Meeting an old friend
Do the preparation task first. Then listen to the audio and do the exercises.
Preparation
Transcript
Selina: Patrick? Is that you?
Patrick: Selina! Hello!
Selina: Well, well. Patrick Eastwood. How have you been?
Patrick: Good. Great, actually. How are you? I haven't seen you for ... how long?
Selina: It's been ages. At least fifteen years. Wow.
Patrick: Yeah. Wow.
Patrick and Selina: So, what are you doing here?
Selina: Sorry, you go first.
Patrick: OK. What are you doing here? I thought you'd moved to London.
Selina: I was in London for a couple of years. But it didn't work out.
Patrick: Oh, I'm sorry to hear that. Are you ... OK?
Selina: I'm fine! The dream job wasn't really a dream, you know? Um ... and London is great but it's so expensive. I mean, just the rent on a flat is ... uh … crazy expensive.
Patrick: I see.
Selina: So, I came back. I've been back now for almost five months. Living back home with Mum and Dad. Which is err ... interesting. Um ... but anyway, what about you?
Patrick: Me? Oh, nothing new. You know me – 'Patrick the predictable'. I never left here.
Selina: Oh. And is that ...?
Patrick: Oh, I'm very happy. I'm married now. We've just celebrated our tenth anniversary.
Selina: No way! You? Married? To …?
Patrick: I don't think you know her. Her name's Marigold. And we've got two kids. They're five and eight years old.
Selina: Married and with two kids? Wow!
Patrick: Don't look so surprised!
Selina: No, no … I'm just amazed how time flies! I'm happy for you. I really am.
Patrick: Thanks. You should really come round to the house one day.
Selina: That would be great. Let's swap numbers and ...
Do you keep in touch with old friends?
No, honestly, it's hard for me to keep in touch with old friends and people in general; I don't send them messages, I don't respond after a few days... I think I'm a very bad friend, but I don't do it on purpose
This recording is helful to me. i love it 😍
I like the way Selina's amazed how time flies. I can't imagine how my own life and my loved ones' lives could be in 10 years, 20 years, and even more...
I love that lesson :)
i have 5/6 oin preparation
7/8 in task1 after second trying
4/6 in task 2
that not bad, i can do better
Yes, absolutly, they're with me actually
I believe old friends are very important to us because we share so many memories and experiences with them.
We've taught them some things, and they've taught us a lot — that's why we should keep in touch with our friends. As people get older, the value of friendship increases for them.
I don’t live in my hometown now, and that’s why my old friends are very valuable to me, and I usually call them every day to stay in touch. However, new friends are important too, because they help me grow and adapt to my new life and environment.
Absolutely yes in past we didn't according to life Ddificulties but now through the technology the world becomes a tiny village.
In the preparation part, The dream job wasn't really A DREAM, why is the answer ''perfect'', and not ''boring''?
Hello yasuragi,
The word 'really' here means 'in fact' or 'in reality' so it tells us that we are going to talk about a contrast: the job was supposed to be ideal but in reality it was not. As we have a negative verb (wasn't) we need a positive attribute. If the verb was positive then we could use a negative attribute:
In reality it wasn't perfect.
In reality it was boring.
Peter
The LearnEnglish Team