Improve Your English – 228 [Archives:2004/722/Education]

Dr. Ramakanta Sahu
I. What to Say
Situations and Expressions (64)
Wedding wishes (II)

Marriage symbolises a solemn pledge of two loving hearts locked in a lasting partnership to fight the battle life together, with a spirit of deep understanding and abiding faith in each other.

– Marriage is a beautiful bond of love, strengthened by trust and togetherness. May all the joys of a happy marriage be yours to have and yours to share through many wonderful years together.
– As the two of you tie into a holy matrimony, here's sending you a world of luck. A wedding brings feelings that are based upon the love and hopes that two people share. So, as you experience the wonderful feeling of this special occasion, you're wished the best, that life can bring your way. Wishing you happiness always.
– Wedding greetings as both of you tie the eternal bond of love. Hope your precious relationship grows and strengthens each day, and life showers the best for you.
– As the two of you start on a new journey of togetherness, here's wishing that your journey be harbored with love and compassion, and may the moments you both live, be cherished by you all life through. Wishing life's best as you wed.
– On your wedding, wishing you life's best. Hope your wedding be a fresh season of spring. Wishing a ceremony that brings two unknown people so close, that nothing seems closer than the love they share, especially for you as both tie the knot.
– Warm greetings on your wedding. In marriage two people together, can create an infinite love.
– When two people join their lives together, they feel all of life's ups and downs. These two people will face each failure together and discover the strengths to go on. They'll encourage each other's dreams and forgive each other's faults through a labor of love. These two will become one, creating a marriage that'll grow into an infinite love.
– A wedding is a start of togetherness of walks in the rain, basking in the sunshine, caring for one another and sensing the love that marriage carries.

II. How to Say it Correctly
Correct errors, if any, in the following sentences
1. He is the last but one boy in the class.
2. We doubted that he will win the case.
3. I have decided to substitute the old curtains by new ones.
4. If he tries hard he may succeed to accomplish the task.
5. They are studying in this college since 2001.

Suggested answers to last week's questions
1. Men are but children of a larger growth.
2. The answer should be written on a sheet of paper.
3. No other girl in the class is as resourceful as Aisha.
4. We must guard ourselves against bad habits.

III. Increase Your Word Power
(A) How to express it in one word
1. The theory of heredity tending to reduce to numerical law the recurrence of inherited characters.
2. Study of the form of animals, plants or words.
3. Place where dead bodies are kept.
4. Coining a new word.
5. Showing undue favor to one's relatives.

Suggested answers to last week's questions
1. An excessive morbid desire to steal: kleptomania (n)
2. One who compiles a dictionary: lexicographer (n)
3. One who is a free thinker on religion: libertine (n)
4. The philosophy of practicing duplicity in statecraft: Machiavellianism (n)
5. A ridiculous confusion and misuse of words: malapropism (n)

(B) Foreign words and expressions
Give the source of origin and meaning of the following:
1. gazette 2. genre 3. ghazel
4. grammatology 5. grotesque

Suggested answers to last week's questions
1. essay (Fr. 'essai' meaning 'attempt'): A composition, in prose, which discusses, formally or informally, a topic or a variety of topics.
2. euphemism (Gk. 'fair speech'): The substitution of a mild and pleasant expression for a harsh and blunt one, such as 'to pass away' for 'do die'.
3. euphony (Gk. 'sweetness of sound'): Pleasantness of sound.
4. Farce (Lat. 'Farcire' meaning 'to stuff'): Play full of ridiculous situations to make people laugh.
5. Festschrift (Gk. 'celebration writing'): A 'homage volume' compiled in honor of a distinguished scholar or writer.

(C) Words commonly confused
Bring out differences in meaning of the following pairs of words
1. aspire, expire
2. avocation, vocation
3. beneficial, beneficent
4. childish, childlike
5. complement, compliment

Suggested answers to last week's questions
1. blue (adj.): He was dressed in blue for the party.
blew (v. past of 'blow'): The referee blew his whistle to end the game.
2. boar (n.) (a wild male pig): A boar is a wild animal.
bore (v.t.) (make someone feel tired): I am never bored listening to lilting music.
3. moral (n) (standards of behavior): This is a story with a moral.
morale (n) (temper, state of mind): The morale of our army is very high at the moment.
4. stairs (n) (series of fixed steps): He fell from the stairs and was injured.
stare (vt) (look fixedly at): Don't stare at me like this.
5. advice (n) (opinion about what to do): Please heed my honest advice.
advise (vt) (recommend): The patient was advised complete rest.

(C) Idioms and phrases
Bring out the meanings of the following in sentences
1. nigger in a wood pile
2. to pick a quarrel
3. penny wise pound foolish
4. once in a blue moon
5. maiden speech

Suggested answers to last week's questions
1. eagle-eyed (keen sighted): It is impossible to escape from the eagle-eyed police officer.
2. an old flame (some one with whom one used to be in love): She is an old flame of mine.
3. gate crasher (uninvited intruder): Such gate crashers as him should be properly dealt with.
4. gift of the gab (power of talking): He is adored for his gift of the gab.
5. heart to heart (free and frank talk without hiding anything): The two friends had a heart to heart discussion.

IV. Grammar and Composition
(A) Grammar
Choose the best answer
1. He wants to know
A. What is the time?
B. What is the time
C. What the time is?
D. What the time is.
E. What time is it.

2. Monkeys use —– tails to help them climb.
A. is B. it's C. his D. their E. their's

3. The teacher gave him
A. many good advices
B. a lot of good advice
C. many good advice
D. a lot of good advices
E. much good advices

4. Most children go to school —– bus.
A. on B. in C. by D. to E. with

5. This book is Eshrag's, but that one is not —–
A. her B. hers C. her's D. hers'
E. her's book

Suggested answers to last week's questions
1. As a result of the recession, we've had to raise the amount of money we spend on research and development.
2. Last year was a good year for the company and our sales rose considerably.
3. The price of coffee has gone up as a result of bad weather conditions.
4. Many Asian companies have entered the market and there has been a 20% fall in prices.
5. Some govts. fear a drop in Japanese investment in Europe.
6. The decline in profits is the result of poor management.

(B) Paragraph writing
Expand the idea contained in the maxim
59: Friendship is seldom lasting but between equals

Last week's topic
58: Fashions in dress are much less harmful than intellectual fashions

Fashion refers to the manner of doing or making something. It is the way of dressing or behaving that is considered the best at a certain time. In fact, trends in dress keep on changing in keeping with the change in people's taste. New trends in dress or manners are, by and large, harmless. However, some people love to flaunt new-fangled ideas and stylize themselves as 'trendy'. They project themselves as iconoclasts and flout time-tested ideas, social norms, beliefs and practices, dubbing them orthodox or conservative. They often set harmful new trends in thought patterns and pave the way for moral and spiritual degradation, or bankruptcy of the new generation. Thus, fashion in dress are much less harmful than the intellectual fads of the pseudo-intellectuals who misguide innocent minds by their misadventure.

V. Pearls From The Holy Quran
“Allah! There is no god
But He: of a surety
He will gather you together
On the Day of Judgment,
About which there is no doubt,
And Whose word can be
Truer than Allah's?
S4: A87

VI. Words of Wisdom
“The only victory that counts is the one over yourself.”
)Jesse Owens
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