Hello everyone, and welcome to 'Weekly
English Tips for Russian Speakers'-
Normally I present to you, each week, one
common English mistake made by those who
speak Russian as a mother tongue, but
this week I'm going to do things a
little bit different. This week I'm going
to present to you ten everyday English
situations, and teach you how to handle
yourself in those situations - use the
right phrases, etc. So let's get started.
I thought it would be best if I
presented to you a list of the ten
everyday situations, and then you can
look at them and then you can try to
decide yourself how you would handle it.
Then I will talk about each one, and
you can see how you did after that. So
here is the list here.
Just one other quick thing: You will probably have to
pause the video and think about each
answer individually.
I just want to say from the start
that 'How are you?' is a very good and
acceptable way to say something, and it's
a good fallback. You can always say 'How
are you?' in every situation...and actually
you have to use it, I think, in very
formal situations and the situation
where you don't know somebody so well.
That being said, I actually don't say 'How
are you?' very often in my life because
I'm not often in those situations. I
say these other phrases -- and I've made
a list for you in the slide that
follows this section. I divided them
into two parts: There's the questions
that start with 'how' and the questions
that start with 'what', and they have different
answers which I'll talk about in the
section that follows the slide. The 'how'
questions are'How are you doing?'
(that's very common), 'How's everything going?'
(that's also very common),
'How's it going?' (that's probably the one I
say the most) and 'How are things going?'
Then the 'what' section.
'What's up?'-- that's actually very common as
well -- 'What's going on?' and 'What have you
been up to?'
So the textbook answer to 'How are you?'
in every textbook around the world is
'I'm fine thank you, and you?' Again,
it's a very acceptable answer and it's a
good fallback answer. In reality, we
don't actually say that very much. We
answer in many different ways. If
you're doing very well you could say
'Great, actually. How about you?' Two
things with this: The word 'actually' is
a great word that you should really get
into your vocabulary -- we say it all the time --and
notice I said 'How about you?', so I reflect
the question back to you.
That's a very important skill. You
could also say 'Not bad. How's it going
with you?' and that's probably the one I say
the most because it's pretty neutral -- you're not
doing fantastic, you're not doing bad...so not bad.
Then again, I reflect the question back to
you. If you're doing a little bit
negative you could say 'It could be
better, I guess.
How are you doing?''...again, you're reflecting
the question. If you're doing
terrible --
and if you're speaking to the right
person -- you can say 'Awful, actually. It's
been a rough week.
How are you?' Again, I reflect the
question back to you.
Ok, so those are the 'how' questions,
right? With the 'what' questions it's
actually pretty easy. If you say....if I say
to you...or if you say to me 'What's up?' I
could say 'Not much. What's up with you?'
'Not much' is a very good answer to the
'what' questions.
The standard response to 'thank you' is,
of course, 'You're welcome.' This is a
very good response, and you can use it in
any situation, and I do use it quite a
lot. I think I more often say 'No
problem.'...
that's a good response to 'thank you'.
You might have learned that you could
say 'My pleasure', and this is ok, but it's
a little bit too much and a little bit
too formal, and I wouldn't use it very
much.
Okay, a few
responses to 'I'm sorry.' Again, I think it
depends on the level of the apology.
if it's...if somebody is just a little bit sorry
about something you could say 'Don't
worry about it.' or 'It's ok...it's no problem.'
That might be a good response. If
it's a huge apology, and it really
affects your life , and the person says 'I'm
really, really sorry.'
You could say, 'Apology accepted.'
Okay, this one is actually the easiest of
the bunch. Let's say you ask me 'Can
you hand me the marker?' I would say
one of two things: I would say 'Here you
go.' or 'Here you are.' So 'Here you go.' 'Here
you are.'
That's about it.
I've just cooked a dinner,
and I have friends and family around and
I want them to start eating because
they're waiting patiently and politely.
I think what I would say in an informal
situation is 'Dig in.'...
so just start eating. I could also say,
for example, 'Help yourself.' --
so just start eating, basically.
In this familiar phrase that is used in many
languages around the world, if you want
people to enjoy the food in English then
we usually use the French. You would
say 'Bon appetit'. If you don't want to
use that foreign language then you could
say 'Enjoy your meal.'
I'm introduced to somebody. Let's say
someone says, 'This is Timo.', and I would
say'Nice to meet you.' Then Timo would
say to me back
'Nice to meet you, too.' It's always good
to say 'Nice to meet you, too.' You
shouldn't hesitate to do that.
I just wanted to talk a little bit
about a mistake I hear a lot. The
first time you meet somebody you say
'Nice to meet you.', but that's the only
time you ever say 'Nice to meet you.' to
somebody. After that, you say 'Nice to
see you.' or 'Nice to see you again.'
It's very common in English to say
'Have a nice day.' The proper response
to that is 'Same to you.' or just 'You too.'
and this applies for many situations.
'Merry Christmas' 'Same to you.' 'You too. 'Happy
New Year.' 'Same to you.'
'You too.'
''Good-bye' is a very standard
response and it's a very good response
and you can fall back on it.
However, it's the same kind of thing as these
other things, and we don't actually say it
that, that often. I will give you some
examples of other things you might say.
You could say just 'bye'. You could say
'bye-bye'.
You could say 'See you later.' -- and I think
that's the thing I probably say the most. You
could say 'Take care' , and 'Take care' is
very nice. It's a...it's not overdoing it,
and it's kind of a kind way to say
good-bye.
You could say 'So long' which is something
I also say a lot. You could say -- to be
totally informal -- 'Have a good one.'
That might be the informal one you might
have in your arsenal.
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