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The Lost City

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Published: 4.10.2017
Level 5   |   Time: 5:19
Accent: Canadian, American

TOEFL: Author Douglas Preston describes the discovery of an ancient lost city in Honduras - the Lost City of the Monkey God.

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You can download the file [ HERE ].

    

triangle Directions 목표 Direcciones Instruções


  1. READ the VOCABULARY

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  2. WATCH the VIDEO

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  3. ANSWER the QUESTIONS

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  4. WATCH and READ the SCRIPT

    Watch the video again while you read the script. Reading and listening at the same time will help you hear each individual word and improve your listening accuracy.

  5. DO the ACTIVITIES

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  1. LEA el VOCABULARIO

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  2. VER el VIDEO

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  3. RESPONDE a las PREGUNTAS

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  4. MIRAR Y LEER

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  5. HACER LAS ACTIVIDADES

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  1. 어휘 읽기

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  5. 액티비티 하기

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  1. LER o VOCABULÁRIO

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  2. ASSISTA ao VÍDEO

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  3. RESPONDA às PERGUNTAS

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  4. ASSISTA e LEIA o SCRIPT

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triangle Vocabulary 어휘 Vocabulário Vocabulario


  • ☐ ☐ ☐ fascinated [adj] - interested
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ ancient tombs [n] - old graves/burial sites
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ shipwrecks [n] - remains of a crashed boat/ship
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ impenetrable [adj] - unable to enter
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ curse [n] - bad luck
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ ancestors [n] - family from previous generations
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ fall ill [exp] - become sick
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ dissuade [v] - discourage / pursuade not to do
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ penetrate [v] - enter
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ state-of-the-art [adj] - modern technology
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ jungle canopy [n] - top of the jungle
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ LIDAR [n] - similar to RADAR but using light to measure/map areas
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ sprawling [adj] - wide / large
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ metropolis [n] - big city
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ harrowing [adj] - dangerous / upsetting
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ Cortez [p] - a famous Spanish conquistador from the 1500s
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ chronicle [v] - tell a story
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ anchored [adj] - a boat stationary in a harbor
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ launch [v] - start
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ swamps [n] - marshes / wetlands
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ expedition [n] - trip / journey
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ conceive [v] - think of / imagine
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ raised a million dollars [exp] - collect a million dollars
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ take place [phv] - happen
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ skeptical [adj] - don't believe something
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ bungalow [n] - a small house on the beach
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ Christopher Lloyd [p] - a famous (crazy-looking) American actor
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ earthworks [n] - walls made of dirt and stone
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ plazas [n] - town squares / marketplaces
  • ☐ ☐ ☐ mysterious [adj] - secret / unknown

[n] - noun,  [v] - verb, [phv] - phrasal verb,  [adj] - adjective,  [exp] - expression



triangle TOEFL Questions TOEFL 문제 Perguntas do TOEFL Preguntas de TOEFL


  1. What is the conversation mainly about?
    new archaeology technologies
    ancient myths about Honduras
    the discovery of a new archeological site

  2. According to the narrator, why was the White City hard to find?
    It was very difficult to get to the city.
    The city had a curse.
    No one had ever heard of it.

  3. What is the curse of the White City?
    Anyone who enters the city will die.
    The city will be lost forever.
    The city is full of gold and silver.

  4. What was LIDAR used for?
    raising money for the expedition
    scanning the ground below the jungle canopy
    keeping the archaeologists safe

  5. Why is the author talking about the expedition to the White City?
    He thinks it is interesting.
    He will go there soon.
    He went on the first expedition to the city.

  6. Why does the author mention Cortez?
    to show how the legend of the White City started
    to explain why the city is in Honduras
    to explain the name of the city

  7. What factors make the valleys difficult to explore? (Check all correct answers.)
    They are surrounded by high mountains.
    They are covered by thick jungle.
    They are near active volcanoes.
    They haven't been explored before.

  8. Why did it take Steve Elkins 20 years to start his search for the White City?
    He was waiting for technology.
    He needed to raise enough money.
    There was a war in Honduras.

  9. How many cities did they find using LIDAR?
    one
    two
    three

  10. Who was most skeptical about finding something in the valley?
    the author
    Steve Elkins
    the LIDAR engineers

  11. Why does the author say this?

    Most archaeologists don't have enough training to read LIDAR images.
    There weren't any archaeologists on their expedition.
    The features of a city on the LIDAR images were obvious to everyone.

  12. What features were visible on the LIDAR? (Check all correct answers.)
    roads
    pyramids
    plazas
    gardens
    houses
    statues

  13. Why does the author state it was the discovery of a "civilization"?
    There was more than one city.
    The cities were so big.
    Cortez had mentioned the civilization in his letters.


triangle Discussion 논의 Questões de discussão Discusión


  1. Would you consider going on an expedition to find a lost city like the one described in the listening?
  2. What is the most famous archaeological site in country? Have you visited it? What do you know about it?
  3. What is most impressive archaeological monument you have ever visited?
  4. What archaeological site would you most like to visit?
  5. This is one of the lidar images that clearly shows a lost civilization. Is it clear? What feature (roads, building, squares) can you identify?

  6. Which of these four ancient sites can you identify? Where are they located? Have you visited any of them? Which would you most like to visit?




    Teotihuacan (Mexico) | Tikal (Guatemala)
    Angkor Wat (Cambodia) | Machu Picchu (Peru)

triangle Script 대본 Roteiro Texto



We've long been fascinated with the World's Greatest Unsolved Mysteries - pirate treasures, ancient tombs, shipwrecks filled with gold, lost cities and the civilizations that disappeared along with them. One of those lost cities has existed in Central American myth and legend dating back to the time of the Spanish conquistadores. It's known as the White City or the Lost City of the Monkey God. And it was believed to have been located in one of the most impenetrable and dangerous jungles in the world - a valley in the mountains of eastern Honduras. But along with the difficulty of simply exploring and conducting archaeology in such a region came a curse. According to the ancestors of those who once lived there, anyone who enters the city will fall ill and die.

Well not to be dissuaded, a team of scientists determined to solve the 500 year old mystery set out to find the white city. They were equipped with state of the art aerial technology able to penetrate the thick jungle canopy and profile the ground below. It was the first time LIDAR had been used for archeology. Success came quickly but not easily. Images of a sprawling metropolis did emerge, but the expedition to uncover that Lost City was so hellish, so harrowing, it's a wonder the researchers made it out alive. One member of that team was best-selling author Douglas Preston. He chronicled the journey in his new book The Lost City of the monkey god. Mr. Preston welcome to Quirks and Quarks.

Well thank you.

First of all tell me about the legend of the White City.

Well it dates back to the time of Cortez. He wrote a very famous letter to the Emperor Charles the Fifth while anchored off the coast of Honduras, reporting on that he had many reliable reports that somewhere deep in the interior of Honduras was a great civilization a very wealthy full of gold and silver. But he was not able to explore it. That sort of launched the myth of the White City or the Lost City of the Monkey God.

What's this region like now?

Well you have the Mosquito Coast, which are endless swamps. And then in the interior, you have these incredible mountain chains, some of which are over a mile high covered with the thickest jungle in the world. And inside these chains of mountains or valleys that have never been scientifically explored and are completely unknown are there some of the last unexplored places on the s urface of the earth. And that's where the legend has remained alive. There are many people who have felt well there very well could be a lost city hidden in one of these valleys.

Well tell me about the expedition that you were part of. When did you first start to look for this last city?

Well I've been following this crazy guy named Steve Elkins, who back in the mid-90s conceived of finding this lost city and filming the discovery. He was a filmmaker. I took him 20 years, but finally in 2012, he raised a million dollars. He brought a plane down to Honduras carrying a LIDAR machine, which by the way was built in Toronto. And this extremely powerful technology was able to actually map the floor of the jungle beneath the thickest 150 foot jungle canopy in the world. And so he mapped three unexplored valleys in the mountains of Honduras and La Mosquitia. And in the first valley, called Target One, he found a lost city. In the second valley, called Target Two, he found some very unusual features which have not been visited or explored yet. And then in the third valley, Targets Three, he found another lost city. So we\re really talking about here are two cities that were completely unknown to archaeology discovered with some remarkably powerful technology.

But I'll never forget the initial LIDAR exploration took place on in May of 2012. And I remember on May 5th, the LIDAR engineers who had come down from the University of Houston, who were very skeptical of this whole project. They really thought it was a bunch of craziness. One of the engineers burst out of his bungalow (we were on the island of Roatan off the coast of Honduras) just waving his arms and yelling. He looked like a Christopher Lloyd going crazy. He said, There's something in the valley! There's something in the valley!” So we all rushed into his bungalow and looked at his laptop computer and I couldn't believe my eyes. I mean I thought maybe they might find something, but you didn't have to be an archaeologist to see the pyramids, the earthworks, the roads, the leveling, the plazas. I mean there was a city in this valley. I couldn't believe it. And then three days later when the images came back from T-3, they also showed a city. So what really in effect the team discovered wasn't just the lost city but a lost civilization and a very mysterious civilization at that.