Welcome to a very important lesson in British English and British culture. Because
there is nothing more British than talking about the weather. We love it! So today I'm
going to teach you ten very British weather words.
Before we look at our ten words I want to explain exactly why we Brits are so obsessed
with the weather. They say we have all four seasons in one day and it's so so true.
I guess British weather it's just so changeable. You never know what's coming next and that
keeps you guessing and it makes it interesting. Because you don't know what's coming next
it's something to talk about. One minute it's really sunny and the next minute it's a flood
and you don't know what's coming next. It's kind of exciting. But why is it so changeable?
Well there's a reason for that. Obviously because Britain is an island, it makes our
weather system quite unique. We have five main air masses that bring weather. Now they
can either be polar or tropical. Obviously the polar air masses bring cold weather and
the tropical air masses bring in warm weather. These air masses come in from two different
directions. One of the is maritime which is coming from the sea so mainly the Atlantic
ocean and the other one is continental so that's coming from the land. So that could
be central Europe or north Africa. So that again effects what weather we get. When you
add to that the jet stream which is a fast-moving air current you have quite a crazy combination.
No wonder we have crazy weather. So yeah, that's a little background into why the weather
in Britain is so unique and why we are so obsessed with it because it's just so interesting.
You can never guess what's coming next. Alright let's get into our ten very British weather
words. Number one, I don't think there's a word that describes British weather better
than overcast. This is an adjective that describes when the sky is just covered in cloud. You
cannot see blue sky because there is only cloud. This always reminds me, whenever I
fly back into London. I have been probably on holiday or someone sunny and I'll fly back
in and you go through this layer of cloud and you descend through it and you just think
'I'm not going to see the sun again for weeks or months.' And it's overcast, nothing but
cloud. Overcast! Yeah, so British. An example sentence 'This afternoon it's going to be
overcast.' Alright let's look at number two. This is another very British weather word
and it's the first of many words to do with rain. I mean we are talking about British
weather here, of course we are going to talk about rain. This word is fantastic 'drizzle'
oh that's a fun one to say 'drizzle'. So drizzle is light rain, not heavy rain, it's very light
rain. It can also be a verb so 'Bring your coat it's drizzling outside.' It's raining
lightly, a little bit. This is a word we use all the time when talking about rain, you'd
describe it as being drizzle or drizzling. We'll come back to rain later on but I wanted
to get on to a bit of British slang. When we are talking about cold weather some people
use a very fun slang term 'brass monkeys'. So if it's really cold you could say 'It's
brass monkeys in here'. It means it's very cold. It's brass monkeys. Now that is of course
a slang word, so very informal. Don't use that in your IELTS exam or your business presentation
but yeah great word to know. Another word we use to talk about cold weather is nippy.
This is very informal British English slang and it means chilly or cold. So maybe as you
are walking to work you go 'It's a bit nippy today, isn't it?' It's a bit nippy, it's a
bit cold. We have a lot of slang words for cold. Maybe I should do a whole separate vlog
for that. So brass monkeys very cold, nippy cold or chilly. And we are back straight away
with rain words. This is a nice one, a shower. It just means a short period of light rain.
So for example 'This afternoon there will be some light showers.' And that means there
will be some short period of light rain. Now that is contrasted with a downpour. This is
a sudden burst of heavy rain. So if you get caught in a downpour, you are going to get
very very wet. 'I got caught in a downpour and my shoes are soaking wet.' So they are
very similar ideas, a period of rain. A shower is short and light rain and a downpour is
sudden and very heavy rain. Alright let's take the word rain itself. Now it can collocate
with so so many words. The one that I quite like is torrential rain. Torrential rain is
very heavy rain. It's something that we get a fair bit in Britain, torrential rain. Now
other words that we use to describe heavy rain or torrential rain. We could say 'it's
pouring down' so 'it's pouring down outside'. You could say 'it's chucking it down'. 'It's
bucketing it down.' Slightly ruder, 'it's p*ssing it down.' That one is a little bit
rude, be careful with who you use that with. I use it 'Oh it's p*ssing it down outside.'
But it is very very informal. Or you might just say 'It's properly raining.' 'Have you
seen outside? It's properly raining!' It means it's raining heavily. So some great phrases
for you to describe heavy rain. Let's go back to clouds because in Britain it's always cloudy.
Now sometimes in the summer the sun will come out, you will see the sun and then you'll
see the clouds. And the clouds will move across and obscure the sun, so you can't see the
sun anymore. The verb that we use for this, it's a phrasal verb. To cloud over. It's a
very sad moment when it clouds over. An example sentence 'It was really sunny this morning
but it's clouded over now.'As you can see there with all phrasal verbs I'm changing
the tense on the verb so clouded n the past tense but over stays the same, it never changes.
Now it's not always cold wet weather in Britain. Sometimes we do have hot weather and something
that I remember from my childhood is always looking at newspapers and the headline of
a newspaper would always say 'Heatwave coming' or 'We are in for a heatwave'. A heatwave
is a period of very hot weather or unusually hot weather. Now sometimes in Britain we do
get heatwaves where it's maybe three or four days or a week maybe of really really really
extra hot weather. Everyone is super happy when there is a heatwave for maybe the first
afternoon and then we start complaining and grumbling about how hot it is, yeah. So an
example sentence 'There is supposed to be a heatwave next week.' Recently in Britain
we've had some really strange weather. We are in spring now and yet we had lots of snow
over the weekend. Now when there is lots of snow and it stops you from going out maybe
to go to school or to go to work, the roads are covered in snow, transporting stops working,
that kind of thing. When that happens we have a phrase 'to be snowed in'. And that was always
quite a magical thing. I remember as a kid. Those days when you had really heavy snow,
so that you couldn't go to school and so you stayed at home and you played games and you
watched TV and you stayed nice and warm. You were snowed in. So we used to love it. I think
this is probably quite a British thing because most countries can deal with snow whereas
we are not very prepared so when it snows heavily no one goes anywhere. Everyone has
to stay at home.'They forecasted a blizzard tonight so maybe we'll be snowed in.' The
final phrase actually comes from American English but it is used in British English,
an Indian summer. Now I wanted to teach you this because I think it's really interesting.
So an Indian summer is a period of unusually warm weather at the end of summer or just
after summer. So usually in Autumn. So in Britain it would be in September or October.
If the weather is unusually warm, it's an Indian summer. As I said this phrase comes
from American English and dates back to the 1800s I don't know exactly the etymology but
it comes from America and it's used here in Britain as well. So an example sentence 'It
looks like we're going to have an Indian summer this year.' Eat Sleep Dreamers what I'd like
you to do right now is in the comments below this video, I want you to write a little weather
report about the weather in your city or town right now. Have a look out the window, tell
me what you can see and see if you can use the vocabulary that we have looked at today.
Just one or two lines, it doesn't have to be too long but a little weather report telling
me what it's like where you are right now. So 'Tom it's a bit nippy here today' and then
say where you are from. That would be fantastic, I'd love to know what the weather is like
around the world today. Also if you know any other words that you think of when you think
about British weather. Let me know in the comments below. I know that these words aren't
just British English words but they are words that we use to describe British weather. That's
why I chose them. Of course guys if you've enjoyed this lesson please give it a big thumbs
up and share it with anyone you know that is learning English. Go follow me on Instagram
and Facebook guys. Every day I'm putting new English language learning posts up there so
that you can take your English to the next level. Remember I've got new videos every
Tuesday and every Friday. I've enjoyed this one guys, I felt like it's a really important
one. If you want to get to know more about British culture and British English then the
weather is such an important topic. Thank you so much for hanging out with me guys.
This is Tom, the chief dreamer, saying goodbye.