Today, Explained - The Island of Explained

Episode Date: May 1, 2020

Come with us to the magical Island of Explained, where we’ll climb trees and venture into caves to answer kids’ biggest coronavirus questions. Go to vox.com/todayexplainedlearning to find supplemental activities, from testing how far snot travels to coloring in a map of the Island of Explained. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Boop-a-doo-doo-doo-doo-day. Doo-doo-doo-doo-doo. Explain. Hey, it's Sean. Usually at this point in the episode, I'd give you a bunch of news about the pandemic, but I'm not going to do that today because today's episode is for kids.

Today, Explain producer-reporter Noam Hassenfeld has been working on a very special episode for the young ones. Noam, what do you got? Yeah, I've actually been working with Vox podcast producer Bird Pinkerton. And, you know, everyone's been stuck at home a lot lately, so we thought this would be a good time to take people somewhere magical.

So we're going to an island. An island? Yeah, the Island of Explained. The Island of Explained. How is it that we've made 550 episodes of this show and no one's ever invited me to the Island of Explained? It's always been there, Sean. You just have to believe.

Okay, well, I'm going to put on my Believe shirt and we're going to head there after a quick break. BetMGM, authorized gaming partner of the NBA, has your back all season long. From tip-off to the final buzzer, you're always taken care of with a sportsbook born in vegas that's a feeling you can only get with bet mgm and no matter your team your favorite player or your style there's something every nba fan will love about bet mgm download the app today

and discover why bet mgm is your basketball home for the season raise your game to the next level this year with BetMGM, a sportsbook worth a slam dunk, and authorized gaming partner of the NBA. BetMGM.com for terms and conditions. Must be 19 years of age or older to wager. Ontario only. Please play responsibly.

If you have any questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, please contact Connex Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. The following episode is intended for young audiences, like really young audiences. Listener discretion is advised. I get it. Explain! Today! Today! Explain! Explain! Today! Today, explain! Noam?

Noam Hassenfeld? Is that you? Bird Penderton! Nice to see you. It's nice to see you too, but where are we? This is the island of Explained. I thought you might want to get out of the house for a bit, but even when you're out here, remember you still should stay six feet away. This place is incredible. Like, this massive tree,

these pink clouds, kind of a weird number of crickets, but fine. Can I ask, though, why is there a door here inside of my bookshelf? It's not just your bookshelf, Bird. There are doors to the Island of Explained anywhere you can find knowledge. So bookshelves, museums, schools. Actually, this is where we get all our answers on Today Explained. What? Where do the answers come from? They're all over. There's this history tree we're standing under. It's got a million histories growing out of it.

There's Deep Dive Lake down there where you can really explore a topic. And just past the forest in the distance, that's the ancient ruins of the food pyramid. This is so cool. Are we going to go looking for some answers? Yeah. Today, we've got a bunch of questions from kids who listen to the show, and we're going to go on sort of a question answering quest. All right, I'm in. What's question number one? Let me pull it up on my phone. Honestly, amazing you get service out here.

So this one is from Lucia Marvin. Hi, I'm Lucia, and I'm calling from New York. My question is, why did the cameras come here? Oh, that's a great question. Yeah, it is. I kind of want to have Lucia here with us. Let's call her up. Hello? Hi, Lucia.

I am Bird. This is Noam. Hey, Lucia. Can you tell us a little bit about yourself? I'm five years old and my favorite color is pink and purple and blue and also red. And my favorite animals are unicorns and bears. Amazing. I also love bears. Anyway, we called you because we want to answer your question about why coronavirus came here. And we're now standing under this giant tree that apparently has a lot of histories in it slash on it, maybe?

No, and what is the deal here? Do we just ask the tree questions? No, it's actually a little bit weirder. The history tree has this kind of weird book fruit growing out of it, and the histories are written on those books. Wait, wait, wait. Does that mean we have to climb this giant tree to get an answer? Well, I mean, I'm kind of not that into heights, so I thought you might climb it. All right, I see how this is.

Okay, breathing in. This isn't so bad. Be careful! Thank you, Noam. All right, here's a book fruit. It is about the first person who made cheese, which is not what we want. The history of freckles, also not what we want. Okay, this one says the history of Corona the virus.

This looks like exactly what we want. Read it. What? No, Mom, it's full of holes. Oh, yeah, that's fine. Sometimes when history fruits aren't fully grown yet, they have holes. Those are the things we don't know yet. It's the holes in our knowledge.

Oh. All right. Lucia, are you ready to see what's in here? I'm ready. Hi. What was that? It's the coronavirus. Oh.

Lucia, I think you might actually be right. I think the book reads itself out loud when you poke it. So let's just see what happens if I do this. I'm a coronavirus, but most people just call me Corona. I'm super tiny and you can't see me without a microscope. If you do get to see me, I'm kind of weird looking. I'm a little ball and don't get too close because I'm covered with spikes. So maybe you're wondering where I came from.

Well, I'll tell you what I know. I grew up inside of a bat. I hung out there for a little while. But the thing is, I love going new places, and you can't go very far if you stay in bats. So my dream was always to get into other species, especially people who travel all over the place. Actually, let me tell you how I got from bats to people. It's kind of a funny story. What's that fuzzy noise? I don't know.

Noam, do you know what the fuzzy noise is? Oh yeah, don't worry about that. That's just one of the holes in the book fruit I was telling you about. You know, the things we don't know yet. And that's how I got into people. Unfortunately, I started making some of those people really sick. I'm sorry, guys. I really just wanted to travel. But some people were getting much sicker than other people. That's because... But the important thing is, when people cough or kiss or maybe shake hands and then touch their face, I can move between them, riding tiny drops in the air. I think I started off in China, but I'm not really sure.

I got into my first person in... From there, I traveled all over, inside of lots of different people. Some of them took buses or trains. Some of them took planes and cruise ships. A lot of people didn't even know they had me, and those people kept passing me to other people. I rode inside one person to South Korea. She coughed on some people at a hotel restaurant, so I hopped into them. Another person flew me all the way to France. I saw the Eiffel Tower,

the Mona Lisa. Oui, oui, c'est magnifique! But also, I got to spread into other people in France, because this lady I was in kept coughing copies of me out. One of the people who got me actually traveled way out to Brazil. I got to see the Amazon rainforest from a plane, and then, eventually, I got to see it in person. I mean inside a person. I traveled pretty much everywhere. Italy, Iran, Australia, and even here, the U.S. So that's my story. I started from a bat and now I'm here. I mean started from a bat and now I'm here. I mean, started from a bat, and now I'm here.

Started from a bat, and now I'm here. So, Lucia, I guess the most simple answer to why coronavirus came here is, oh, right here on page eight. When viruses can spread and travel all over, they do. It actually looks like there's a lot more book fruit to read also. Maybe I can look for specific stuff in here. Do you have any more questions? What was it like when you were growing up in a bat? All right.

Let me look for that. Here it is. Chapter three, growing up in a bat. It was fine. You know, it's pretty easy for me, a virus, to hang out in bats for a long time. In a bat, I don't really make the bat sick because the bats are kind of used to having me around. Unlike in people where, unfortunately, I made them sick. When am I going to go back to school?

Oh, it looks like that is here near the end of the story. Everyone was finally able to go back to school when... Oh man, Lucia, it looks like this hole is really big. We might have to go somewhere else for this answer. I'm going to climb down to Noam, see if we can figure this out. But thank you so much for your question. We are going to do our best to find an answer. But for now, I think this is goodbye.

Goodbye, bird. Goodbye, canona. Virus. Whatever you're called. Lucia, we're going to try to answer your question after the break. Thank you. Thanks for having me. when you join Ramp. You can go to ramp.com slash explained, ramp.com slash explained, R-A-M-P dot com slash explained. Cards issued by

Sutton Bank, member FDIC. Terms and conditions apply. Bye. Today, today explained. Hey, Bird, we're back. Still on a magic island. I know, I'm still glad to be here and not bored in my boring house. And, you know, Lucia's question about going back to school,

a lot of kids were wondering the same thing. Hi, my name is Esther. I'm 11 years old and I'm calling from Philadelphia. My question is, why can't we go to school with face masks and gloves and not do things that we have to be close? Hi, I'm AJ from New Jersey. My school's been out.

I can't see my friends, and it's hard. I've gotten into video games, found some new ones, and I just wanted to talk. Hi, my name is Beatrice. I live in Dajon. I really want to go to school, but I've been out for school for 50 days. I can't go to my friend's house anymore. It's really hard. Do you know the answer? Why can't kids go back to school right now? I mean, I think because teachers and principals said so. Noam, did you hear that? Yeah, it sounded like an echo or something. I think it was coming from over there. Is your island haunted by ghosts? No, there's no ghosts on the island of Explained.

Why don't we check it out? Oh, there's like a little, there's a little path down to that beach over here. Okay. Wow. The seashore is really beautiful. What am I looking at? This is one of my favorite places on the island of Explained.

This whole thing stretching around the corner there, this is the Gulf of Knowledge. Wow. And what's that, what's that rocky shoreline out there? Well, you can see it curves around, and it actually, if you follow it all the way with your eyes, right at the end there, that's the point. Wow. It's almost like every place here has a really punny name.

What about this beach that we're climbing down to? That's the beach. Not the under sands? Not the beach of contracts? Just the beach. Huh. Looks like some kind of very creepy cave. I think I heard someone inside, though.

Should we check it out? I'm not going into the spooky ghost cave. I did the tree. I'm not up for a cave. Okay. I will do the cave. You stay here. I'll report back. Hello? Hello?

Is there someone there? Who's there? Yeah, hi. My name's Noam. I just, I was walking here from the history tree. I heard an echo and I found this cave. What is this place? Oh boy, you've gotten yourself into something here.

This is the cave of Batwai. Batwai. Hmm, how should I explain this? We're in a cave that judges answers. So when you ask a question, if it doesn't like the answer, if it doesn't think it was in-depth or satisfying, it whispers, Batwai.

And why did you come here? Well, you know, I'm just hanging out. Did you hear that? That's the cave whispering. It wasn't a good enough explanation. The real answer is that I love learning. And I came here and I've been listening to the cave. If I say something and the cave says, but why? I want to try harder. I want to get a better answer. I actually have a question that I'd love to get a good answer to. I was just listening to it out there with my friend Bird. It's from a kid named Esty. Let me see if I can call her up. Can you hear me? Yeah, I can hear you. This is Noam. Can you hear me? Yeah. You actually sound great. Where are you calling from? My closet.

Oh, Esty, I forgot to tell you. I've got you on speakerphone in this magic cave here. Basically, the deal is, if the cave doesn't think an answer is a good enough explanation, it'll just whisper batwai over and over again. So you might hear some weird whispering. Batwai, batwai,

batwai. Exactly. So now you've met the cave, but I'm also standing here with a new friend I just met, and I think he might be able to answer your question. Hey, Esty. I'm Brian. It's nice to meet you. So Brian, let me just pull up Esty's question real quick. My question is, why can't we go to school with face masks and gloves and not do things that we have to be close? That's a great question.

But let me ask you a question first. Do you think you're wearing a mask to protect yourself from getting sick? Or are you wearing a mask to protect other people from getting sick? I think it's more about... I think really both. Like, if we don't get sick, then other people won't get sick. So if we don't go out and we don't, like, touch things that might make us sick, and we don't touch other people, then not that much people will get sick. So it's protecting more people than just us.

Exactly. I've been thinking about a little experiment here. Can I tell you about it? Yeah. Do you ever play with dominoes, like the tiles you stack up in a row and knock them over? I did sometimes, but not that much. What did you do with them?

Do you remember? Once I made a circle, and then we pushed it, and then it went all the way around. It was really cool. Exactly. It's kind of like the way coronavirus spreads. If you take one domino...

Oh, that makes so much sense. See, you're, like, steps ahead of us. Okay, Esty, you've clearly got this figured out. But I just want to make sure the cave gets it. Think about the dominoes. If one domino gets sick and falls over... Then it'll just keep going. Yeah, and then...

That is very sad and satisfying. Yeah, you know, when they're just tiles, it's satisfying, but when they're people, it's less good. Yeah. So if we're thinking about people like dominoes, what's the best way to stop more dominoes from falling over? By spreading them apart? Because, like, let's say, like, a kid gets sick.

Like, even if they don't know it, then they're still sick. And then they're, like, going to someone who might have problems or they're old. Or someone like one of my cousins, maybe if, like, I go to visit, then maybe he would get sick and then he would die. Yeah, and then all the dominoes, the people are falling down. Yeah. But you had another part to your question, right? What if we just wore masks and gloves and then we went to school? Would that be okay?

You got the last one. Do you want to try thinking through this, why that might not be a great idea? Well, I feel like even if we do have masks and gloves, we're still like touching things and like it's not protecting us. It's protecting other people. Like if we sneeze, then it's not spreading somewhere else. Yeah, the masks here, they aren't perfect. They do help a little bit. So if you have to go somewhere and be around other people, wear a mask. But because they don't do a perfect job,

the safest thing to do is just stay six feet away. So, did we answer your whole question? Well, part of my question was if we could do things that we don't have to be so close. Like what? Like, if we're sitting in class, then we're able to sit six feet apart, technically. How good do your classmates follow the rules?

If you were to, you know, think about what would happen if your teachers told you all to stay six feet apart, do you think it would happen? No. No. It's really hard to be perfect at this, and if you feel like it's hard, it is because it is hard, and that's okay. You know, Esty, you came here with your own question,

but you've been pretty good at answering them, too. Esty, you're awesome at answering questions, and we haven't even heard the cave ask for a better answer in a while. Why, but why, but why, but why? All right, we're going to let you go before we start any more But Why Chain reactions here, but thanks so much for the question,

Esty. Bye. Goodbye. It was nice to talk to you. And Bird's probably worrying about me, so I'm going to go find her. Thanks again, Brian. Bye, Noam. Noam, you're alive! I'm alive, and I learned a lot. Like what?

Like... This cave it judges answers If they're bad it says but why But why? Exactly And the schools they shouldn't let the kids inside But why? To keep the children safe And their families safe as well

But why? Isn't it obvious why we want to keep families safe? Yeah Sorry, I got totally carried away No problem So Kids keep other people safe If they stay home from school But why? Yeah. Sorry, I got totally carried away. No problem. So. Kids keep other people safe if they stay home from school. But why?

They can't cough on each other. They can't sneeze or spit or drool. But why not masks? Those are pretty good, but perfect they are not. But why? A cough might still get through, so it's best to stay apart. Well, rats. Sorry, bird.

You can't argue with the facts. Noam, thank you for taking me here. You genuinely made my day a lot better. I was happy to. And maybe we can come back sometime. I'd love that. That's Today Explains Noam Hassenfeld, kids. Sorry, he's not available for birthday parties at this time, but Bird Pinkerton might be.

She produced this episode with Noam. Thanks, Bird. Noam and Bird had a ton of help today from Vox's editorial director of podcasts, Liz Kelly Nelson, as well as our old pal Jillian Weinberger and our new pal Rachel Giannini. Vox's science editor, Eliza Barkley, played Corona. Vox's Brian Resnick played Brian. Thanks to Lauren Katz and Alexa Lee from Vox for keeping it social. And big ups to our extended Vox Media family, Amanda Northrup, Alex Medina, and Alex's son, Luca. The Today Explained team includes Efim Shapiro and sometimes his son, Harvey,

Bridget McCarthy, Halima Shah, and Amina Alsadi. Cecilia Lay checks the facts. Breakmaster Cylinder brings the beats. Today Explained is a part of the Vox Media Podcast Network, and you can spend more time on the island of Explained with a set of

activities we've put together for you to do with your grown-ups and to do with your kids go to vox.com slash today explained learning to find four fun activities from testing how far snot travels to coloring in your very own map of the island of explained again that site is vox.com slash todayexplainedlearning. Thanks.