Paris: In A Nutshell
| This is the first entry in the Paris in a Nutshell series. This entry is available as a Adobe Acrobat file for printing or use in a class. This entry includes a listening exercises. You can dowload the MP3 or play it using the button below. (MP3) |
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I can’t think of any topic that’s as boring as talking about someone else’s vacation. Too bad: today—and this whole week, really—we’re going to be talking about my vacation.
But it won’t be a normal vacation report. Instead, we’re going to do some listening to the way I’d describe my vacation in just a few minutes to someone like my mother. . . and we’ll talk about the vocabulary I used.
You can decide if you want to listen before you read this, or after. What I have here are explanations of a few of the words and phrases I used in my “vacation report.”
I said we felt “recharged and energetic” when we came back. What does that mean? You might know that ‘energetic’ means we had energy. That’s all it means: ‘with energy.’ If you play tennis with a lot of energy, you’re an energetic tennis player. If you argue with a lot of energy, you argue energetically.
For ‘recharged,’ it’s best to think of your cell phone. You can carry it with you and it works with no wires, but not forever. Eventually, the battery will have no more energy left, and then you’ll need to plug it into the wall to ‘fill it up’ with energy. You recharge your battery. If you feel ‘recharged,’ then it means you had no energy, but now you’re filled back up. After the weekend, I usually feel recharged enough to go back to work.
I can’t recommend Paris as a place to go. What does that mean? It means that I won’t tell you to go there. Think about restaurants: When your best friend is thinking about a good place to take his girlfriend on a romantic dinner, can you tell him the name of a good restaurant? You can recommend a restaurant to him. To ‘recommend’ something is simply to say that you think it’s good.
In Germany, I said, people are more willing to speak English. ‘Willing’ is a word you don’t hear very often, but it’s not a difficult concept to understand. There are some things that I’m able to do: speak English, drive a car, speak German, wash the dishes and, yes, even jump from a bridge.
It sounds crazy to say I’m able to jump from a bridge—I never would do it—but I have all the muscles I need to walk onto a bridge and jump off. But, even if I can jump off a bridge, I won’t. I never will. I’m just not willing to jump from a bridge. When I say that Germans are more willing to speak English, I don’t mean that they speak English better than the French, I mean that the French don’t speak English with tourists. . . and Germans will. ‘Willing‘ has nothing to do with if you can do something or not. It has everything to do with if you’ll say ‘no’ or not.
Do you have any questions on what I said in the recording? Feel free to ask them, any time! Did I speak too quickly? Too slowly? How well did you do?
I have a few questions for you:
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Have you been to Paris? What did you think? Was my description good, or not so good?
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Do you think I liked the city? Or did it sound more like I didn’t like the city?
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How would you use these words in sentences of your own? Don’t ‘just’ make sentences. Think about how you can use these words in your life!
October 13th, 2009 at 21:01
Dear Toby,
I have to admit I was surprised with your little comment, more precisely about the (un)willingness of the French to speak English.
I do remember the first time I went to Paris – the early 90s if my memory doesn’t betray me. I knew I had better not speak ANY English at all, so I survived with my French (and my Spanish, of course!). Somehow it worked.
I have to say I have not yet listened to the other lessons about Paris, but in this one you sound more like you didn’t like it. In any case, I remember I didn’t like it that much. Probably because I had been told it was the quintessential city in (of?) the Universe, bla, bla, bla. Well, probably I was expecting too much.
Anyhow, and back to the willingness / unwillingness of the French to speak English: even if I didn’t fall for it the first time I was there, Paris is Paris. So when I had a chance I went back. To my surprise many people decided to use English with me the last time I was there, although initially I had addressed them in French. I don’t know why. But I certainly appreciated their reciprocity!
Best regards,
Beatriz Martinez
October 14th, 2009 at 19:18
Beatriz:
I guess you and I had very different experiences. To me, the only people who didn’t mind speaking English were the ones who were taking my money. In general, though, I heard a lot of ‘why don’t you speak French?’
(To be honest, my wife, who speaks French, was often asked why I didn’t.)
Maybe I’ll go back and try again,
-Toby