English Recordings

A．How long have you been together?
B．About 4 years.
A．4 years!? That's a long time.

A．How long is the flight?
B．It's 14 hours.
A．Wow. That's a long time.

A mazing Thailand　４
Is the aqua noodle tasty?
What do you think when you hear “aqua noodle”?
You may imagine like a food Somen.
Somen is a kind of Japanese noodle that is especially popular in summer as it tastes great when cooled with water.

It was when I was swimming in a pool of the hotel.
A woman was holding four aqua noodles and I asked her “where did you get them?”
The woman was from Irkutsk Russia with her family, I had talked her the day before.
She said “you can borrow them at the gym by the pool.”
I went to the gym and said “Can I use some floating bars?”
She said,” Sure. How many do you want?” “Two please”.
And she handed me two aqua noodles.
I asked her “I don’t know what to call these bars. Will you tell me the name?”
She said, “ Noodn”.

I told to my wife, pointing the aqua noodle, that I found it called noodn in Thai language.
She said, “That is strange, I haven’t heard that in Thai, I’ll ask the swimming guard again.”
The guard answered” Fong naam.”
She said to me, “That makes sense, which means rubber foam.”

When I got in the room I searched on the internet, and found it is called “aqua noodle” in English.
My wife said,” Thai pronunciation changes “l” to “n” easily.”

London
London is made up of two ancient cities which are now joined together.

They are:
the City of London (or 'the City') the business and financial heart of the United Kingdom. It is also known as the Square Mile (2.59 sq km/1 sq mi). It was the original Roman settlement (Londinium), it is the oldest part of London.

the City of Westminster, where Parliament and most of the government offices are located. Buckingham Palace, the official London residence of the Queen and the Royal family are located there, too.

Together with the 32 boroughs of inner and outer London they make up a region known as Greater London.

London: a city of extremes

London is the biggest city in Britain and in Europe.

London Metropolitan Area has a population of around 15,000,000 (2011)

London has the highest population density; in Britain, with 5,206/km2 (13,466/sq mi) people per square kilometre (13,466 per square mile);

London has the tallest building in Europe: the Shard;

London was the first city in the world to have an underground railway, known as the ‘Tube’;

London has the largest area of underground system;

London has a diverse range of peoples and cultures, and more than 300 languages are spoken within its boundaries;

London's 43 universities form the largest concentration of higher education in Europe.

…London is not only a place of culture and history, it is also a place for shopping, leisure and sport.
Its many parks, such as Hyde Park and its neighbour Kensington Gardens at the western edge of central London,
and Regent’s Park on the northern edge offer londoners and tourists the chance to relax.

In one of its many markets, such as those in Portobello Road or in Camden Town tourists are certain to find something special they want to buy.

..And we haven’t mentioned the numerous attractions and tours related to sports: tourists can visit Wembley Stadium, the home venue of the England national football team;
Lord’s Cricket Ground, home of the museum of cricket… and many more buildings and landmarks known all over the world.

There are also a few more icons we immediately relate to London:
The royal guards,
the horse guards
and the beefteaters,

The red telephone box, a telephone kiosk for a public telephone ... can you guess why it is red?

The red pillar box: a free-standing post box.

.. and the well known London means of transport: double decker buses, black cabs and the Tube.

London and its icons

London is home to some of the most famous and iconic attractions in the world.

Here are some you are bound to recognise:

The spectacular Tower Bridge, built in the late Victorian era;

The Monument, in the City of London providing views of the surrounding area while commemorating the Great Fire of London (1066), which originated nearby.

30 St Mary Axe (informally known as "the Gherkin" and previously the Swiss Re Building) is a skyscraper in London's financial district, the City of London.

The British Museum: dedicated to human history and culture. Its permanent collection, with around eight million works, is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence and originates from all continents.

Covent Garden, with its restaurants and street artists;

Piccadilly Circus and its world famous Statue of Eros and huge electric signs; it leads to Soho,
Leicester (pronounciation: /lester/) Square,
Chinatown;

Tate Modern: the most-visited modern art gallery in the world. It is based in the former Bankside Power Station, in the Bankside area of Central London.
Not far from Tate Modern there’s Shakespeare’s Globe: a reconstruction of the Globe Theatre, an Elizabethan playhouse in the London Borough of Southwark, on the south bank of the River Thames.

The National Gallery: an art museum with a collection of over 2,300 paintings dating from the mid-13th century to 1900.
It is in Trafalgar Square, one of the focal points of the city centre. The centre point of the square is Nelson’s Column, an internationally recognised monument.

The Houses of Parliament, standing on the site of the old Palace of Westminster. The clock tower beside the Houses is home to Big Ben (that's the bell, don't forget!);

The London Eye: a fantastic way to get a bird’s eye view of the city;

Marble Arch and Wellington Arch, at the north and south ends of Park Lane respectively, have royal connections, as do the Albert Memorial
and Royal Albert Hall in Kensington.

Buckingham Palace: located in the City of Westminster, it is the official London residence and principal workplace of the Queen.

Westminster Abbey: where every King and Queen has been crowned since 1066. It's also the final resting place for many sovereigns, politicians and artists.

Architecture

London's buildings have varying ages, so they are too diverse to be characterised by any particular architectural style.

Many grand houses and public buildings, such as the National Gallery (1824), are constructed from Portland Stone (Dorset).
Some areas of the city, particularly those west of the centre, are noticeable for their whitewashed buildings.
Older buildings are mainly brick built, most commonly the yellow London stock brick or a warm orange-red variety, often decorated with carvings and white plaster mouldings.
Only a few structures in central London survived the Great Fire of 1666, for example the Tower of London (founded in 1066) and some Tudor survivors in the City such as
the Royal Exchange (1565) while some railway stations are excellent examples of Victorian architecture, most notably St. Pancras and Paddington.
Very famous are also Wren’s late 17th century churches such as Saint Paul’s Cathedral and the financial institutions of the 18th and 19th centuries such as the Bank of England (1694),
to the early 20th century Old Bailey and the 1960s Barbican Estate and the most recent:
the Shard by the Italian architect Renzo Piano.

London has been a thriving city for over two millennia and as such is home to a fascinating range of buildings and landmarks.

Since 1965 Greater London has been divided into 32 boroughs in addition to the ancient City of London

and the City of Westminster.

The City of London is the main financial district
and Canary Wharf has recently developed into a new financial and commercial hub, in the Docklands to the east.

The West End is an area of central London containing many of the city's major tourist attractions,
shops,
businesses,
government buildings,
and entertainment venues (including the famous West End theatres), attracting tourists.
The name "West End" is a flexible term with different meanings in different contexts. It may refer to the entertainment district around Leicester Square
and Covent Garden;
to the shopping district on Oxford Street, Regent Street, and Bond Street.

This building can be seen in Mexico, it dates back to about 6000 years ago.

Her face crumpled into a smile.