Fluency News #59

Hello, everyone!

Sejam bem-vindos e bem-vindas a mais um episódio da nossa nova série de podcasts, o Fluency News! Aqui, você vai treinar a sua escuta e ficar por dentro do que está acontecendo no mundo, sempre com as três principais notícias da semana, tudo em inglês! Ao longo do episódio, nós também adicionamos explicações em português das coisas que achamos que precisam de mais atenção, assim você não perde nenhum detalhe!

No episódio desta semana, nós falamos sobre a crise na fronteira entre a Polônia e a Bielorrúsia, sobre o navio com mais de 800 imigrantes que finalmente aportou na Itália e sobre as emissões de CO2 aumentando novamente. Nós também falamos sobre a mulher lutando contra o Talibã usando a educação.

Nós temos uma nova página de dicas de inglês no Instagram, vá conferir! @fluencytvingles

Toda semana temos um novo episódio do Fluency News, não deixe de escutar! See you!

Este episódio foi escrito por Lívia Pond.

Episode Transcript

What is up, guys! How are you doing today? I’m Scott Lowe, and you’re listening to Fluency News, Fluency Academy’s news podcast series. Here we share some of the world’s most relevant stories of the week, and we learn a bit more about unique structures and expressions of the English language.

Before we dive in, let me just remind you to head over to fluencytv.com, to have access to the transcript of this episode and all of our sources. There you’ll also find over a thousand free lessons, in seven different languages! Alright, now let’s get started.

Poland has increased security along its border with Belarus and accused Minsk of encouraging migrants from the Middle East and Africa to cross into the European Union, in revenge for Western sanctions on longtime President Alexander Lukashenko.

Belarusian authorities have escorted an estimated 1,000 people to the Polish border in an escalation of a deadly crisis that has already left people trapped between borders and at least eight dead due to exposure.

The developments appeared to signal an escalation of a crisis that has been rumbling for months.

Lukashenko, who launched a crackdown on dissent in Belarus after winning a sixth term in a disputed presidential election held in August last year, has repeatedly denied the EU accusations.

Videos published by Belarusian media on Monday showed armed Belarusian border guards in combat fatigues guiding the column of people, which included families with children, along a highway towards a forest that runs alongside Poland’s Podlaskie region.

Video reports later showed a standoff at the border, where Polish border guards repeatedly used teargas to push people back as some in the crowd tried to cut through barbed wire or knock down border fencing to cross the border.

By evening, hundreds had set up tents and lit campfires in a forested border area, suggesting clashes could repeat themselves in coming days as Polish officials have vowed to prevent people from crossing into the country from Belarus.

A palavra standoff é bem usada quando estamos falando de todos os tipos de conflito. Ela significa “impasse”, “paralisação” ou “empate”. Quando dois grupos se enfrentam e nenhum lado está disposto a ceder, temos um standoff. Essa palavra é um substantivo , e pode ser escrita com ou sem um hífen entre “stand” e “off”. Esse substantivo pode ser usado para falar de guerras, conflitos civis, debates e em esportes, com o mesmo significado, diferindo apenas na intensidade do impasse. Outras palavras com o mesmo significado são “draw”, “impasse”, “deadlock” e “stalemate”.

Speaking of migrants, a German humanitarian ship with more than 800 rescued migrants, including 15 very young children, docked into a Sicilian port on Sunday after being granted permission by Italian authorities following days of waiting in the Mediterranean Sea.

The charity group Sea-Eye said the vessel Sea-Eye 4 was assigned to the port of Trapani, in western Sicily, on Saturday evening. Most of the adults were to be transferred to other ships for preventative quarantine against COVID-19, while some 160 minors, including babies and children younger than 4, were to be taken to shelters on land.

Many of the passengers came from countries in West Africa, Egypt or Morocco, said Giovanna di Benedetto, an official from Save the Children in Italy.

Shouts of joy from those aboard Sea-Eye 4 could be heard on Trapani’s deck as the vessel drew near, SkyTG24 TV reported.

About half of the migrants were rescued from a sinking wooden boat on Nov. 4, while the other passengers had been plucked to safety from the sea in separate operations.

Sea-Eye officials lamented that Malta, a European Union island nation in the central Mediterranean, hadn’t responded to the wooden boat’s distress signal in its own search area.

On Saturday, Sea-Eye 4 received a delivery of food and blankets while it waited to learn where the migrants could land. Doctors aboard Sea-Eye 4 had treated 25 people for hypothermia, sea sickness and high blood pressure, along with injuries consistent with torture.

The number of migrants crossing the dangerous central Mediterranean has surged this year to more than 54,000.

Você sabe qual é a diferença entre many e much? E a diferença entre many, lots of ou a lot of? “Much” e many, servem para falar de quantidades de alguma coisa. Essas palavras podem ser traduzidas para “muito”, “muitos”, “muita” e “muitas”. O uso vai depender do substantivo que vem logo depois: é um substantivo contável ou incontável? Se for algo que é possível contar, como pessoas, animais, e objetos, usamos many. Se for algo que não se pode contar individualmente, como dinheiro, líquidos e grãos, usamos much.

Many pode ser traduzido para “muitos” e “muitas”. “A lot of” e “lots of” também podem ter essa mesma tradução. Apesar de serem intercambiáveis às vezes, é preciso lembrar que many só pode ser usado com substantivos contáveis, enquanto “a lot of” e “lots of” podem ser usados com contáveis e incontáveis. Assim, tanto “many” quanto “much” podem ser substituídos por “a lot of” e “lots of”, mas nem sempre é possível fazer o contrário. Resumindo, se usa many com coisas contáveis e much com coisas incontáveis. E a lot of e lots of, tanto faz, pode usar para os dois casos.

And now, in some environmental news, emissions of carbon dioxide are rising rapidly again.

Global carbon dioxide emissions have bounced back after the COVID-19 restrictions and are likely to reach close to pre-pandemic levels this year, an analysis has found.

The troubling finding comes as world leaders meet at the COP26 climate talks in Glasgow in a last-ditch bid to keep dangerous global warming at bay. The analysis was undertaken by the Global Carbon Project, a consortium of scientists from around the world who produce, collect and analyze global greenhouse gas information.

The world’s strong economic rebound has created a surge in demand for energy, and the global energy system is still heavily dependent on fossil fuels.

Most concerning is the long-term upward trends of CO₂ emissions from oil and gas, and this year’s growth in coal emissions, which together are far from trending towards net-zero by 2050.

Emissions from global coal use were declining before the pandemic hit in early 2020, but they surged back this year. Emissions from global gas use have returned to the rising trend seen before the pandemic.

CO₂ emissions from global oil use remain well below pre-pandemic levels but are expected to increase in coming years as road transport and aviation recover from COVID-related restrictions.

Você sabe o que são compound adjectives? São os adjetivos compostos, aqueles que apresentam mais de um elemento, mas que tem um sentido único. Eles são fáceis de identificar, porque são características divididas por um hífen. Nessa história, que é bem curtinha, nós temos alguns exemplos, como pre-pandemic, last-ditch, long-term e net-zero. Apesar de ser comum que eles sejam duas palavras divididas por um hífen, eles podem ser formados por mais de dois elementos também. Se você procurar na gramática, vai ver que existem exceções para o uso do hífen. Alguns compound adjectives são “open compound adjetives”, o que significa que eles não são separados pelo tracinho, apenas posicionados um ao lado do outro, podendo ser duas ou mais palavras, ou juntas em uma única palavra. É possível criar compound adjectives juntando dois adjetivos, um substantivo e um adjetivo, um verbo no particípio do passado e um adjetivo e muitas outras opções.

And now, let’s see some good and inspiring news! When the Taliban took power in Afghanistan, they instructed girls and young women to stay home from school. With no resolution in sight, a woman decided to act. Angela Ghayour’s online school now has nearly 1,000 students and more than 400 volunteer teachers.

Angela was just eight when civil war broke out across Afghanistan, in 1992. Her family fled from their home in Herat in the west of the country to Iran, and for the following five years Angela was unable to go to school – ineligible because of the family’s temporary visa status.

“It was quite common back then that Afghan children who had fled to Iran couldn’t go to school because they didn’t have the right documents,” Angela recalled.

After five years, Angela’s father finally managed to secure the right paperwork, and she was able to go to school in Iran. And aged just 13, she realized she had a calling.

Every day after school, Angela would return home and teach 14 other Afghan children, all of them unable to go to school.

Years later, after the Taliban was deposed from power, Angela returned to Afghanistan and qualified as a secondary school teacher, before moving to the Netherlands, and then finally to the UK.

Like many, Angela felt paralyzed watching events unfold in her home country over the past few months.

The Taliban swept into power, and in what seems like an instant, two-decades of progress in women’s education was put in jeopardy. The Taliban claim that their restrictions on women working and girls studying are “temporary” and only in place to ensure all workplaces and learning environments are “safe” for them.

Miserable from the thoughts that girls were once again deprived of education, she felt compelled to act. Angela founded the Online Herat School, an educational resource for Afghan women and girls. She posted on Instagram asking for help from any experienced teachers, and since that first post nearly 400 volunteers have joined the program. Via Telegram or Skype, they offer more than 170 different online classes in everything from math to music to cooking to painting. Most of the teachers are from Iran, and they work between two and eight hours a day.

“I feel this school is the result of all of my pain, my agonies and experiences,” said Angela.

“Our motto is: the pen instead of the gun.”

Together the volunteers support nearly 1,000 students.

In recent weeks, there has been some positive news for female students in the north of the country, where girls have returned to secondary schools in five of the country’s 34 provinces.

Young women in private universities, but not state run facilities have also been allowed to return.

Things are still looking grim in the country, but it seems like there is yet hope to be had.

And that is where we’re going to end today’s episode, folks.

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Remember, there’s a new episode of Fluency News every week, and constant contact with the language you’re learning is essential to guarantee your success, so we’ll be waiting for you. See you soon! Peace out.

Stories:

Poland ups security on Belarus border amid fears of major breach
‍https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/11/8/poland-ups-security-on-belarus-border-amid-fears-of-major-breach
‍https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/nov/08/belarus-escorts-hundreds-of-migrants-towards-polish-border
‍https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/poland-fears-major-incident-migrants-belarus-head-border-2021-11-08/

Italy: 800 migrants on board German rescue ship reach Sicilian port
‍https://www.dw.com/en/italy-800-migrants-on-board-german-rescue-ship-reach-sicilian-port/a-59744534
‍https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-11-07/german-rescue-boat-with-800-migrants-aboard-heads-to-sicily
‍https://apnews.com/article/europe-migration-sicily-8b21e9e4d3cf5c8fb73e435e9546043e

Despite dropping last year, global emissions are almost back to pre-pandemic levels
‍https://www.sbs.com.au/news/despite-dropping-last-year-global-emissions-are-almost-back-to-pre-pandemic-levels/1bbd50e1-a1a9-4326-9d33-df793e1c7aaa
‍https://www.dw.com/en/global-co2-emissions-rebound-to-near-pre-pandemic-levels-study/a-59715004

The teacher defying the Taliban on girls’ education
‍https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-59063624