Living the Dream

HELLO FROM SAMANTHA

Dear Juliette

Thank you for your wonderful description of your big move to London. As you will realise from the comments you received from your readers, you are “living the dream” that so many people have, that is, you have made the enormous effort to uproot yourself and settle in a new country. It’s a move that means using a second language and learning about a new culture, which are both stressful life events. This experience is usually both difficult and rewarding, and you always grow from it as a person. So it was first study, then love that brought you to England! I’m sorry to hear that your relationship (not “relation”, paragraph 4) didn’t work out. That’s too bad; the positive outcome is that you are still in London and seem to be making your mark here!

I know exactly what you mean about London. I love to visit, it is such a vibrant, cosmopolitan city, the museums and parks are fantastic and there is so much to do. But as you say, you need a lot of money to have a good time in London, as everything is so expensive. You describe it as an “urban jungle” (paragraph 5), which is a great phrase to use. The technical word for this phrase is an “oxymoron”. Here we have two words with opposite meanings: “urban” meaning “belonging to a city”, and “jungle” obviously meaning "wild natural environment". It sums up London perfectly. You also say that you have “got the feeling to live on another planet” (paragraph 5), we could re-phrase this and write “it’s like living on another planet”. I love the way you continue to use the language of contrast throughout the paragraph. You say “Some days I love it, some days I hate it.” (paragraph 5) Another way of describing this conflict in your feelings is to say that you have a “love-hate” relationship with London. We can have a “love-hate” relationship with a person, too, but I wouldn’t recommend it! (Love-hate is also an oxymoron).You also mention that your feelings are “mix” (paragraph 5), which describes the same condition. In this case, we use “mixed” as the adjective to describe feelings that are different or conflicting. [Task] When we use language from a particular area of vocabulary, for example the language of contrast, we are using a particular semantic field. It means that our writing style has more unity and this is a particular feature of journalistic writing! Please try to do this again in your next entry. You could choose language of reminiscence (or any other area that interests you) and try to use as many verbs, adjectives, adverbs and nouns as possible.

I really enjoyed reading your blog, it was interesting both from a teacher’s point of view in terms of the language you used, and from a personal point of view, to hear about your experience. So thank you for sharing all of this with us, Juliette! Your use of verbs was even better than Friday’s entry, but you still made a few mistakes! Perhaps you were a little distracted when you were telling us about the lovely Englishman because you used the present tense, not the past tense! (paragraph 5). In your very last paragraph, when you say that you are going to stop writing, you use the simple present, but what tense should you use?

Finally, a comment about word order: in paragraph 1 you say that you will “read twice my blog”, but I would prefer it if you read your blog twice! In you next entry, as well as keeping an eye on verb tense, I would like you to focus on linking words, to improve the flow of information from one sentence to the next. To help you, I have highlighted many of the linking words in this blog in bold!

Looking forward to reading part 2 of your adventure!

Best wishes

Samantha

PS.
Thank you for telling us about superstitions in your own countries. Thanks, in particular to Carmen, who is an authority on this subject! The grammar structure I copied from Juliette’s entry of February 16th was (Juliette) “Being French, I’ve got lots of problems…” I use this three times to start a sentence: “Looking at your blog…”; “Being careful about verb tense…” and “Looking forward to your next post”.

USEFUL WORDS AND EXPRESSIONS

living the dream (phrase)
This means that you are putting into practice what most people just dream about doing.

uproot (verb)
To make a move or a big change in your life. Usually uproot carries the implication of leaving something behind you.

settle (verb)
Here, settle is used to mean go and live somewhere.

stressful (adjective)
Worring, causing anxiety or distress.

relationship (noun)
Used to mean the connection between two people; here Juliette uses it to mean between a man and a woman, but it can be used for any kind of family, social or working relationship.

making your mark (phrase)
Making an impression on other people, making a name for yourself.

vibrant (adjective)
Lively, full of energy.

cosmopolitan (adjective)
Containing people of all nationalities and cultures. Used in a positive way to mean that a city is sophisticated and interesting.

urban jungle (noun)
The idea that a city can be uncivilised, scary and non-stop.

oxymoron (noun)
This is a literary term, which is used about two words used together which have opposite meanings. For example, in my entry on Sunday 18th February, I mentioned the almonds given to guests at weddings, which are sweet and bitter at the same time. “Bitter-sweet” is an oxymoron. The use of words containing oxymoron is very useful when describing mixed feelings, such as Juliette has about living in London.

living on another planet (phrase)
This means that you feel as though you are living somewhere very strange and unknown.

love-hate (adjective)T
This term is used to describe a relationship which often changes between intense love and hate.

semantic field (noun)
A “subject area” of vocabulary, for example, the semantic field of business would include adjectives, nouns and verbs connected to business.

reminiscence (noun)
Recalling past events and memories.

conflict (noun)
Used here to mean a struggle between liking and disliking something at the same
time.

conflicting (adjective)
In opposition with each other.

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