I dunno...

Hey everyone, I'm not sure if I talked about this before or not so I decided to post a small lesson about it today. In casual English, the sentence I don't know is often said as:

I dunno.

This is really common in Canada and the U.S. and we use it all the time, especially young people. For example, this is a conversation I might have had in high school:

A: I'm bored...

Phil: Yeah, me too.

A: Whaddaya wanna do?

Phil: I dunno, whadda YOU wanna do?

A: I dunno...

Phil: Umm, let's call Marc maybe he has an idea~!

So in this conversation you see "What do you" becoming "Whaddaya" but the second time I said "Whadda YOU" with the stress on YOU because I was redirecting the question back to my friend. And of course, want to became wanna...

Now, when I was a kid in Canada there was a show called You Can't Do that on Television and on that show everytime a character said "I don't know" or "I dunno" they would get slimed~! Here's a clip from Youtube:




Ok that's it for now, have a good week~!

Phil

That's like the pot calling the kettle black...

Hey everyone, I came back from my trip to Europe and am ready to post some new lessons ^_^ I hope you all had a Happy New Year and good luck in your studies in 2010!

Today, I was talking to my friend at a cafe and asked her if she liked my new tuque(winter hat in Canadian English pronounced Two-ku), she said she didn't like it... then when we were leaving I saw her tuque and said:

"That's like the pot calling the kettle black!"

She had no idea what I was talking about so I had to explain the idiom and thought it would make a nice post for my blog~!

First, let's go over the vocabulary:

pot - a deep round container used for cooking, usually made of metal and often having a lid.

kettle - a metal pot with a lid used for boiling water, often called a teakettle

A teapot is used to serve tea BUT is NOT used to boil water, whereas a teakettle is used to boil water to make tea and may or may not be used to serve it.

Now, when people use pots and kettles to cook over a fire over time they turn black. So, normally BOTH pots and kettles are black. So the expression "That's like the pot calling the kettle black!" is used when someone says something about someone else BUT it is also true about them!!!

Fat guy: I had to break up with my girlfriend.

Friend: What?!?! Why? You seemed happy together...

Fat guy: She got fat so I dumped her.

Friend: What? That's the pot calling the kettle black buddy!

So as you can see it is often used when someone say something negative about someone which is also true about them!

Have a nice week and I hope you enjoy my new lessons in 2010,

Phil

Christmas Songs/Carols

Hey everyone, at the moment I am in Holland enjoying my winter holidays so today I will just be showing you some videos of famous English Christmas carols from youtube. Enjoy and:

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year~!

Jingle Bells, popular with kids



Silent Night, a mellow Christmas classic plus We Wish you a Merry Christmas and Joy to the World... a bit long




Bing Crosby singing White Christmas, another classic




Dean Martin singing Let it Snow, winter song~!




Elvis Presley singing the mellow, Silent Night

Do you go to cram school?

In Japan, many children go to juku, 塾 (じゅく), to prepare for entrance exams for High School, University, etc. These kinds of schools don't really exist in Canada or the U.S., if we feel our kids need to study more we hire a tutor to come to our homes and help them study. Usually, the teacher will contact the parents saying their kid needs help and will recommend a student of a higher grade to tutor them.

In English, we translate juku as cram school. This comes from the verb to cram which means to force something into a space which is too small for it. For example:

The pushers on the yamanote line crammed the people into the train.

Wow~! Did you see they crammed 15 clowns into that tiny car!

Be careful, in English pusher means (illegal) drug dealer but in Japanese it is someone who pushes people onto crowded trains during rush hour!!!

Now, from that meaning students started to use it to talk about last minute studying because they have a lot of information to cram into their brains in a short amount of time. For example:

Man, I'm not ready for tomorrow's final... I'm really gonna have to cram tonight!

I had to cram all weekend to pass my history midterm.

Often when students have to study hard they pull an all-nighter. This means that they study all night without sleeping!

My teacher is crazy~! I had to pull an all-nighter just to read this week's material!!!

Hmm, that's it for now, have a great weekend,

Phil

Do Japanese people have...?

So time for another mini-lesson, as it is the holiday season I am pretty busy doing Christmas shopping and packing for my upcoming trip to Europe so I don't have as much free time to write longer posts. Sorry about that, but I hope you still enjoy these shorter lessons ^_-



Today, I will be talking about some rooms and places you fill find in a house in the West. I wonder if Japanese homes also have these? Maybe you can post a comment and let me know~!



So the typical rooms in a house are:

• an attic アティック or 屋根裏 (やねうら)
• a pantry パントリー or 配膳室 (はいぜんしつ)
• a living room 居間 (いま)
• a dining room ダイニングルーム
• a kitchen キッチン or 台所 (だいどころ)
• a bedroom 寝室 (しんしつ)
• a bathroom (which usually also has a toilet)
• a garage ガレージ
• a basement 地下室 ( ちかしつ) or 地階 (ちかい)
• a hallway 廊下 (ろうか)

You might also hear about some other places in a western home. For example at my house we had:

a den, this was our TV room we also had a living room for special occasions

a linen closet in the hallway where we kept linens like; sheets, blankets, towels, etc.

a junk drawer in the kitchen, where we would keep all kinds of junk like; rubber bands, twist ties, staplers, scissors, string, glue, etc.

So do Japanese homes have linen closets, dens or junk drawers?

Phil

I have a real sweet tooth ^_-

Hey everyone, today we will have a quick lesson of a noun that I think is fun and interesting to know. I wrote it down on a scrap of paper a long time ago and came across it now so decided it was time to write about it~!

a sweet tooth (n)

Now we use this noun in the same way as "I have a book" or "I have a bad back" so it's used with the verb to have + a sweet tooth. This means that you REALLY love sweets. It means that you often eat sweet foods and that you psychologically feel an urge to eat sweets as often as you can. In Japanese, you might use:

甘いもの好き (あまいものずき)

Since it is the Christmas season, many people are eating sweet foods like pies, cakes and pastries so you might hear someone say:

"I have a real sweet tooth."

or when shopping you might ask:

"What gift do you recommend for someone with a sweet tooth?"

Have a good week,

Phil

What can you do in Montreal?

Hey everyone, how's everything with you? Today, we are gonna have a quick pronounciation lesson. In English, when you have a word which finishes in O followed by a word which starts in I it becomes a WI sound.

O + I = WI

So here are a few example sentences to help you sound more like a native English speaker.

What are you doing? (formal)

Whad R U do-wing? (normal)

Whacha do-win? (casual)

Here you can see that "What are you" becomes "Whacha" in very casual English. You will often hear kids asking this questions~!

What is going on this weekend? (formal)

What's go-wing on this weekend? (normal)

What's go-win-non this weekend? (casual)

You can notice that in casual English the final g in words is often dropped:

going -----> goin'

doing -----> doin'

Also notice that the N connects to the following vowel. Just like you get:

an apple ----> an-Napple

an orange -----> an-Norange

and so when you drop the final G you get:

going on -----> go-win-Non

Here's my final example:

What can you do in Montreal? (formal)

What can you do-win Montreal? (normal)

What can ya do-win Montreal? (casual)

Alright, that's it for now have a good weekend~!

Phil