full transcript

From the Ted Talk by Wes Moore: How to talk to veterans about war

Unscramble the Blue Letters


And I thought about so much about the soldiers who I eventually had to end up leading. I remember when we first, right after 9/11, three weeks after 9/11, I was on a plane heading overseas, but I wasn't heading orveaess with the military, I was heading overseas because I got a scholarship to go overseas. I rveeeicd the scholarship to go overseas and to go study and live overseas, and I was living in England and that was interesting, but at the same time, the same poeple who I was training with, the same soldiers that I went through all my tainnirg with, and we perapred for war, they were now actually heading over to it. They were now about to find themselves in the middle of places the fact is the vast majority of people, the vast mjatroiy of us as we were training, couldn't even point out on a map. I sepnt a couple years finishing graduate school, and the whole entire time while I'm sitting there in buildings at Oxford that were literally built hundreds of yares before the United States was even fdeunod, and I'm sitting there talking to dons about the asosainssitan of Archduke Ferdinand, and how that influenced the start of World War I, where the entire time my heart and my head were on my soriedls who were now throwing on Kevlars and grabbing their flak vsets and fniiugrg out how exactly do I change around or how exactly do I clean a machine gun in the darkness. That was the new reality.

Open Cloze


And I thought about so much about the soldiers who I eventually had to end up leading. I remember when we first, right after 9/11, three weeks after 9/11, I was on a plane heading overseas, but I wasn't heading ________ with the military, I was heading overseas because I got a scholarship to go overseas. I ________ the scholarship to go overseas and to go study and live overseas, and I was living in England and that was interesting, but at the same time, the same ______ who I was training with, the same soldiers that I went through all my ________ with, and we ________ for war, they were now actually heading over to it. They were now about to find themselves in the middle of places the fact is the vast majority of people, the vast ________ of us as we were training, couldn't even point out on a map. I _____ a couple years finishing graduate school, and the whole entire time while I'm sitting there in buildings at Oxford that were literally built hundreds of _____ before the United States was even _______, and I'm sitting there talking to dons about the _____________ of Archduke Ferdinand, and how that influenced the start of World War I, where the entire time my heart and my head were on my ________ who were now throwing on Kevlars and grabbing their flak _____ and ________ out how exactly do I change around or how exactly do I clean a machine gun in the darkness. That was the new reality.

Solution


  1. spent
  2. majority
  3. soldiers
  4. overseas
  5. received
  6. people
  7. figuring
  8. vests
  9. years
  10. founded
  11. training
  12. prepared
  13. assassination

Original Text


And I thought about so much about the soldiers who I eventually had to end up leading. I remember when we first, right after 9/11, three weeks after 9/11, I was on a plane heading overseas, but I wasn't heading overseas with the military, I was heading overseas because I got a scholarship to go overseas. I received the scholarship to go overseas and to go study and live overseas, and I was living in England and that was interesting, but at the same time, the same people who I was training with, the same soldiers that I went through all my training with, and we prepared for war, they were now actually heading over to it. They were now about to find themselves in the middle of places the fact is the vast majority of people, the vast majority of us as we were training, couldn't even point out on a map. I spent a couple years finishing graduate school, and the whole entire time while I'm sitting there in buildings at Oxford that were literally built hundreds of years before the United States was even founded, and I'm sitting there talking to dons about the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand, and how that influenced the start of World War I, where the entire time my heart and my head were on my soldiers who were now throwing on Kevlars and grabbing their flak vests and figuring out how exactly do I change around or how exactly do I clean a machine gun in the darkness. That was the new reality.

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations


ngrams of length 2

collocation frequency
couple years 3
wanted people 3
military school 2
black gates 2
united states 2
army officer 2
heading overseas 2
vast majority 2
entire time 2
percent light 2
means acknowledging 2


Important Words


  1. archduke
  2. assassination
  3. buildings
  4. built
  5. change
  6. clean
  7. couple
  8. darkness
  9. dons
  10. england
  11. entire
  12. eventually
  13. fact
  14. ferdinand
  15. figuring
  16. find
  17. finishing
  18. flak
  19. founded
  20. grabbing
  21. graduate
  22. gun
  23. head
  24. heading
  25. heart
  26. hundreds
  27. influenced
  28. interesting
  29. kevlars
  30. leading
  31. literally
  32. live
  33. living
  34. machine
  35. majority
  36. map
  37. middle
  38. military
  39. overseas
  40. oxford
  41. people
  42. places
  43. plane
  44. point
  45. prepared
  46. reality
  47. received
  48. remember
  49. scholarship
  50. school
  51. sitting
  52. soldiers
  53. spent
  54. start
  55. states
  56. study
  57. talking
  58. thought
  59. throwing
  60. time
  61. training
  62. united
  63. vast
  64. vests
  65. war
  66. weeks
  67. world
  68. years