Zapp! English Listening 3.13 - Problems and difficulties
Taught by Katie Wood — Cambridge CELTA · Cambridge DELTA · Cambridge-accredited Teacher Trainer
Recorded and taught by a team of British and North American English teachers, based in Oxford (UK) and Barcelona (Spain).
Katie hands the group a task: four difficult things — breaking up with someone, learning to drive, moving house, and borrowing or lending money — and one job, to put them in order. Tom's first reaction is "Tricky, tricky." Twenty minutes later the group reaches a verdict, and it's "There we go. Unanimous." In between there are haircuts after break-ups, a washing machine carried down three flights of stairs, road rules that nobody obeys, and one very awkward joke about five hundred euros.
What you'll hear in this episode
Katie, Tom and Amanda work through the four items one at a time, and the conversation keeps escaping the task. On break-ups, Tom asks the obvious clarifying question first — "Does that mean you're doing the breaking up?" — before Katie cuts in with "Why has…somebody broken up with you Thomas?" Amanda argues that both sides are hard, because guilt can be as heavy as rejection when "you still have feelings for the person."
Moving house turns into confessions. One of the hosts describes moving every year for twelve years while owning a truck load of records, and needing about ten friends each time. Another remembers a narrow staircase, three storeys, a washing machine and a mattress: "I swore never ever again." The advice offered is brisk — "Go minimalist" — and the tangent about paper books versus e-readers gets closed down with "Another podcast."
On driving, all three passed their test first time, so the difficulty gets relocated: one speaker found driving where there are no road rules easier than driving where there are rules people ignore, because "you're driving in chaos and you're used to the chaos." Another calls driving in a smaller city "complete mayhem every time you go out." Money is the most uncomfortable topic. Amanda says she hates asking, even when she has already earned it: "I hate the concept of money, I wish it didn't exist at times."
Quick facts
| Episode | Zapp! English Listening 3.13 – Problems and difficulties |
| Episode number | 3.13 |
| Pack | Listening 3 |
| Level | 3 |
| Duration | 20 minutes 15 seconds |
| Speakers | Katie, Tom and Amanda |
| Workbook | Included in the all-in-one pack (€39) |
What you'll learn
The main skill here is working out opinions when nobody states one cleanly. Amanda's position on break-ups arrives in pieces, across three interrupted turns, and you have to assemble it. That's normal in real talk, and the workbook's questions are built to make you do it.
You'll also get a lot of practice with agreement and hedging. Watch how little is needed: "Yeah me too", "First time", "Same." Tom and Amanda even repeat each other's exact words — "Something you get used to" — which is one of the ways English speakers show they're aligned rather than adding new information. Katie uses a tag question to hand an opinion to the group: "They say it's one of the most stressful things you can do, don't they?"
Then there's interruption. Katie finishes Amanda's sentences, Amanda finishes Katie's ("It would come from them"), and Tom talks over a cough twice. If you're used to clean textbook audio, this is the useful discomfort. The comedy of misunderstanding is worth studying too: Katie jokes that Tom is talking about the five hundred euros she owes him, he backpedals — "I wasn't referring to you" — and Amanda lands the punchline, "He didn't tell you about the interest rate did he?"
Vocabulary in the workbook
The glossary gives you the words you need before you listen, with these definitions:
- tricky (adjective) – difficult. Tom's very first reaction to the task.
- rejection (noun) – saying no to something, not accepting an idea, offer etc.
- guilt (noun) – a bad feeling you have because you did something bad or wrong, or didn't do something you should have.
- narrow (adjective) – thin (not for people, usually for streets). It comes up with the staircase.
- cope (verb) – to do something but find it difficult.
- mayhem (noun) – chaos, no organisation at all.
- boundaries (noun) – limits. Tom's advice about lending money.
- unanimous (adjective) – everyone agrees. Katie's word for the final verdict.
What's in the workbook
The workbook opens by pre-teaching two items you need before the audio makes sense: the expression break up and the verb to reject. Then come three listening tasks, each with its own questions and answer key. Task 1 asks you to decide first — is breaking up harder than moving house? — and then listen to see whether the speakers agree with you. Task 2 asks three specific questions about driving, including who found a motorbike or scooter easier than a car. Task 3 covers the money section, including whether Tom is actually annoyed about being owed money.
The Extra Materials add seven more listening questions across the three segments, plus a matching exercise that takes six spoken expressions straight out of the transcript — gone through it, got over it, with hindsight, hassle, be bothered and get rid of — and asks you to pair them with definitions. Full transcript and answers are included, so you can check why you got something wrong rather than just that you did.
This workbook comes with the all-in-one pack, which covers every episode for €39.
Get the complete courseAll workbooks and audio — €39
Common questions
Is the conversation scripted?
No. Katie, Tom and Amanda were given the four topics and nothing else, which is why they interrupt, cough and change their minds. The teaching sections that set up the tasks and give the answers are scripted, so the instructions stay clear.
What level do I need to follow this?
This is a Level 3 unit from the Listening 3 pack. The essential vocabulary is taught before you listen, so the difficulty is the speed and the overlap, not the words.
Can I use the audio without the workbook?
Yes — the English conversations are free. The workbook adds the questions, the answers, the vocabulary work and the full transcript.
What is the group's final answer?
All three choose breaking up with someone. Tom puts it alongside grieving as "the two hardest things we have to cope with in life", and Amanda adds that otherwise "we'd be robots and not humans."
How long is the recording?
20 minutes 15 seconds, in three segments.
Get this episode
To save the audio, right-click the MP3 link and choose Save link as.
Listen on
