At the beginning of this article, I want to tell you a funny experience my SM3 friends had.
A few days after arriving Singapore, some friends of mine wanted to take a taxi back to Eton hall instead of taking a bus as usual. Since Eton hall is not a well-known place, they decided to tell the driver the name of the bus stop we usually get off which is quite near Eton hall. The bus stop is named “opp Gillman hts Condo”, but they can just remember the first word, “opp”. Apparently, they didn’t know what the meaning of “opp” is. So, after they got on the taxi, they told the taxi driver to send them to “opp” without hesitation. The driver was totally confused, because “opp” can be found everywhere. The driver told them that “opp” is short for the word “opposite”, and they felt so embarrassed.
Of course, this is a joke about language. However, behind this joke, we may find a fact that our vocabulary is not so balanced. Maybe, we can remember some so called difficult or long words occurred in the textbooks. We, including the teachers, are crazy about fancy words because they can help us out in the examinations. But when it comes to everyday life vocabulary, I didn’t know the words even three years old English-speaking children know, such as “seesaw”, “flip-flops”. Don’t even mention the informal expressions used frequently in the English-speaking world. These are not allowed to appear in the text books, but they do appear in our daily life.
So this is a paradox in English education. Maybe in English teaching, the content should be more relevant to our life. I think language, basically is just a tool to communicate. It should be used in our life eventually. For me, it is really a pity that having learnt English for so many years, we still don’t know the meaning of “opp”.
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Actually when I see your title, I think you are going to tell the meaning of “oops”, however, after I read your blog did I realize you are talking about “opposite”. To be frank, I met this embarrassing situation as well. What’s more interesting is that we asked the bus driver about this and he didn’t get it at all. So we can just see the view and trying to find a suitable bus stop. Only after we first met our seniors did we know that “opp” stands for “opposite”. How awkward we were at that time! Anyway, learning and master a language is a tough task, we still have a long way to go.
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