Uh, I don't know if you remember when he walks in the job, the, the interview, uh, for the internship program he's applying for, and he's all covered in paint because he had an incident with his apartment the night before.

So he was clearly not dressed appropriately and looking at the interview, uh, you know, watching the interview, it was clear that he didn't have the qualifications necessary for that position, right?

But then he says, he says something really nice in that scene that really like, you know, I think it defines very well also what we mean or what I mean by resilience.

Can I say something?

Um, I'm the type of person, if you ask me a question and I don't know the answer, I'm going to tell you that I don't know, but I bet you what, I know how to find the answer and I will find the answer.

Man.

When I saw that for the first time, I was like, yes, that's it.

You know, that scene, it was like less than 20 seconds.

But if a learner, if there weren't subtitles there, I think most learners would have a lot of difficulty understanding Will Smith because he uses so much connected speech there.

So I wanted to challenge you guys to actually try to mimic these entire 15 seconds, exactly like Will Smith says them.

Cause it's just, even if you're not interested in sounding like a native speaker, it's going to help you a lot with your listening.

So, um, let's see, I have here the text.

So he says, he starts out by saying, can I say something?

Can I say something?

But he doesn't say, can I say something?

Which is how most people learn how to say it in school.

Right.

But he reduces can to kin.

This is something that we need to do all the time, right?

Kin.

And it links to the I and I links to say, so can I say, can I say something, can I say something?

Can I say, can I say something?

Exactly.

And then I'm the type of person.

I'm the type of person.

Here we have schwa.

We've talked a lot about the schwa as well, that this is the most common sound in, at least in American English.

And it's this, uh, uh, we use it all the time.

So in school you probably learn to say the, but usually we'll reduce the to the, I'm the, I'm the type of person.

So we have another one there, the of, the V gets dropped and we also just pronounce it as a schwa.

And that all links together.

I'm the type of person.

I'm the type of person.

You got it.

Going back to the scene.

So Will Smith says, if you ask me a question, if you ask me a question, but there's an, again, a lot of connected speech in this line.

If you, so you oftentimes we natives will reduce that to yeah.

Or yeah, as he does here.

So he says, if yeah, if yeah, ask me, uh, again, we have the schwa there.

A instead of saying a, we'll often say, uh, and then question.

If you, if yeah, ask me a question.

If, yeah, if you ask me a question, you got it and I don't know the answer.

So again, this, he reduced a lot.

So, and oftentimes we'll say it that way, but oftentimes we just say an or an.

So he says there an, and it links to the I and I, and then don't, we have a T at the end there, usually when we have this NT at the end of words, we'll pronounce it as an, and then don't, we have a T at the end there, usually when we have this

NT at the end of words, we'll pronounce it as an, and then don't, we have a T at the end of words, we'll pronounce that T as what's called a glottal T.

It's a sound that's cut off at the back of the, we cut the T off at the back of our throat, right?

So it's like a, uh, and so instead of saying don't, which a lot of learners

I hear say don't or can't, or isn't, we don't say that strong T in American

English, we'll say don't can't isn't right.

So he links all those, those three words together.

And I don't, and I don't, and I don't.

Again, we have a D here that's reduced to the, and that links to no.

And I don't know the answer.

And I don't know the answer.

The answer.

Exactly.

Okay.

We have here, I'm going to tell you that I don't know.

I'm going to tell you that I don't know.

Which of course he doesn't say it like that.

We have going to, most learners know that that becomes gonna, right?

So, uh, and he reduces it even more.

Oftentimes gonna will reduce to anna.

So he says, uh, instead of saying, I'm going to, he says, I'm gonna, I'm gonna.

And also like, again, there, the, the U reduces and links to tell.

So it's tell you that I, we have an American T there when we have a T in

American English between two vowel sounds.

So here between a and an I, it usually changes to a D sound.

So instead of being that I it's that I don't again with the glottal T there.

No, I'm going to tell you that.

I don't know.

I'm going to tell you that I don't know.

You got it.

Okay.

And then, uh, but I bet you what he says, which by the way, what does it mean?

If I say, I bet you, I bet you what?

Like placing a bet, like, you know, you are willing to bet your money to put your money on the table and say, Hey, I can do this.

And if I can't, you can take my money away.

Exactly.

So he says, but I bet you what, but I bet you what he says as, but I, so we have an American T there.

And then something really interesting that happens here is oftentimes when we have a T plus a Y in American English, we change it, it morphs into a sound.

Same actually happens.

If you have a D plus a Y it morphs into a just sound.

So bet you becomes bet you.

And you'll hear people say this a lot, like bet you or betcha, you know, and what, betcha, what, betcha, what?

So here he says, but I bet you what?

But I bet you what?

I know how to find the answer.

I know how to find the answer.

So here we have the two reduces to a schwa sound.

So it becomes tuh, but then because it's a T between two vowel sounds, between the uh and the ow of how it becomes howda, howda, I know how to find the answer.

So the, the other thing that happens there is he drops the D on find.

And this is probably because oftentimes when you have a D and a T following each other, you might drop one of them.

So he says, find the, uh, actually, I think here he emphasizes, so he says, find the, find the answer.

I know how to find the answer.

I know how to find the answer.

And finally, this one has hardly any connected speech because he's being very emphatic.

So when we want to be emphatic, oftentimes we'll deliberately not use connected speech.

Right?

So he says, and I, so we do have connected speech there, which we saw before, and I, but then in every other word, he says pretty, pretty emphatically.

And I will find the answer.

And I will find the answer.

Can I say something?

Um, I'm the type of person, if you ask me a question and I don't know the answer, I'm going to tell you that I don't know, but I bet you what?

I know how to find the answer and I will find the answer.

So again, I want to challenge you, dear listener, dear viewer to, you know, watch the entire scene again and try to mimic Will Smith, try to say it exactly as he did.

So we gave you kind of the, the piece by piece there.

If you're watching the video on YouTube, it'll help too.

Cause you'll, you'll be able to see there the connected speech, but doing that, I promise you, if you, if you do that a few times and you're able to get it really down, how he says it, it's going to help you so much to understand fast speaking natives, right?

That's one of the really beautiful things about being able to speak English is it allows you to open yourself up to all these different ways of, of seeing the world, all these different realities, this whole, this whole, uh, conversation about stepping outside of your comfort zone.

It really reminds me of one of my favorite movies, which is called into the wild.

So we prepared a clip from that as well.

So the scene that I chose is from, uh, he's, I believe in Arizona staying with this, this older man who is a widower, which means his, his wife died and he, he lives alone.

And so they, they kind of cultured, they cultivated, got tongue tied there.

They foster, or you could say a relationship.

You're going to live a long time, Ron.

You should make a radical change in your lifestyle.

I mean, the core of man's spirit comes from new experiences.

And there you are stubborn, old man sitting on your butt.

Sitting on my butt.

Yeah.

I'll show you sitting on my butt.

Talking to old man.

I'll show you.

Come on then.

Come on.

It is such a beautiful scene.

Yeah.

I highly recommend that if you haven't watched it yet to check it out, because it's the whole movie is just like so inspiring.

Uh, but the reason I chose this scene in particular is because I love this quote that he says, the core of man's spirit comes from new experiences, which I think is really everything that we're talking about, about stepping outside of your comfort zone, uh, and, you know, experiencing new things, meeting new people from other places and so on.

Just like he does.

He's just in the States, but he's still the States.

It's a big country is able to meet all these really different people who teach them different things.

So what does that mean by the way?

If you say that the core of something, the core of man's spirit, let's say maybe the main part of something.

Yeah.

The main part of something is the core, the fundamental thing, quality or truth, let's say.

And he calls him a stubborn old man.

I think something like that.

Right.

What does it mean if someone is stubborn?

If you are stubborn, you are stuck in your ways and it's very hard to change your mind, to change your opinion.

And, uh, that's actually, uh, it's usually using a negative way.

Yeah.

This word, because I know it shows that she's stubborn.

Because I know it shows that you are inflexible.

You are not open to all the points of view, other types of opinion.

You are stubborn.

We even have an expression we could use.

If you're wanting to be even more in fact, you can say someone is stubborn as a mule.

Mule is a, an animal, like a, I think it's crossed between a horse and a donkey.

And apparently these are very stubborn animals there.

If they don't want to move, for example, it's very difficult to get them to move, right?

They're just stubborn.

And then people who are watching on YouTube, they saw both of us were laughing when he says sitting on your butt, what does that mean?

If someone's sitting on their butt, literally your butt is right behind.

Right.

And, uh, sitting on her butt is like a lazy person that you're just sitting on her, but like not doing anything, like sitting down and maybe watching TV all day long or not doing much with your life, just sitting on her butt.

It's a fun expression.

And I really like to, uh, the way that he says this, cause he's as often happens, right when we have these words ending in I N G we'll drop the G.

So you just said sitting on and, uh, reduces again, the your, like we saw before we reduce you, we also reduce your.

So he said, sitting on your butt, sitting on your butt.

And something here too, that I thought I would quickly point out is a lot of learners, I think, because for example, in Spanish, you don't have a word that you'd use for that's different between, but, but, uh, but an ass for example.

And so I hear some learners will use the word ass, but ass is actually a curse word in English.

Right.

So, uh, yeah, as you, you can use if you're with, you know, people who you have a good relationship with and everything, but in other cases, but is a softer word we could say, right.

That reminds me of maybe a, a previous episode we did where you mentioned this, right, Ethan, uh, also those cultural insights, like, you know, for example, cursing too lightly, uh, like, you know, be careful with the word ass.

Yeah.

Don't use it so lightly.

Yeah.

And just like in, in ending the scene, uh, Ron says, I'll show you.

What does that mean?

So when somebody, um, challenges you or dares you to do something and you accept that challenge, you can say, oh yeah, you think I cannot do this.

I'll show you watch me.

So it's a great phrase to accept the challenge and do it.

And watching the scene is really nice because the, the, you know, Ron, he says, oh yeah, I'll show you.

And then he does climb up the hill.

Yeah.

It, despite difficulty, right.

It's actually, he's quite resilient in that case.

We could circle back.

There you go.

Beautiful.

The last thing I took note of is that, uh, Alexander says you're going to live a long time, but he says this really quickly.

People might've noticed this.