Buying Makeup

Hello everyone and welcome to EnglishPod.

My name is Marco.

My name is Catherine and today we're talking a little bit about, well, kind of girly things.

That's right.

We've talked about guys' shoes, women's shoes.

So now we're going to talk about another aspect of women's accessories.

We're going to talk about makeup.

Okay, so we're wearing makeup today.

Actually we're buying makeup at the store.

I never even knew there were so many kinds of makeup.

So we're going to learn all about these in today's dialogue.

I'm hungry.

Let's go grab a bite to eat.

Yeah, me too.

Oh, can we stop at the shop really fast?

I lost my makeup bag at the airport and I want to pick up a few things.

Will you take long?

No, five minutes.

I promise.

Come on.

We've been here for almost an hour.

I thought you said you were only going to get a few things.

How long does it take you to pick out a lipstick and some nail polish?

Are you crazy?

You have no idea what you're talking about.

Just for my eyes I have to get eyeliner, an eyelash curler, eye shadow, an eyebrow pencil,

and mascara.

Then I need to get foundation, liquid foundation.

Whoa, whoa, whoa.

Are you nuts?

How much is all this going to cost?

I'm looking at the price of each one of these little things and it's outrageous.

This is basically a crayon.

What about you?

You spend as much money or more on your razors, aftershave, cologne, and gel.

Not to mention how much you spend on clothes and...

Fine.

Get the stupid $30 crayon.

Alright, we're back.

So obviously we're getting a lot of things for this girl, a lot of makeup.

So I think there are a couple of things that we may not know about.

So let's take a look at them now on Language Takeaway.

Language Takeaway.

So the first thing we're talking about today is a basic.

Most women carry this around in their purses.

It's called lipstick.

That's right.

And as you said, this is a pretty basic thing.

It's the kind of like paint that you put on your lips.

And it's called a lipstick because it looks like a little stick.

Right, and you turn it with your fingers and it comes up and then you turn it again and

it goes down, basically keeping it from touching all of the things in your purse.

That's right.

So lipstick.

And well, apart from this, we also have nail polish.

And this is also very popular with the ladies when you paint your nails a certain color.

That's right.

So polish is basically anything that makes something shiny.

It's something that you add to surfaces.

So you could add polish to wood on a table.

But in this case, we're putting it on our nails.

That is fingernails or toenails.

So it's nail polish.

Alright, very good.

And now we're getting into the specific things.

A lot of makeup that women use on their eyes.

So for example, the first thing she said, she needs to get an eyeliner.

Okay, so eyeliner is basically a pencil.

This is what the guy is making fun of her about.

He says it's just a pencil or a crayon for your eye.

And so basically, you use it to draw a line on the top or the bottom of your eye, your

eyelid.

Okay, so yeah, it kind of looks like a marker and it comes, I think, black and different

colors and then you paint little lines around your eyes to make them more pronounced.

So it's called an eyeliner.

Okay, and now we have an eyelash curler.

And also, I think this is very important for the ladies.

Yeah, well not everyone uses this.

It's a little bit of a scary instrument.

It looks like it might pop your eye out.

It's something you use on your eyelashes.

So those are the hairs that come off of your eye.

And basically, you use this to make them curly or to make them seem a bit longer and prettier.

So an eyelash curler is something that, it's almost like a press or something for your

eyelashes.

Okay, very good.

And well, now that we've got that covered, we move on to eye shadow.

And I think this goes on your eyelid, right?

That's right.

Some people make it go further.

They put it on their face above their eyelid, but that's a little bit crazy.

I think eye shadow generally goes, like you said, on your eyelid.

And it can be in many different colors.

So blue, pink, red, whatever.

People sometimes go crazy with eye shadow.

Okay.

And now what about an eyebrow pencil?

This is basically a pencil for filling in or for coloring your eyebrows.

Sometimes people like to make their eyebrows look darker or thicker.

And so they use this pencil.

It's usually brown or black.

And they use it on their eyebrows.

So we've picked up a lot of vocab here related to your eye.

For example, an eyelash, your eyelid.

Now we're talking about the eyebrows, which are the hairs on top, more or less around

your forehead.

And now we also have another type of makeup called mascara.

This is another basic.

So like we said earlier, lipstick is something you almost always find in a woman's purse.

Well, mascara is another one of those things.

Almost everybody wears mascara.

This is kind of like a brush for your eyelashes and it paints them a different color.

So most women wear black or brown and it makes your eyelashes look really long.

Oh, okay.

Very good.

So this is kind of like paint for your eyelashes.

And now moving away from your eyelashes, we're going to have, we're buying also some foundation

and liquid foundation.

Okay.

So foundation is just a kind of base for your face.

So foundation, like a building, is the very bottom.

Well, in this case, it's something that you put on your cheeks, on your face in general,

on your forehead to kind of smooth your skin out and make it look all the same color or

the same texture.

And so foundation can be like we see here, either a powder, which is kind of like a dry

substance, or you can use liquid foundation, which is like it says, liquid.

It's almost like a thick cream.

All right.

So foundation is, as you said, I guess you just want to make your skin look the same

color, the same texture, because obviously not everyone's skin is perfect.

We all have some spots maybe, or some different color on our face.

You say we like you wear foundation too.

Do you wear makeup, Marco?

Well, I mean, we as people because, you know.

All right.

No, no, no, no, none of this makeup for me, although I have used an eyelash curler once.

That's scary.

Well, my friends dared me to, so okay.

And you loved it.

Of course.

Now I use it all the time.

No, no.

But what I do use is now things related to guys.

So for example, the girlfriend was saying, well, you buy razors and aftershave.

So what are these things?

Well, razors aren't just a guy thing.

Everyone can have a razor.

It's basically a blade, like a very sharp piece of metal that you use to cut hair.

So the hair on your legs, the hair on your face, these are things that you cut with a

razor.

And men use razors to shave their faces, shave their chins or above their lip.

All right.

And well, actually, after we shave our beard, we put on a little bit of aftershave, which

is basically kind of like alcohol that smells really nice.

That's right, because shaving can actually hurt your skin or the hairs under your skin

can become really itchy or irritated.

And so aftershave helps make everything feel better.

Okay.

Well, and sometimes we also use a little bit of cologne to smell nice.

So women usually wear perfume, which is, you know, the perfumes like CK and Hugo Boss and

all that stuff, as well as for guys, it's usually called cologne.

Okay, that's right.

It's an important difference there because we don't say perfume for guys and we don't

say cologne for girls.

So women wear perfume, like you said, but men wear cologne.

And this word is very funny looking.

It ends with, it's spelled C-O-L-O-G-N-E.

So you don't really say the G, it's not cologna.

Right.

It's cologne.

And it's something that you put on your neck or your face to smell really good if you're

a man.

Exactly.

And finally, if you have long hair or maybe you have very spiky hair like I do, you need

to wear a little bit of gel to kind of give your head a little bit of shape.

That's right.

So gel is actually the name of a kind of substance.

It's not liquid, but it's not hard either.

And it's basically thick like paste that you put in your hair to keep it in one place.

Yeah, it makes your hair become a little bit hard or it keeps your hairstyle in for a long

time.

That's right.

All right, so a lot of vocab here, a lot of things that we've picked up.

Why don't we go back, review all this great vocab on our dialogue for today.

I'm hungry.

Let's go grab a bite to eat.

Yeah, me too.

Oh, can we stop at the shop really fast?

I lost my makeup bag at the airport and I want to pick up a few things.

Will you take long?

No, five minutes.

I promise.

Come on, we've been here for almost an hour.

I thought you said you're only going to get a few things.

How long does it take you to pick out a lipstick and some nail polish?

Are you crazy?

You have no idea what you're talking about.

First for my eyes, I have to get eyeliner, an eyelash curler, eye shadow, an eyebrow

pencil, and mascara.

Then I need to get foundation, liquid foundation.

Whoa, whoa, whoa.

Are you nuts?

How much is all this going to cost?

I'm looking at the price of each one of these little things and it's outrageous.

This is basically a crayon.

What about you?

You spend as much money or more on your razors, aftershave, cologne, and gel.

Not to mention how much you spend on clothes and-

Fine, get the stupid $30 crayon.

All right, we're back.

So now we're going to take a look at three short phrases that we've picked out for you

on Fluency Builder.

Fluency Builder.

So this first phrase is something that we almost always say with our friends or family

when we're hungry, we're shopping.

Sometimes you're outside and you just really want to eat.

You say, hey, let's grab a bite to eat.

That's right.

It's a very natural colloquial way of saying, let's go get something to eat or let's go

eat something.

So it could be small, it could be a snack like an ice cream, but it can also be dinner.

So hey, do you want to go grab a bite to eat sometime?

That means, hey, you want to go have lunch or dinner sometime?

Very good.

So the phrase is grab a bite or go grab a bite to eat.

So a bite can be a noun, like a thing, like a piece of food that you eat, but it can also

be a verb, to bite, like the dog bites the man.

And so you have to be careful with this one.

In this case, it's a noun.

Okay, very good.

And well, she wanted to first go to the store and she said, I want to pick up a few things.

Well, usually when you pick something up, you take it from a table or from the ground.

But in this case, it means to buy something because you can't just pick something up in

a store and then walk away.

You have to pay for it.

So for example, you can say, when you come home, can you pick up a carton of milk?

So that means, can you buy some milk on your way home?

It doesn't mean, can you take some from someone else or steal some.

Exactly.

All right, so to pick something up, to buy, to go and get, but obviously you have to pay.

All right, and he used this very interesting phrase when she was getting all these things

for her.

He said, whoa, whoa, whoa, are you nuts?

Okay, so nuts is the important word here.

It means crazy or out of your mind.

That's right.

So it's another way of saying crazy.

So if you call someone nuts or you say, he's nuts, that means.

Yeah, like don't talk to him.

He's nuts.

Or he always says really dangerous things.

He's nuts.

So he's a little bit crazy.

So it's an adjective as to describe someone that's a little bit crazy or a little bit

adventurous maybe.

But in this case, he's not actually saying she's a crazy person.

He's saying, listen, this is so much stuff.

Are you crazy?

Or he's basically saying, do you really want to do this?

This seems like a bad decision.

Exactly.

So that's why he used the phrase, are you nuts?

Okay, so a lot of great stuff there.

Why don't we go back, listen to our dialogue for the last time and we'll be back in a bit.

I'm hungry.

Let's go grab a bite to eat.

Yeah, me too.

Oh, can we stop at the shop really fast?

I lost my makeup bag at the airport and I want to pick up a few things.

Will you take long?

No, five minutes.

I promise.

Come on, we've been here for almost an hour.

I thought you said you're only going to get a few things.

How long does it take you to pick out a lipstick and some nail polish?

Are you crazy?

You have no idea what you're talking about.

As for my eyes, I have to get eyeliner and eyelash curler, eye shadow, an eyebrow pencil

and mascara.

Then I need to get foundation, liquid foundation.

Whoa, whoa, whoa.

Are you nuts?

How much is all this going to cost?

I'm looking at the price of each one of these little things and it's outrageous.

This is basically a crayon.

What about you?

You spend as much money or more on your razors, aftershave, cologne and gel.

Not to mention how much you spend on clothes and-

Fine, get the stupid $30 crayon.

All right, so talking about makeup, a lot of things here.

Maybe I didn't mention a couple of things.

I don't know.

We took a look at the most important things, I think, right?

But you also mentioned something, for example, cover-up.

There's something, such makeup called cover-up.

Yeah, so cover-up.

It could be a couple of different things in English, for example, something that you wear

to cover your body when you're at the beach.

You don't want to walk around and everyone can see you in your bathing suit.

But when we're talking about makeup, a cover-up is a thing that we use to hide blemishes or

zits or pimples.

You know when you get a really small red dot on your face and you're embarrassed and it's

ugly, and you don't want anyone to see it?

Well, cover-up is a kind of makeup you use that looks like your skin color and you put

it on top and you can't see the red anymore.

Okay, so you cover up your pimple.

Yeah, or you use cover-up.

It's a noun too.

Okay, and I've also seen that, well, many girls don't really wear too much lipstick

anymore nowadays.

They use this thing called lip gloss.

Okay, lip gloss.

Remember we were talking about polish earlier?

Well, gloss is a similar word.

It means something that makes another thing shiny.

And so lipstick can be very dry, can be very flat, but lip gloss is something that makes

things look wet, makes things look shiny.

Okay, and actually one last thing before, when we talked about gel, I guess guys use

gel but women use this thing called mousse.

Or they could use gel too.

I don't think it's gender specific, but a lot of people use mousse.

I know some men who use mousse as well.

Mousse is kind of like a foam.

You know it comes in a can and it goes ffff.

Yeah, and it inflates this white substance.

Yeah, it looks like, I don't know.

Like whipped cream.

Like whipped cream, yeah.

And you put it in your hair and it's very fluffy.

And it's actually less strong.

It's not like gel because if you put it in your hair, your hair won't look hard.

But it will help shape your hair if you want to keep your hair in one place.

A lot of things here.

I think in beauty and cosmetics, we have a lot of a lot of things.

And probably we didn't even touch on half of the things that are out there.

So if you have any questions or if you want to ask us anything at all about this lesson

or anything else, you can always come to EnglishPod.com and leave your questions and comments there.

So we'll see you at EnglishPod and until next time.

Alright, bye everyone!