---戳虾子，喝啤酒，学英语；我们用努力和技术，把英语教的比别人更有趣一些。
新华社曾有一篇新闻说(according to Xinhua news agency)：武汉人一年吃(consume)1500吨小龙虾。而按武汉人最爱吃的(most favored cooking methods)油焖大虾(braised crayfish in oil)的做法，一份约有2.5斤虾，即一年要吃120万份虾。按盛虾的铁锅直径约25厘米计算，120万锅连在一起就是300公里，再除以武汉二环线总长48公里，相当于武汉人一年吃掉的虾全做成油焖大虾，可绕武汉的二环线绕6圈。相当惊人的数字(amazing figures)吧？不由让我也想起了某奶茶绕地球若干圈的洗脑广告语。
可各位吃货(foodie)，特别是准备出国的吃货们(foodies planning to study overseas)，如此博大精深的湖北特色(local features)，待你与老外坐在一起的时候，你能否绘声绘色地跟他们聊聊我们的龙虾文化(the culture of eating crayfish)？如果可以，想必一定是“狂拽酷炫吊炸天”(blow their minds)，让他们瞪大眼睛来一句：really？想想就觉得自己牛逼。
前几天跟几位已经顺利通过雅思考试，正在打点行装的学生一起去武汉的龙虾大本营雪松路“戳”了一顿虾子。席间大家聊起这个话题，你一言我一语的讨论了一番，发现其实我们的虾子跟老外们的虾子真的大有不同。我们“戳”的油焖大虾，到底是lobster, crayfish(=crawfish), prawn还是shrimp呢？
接下来我们看图说话：
Lobster
Cooked lobster
Prawn
Shrimp
Crayfish/crawfish
图看着爽吧？我来简单帮大家归纳一下：
在北美(in North America)，特别是美国(especially in the United States)， “prawn”这个词使用的频率很低(is less used by Americans)，偶尔(occasionally)会被人们用来指(refer to)一些淡水虾(freshwater shrimp)。在英国，餐馆的菜单(on the menus)中常见使用 “prawn”这个词(is commonly seen)，而在美国人们则更常用 “shrimp”这个词来指虾。看过“阿甘正传”的朋友们可能记得故事的尾声主人公Forest Gump是靠着shrimp而成为了富翁(accumulate wealth/become rich)。而除了美国之外的其余英语国家（特别是英联邦国家(commonwealth countries)比如澳洲，加拿大和印度等），虾一般都会被叫做 “prawn”。
“lobster”这个词则用来指海里的体型较大(large-sized)的龙虾，比较出名的有“澳洲龙虾”和“波士顿大龙虾”，而在澳大利亚南澳州有一个专门的“龙虾镇”叫做Kingston.镇子里有一个体型巨大的龙虾雕塑(a statue)，也算是当地的一个知名景点(a noted tourist attraction)。
Kingston in SA
而我们现在吃的“油焖大虾(braised crayfish in oil)”其实正确的叫法应该是“crayfish”或者是“crawfish”，翻译成中文则是“淡水鳌虾”。
“我们用努力和技术，把英语教的比别人更有趣一些”。如果想要英语有趣，我们认为很重要的一点就是“相关性”，即你的生活与英语这门语言的距离将会决定你对这门语言的感觉。那么这些龙虾与我们的有何关系？请耐心看下去：
当季雅思口语高频话题：Describe a kind of foreign food you have had
You shou say: when you had it/where you ate it/what it was/and how you felt about it?
讲故事的能力是语言能力的重要组成部分之一，各位参加雅思考试的孩子们，你们也不可能人生经历丰富到50+个口语话题全都是有真实经历的，那么怎么根据自己所学的内容，脑洞大开组织不同的内容为我所用的能力就变得尤为重要了。这里做一个小小的展示，如何把上面的关于龙虾的内容变成一个雅思口语part 2的内容吧！
Well, speaking of a kind of food from other countries, definitely I would say lobster. Last year, I went to Australia with my family during my summer holiday, and unlike most overseas travellers who always choose big cities like Sydney or Melbourne, we went to a less chosen destination, South Australia, where I tried cooked lobster for the first time.
To be more specific, it was in this small town where I tries this famous local dish with my parents. Back in my hometown, we also have a popular dish called braised crayfish in oil, but the procedure of cooking as well as the raw material are quite different. In China, we don't have this giant lobster available on most ocassions, but instead we have its alternative, crayfish, which is a kind of freshwater medium-sized shrimp.
Compared with rather complicated steps we take to cook crayfish, in Australia local people cook the lobster in a quite simple way. Basically, what they do is to place the lobster in a steamer and steam it for about 10 minutes, and serve it with several pieces of lemon and some seafood sauce. Well, I guess this method can keep the original taste of lobster to a large extent, but you know for Chinese people, maybe this is a waste of such a rare ingredient.
怎么样，各位看官？扒完了各种龙虾的前世今生，也给大家展示了这些素材如何使用。接下来，我们来说说我们北学英语的“龙虾大挑战”任务。
各位， 如果你既想学到英语和文化，又能最后拿到我们为大家准备的武汉雪松路上某知名龙虾品牌的龙虾券，那就来接受我们的任务吧！
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