World Wonders (Level 2)

Learn English Through Story - Subtitles:
World Wonders (Level 2)

Short description:
What are the most beautiful, the most interesting, the most wonderful things in the world? The Great Pyramid, the Great Wall of China, the Panama Canal - everyone has their favourites. And there are natural wonders too - Mount Everest, Niagara Falls, and the Northern Lights, for example.

Here is one person's choice of eleven wonders. Some of them are made by people, and others are natural. Everyone knows the Grand Canyon and the Great Barrier Reef - but what about the Iguazú Falls, or the old city of Petra? Come and discover new wonders ...

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Glossary

1. Buddhist: (n & adj) following the teachings of Buddha
2. calcium carbonate: (CaCO3) something solid and white that is found in chalk and some kinds of stone
3. camel: a large animal with a long neck that carries people and things in hot dry places
4. canal: a long narrow passage that carries water
5. cherry tree: a tree with beautiful pink or white flowers
6. city: a big and important town; capital city the most important city in a country
7. column: a tall piece of stone or wood that is part of a building
8. cool: a little cold; between warm and cold
9. cubic metre: the volume of something that is 1 metre long, 1 metre wide, and 1 metre high (m3)
10. dam: a wall that is built across a river to hold the water back
11. defend: to fight to keep away people or things that attack
12. destroy: when something is destroyed, it is dead and finished (e.g. fire destroys a forest)
13. earth: the world; the planet that we live on
14. earthquake: a sudden strong shaking of the ground
15. electricity: power that makes machines work and can make heat and light
16. elephant: a very big wild animal with a long nose that hangs down
17. entrance: the door or opening where you go into a place
18. flag: a piece of cloth with a special pattern on it; every country has its flag
19. flat: (adj) smooth, with no parts higher or lower than the rest
20. forest: a large area of land covered with trees
21. gazelle: a small animal like a deer that can run very fast
22. god: a spirit that people believe has power over them and nature
23. grass: a plant with thin green leaves that grows on the ground
24. grow: to get bigger; (of a plant) to exist in a particular place
25. harbour: a place where ships can stay safely in the water
26. Hindu: belonging to the religion of Hinduism
27. hyena: a wild animal like a dog that eats dead animals
28. jaguar: a large wild cat with black spots
29. kind: a group of things that are the same in some way
30. king: the most important man in a country
31. land: the part of the earth that is not the sea; a piece of ground
32. line: a long thin mark like this _
33. magnetic: able to attract things made of iron;
34. magnetic field: an area with a magnetic force
35. moss: a very small green plant that grows in wet places
36. Muslim: following the religion of Islam
37. nail: a thin piece of metal that holds pieces of wood together
38. natural: made by nature, not by people
39. park: a large place with trees and gardens where people can walk
40. particle: a very small piece of something
41. pink: with a light red colour
42. prayer: words that you say to God or a god
43. rare: not found very often
44. rock: something very hard that is found in the ground
45. shadow: a dark shape that something makes on the ground when it is between the sun and the ground 
46. snake: an animal with a long thin body and no legs
47. spice: a small part of a plant that you put in food to make it taste good
48. sport: a game like football, tennis etc.
49. statue: a model of a person, made from stone or metal
50. telegraph: a way of sending messages along wires using electricity
51. temple: a building where people worship a god or gods
52. terracotta: a red-brown earth that is cooked to make it hard
53. treasure: something that is worth a lot of money;
54. treasury: a place where valuable things are kept
55. weapon: something that you use to fight with
56. wildebeest: a large wild animal with curved horns
57. zebra: a wild animal like a horse with black and white stripes on its body

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Robin Hood (Level 2)

Learn English Through Story - Subtitles: Robin Hood
(Level 2)

Short description:
After the cruel sheriff killed Robert’s father and took his lands and property, young Robert decided to live in Sherwood Forest with a couple of his loyal friends. There, in Sherwood Forest, he named himself Robin Hood. John, whose brother was out on a crusade, became an evil King of England. He considered Robin and his company to be outlaws.

Robin and friends lived in caves and trained with bows and arrows in the forests of England. All of them became excellent archers, but Robin was the best of the best. Little by little Robin made new friends who were happy to join his band of outlaws. Robin decided to rob the rich and give their possessions to the poor.

All of the King’s soldiers were afraid of Robin and his men. However, the sheriff wanted very much to catch Robin, and therefore he rushed to the forest alone, but he soon returned unsuccessful and ashamed. At last the sheriff made an excellent plan to trap Robin Hood.

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The Eyes of Montezuma (Level 2)

Learn English Through Story - Subtitles: The Eyes of Montezuma
(Level 2)

Short description:
Shelley Marn is a Californian student on holiday in Europe. She meets a young English couple, Clare and Nick Harmans. The Harmans ask Shelley to have lunch with them. She agrees but strangely she never arrives. Why? What has happened?

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Romeo and Juliet (Level 2)

Learn English Through Story - Subtitles: Romeo and Juliet
(Level 2)

Short description:
There has never been a more tragic story than this one of Romeo and Juliet… It was a love at first sight, boundless and everlasting. And pointless death because of families excessive feud. Montague and Capulet are leaders in the city of Verona but they also blooded enemies. Two old men couldn’t even remember what was the cause of their feud. All members of their families hate each other and barely defend themselves from each other.

The Prince of Verona didn’t want endure these fights anymore, because they disturbed the streets of the city and citizens had to participate in feuds. Both of them will die if either of them breaks the peace. That was the new rule for Montague and Capulet and their relatives. But it was not easy to follow it…

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The Visit (Level 2)

Learn English Through Story - Subtitles: The Visit
(Level 2)

Short description:
Harry watched the ‘thing’ carefully. ‘That,’ he thought, ‘is something very, very strange … something from another world, perhaps. It’s a spaceship … or something like it. I’m going to get out and look at it.’

Harry Evans is a police officer. He is driving along a country road when he sees something. He stops. He hears strange music. Is it a UFO? No one believes Harry’s story, but after that his life is different … why?

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Cries from the Heart - Stories from Around the World (Level 2)

Learn English Through Story - Subtitles: Cries from the Heart - Stories from Around the World (Level 2)

Short description:
From Botswana to New Zealand, from Jamaica to Nigeria, from Uganda to Malaysia, from India to South Africa, these moving stories show us that the human heart is the same in every place. Fear and pain, happiness and sadness belong to us all.

These eight stories were winning entries in the 2004 Commonwealth Short Story Competition. The writers are Sefi Atta, Adrienne M. Frater, Lauri Kubuitsile, Erica N. Robinson, Jackee Budesta Batanda, Janet Tay Hui Ching, Anuradha Muralidharan, and Tod Collins.

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Death in the Freezer (Level 2)

Learn English Through Story - Subtitles:
Death in the Freezer (Level 2)

Short description:
When Ellen was six, her brother was born. Her parents was very happy to have a son, but she was upset cause all their attention now was fixed on new baby whom called Al. As Ellen grown up, she was in difficult position. Her husband left her with three children and no money. But Al was very successful, he established a rock band that became a quite popular – they made records and earn a lot of money.

Soon Al was rich and popular, as a result he has all that wanted and spent a lot of time holding parties and taking drugs. Brother didn’t want to share his fortune with sister, but he agreed to hire her to work as a cleaning woman. Once Al returned from tour he looked very ill, also he brought some new weird friends, they shared with Ellen their crazy ideas about human life.

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Glossary

1. AIDS: a very serious and dangerous illness
2. alarm: (n) a loud sound which tells people that something wrong or dangerous is happening
3. apartment: a flat; a group of rooms in a building where you can live
4. bacteria: the smallest forms of life which are found in all living and dead animals and plants; some bacteria cause illnesses
5. card: a small piece of hard paper
6. care: (v) to think that something is important or interesting
7. clean: not dirty
8. company: people who work togerher in a business
9. crazy: we say someone is crazy when they do strangeor dangerous things
10. cure: (v) to make a sick person well
11. doll: a toy that looks like a person
12. dream: (n) pictures in your head when you are a sleep
13. drugs: dangerous things which people eat or inject, and which make them feel happy or excited for a short time
14. drunk: (adj) doing strangeor wild things because of drinking a lot of alcohol
15. electricity: power rhat can make heat and light
16. fingerprints: marks that your fingers make when you touch something
17. flashlight: a small electric light which you hold in your hand
18. freezer: a machine that makes food (or other things) very cold
19. freeze: (past tense froze) to make something very cold
20. frozen: very cold, and hard like ice
21. gas: anything like air, which you usually cannot see
22. guilty: if you are guilty, you have done something bad or wrong
23. hate: (v) to dislike very strongly; the opposite of 'to love'
24. healthy: well and strong; not ill
25. heart attack: a sudden illness when the heart stops working and sometimesthe persondies
26. ice: water which is very cold and hard like rock
27. idea: when you think of something new
28. kids: children
29. law court: a place where judges and lawyers ask questions and decide if someone is a criminal or not 
30. lawyer: someone who helps people with the law
31. look after: to take care of something; to keep it safe
32. maybe: perhaps
33. medicine: something to eat or drink that helps you to get better when you are ill
34. motorbike: a bicycle with an engine
35. record: (n) a round thing which plays music through a record player
36. rock band: a group of people who play pop or rock music
37. safe: not dangerous
38. save: to take someone out of danger
39. science: the study of natural things (physics,biology, etc. are sciences)
40. shut up: a rude way of saying 'be quiet'
41. sick: ill
42. swimming pool: a special place or building for swimming
43. switch: (v and n) to press something (e.g.a switch on a wall) to turn electriciry on or off
44. syringe: an instrument with a needle which is used to inject medicines or drugs through the skin
45. tennis court: a place where people play tennis (a ball game)
46. tour: (n) a journey to visit a lot of places
47. training: learning how to do a lob
48. trial: when people go to a law court to decide if someone is a criminal
49. trust (v) to feel sure that someone is good, strong, right, etc.
50. view: what you can see from a window, a mountain top, etc.
51. whisky: a strong alcoholic drink, from Scotland

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