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Hi, welcome to www.engvid.com , I'm Adam. In today's video, we're going to talk about
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water, H2O, okay? Why are we going to talk about water? Well, honestly, water is life.
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It is the most valuable resource we have, more valuable than oil or gold or anything
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like that, because this is what keeps us alive. It covers 71% of the earth's surface, and
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it makes up 60% of our bodies on average. So, it's very important that people start
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thinking about water, start having conversations about water, and start talking water seriously,
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because if we don't, we're all going to be in very big trouble. So, having said that,
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let's think of some vocabulary about water. We're going to look at types. We're going
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to look at water that you actually drink, and then we're going to look at some words
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that we need to know in terms of managing our water and our water sources.
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So, if we're talking about types of water. We have saltwater, which is the most common
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water in the world; all the seas and oceans. Notice that saltwater is one word, when we
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talk about saltwater. But when we talk about fresh water, it's two words, okay? So, I don't
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know why that is, but saltwater - one word, fresh water - two words. Fresh water, lakes
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and rivers. You can just go ahead and drink it straight if it's clean enough. Okay. And
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then we have well water. Well water is - a well is a hole in the ground that people dig.
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And if you dig deep enough, you'll reach water and then you can pull that water up and - well,
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maybe not drink it right away, but you can work with it and do stuff with it.
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We have spring water, so these are natural springs. It's basically like a naturally made
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well. The water kind of gushes up and comes out on the surface and we can drink it. Mineral
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water is basically tap water, regular water that we add minerals to, to make it a little
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bit more potable, a little bit more healthy to drink. Minerals, for example, iron, calcium,
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zinc, etc. Ozonated water, like, this is not as common, but some people like to drink ozonated
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water. Which means they just add extra molecules, I think, of oxygen. Oh, by the way, H2O, hydrogen,
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oxygen molecules that make up water. Now, potable water. This is a very important word
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to know, potable, because potable basically means drinkable. Potable water, you can drink.
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Unpotable means you can't drink it. You can use it to, for example, wash things or to
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do whatever you need to do with water except drink it. So, sometimes, you'll go to places
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that have a potable water alert. It means don't drink it, drink only bottled water,
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okay? So, it's very important to know this word. And then, of course, there's glacier
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water, which is probably the cleanest and tastiest water you can have. A glacier is
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a huge iceberg the size of cities, right? And they're up in the north and sometimes
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they flow south.
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Now, keep in mind that the salt in salt water, in the seas and oceans, is actually called
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brine, okay? Brine basically means salt, but it's saturated salt, so you have to take it
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out, let it dry out, process it into salt.
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Now, when you go to a restaurant or even at home, there are different types of water you
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can drink. Still water, this is regular flat water. No bubbles. If you want bubbles, there
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are three ways to say it. And if you go to a restaurant, they will ask you, "Would you
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like some water?", and you say "Yes, please". And they'll say "Okay, would you like still
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or carbonated?", or still or sparkling. So basically, carbonated means there's carbon
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in it and it makes bubbles. And sparking basically means the bubbles, but sparking is a little
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bit fancier so they can charge you more money, okay?
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Now, soda. If you go to the US, soda basically means like pop, like Coke or orange soda or
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whatever. In Canada and other places, soda means soda water. It just basically means
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carbonated water. Clear, no taste, but bubbles. Okay? Filtered water, you can put water through
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a filter, usually like a charcoal filter. And it takes out the little particles and
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makes it a little bit more clean so you can drink it. Tap water, this is what you have
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at home. You turn on the tap, water comes out the pipe, you drink it, it's fine. Depends
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where you live. In Canada, you can drink tap water pretty much anywhere. And, of course,
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you can put an ice cube. This is frozen water. You - little cube, different shapes, but we
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call them all ice cubes.
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So, we know the types. We know what we can drink. More importantly, let's look at how
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we can manage our water resources.
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Okay, so now we're going to talk about some words that you're going to start hearing more
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and more about, because this is part of the climate change, part of the changing world
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we live in. And these are the things we're going to be discussing in the next little
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while. So, we're going to talk about - let's start with body of water. So, any - basically
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anything that is full of water. Like a sea, a lake, an ocean, a river, a pond. Anything
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that has a substantial amount of water we call a body of water, right? So, that's one
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thing we need to keep in mind.
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In the ground, we have to think about aquifer. This is a q, "a kwi fer". An aquifer is the
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level underground where there's rock, but the rock is soft enough that water can basically
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pass though it, okay? This is what keeps the water in place, and eventually it'll come
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up or we can go down and dig it up. Similarly, the water table is the ground - underneath
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the ground, the level at which the water is saturated. It means there's enough water that
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it just sort of sits there under the surface and we can dig down and create a well and
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get water for drinking people. Now again, depends where you're living in the world.
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Some of this stuff is very important because if your aquifers dry up, or if the water tables
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get lower and lower, it becomes even more and more difficult to find potable water,
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water that you can drink, right? And this is becoming more and more of an issue in more
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parts of the world, okay?
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Now, in Canada, for example, we have something called a reservoir. I mean, it's in lots of
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places in the world, but a reservoir is basically like a big tank where we store water to use
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for our taps. And basically, it just collects rainwater, okay? So, it rains, there's a big
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- basically a big - I guess it's manmade lake, you could call it. It's small, obviously,
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but it's concrete, and it stores all the water. The water goes from there into a treatment
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facility, where it gets cleaned and chemicals are put in to make sure that it's clean. And
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then it gets pumped out through all the pipes all over the city, etc.
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Now, the place where the water treatment is and all the pipes and all the pumps, etc.
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This is called the waterworks. This is the system of transferring the water to the different
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places. So, these have to be kept up in good shape.
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Now, these days, you're hearing a lot about droughts and floods. A drought is a situation
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where, for a very long time, there is no rain. It means that everything becomes dry. Vegetables
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dry up, animals don't have anything to eat. Everything becomes very dangerous, and food
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prices go up, and this is a big problem. This also generally leads to famine. So, if a region
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is suffering from a drought for a long time, and eventually all the vegetables die and
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all the grass and all the plants die, then all the animals die. Eventually, humans start
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to die off, because they have nothing to eat and nothing to drink, of course.
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The opposite is a flood, where it just rains and rains and rains and rains and there's
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so much water and the ground can't soak it up, so all the water comes and sits on the
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surface. Sometimes it covers entire cities.
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Then we have to think about desalination, and desalination plants. So, we spoke about
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salt water, like in the sea and the ocean. So, we called it - I called it before, "brine",
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but another word for the salt is saline, okay? What we're - what desalination means, to take
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the saline, to take the salt out of the salt water and make the water potable, okay? So,
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desalination plants do this. They take water in from the ocean or from the sea, depending
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where they're located. They take the salt out, they treat them, they send them out into
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the pipes to make - let the people in the cities and countries drink. These are becoming
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more and more common as more and more countries need to start taking water from the large
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bodies of water around them, okay? Again, in Canada, we have lots of lakes, lots of
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fresh water lakes, and we have lots of reservoirs to collect the rain. It's not really much
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of an issue. We don't really use desalination planets. But if you're thinking about somewhere
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in the Middle East, for example, where it's mostly desert and very dry, more and more
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desalination plants are being built to help the people be able to drink.
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Now, all of this is very serious. We have to take this issue very seriously and make
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sure that we protect our water resource and start sharing water around the world as much
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as we can. But I know that it's a little bit too serious. I also brought you a little bit
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of a fun aspect to water, okay? I got you a couple of idioms, actually three idioms
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here. A fish out of water, okay. Just because we're talking about water. So, a fish is - its
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natural habitat is in the water. So, if you wake it out, what does it do? It just, you
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know, it flops around. It's very confused, it doesn't know what's going on. It's not
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in its natural habitat. So, we could say this about any person who is not in their normal
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or comfortable place, okay? So, if you get a new job, but you're not really qualified
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for it, people will very clearly see it and they'll know that you're a fish out of water.
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You don't belong here, you're not comfortable, you don't know what's going on. It's confusing
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for you.
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And water under the bridge. So, if you're standing on a bridge. Let's say there's a
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river and there's a bridge over it and you're standing on it, the water passes and goes.
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So, when you say "water under the bridge" it means let it go. We had a - me and my friend
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had a fight and then we stayed away from each other for a few days. We didn't speak. And
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then we got back together and we said, "You know what? Water under the bridge. Let's move
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on, let's get back to being friends." So, just let it pass, let it go away.
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Now, sometimes you'll hear about the - somebody's waterworks are coming on, right? So, turn
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on the waterworks. Waterworks means tears. So, if someone's waterworks are turned on,
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it means they start crying, okay? So, kind of fun idioms to know about water.
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So, that's basically it. If you have any questions about this, please go to www.engvid.com and
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ask in the comment section. There's also a quiz you can test your knowledge of the vocabulary
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here that we're using to talk about water. Don't forget to subscribe to my YouTube channel
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if you like this video. And come back and we'll have some more good vocabulary lessons
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for you, so we can have the discussion going and make our earth a better place to live,
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okay? Until then, have a lovely day. See you.