英文原版对话1000个:972 Common Errors

Tom: Jess, you were talking before about mistakes that your Hungarian students always made, and how some students from the same country all make the same mistakes again and again and again. Well, I work here in Thailand and they have a very cute phrase, "same, same" which I think means to describe something as being the same as something else, I spend five - ten minutes talking to a student explaining that instead of using same same, she should use "the same as" and I was trying to get this phrase over to her and finally she understood what I meant and she looked at me and said, "Ah, same as same same same same".

Jess: In Spain, I think the most common mistake was that in Spanish the noun people is a singular noun. You would say "le gente es" so when my Spanish speakers would use this noun they would always say, "Oh the people is very hungry" or "the people is very quiet" and I spent most of my time in Spain going "are - are - are" after these, the noun "people" even upper intermediate¹, advanced learners will still making that mistake.

In France, one very common mistake was the pronuciation error. The sound "Th" at the beginning words, for example, "there" or "those" that the French would pronounce with a zed sound, so "zere" or "zose" and I was very reluctant to correct it because it's such a sexy accent and it sounds so much more gorgeous² with the French "ZZ" but I did have to correct it and I was always in France sticking my tongue out of my mouth to emphasize to them that there tongue needed to be forward of their teeth to make the correct sound.

You said you worked in Libya. What were the common mistakes for Libyan students?

Tom: One that always made me smile was when a cheery student or the security guard at the school or people that I met around the compound where I was living would give me a cheery wave and say "How are you? I'm fine" and it took me a good month or two before I realized that in Arabic the question and answer do go together. It just sounds strange in English. I thought they were jumping the gun by answering their own question.

Jess: Sounds like they were talking to themselves. And how about in Japan?

Tom: Now, Japanese have another common phrase which I think it used both in Japanese and because it comes from English they use it in English to. It's "so-so". I'm not quite sure when you might use it. It's when things are not quite good, not quite bad, so if you say, "hey, how are you doing?", they will say "so-so" or if you say, "Hey, how's your food?" they'll say, "so-so". It's not English and the first few months I had of hearing that, I really couldn't quite work out. I understood the meaning, but I knew that it was not something I would ever say, but the difficulty there is trying to think of a good alternative. It's that kind of non-commital, I don't really care answer. I like strong opinions. I love it. I hate it. Let's leave this so-so.

Jess: I agree. It's like over use of the adjective nice. It just sounds really bland³.
 

1 intermediate   

adj.中间的，居间的，中级的；n.中间体，媒介物

参考例句：

• This country is now at an intermediate stage of development.这个国家目前正处于发展的中间阶段。
• Gray is intermediate between black and white.灰色介于黑色和白色之间。

2 gorgeous   

adj.华丽的，灿烂的，美丽的，宜人的，棒的

参考例句：

• The gorgeous costume added to the brilliance of the dance.华丽的服装使舞蹈更加光彩夺目。
• What a gorgeous day it is today!今天天气多好啊！

3 bland   

adj.淡而无味的，温和的，无刺激性的

参考例句：

• He eats bland food because of his stomach trouble.他因胃病而吃清淡的食物。
• This soup is too bland for me.这汤我喝起来偏淡。