name of the company 2degrees comes from.

Rhys calls New Zealand Godzone, which comes from the phrase God’s Own Country. And you can read about the origin of that in Wikipedia. Personally I think it sounds kind of arrogant and just a bit weird, so I don’t use it … but it is quite common for New Zealanders to call New Zealand Godzone.

Rhys’ use of the word pert to describe New Zealand is quite funny. You normally hear body parts being described as small and pert rather than countries.

Another funny thing is how he pronounces logo. He says logo.
I assumed that he was pronouncing it incorrectly on purpose in keeping with his character of being kind of stupid. But I just looked it up and I found that logo is also correct. So now I’m just confused.



STICK NEWS



Kia ora, in Stick News today The Daily English show is relocating.

The Daily English Show is an internet show with an average international audience of 4.2 million viewers a day.
Since its launch in April 2006 in Tokyo, Japan The Daily English Show has taken the online world by storm and six months after the show started the studio moved North to a town called Kutchan.
Almost three years later, The Daily English Show announced they will be relocating again.
According to reports, the shows producers have confirmed they will be going ahead with the move, despite being offered millions of yen to stay in Kutchan.

And that was Stick News for Thursday 23rd of July.
Kia ora.



Word of the Day

Today’s word is typical.

This word has a few different meanings, but the one we’re interested in today is this:

adj. (often disapproving)
behaving in the way that you expect

For example: She’s late again – typical!

At the end of the ad Rhys says: So, who’s keen?
He’s asking if anyone’s interested in buying a mobile phone from this company … and then he looks around and can’t see anyone. So he says: No one. Typical.

Even though he has just explained how great this mobile phone company, no one is interested. Ugh, typical.



conversations with sarah
#698 Are you going to miss Japan?

Step 1: Repeat Rebecca’s lines.
Step 2: Read Rebecca’s lines and talk to Sarah.

Rebecca Are you going to miss Japan?

Sarah Yeah, definitely.

Rebecca A-ha! So you are leaving Japan.

Sarah I mean … if I was to leave Japan then I would definitely miss it.

Rebecca What would you miss?

Sarah Oh, so many things. Like, the internet.

Rebecca What do you mean? The internet’s everywhere.

Sarah Yeah, but lots of countries don’t have fast connections. And it’s a lot more expensive in many countries.

Rebecca Would you miss the food?

Sarah Yeah, stuff that you can’t get in other places. But then again in other places there’s stuff that you can’t get here or it’s more expensive here so … basically everywhere has it’s good and bad points, so I’m pretty much happy anywhere.





Us Kiwis really are special.
The whole world can be connected with six degrees of separation.
But in little old Godzone, it’s only two!
Everybody knows someone who knows someone.
You’d think it would be easy to keep in touch in this small but pert country.
But is it?
I mean just get locked into a contract for two years.
Hope we get porridge.
Get a call plan that’s harder to solve than the Da Vinci Code.
And then ruthlessly select only a small handful of mates to save on calls.
It shouldn’t be that hard!
And now it isn’t … that hard.
2degrees have build a huge new mobile network dedicated to keeping you, your friends and your money closer together.
That’s not actually it by the way, that’s just a giant logo.
No contracts. Simple pricing plans that treat everyone equally. Even you.
And the more people that sign up, the more savings everyone makes.
So, who’s keen?
No one. Typical.



links

today's STICK NEWS pictures

music

show start
artist: Kevin MacLeod
track: Future Cha Cha
from: Brooklyn, NY, United States
artist site

WOD start
artist: DJ iPep's
album: Home Mix 2007
track: Game Toy
from: EVREUX, France
album at Jamendo
artist at Jamendo
artist site

cws start
artist: Kevin MacLeod
track: The Jazz Woman
from: Brooklyn, NY, United States
artist site

qa start
artist: ioeo
album: triptracks
track: triptrack2
from: Saint Raphael, France
album at Jamendo
artist at Jamendo
artist site

qa bgm
artist: Kevin MacLeod
track: Desert City
from: Brooklyn, NY, United States
artist site

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