full transcript

From the Ted Talk by Hyeonseo Lee: My escape from North Korea

Unscramble the Blue Letters


A huge famine hit North kroea in the mid-1990s. Ultimately, more than a million North Koreans died during the famine, and many only survived by eating grass, bugs and tree bark. pweor outages also became more and more frequent, so everything around me was completely dark at night, except for the sea of lights in China, just across the river from my home. I always wondered why they had lights, but we didn't. This is a satellite picture sohinwg North Korea at night, compared to neighbors.

This is the amonk River, which serves as a part of the border between notrh Korea and China. As you can see, the river can be very narrow at certain points, allowing North Koreans to secretly cross. But many die. Sometimes, I saw dead bodies fotnialg down the river. I can't reeavl many details about how I left North Korea, but I only can say that during the ugly yares of the famine, I was sent to China to live with distant rtlveeais. But I only thought that I would be separated from my family for a short time. I could have never imagined that it would take 14 years to live together.

Open Cloze


A huge famine hit North _____ in the mid-1990s. Ultimately, more than a million North Koreans died during the famine, and many only survived by eating grass, bugs and tree bark. _____ outages also became more and more frequent, so everything around me was completely dark at night, except for the sea of lights in China, just across the river from my home. I always wondered why they had lights, but we didn't. This is a satellite picture _______ North Korea at night, compared to neighbors.

This is the _____ River, which serves as a part of the border between _____ Korea and China. As you can see, the river can be very narrow at certain points, allowing North Koreans to secretly cross. But many die. Sometimes, I saw dead bodies ________ down the river. I can't ______ many details about how I left North Korea, but I only can say that during the ugly _____ of the famine, I was sent to China to live with distant _________. But I only thought that I would be separated from my family for a short time. I could have never imagined that it would take 14 years to live together.

Solution


  1. power
  2. years
  3. amnok
  4. reveal
  5. korea
  6. showing
  7. floating
  8. north
  9. relatives

Original Text


A huge famine hit North Korea in the mid-1990s. Ultimately, more than a million North Koreans died during the famine, and many only survived by eating grass, bugs and tree bark. Power outages also became more and more frequent, so everything around me was completely dark at night, except for the sea of lights in China, just across the river from my home. I always wondered why they had lights, but we didn't. This is a satellite picture showing North Korea at night, compared to neighbors.

This is the Amnok River, which serves as a part of the border between North Korea and China. As you can see, the river can be very narrow at certain points, allowing North Koreans to secretly cross. But many die. Sometimes, I saw dead bodies floating down the river. I can't reveal many details about how I left North Korea, but I only can say that during the ugly years of the famine, I was sent to China to live with distant relatives. But I only thought that I would be separated from my family for a short time. I could have never imagined that it would take 14 years to live together.

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations


ngrams of length 2

collocation frequency
north koreans 12
north korea 8
north korean 7
south korea 5
family members 2
south korean 2
international community 2


Important Words


  1. allowing
  2. amnok
  3. bark
  4. bodies
  5. border
  6. bugs
  7. china
  8. compared
  9. completely
  10. cross
  11. dark
  12. dead
  13. details
  14. die
  15. died
  16. distant
  17. eating
  18. family
  19. famine
  20. floating
  21. frequent
  22. grass
  23. hit
  24. home
  25. huge
  26. imagined
  27. korea
  28. koreans
  29. left
  30. lights
  31. live
  32. million
  33. narrow
  34. neighbors
  35. night
  36. north
  37. outages
  38. part
  39. picture
  40. points
  41. power
  42. relatives
  43. reveal
  44. river
  45. satellite
  46. sea
  47. secretly
  48. separated
  49. serves
  50. short
  51. showing
  52. survived
  53. thought
  54. time
  55. tree
  56. ugly
  57. ultimately
  58. wondered
  59. years