hey Michelle what's going on with you how's everything in New York hey Lindsay everything
is good over here actually last weekend I I my family and I went to this um Place Alice's
Teacup um I don't know if you had ever heard of it when you when you lived there but it's like pretty
famous and it's just this cute little tea shop at and they serve you know tea time basically like
a whole thing tea time and I hadn't been since I was you well since I first moved to New York
and I'd always dreamt of going back there one day and so we got to go so that was cool oh fun yeah
I I know when you go to London you can do that too you can go and order like have high tea um or even
we did that in London you did do that in London okay I didn't hear that story or even when I was
in Egypt they offered that but it's a little bit not quite as like I don't know I do it in London
right London or New York I guess more so London we did a Charlie and the Chocolate Factory themed
one so that the kids yeah that was fun yeah good right what are we get into today Michelle well
we are not talking about tea but we are talking about let's see I have a question do you do you
like when a celebrity's child is famous like do you feel like they always deserve it or do
you feel like sometimes it's undeserved I think it depends on if they've built a career or done
something themselves right so the kids so it shouldn't just be famous because your parent
is famous I think right yeah is that what you're asking so if the child basically yeah yeah yeah
they have to do I I'm yeah like I I don't know well I mean some people they you know they kind
of get lucky they I mean their parents are able to get them into things and you think oh if they
had this you know if they had a different parent would they have still had the same success you
know the Legacy the Legacy issue right it's all over the news right now not just in this well in
the celebrity world is another way of interpreting it but also in academic institutions universities
yep exactly exactly so I don't know I think there are some people who have famous parents who are
actually really talented um and maybe some who aren't as so but this kind of leads us into a
great listener question from Molly uh would you read the question for us all right from
our listener Molly Molly says deers I love that that's I have a quick question what does ride on
someone's coattails mean I grasped that it's having success due to someone else associated
with you but does it exclude one's own efforts and can mean to follow in their footsteps best regards
Molly what a good question Michelle oh yeah I love this one um this is good and I like how she
threw another expression in there too that we can talk about so thank you Molly for that question
um so yeah Molly you're right we're gonna but and we're gonna talk more about why you're right and
go into this in just a second but guys we want to remind you wherever you are listening to the
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stuff exactly yes okay so to ride someone's coattails um so Lindsay what is the dictionary
defined this as okay so let's go straight to the dictionary first that's our starting point and
then we will expand on this so the dictionary says The Free Dictionary says to benefit from someone
else's success to use someone else's success as a means to achieve one's own very interesting yeah
for sure um and guys uh we also want to remind you that we had a great episode yesterday that you
should check out if you haven't heard yet uh it's 2058 5 years down the road future plans in English
so listen to that one don't miss a day yes I love it I love it so Michelle is this a does this word
this term in itself is it positive or negative what's the connotation behind it yeah yeah good
question I think I think it's mostly negative because it's it I mean well we're thinking of
physically like I mean well let's talk about the expression first to ride on someone's coattail
so coattails right it's like someone's wearing something and they're like dragging you and so
it's you can get that image in your head right you are you are like holding on as they move forward
and then you can move forward too right yeah like what are coattails anyways is that like
would that be if I were wearing like a long robe type thing it would be the back of my robe what
is it what is coattails I don't even know or is it just I'm looking I'm looking I mean I well I
imagine it one of those long coats yeah yeah yeah king or a queen uh no no no no no more like more
I mean maybe tuxedo long tuxedo okay that think of like or or just like a nice coat and then yeah
it's okay so so the idea is this person is wearing a very nice coat because they're successful right
MH probably a long talk or something if it's a man or a really nice dress if it's a woman and
then someone is as you said grabbing on and sort of riding the back of the I love that image it's
very yeah I yeah that's why I like this idiom so much is because you do got that image in
your head I can't help but think of a picture in my mind when I hear it um and guys that's a
really helpful way to learn as well to have an image in your head to idiom maybe we can do an
episode on that once like I think we should yeah yeah um using that as a way to help remember what
things mean so anyway I think it's I think it's a mostly negative connotation because you're not
getting there yourself you're using someone else yeah this kind of comes back to the weird uh the
weird I guess it's a juxtaposition in American culture where you know rugged individualism do
it yourself tie your shoes all by yourself we've talked about this like The Narrative we say the
kids and everything but in the end I think that we all use someone's help like everyone in the world
has name dropped right once someone they know or someone there's some people that do it more
than others right or you know um associating in some small way so some people do this more than
others but I think we don't do anything all by ourselves it's just a matter of how do we
go about it do we go about it in a classy way you know an explicit way trying to ask for help or do
we try to kind of sneakily associate ourselves somehow with that right yeah yeah right no I
think that's true I've recently heard something on TV about that and people were saying you know
it's not necessarily wrong the wrong thing to do because we should help each other we should
but I think it's I think one of the problems is when somebody doesn't get an opportunity
because someone else does um because of their connections and that's where and that's where
it's not fair like um so but I think helping each other there's nothing wrong with that so there's
a little bit of a difference but Molly asked oh sorry go ahead Lindsay no I was gonna say well
said I completely understand that's a systemic issue right Michelle and something that we need
to look at in our system in the coming years that we have to fix and that's why there was just the
decision on affirmative action which is very you know there's a lot of mixed opinions about
it but it is going to become more challenging um to get a leg up and now I think that there
needs to be some action taken on Legacy uh priori in the same way that that action was taken with
affirmative action so we will come back to this guys yes that's a bigger much bigger discussion
for sure interesting topic yes um so but Molly asked if this excludes one one's effort so I'm
not sure I understood this part of the question but basically um I think that someone can be
respected if they ride someone's coattails if they prove their value so that's what we were saying
yeah interesting okay I like that do we have any examples Michelle that we want to share then yes
exactly let's do it so here we go she rode on her sister's coattails to get the job but once
she showed she wasn't a hard worker they let her go ah sometimes that happens right sometimes you
know having an association with someone can get you the job but it won't keep you the job right
yes right yes that's true um and what's another example uh the team wrote on their predecessors
coiles to get sponsorship but they didn't actually win any games okay that's okay that's no good oh
wow well so speaking of sponsorships actually guys we want to remind you that all ears English
is sponsored by Rosetta Stone yes exactly Michelle and I think one of the big Keys when it comes to
learning a language Michelle is repetition so the science of training our brain so recently
when I opened up the Rosetta Stone app to work on my Portuguese I told you Michelle I'm going
to Portugal and right I saw that I had an activity waiting for me it was a read listen speak activity
ah that sounds interesting so how did that work well so there was a photo and a scenario and you
would read the text and then you'd listen to a native speaker saying it right the words were
highlighted Rosetta Stone app it actually does go ahead and highlight those words as they're spoken
and then you'd actually speak that same text passage yourself oh that's great yeah guys we
like this because you're repeating it three times right and this is exactly what the brain needs
when learning a language so guys that is the key and then also when it comes to pronouncing words
Rosetta Stone has the true accent technology yeah so the app compares the Soundwave of your voice to
the Soundwave of native speakers voices right so it analyzes how closely your speech matches the
examples I love it guys it works wow that is so cool and especially if you want to impress your
family on your next trip guys you know Rec recently I went to Paris with my family and
if only I had this on my trip to Paris when every morning we would go there was this adorable Bodega
right below our arbnb and every morning we would go and I wanted to speak in French I wanted to
show my son how I knew French and I could only remember just very small Expressions I I could
understand but I couldn't speak I couldn't connect I it always just led to a conversation in English
honestly oh my gosh Michelle I know that moment it's that moment where you really want to connect
and in your case your son was there watching you so you had other reasons you wanted to expose him
to looking at Mom and saying oh my gosh mom can speak another language that's incredible what
kind of impact could that have had on a a young child that's that could have been amazing and it's
so frustrating right but but Michelle next time hopefully you will go ahead and use Rosetta Stone
and you'll be ready right I will I sure will yes I'm excited to get back into my French so guys I
mean for you now is the time it's September it's back to school back to work it's your window of
opportunity to pick up new habits that lead to success yeah so guys listen up we have arranged
a very special deal just for the allers English audience so for a limited time listeners can
get Rosetta Stone's lifetime membership for 40% off and we love lifetime memberships because we
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the Special allers English coupon code which is AE yeah guys I'm going to spell that out so you can
go ahead right now and just type it in as you're listening so go to r o s e t t a s p o ne.com
good stuff all right Michelle so shall we let's go into some more examples or some words and
phrases that kind of associate right with this concept of one coattails yeah well yeah and I
just wanted to touch on following in someone's footsteps because Molly asked about that too I
mean I think to follow in someone's footsteps is generally different and I think this one
doesn't have a negative connotation um what do you think yeah I totally agree with that yeah to
fall in one's footstep is steps is a little more like oh my dad was an optometrist I I thinking I
might want to do that because I kind of want to follow my dad and be like my dad kind of right
exactly that's a that's so that's a different kind of thing um so but let's give a couple
other expressions like just go along with this theme so what's the first one all right so to
prove oneself right so you might have to do this even if you did ride on someone's coattails to
get in the door you know to get a foot in the door as we say her father got her the job but
she still needs to prove herself and that's for sure yes yes yes exactly and then this is a big
word uh coming up so this is nepotism that's the first word I thought of um yeah that's the first
word I thought of when I read this listener question actually um um so Lindy what do you
think about this one what is nepotism I love this wor so it's the idea that especially I think of
this in the political realm a lot of times but I don't think it's just for politics you see I mean
we we've seen it in different presidencies where people's family members end up in the cabinet or
end up having important offices um and I think especially in our country it's frowned upon
because people should be elected or should even in one's cabinet I think you know it's important that
we feel there's some transparency so for example nepotism is frowned upon in the company and that's
in the corporate world too right for sure so yeah nepotism I think is generally a pretty big problem
in many different areas of society um and then the last one is to have friends in high places so this
one is just to in high places just like people who are you know at a certain level of authority
who have some poll they can get you jobs they can you know uh they can get you certain perks um so
she has friends in high places so it's easy for her to get job offers yeah and I've even heard
kind of plays on this expression friends in high places there's a country music song and I think
it has a line like Friends in Low Places I have yeah so we you know these are icons in society
when it comes to talking about I guess succession and and you know following in someone's coot um
you know following in someone's footsteps and kind of use like letting someone else help you
get a leg up right these are phrases that we use in our culture super common guys good stuff yeah
sure so should we do a role play yes let's do it Michelle to finish off today's episode here
we go so Michelle you and I we are co-workers we're gossiping about our other teammate uh oh
uh oh all right here we go so did you know her dad is the dean wait really I wish I could get
a job using nepotism yeah but she will still have to prove herself this isn't an easy job true maybe
she's talented and not just writing on her dad's coattails yeah it helps to have friends in high
places for sure ooh controversial and that can also be demotivating for employees in a company
if they see okay yeah the boss's daughter has a job automatically right that kind of thing uh not
not always good for the morale of the company so what did we do here Michelle what did we use yeah
so well uh you told me her dad is the dean and I said I wish I could get a job using nepotism so
like my family ties getting getting perks because of my family yeah you got it so so and then I said
yeah but she'll still have to prove herself so she'll have to work hard to show that she actually
deserves the job right and that's that difference that Lindsay and I were talking about um where is
it okay or not okay um and then I said well maybe she is talented and not just writing on her dad's
coattails like using her dad's success yeah and then I said yeah it helps to have friends in high
places yeah yeah and then Michelle we could go into this topic another day this topic needs to
be fleshed out more on the societ side we don't have time for it today because we just did the
vocabulary but there's a lot to be said oh lot yes a whole lot a whole lot so but guys I mean
this was a great question thank you again Molly for this um I mean I think the takeaway is that
like what we were talking about Lindsay it's okay to get help like we we succeed but I mean
especially we always talk about making connections trying to make friends you know that's that's part
of the natural way things go I mean otherwise we wouldn't do things like networking and trying to
form those relationships we they H they have to be done and also if your family member helps you
or somebody does help you get an in as you can call it it's um you know as long as you can prove
yourself I don't think that yeah I think it's it's a fine line because you may have not gotten in the
door at all unless you had that in but I don't know I think I don't know it's just happens it's
a reality of things unfortunately it's a reality and so I'm really curious what our listeners are
going to say you know maybe we'll talk about this in a fluency party for our students one day who
knows we'll see we'll see but you know it's it's interesting to reflect on in your culture how is
nepotism looked upon you know is it expected and accepted that someone in in any position
of power in a company or even in politics would pull you up and put you in a position that would
would that be questioned or challenged how and to what extent that can also be really cult so I'm
super excited to hear from our listeners on this one Michelle me too me too all right well this
was fun and Lindsay I will see you on the next episode everyone thank you for listening all right
and guys don't forget to go over and get that special deal just for you guys at Rosetta Stone
go to rosettastone.com all right Michelle you take care I'll talk to you soon bye Lindsay [Music] bye