Daily Training for December 23rd: El Gordo: You Have To Play To Win

Spain's El Gordo, world's biggest lottery, was the subject of a report on NPR and is today's Daily Training.

El Gordo: You Have To Play To Win
by Jerome Socolovsky

This story provides us with three examples of how we express age in English, let's take a look at these very common expressions which can be adjusted difference ages:

in their early 30s

• people in the first few years of their 30s or aged 30, 31 32 and 33. 
• can be modified to: in their 30s, in their early 30s, in their mid-30s, in their late 20s
• can be used beginning with teens and go up as old as one wants

30 something

• adjective to describe someone between 30 and 39 years old
• can be used beginning with 20 and go as old as one wants, a 20 something man, a 50 something woman, etc.

35 year-old

• adjective used to describe someone's exact age
• can be used for any age, a 1 month-old girl, a 2 year-old boy, a 14 year-old actress, a 35 year-old politician etc.
• careful with the s at the end of year! Jane is 35 years old. Jane is a 35 year-old doctor.

Now let's take a look at the rest of the words:

• mired (entangled in, involved in)
• on welfare (receiving payments from the government for being unemployed)
• faith (belief in a person or plan)
• get one's hopes up (become optimistic)
• jinxed (have bad luck)

Now, listen to the story on NPR.

Tell me: is it true that El Gordo is Spain's version of the American Dream and one of three ways to climb the social ladder?

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