In Episode #15, Tim shifts his attention from the details of English and English teaching to four true, sad and bizarre stories from his life and travels, as well as a bit of Indo-European etymology. After all, Tim does get around the world and so it is morally imperative that he turn base metal to gold by sharing his horrible experiences for the jollification of others.
Congrats for creating a new genre! As a linguist and a big fan of a good story, I enjoyed it a lot. I liked the subplots and the imagery, some things really stuck in my mind. I missed some dramatic turn in the last story though: you were building some sort of a climax and in the end it fell short (for the better I guess, if we speak about real life). And it’s a good idea to highlight certain lexical items, was useful. Первый блин не комом!
PS Elizaveta- I replied to your comment on Episode #13!
Yes, indeed, I did have the feeling at the end of the last story that I had built up to something and then disappointed, but that that was definitely for the best! Situations like these give me an occasional glimpse of what it’s like to be a woman traveling alone.
Oh, yes! I still wonder, how I wasn’t beaten, raped or killed in my twenties, when I stupidly or naively trusted complete strangers in certain situations. Once I stopped a car after a concert at night and asked for a lift, it was a sports car and the guy was completely stoned, which I didn’t notice at first. He was driving about 200 km/h and in 15 minutes I was near my house with a first grey hair.
I had similar situations: a guy who picked me up while I was hitchhiking in France untowardly requested a specific favor from me. After refusing and getting out of the car, I found a smooth, potato-sized rock and carried it in my pocket for the rest of the trip. I’ll admit that having a small library of savage moves at the ready in my mind detracted from my enjoyment of the rest of the trip!
More horror stories in the comments! Do you think you could make use of that stone if things went dangerously south? I would simply freeze and wouldn’t be able even to scream, though this is when your special squeak could come really handy. I still can’t get it how you produce it and I really tried)
I do think I could use the stone if I realized things were going badly early enough. In this type of situation, being caught unaware but armed is probably worse than the reverse.
As for the bird screech- you need to breathe IN! Exhale everything you have, then breathe in loudly like you’re panicking, then try doing the same with your throat nearly closed. Warning: you will choke a bit when you first try. You will need to practice with closing your throat to various degrees, but the more closed the better.