12 Dancing with the world

1 Do you ever watch videos on the internet (for example, on YouTube)? If so, what kind of videos
do you like?

2 Read the article. Why is Matt Harding famous? Why are his videos so popular?

If you love life, then dance

I
n 2003, Matt Harding left his job as a video the simple but powerful idea of the video: that The chewing gum company paid for him to
game writer to travel around the world. He people are the same in every country, and we do another trip and make a third video, which

ExTRA READING:
spent five months travelling and he visited all love to smile, to dance, to have fun. was also very successful. Because of his

about 17 countries, from Vietnam to Mexico,
from Mongolia to Russia. In each place he
made a short video to show to his friends
and family at home. When he was in Hanoi,
Vietnam, a friend asked him to do a funny
dance, so he did. Matt thought it was good so
he did the dance in every country he visited.
When he got home from a second trip to
Africa a year later, he had lots of videos of
his funny dance, so he put them together
and uploaded the video onto the internet.
Slowly, people started telling their friends
about it, and it soon became one of the most
popular videos on the internet. People loved
Matt didn’t have a regular job at that time
so he didn’t have much money. Luckily, a
chewing gum company decided that they
loved the video, and they offered to pay Matt
to make another one. For his second film he
visited 39 countries in six months and danced
on seven continents. His second video was
even more popular than the first and made
him one of the most famous people on the
internet.
In 2007, he had another idea. He wanted
to travel around the world again, but this
time he wanted to ask people to dance with
him too.
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dancing, Matt has met hundreds of famous
people and he’s been on TV many times –
and he always does his funny dance. He’s
also written a book about his story called
Dancing Badly Around the World.
He thinks the best thing about the videos is
that he meets normal people and dances
with them. One of his most famous clips is
his dance in Rwanda. He says he just started
dancing and lots of children thought he was
funny and started dancing with him. Matt has
been to over 80 countries and over 30 million
people have watched his funny dance on the
internet. Have you seen it yet?

3 Read the article again. Answer the questions.

1 What was Matt’s job before he started travelling? 6 What did Matt want to do differently in his
He was a video game writer. third video?
2 Why did Matt leave his job? 7 Has he ever danced on TV?
3 Where did he do his first funny dance? 8 Why did the children start dancing with him in
4 Where did he get the money to make his second Rwanda?
video? 9 How many people have seen his video on the
5 How many countries did he visit for this video? internet?

7 Yes, he has. 8 Because they thought he was funny. 9 Over 30 million people.
3 In Hanoi, Vietnam. 4 From a chewing gum company. 5 39 countries. 6 He wanted to ask people to dance with him.
very popular because they’re funny, and they show that people are the same in every country. 3 2 To travel around the world.
He travels the world and does a funny dance in each country. He then puts videos of his dances on the internet. These videos are 2

Instructions p217 © Cambridge University Press 2012 face2face Second edition Elementary Photocopiable 229