Listen out for and read the interesting collocations (shown in bold type). Collocations are frequent combinations of words in a language so they are useful to learn.
For example: *What do you do with a Spanish blind?
Today, I'm going to talk to you about my balcony. Now the balcony I have is in my flat in Seville. And first of all, to get to the balcony, I have to open the patio doors. Now these are two large heavy glass doors, which open from the living room onto the balcony.
In Spain, they have a wonderful invention of these blinds. Now, the blinds - you can let them down by pulling a cord next to the window. And what they do, they stop the light coming into the room. They're very useful. And if you've ever been to England, I often think they could use this invention there too. In England, they usually have just curtains, curtains which hang down in front of the window. And they partially stop the light coming in. But if you have ever been to England, you will know that if you sleep in a hotel, or in a house, you will probably wake up at five o'clock in the morning because of the light coming through the window. But these wonderful Spanish blinds block the light completely. So we have these blinds here on these patio doors. And I'm going to pull the cord and you can hear the blind coming up there.
Now I can walk outside onto the balcony. Our flat is on the fourth floor - 1234. So I'm quite high up here. And I have a nice view. So we say that the balcony looks out onto, well, as you can hear it looks out onto a road. And this road has quite a lot of traffic. You can probably hear the traffic noise, the sound of the cars and buses, motorbikes as they go past. Despite the noise from the traffic, I think I'm lucky because I'm actually not right on the road. We're just down a little quiet road about 50 metres from the main road. So it's a little bit quieter than the [for] people who have flats that look onto the road, the main road directly.
And we're also lucky because our balcony looks south. So in winter, on a winter's day like today, in January, I can feel the warmth of the sun on my face. And I have a lovely view. There are some gardens in front of me and trees. And to my right, and fairly close, really, just about a hundred metres away, I can see a famous monument - Spanish Square, which is a beautiful monument (that was a loud motorbike going past!) in Seville, which is a favourite for the tourists who visit here.
Looking at the balcony itself. Well, it's not a very big balcony. But we can put some chairs here if we want to. And I can remember during the time of the confinement during the time of COVID-19, when we all had to stay indoors in our flats, there was was no traffic on the road. And it was very nice to sit outside here - it was very quiet to sit out on the balcony. So at the moment, there aren't any chairs on my balcony. But we do have an awning. Now the awning is a piece of cloth, material, which you lower down by turning a handle. I'll do that now. Now what that does, the cloth or material or awning comes down and it stops the strong sun from coming into the living room. It's a sort of a sunshade if you like. And it's a very pretty green and white awning.
And then in the evening when it's quieter and a bit warmer as well. We have a little light here on the balcony. But we can switch it on and sit here and look at the stars. Well, you can see some stars. I am in the middle of a city. But even so we can see some stars here from our balcony on a clear night. Okay, so I'll say goodbye to you now from my balcony where I'm enjoying the sun. Bye-bye.
*Answer to above question: you let them down by pulling a cord / you pull the cord and the blind comes up (or goes up).
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