Welcome to the Listening Time podcast. I’m Conner from polyglossa.com and you’re listening to Episode 19 of the Listening Time podcast.

If this is your first time here, I’m happy that you found this podcas. This should be a useful resource for you to help you practice your listening comprehension in English. The way this podcast works is that I choose one or two topics each episode, and I talk about them in a normal way, using normal phrases, expressions, normal vocabulary in general, but I speak a little bit more slowly and a little bit more clearly than the average native speaker speaks.

So, in this way, you can understand me a little bit better, or maybe a lot better than you can understand a normal American or English speaker speaking on a normal podcast made for English speakers. So, if you can’t yet understand native speakers when they speak at normal speed, then this podcast should be a great tool for you because it will help you train your listening skills so you can eventually listen to those real podcasts. Okay?

And remember that for each episode, you have the transcript available. Just go to the Details part of the episode, and you’ll find the link to the transcript there. So, the way I recommend you listen to this podcast is to listen to each episode multiple times: maybe the first time without the transcript, and then the second time, you can listen to it with the transcript so you can identify all those words and phrases that you missed the first time around. And then you can listen one more time without the transcript again to see how much better you understand the episode. So, this should be a great tool for you.

And remember that I’m not reading a script, I’m just speaking naturally as the thoughts come to my mind. So, I might be a little disorganized in my speech, but that’s how it’ll be. And in this way, you’ll hear how a native speakers speaks naturally, right, without preparation. Also, remember to sign up for our one dollar Listening Practice Seminars at polyglossa.com if you want to train your listening skills more. And don’t forget to give this podcast a like, a rating, a review, and share it with anyone else who might find it useful. So, on today’s episode, we’re going to talk about the zoo. This is a fun topic. I think most people like the zoo. So… should be interesting. Alright, let’s get started.

Alright, so today, we’re going to talk about the zoo. The reason why I chose this topic for today’s episode is because I just went to the zoo last week. I went to the Guadalajara Zoo. This is where I currently live right now: in Guadalajara, Mexico. And so I had the chance to visit the zoo with my wife and my mother-in-law. And so we went during the week… it was on a Thursday. So, it actually wasn’t crowded at all, really… to me, it kind of felt like a ghost town. In English, when we say that something looks or feels or seems like a “ghost town”, that just means that it feels like no one is there, right. I’m from San Diego, California and San Diego has a very very famous Zoo, and so I’m not used to going to a zoo and not seeing it really crowded.

So, that’s why I said that it seemed like a ghost town to me. Because really, there weren’t a lot of people there. That was really nice, of course, because normally you have to wait your turn to get the good spot to see the animals in the exhibit. But this time, it was pretty empty, so we could always find these good spots and see the animals clearly, so that was nice. And the zoo here is fairly big. It’s definitely not as big as the San Diego Zoo or other famous zoos, but it’s actually pretty good-sized. So, it has a lot of the normal animals you’d expect, and it has, I think, more regional animals from this state of Mexico than other zoos might have. But it’s cool. It’s cool to see some regional animals here as well.

So, let’s talk about some typical zoo animals. So, which types of animals do people normally expect to see at the zoo? Well, I think the first types of animals that come to mind for me are the animals that live in the safari in Africa. So, these are animals such as lions and zebras and giraffes and elephants… the African animals, right. These are some of the most famous ones. I think when we’re children, we oftentimes watch movies like The Lion King, or read books, or see other things that introduce us to the world of the African deserts and Sahara and Safari and Sahel, and all of those regions. And we get to know these famous animals. So, I think that’s why these are some of the most popular animals to see at the zoo.

Then, you have animals that live in the jungle. So for example, you have animals like jaguars, and I think leopards also live in the jungle, right, some of those types of big cat animals. And of course, monkeys, orangutans chimpanzees, gorillas… all kinds of primates. And then there are also animals that live in the swamp, or marshland. Those words refer to the area of land that has a lot of wet ground. So sometimes, it might seem like it’s covered in water, and maybe during the dry season, it might have less water, but it’s still kind of wet. So, for example, a place like Florida has swamps. And in these swamps, we find some animals like alligators. These are very popular animals. I think a lot of people are afraid of them. I really like seeing these animals at the zoo, because the alligators and crocodiles tend to stand very still in their exhibit.

By the way, the word “exhibit” is a word we use to describe the area where each animal lives in at the zoo. Another word we can use is “enclosure”. So, each animal has its own enclosure where it can’t escape, of course. So, the crocodiles and alligators tend to be very still in their enclosures, and they look like statues. If you’ve seen alligators or crocodiles at the zoo, you know what I’m talking about. They look really funny, like they’re fake, almost.

So, one other type of landscape where certain zoo animals live would be the plains. The word “plains” refers to grasslands areas with a lot of grass, and usually they’re very flat. Right. So, like in the US, there are animals such as prairie dogs or in the past, there were a lot of buffalo. That was a very common animal in the US hundreds of years ago. So, of course, there are many different types of animals at the zoo from many different types of regions and landscapes.

So, what are some of the other features that you can find at a zoo? Well, one of the things that you can pay for is the skylift. A skylift is something that takes you up in the air, and it uses a long cable to transport you from one area to another in the sky. So, you’ve probably seen these before in certain places like at amusement parks or zoos or other places like that, maybe. They’re kind of like ski lifts, which are the machines that take you to the top of a mountain so you can ski or snowboard. They’re similar to that. But at zoos, you can see these sky lifts that are available there. There was also a train… a little mini train at the zoo here in Guadalajara, which is nice for kids and adults as well if you don’t want to walk the whole time. The train takes you through the zoo, and you can see some of the animals from the train.

And there’s also a petting zoo at many zoos. The phrase “petting zoo” refers to the area where adults can take their children to go and feed some different animals. Usually in the US, you feed… like goats and sheep, and things like that. So, you buy a little bit of food, and then you can feed these animals from your hand. They’ll eat right off of your hand, or you can throw it on the ground, and they’ll eat it there. But this is called a “petting zoo”, because the verb “to pet” means to means to put your hand on an animal and move it, stroke it, right. You do this to your dog, right, you pet your dog when you want to spend time with him and you want to show him love… you pet your dog. So, that’s why this part of the zoo is called a petting zoo, because the little children can pet these animals like goats and sheep, and it’s a nice activity for them.

And then one other thing that zoos often have is some kind of theater where they do performances and presentations and things like that. So, I saw one of those theaters here at the zoo when I went, and I think there was some kind of performance or something, but I wasn’t able to stay and see what it was exactly, but that’s another feature. And then of course, there are gift shops at zoos. So,a “gift shop” is a place where you can buy gifts or souvenirs at a zoo or an amusement park. A “souvenir” is something that you buy that will remind you of this place that you visited. So, maybe you put it in your room or somewhere in your house, so that it will remind you of that trip to the zoo. That’s what we call a souvenir.

Okay, so now let me just talk a little bit about the San Diego Zoo because as I told you, I’m from San Diego, and we have a very famous zoo, so I can’t avoid that topic when talking about the zoo. So, the San Diego Zoo might be the most famous zoo in the United States. It’s definitely in the top three, but I’m not sure if it’s number one. But it’s very famous, and it has a huge variety of animals. So, here at the Guadalajara Zoo, I saw a lot of different types of animals, but it doesn’t really compare to San Diego, which has, I think, many more animals, and many more varieties because it’s simply bigger and has more. So, one of the reasons why it’s so famous, is that it has pandas.

So, most zoos do not have pandas, because if I’m not mistaken, only certain zoos get permission from China to hold pandas there. So, the San Diego Zoo has a few different pandas. And many people go to the zoo just to see these pandas, right, This is the one exhibit that has a long line in front of it. The other exhibits at the San Diego Zoo are not too crowded… off course, there are always people, but you just need to wait a minute and then the other people will move and then you can see the animal. But when it comes to the pandas, this is a completely different story. You have to wait in line, and it takes a long time… not a long time, but it takes much longer to actually get to the front of the line and see these pandas in the enclosure.

Honestly, I don’t know why pandas are such popular animals. They’re not my favorite animal. But I’ve talked to many people who claim the panda as their favorite animal… so, I don’t know why that is but they’re very, very famous, and so that’s another reason why many people like to go to the San Diego Zoo. They’re so famous that there’s even a camera that is always recording this panda enclosure. And if I’m not mistaken, you can access this live stream on the San Diego Zoo website and watch the pandas from your house. So, it’s a very popular animal as you can see.

So, there’s one other park that is affiliated with the San Diego Zoo, and this is called the San Diego Zoo Safari Park. So, it’s the same company, but this park is located at a different location from the zoo. It’s probably like 20-25 minutes away, so it’s kind of far from the zoo. But this place is called the Safari Park. And the reason why it has the name Safari Park is because it’s not a conventional zoo. It’s more like a safari area where you can go and take a little… I think it’s a train or some type of vehicle… I think it’s a train, where it takes you through a lot of open land, and you can see certain animals in the distance, as if it were an African safari. Right. If you go to Africa, and you go on a safari, you usually go through the open land in a vehicle, and you see these animals all around you and you just take pictures and observe them.

So, this experience that you have at the San Diego Zoo Safari Park is similar to that, but of course, not quite as exciting as going on a safari in Africa, but it’s still really cool. You get to see similar animals, probably the same animals, but it’s in a more controlled environment, right, you feel very safe. You don’t feel like you’re going to get attacked by some kind of animal at any moment. So, I know that people sometimes come back from real safaris, with some interesting stories about animals following them or elephants charging them in their little vehicle… so it’s not like that at this park, but it’s a very cool place because like I said, you feel like you’re on a safari, and you get to see many animals in a lot of open space. So, at the zoo, you see animals in smaller enclosures, and so they don’t get to move around too much, but at the Safari Park, you can see them with a lot more space to move around, and it’s a different experience. At this Safari Park, there are also enclosures with animals in them, and I think it’s mostly focused on safari-type animals.

But the thing that I really like about the San Diego Safari Park is an event that they do called the cheetah run. So the cheetah is the animal that runs the fastest, right, it’s the fastest land animal on the planet. So, what they do at this park is… every day, I think, they have an event where they bring the cheetah to this closed course. A “course” is like an area where you run. So, they bring the cheetah to this closed course, and they use some kind of toy or something that the cheetah is attracted to. And then they pull this toy with a rope very very fast, and they have the cheetah run after it. Right. The cheetah chases this toy. When something “chases” something else, it means it runs after it and tries to catch it.

So, the cheetah tries to catch this toy, it chases it, and it runs really really fast, and then they time the run. When you “time” something, it just means that you see how much time it took. Right. So they timed the run, and they see how fast the cheetah actually ran. And usually, it reaches really incredible speeds. And a lot of people bring their camera, and they record this cheetah run in slow motion. And then the videos that they take look really incredible afterwards. So, this is one event that I really like that they do at the Safari Park, and I really like cheetahs. I like the fact that they’re super fast, and they can run as fast as a car that’s going at normal speed, so that’s pretty cool.

Well, I think I’ll stop us there for today. Remember that you have the transcript available for this episode, so make sure that you access that in the Details part of the episode. And, of course, remember to sign up for our one dollar Listening Practice Seminars at polyglossa.com and don’t forget to like this podcast, and give it a rating and a review. And please share the podcast with anyone who might find it useful, and help this podcast grow and help other people practice their listening skills in English. Okay? Thank you for listening to this episode and I hope you’ll come back for Episode 20 of the Listening Time podcast.