'Show Your Hand', other Card Idioms - December 05, 2024

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1. 0:08And now, words and their stories from VOA Learning English.
2. 0:19Playing cards is a popular pastime for people of all ages.
3. 0:26Some games are easy, while others are complex.
4. 0:31And people of all walks of life play cards.
5. 0:36A set of playing cards is called a deck.
6. 0:39A deck of cards is not costly and can be bought almost anywhere.
7. 0:48With one deck of 52 cards, you can play many different games.
8. 0:54Some of the games include Poker,
9. 0:57Blackjack, Bridge, Rummy, 500,
10. 1:02Snap, Hearts, and Crazy Eights just to name a few.
11. 1:07The deck of cards also gives the English language many idioms.
12. 1:13Today we will talk about a few of them.
13. 1:17To win at many card games, you must keep your cards hidden from the other players.
14. 1:24In many games, the cards you are dealt and play with are called your hand.
15. 1:32If your opponents know your hand, they can easily beat you.
16. 1:38Some players keep their cards hidden by holding them to their chest.
17. 1:44In life, you might need to keep some parts of a plan hidden or secret for them to succeed.
18. 1:53You might need to keep your cards close to your chest.
19. 1:56This idiom means to keep your plans, intentions, or methods secret.
20. 2:05However, with most card games, players must show their cards to the other players at some point,
21. 2:13sometimes at the end of the game.
22. 2:16This gives us two similar idioms –
23. 2:20to show your hand and to lay your cards on the table.
24. 2:27As an idiom, to show your hand or your cards means to tell people your plans or intentions
25. 2:35that you had kept hidden.
26. 2:38The same is true of laying your cards on the table.
27. 2:42In many card games, the players must show their cards by placing them face-up on the table
28. 2:50for everyone to see.
29. 2:53When we put our cards on the table, we show something that we have kept hidden.
30. 3:00These can be things like our reasons for doing something, our intentions, or our opinions.
31. 3:09Now, in a game of cards, luck or chance plays an important part.
32. 3:16You must play with the cards you are dealt.
33. 3:20This is the case in life, too.
34. 3:23Not everything is a choice.
35. 3:26Sometimes we must deal with things that are out of our control.
36. 3:31We must play with the cards we are dealt.
37. 3:34dealt. We can also say, play the hand we are dealt.
38. 3:40So luck is part of the game.
39. 3:43We cannot know or predict the cards we are dealt.
40. 3:47But sometimes other players cheat.
41. 3:51They can do this by stacking the deck.
42. 3:55When you stack the deck, you add cards to the deck that will help you win.
43. 4:02This gives you an unfair advantage.
44. 4:06In life, we can sometimes feel that things are stacked against us.
45. 4:12This means that no matter how hard we try, we still struggle.
46. 4:17We feel as though life has dealt us a bad hand.
47. 4:22And we must struggle and fight to gain anything at all.
48. 4:28For example, if the deck is stacked against you, the odds are not in your favor.
49. 4:35You might have to struggle against all odds to succeed.
50. 4:41These are just a few of the idioms English gets from a deck of cards.
51. 4:46words. There are many more.
52. 4:49But that's all the time we have today.
53. 4:52Keep listening to words and their stories to learn more.
54. 4:57Until next time, I'm Ana Mateo.