hi everyone and welcome back to my channel learn academic english so yesterday i opened
youtube and there was a suggested video from a pretty well-known youtube english
channel and the title of the video was don't say happy birthday and i thought to myself
hmm don't say happy birthday well why not what are you supposed to say i opened the video and
i watched it and i noticed that she was suggesting other ways to say happy birthday but the problem
is that we don't really use those other ways we almost always say happy birthday and i noticed
that this is a pretty common trend on youtube these videos of stop saying happy birthday or
don't say how are you and i don't like this trend the reason is that i think that as an english
learner you have so many things that you need to learn english is a language with a huge vocabulary
there are a lot of phrasal verbs and idioms the pronunciation is not easy and i think that you
have enough things that you need to learn so when people start telling you don't say how are you or
stop saying happy birthday it can make you feel confused like why can't i say those common things
does that sound strange or will people make fun of me i want you to know that those videos
are designed to get clicks and they are teaching useful vocabulary but i don't think that they
are a good use of your time so in today's video i'm going to talk about a few of those
a common expressions is it okay to use them are there other common ways of saying them
but before we do that i want to talk a little bit more about this idea so what's the purpose
of these videos of don't say how are you or stop saying how are you really what they are doing
is they are teaching other ways to say common expressions as i mentioned before the problem
with this is that the common way of saying it is the common way that means that that's what
most people say and if that's what most people say then it's okay if you say it that way too
the other problem is that most of the other suggested expressions in those videos for
example stop saying how are you here are other 10 other ways you can say how are you
well a lot of those other ways are not as easy to use they might change the meaning a little bit or
they might be used by older people or they might be just really uncommon ways of saying that so
what's the purpose of learning those well there is some reason that it's a good idea to learn those
mostly because when you hear people using those other expressions you'll be able to understand
them for example with how are you a lot of people will say how's it going that is a very useful
expression that you should know do you need to use these other expressions in your speaking
no it's totally fine if you use the most common way if you say how are you or i'm fine thank you
those are the most common ways and it's totally fine if you say it that way too however it is
important to learn some other ways just so that you'll be able to understand them when you listen
to them in your speaking i think that a better use of your time is to focus on the english that you
need if you want to come to the united states or if you want to work for an american company
you need to be familiar with american english vocabulary you also need to make sure that you
know phrasal verbs and idioms and that you're focusing on words that are used in the united
states not in the uk that would be a good use of your time in my opinion that would be a better use
of your time than learning all these other ways to say really common expressions okay that being said
let's take a look at some of those really common things that we say and these are again things that
some other youtube channels have said don't say it or stop saying it again it's totally fine to
say them but we'll look at some other ways to say them too so let's start with happy birthday since
that's the one that i saw yesterday happy birthday that's the what people say maybe 99 of the time
everybody says happy birthday but there are a few other ways you can say it sometimes we'll say for
example happy 40th if someone is turning 40 years old we might just say happy 40th
or happy 40th birthday when you hear people say happy 40th what they're doing is they're dropping
the word birthday but it's not very common people usually just say happy birthday another expression
that you might hear or see on facebook or somewhere is happy belated birthday this is
when you forgot about the person's birthday or you didn't have a chance to wish them a happy birthday
so then one or two days later you wish them happy birthday what this really means is happy birthday
later it's pretty common but you would only use it in that situation when you're wishing
the person a happy birthday one or two days after their birthday okay the next common expression is
how are you well everybody says how are you we say it all the time you know i go to my work and every
time i see people we say hi how are you good how are you so this is just a super super common thing
that we say there's nothing wrong with it but there are a few other ways that we might say it
we often say how's it going this sometimes invites a little more detail so for example if you want
to hear more about how the person is doing you might say how's it going and they might give a
little more detail or how have you been but how have you been is a little bit different this is
asking again for more information and we often use this when we haven't seen someone for a while
so if you haven't seen a friend for a while and then you see them you can say how have you been
or how are you doing this is a longer form of how are you so again you have some choices here but
the most common one how are you all right next thank you well we always say thank you there's
nothing wrong with saying thank you but sometimes people will say thanks and that's more informal
or they might add a word like thank you so much thank you very much or we might say i appreciate
it but usually when we say this we say thank you first thank you i appreciate it and that would be
when you want to express extra appreciation when someone did something especially nice
okay the next one you're welcome again i've seen people saying in videos stop saying you're welcome
well that's silly because this is the most common way that we say um but there are some other ways
we can say no problem no worries or any time which one is the most common you are welcome
no problem and no worries are more informal and no worries is especially used by younger people
okay next the question what if you don't understand someone what you can also say
what's that or come again but this one is not very common and it's used more by older people so if
you are younger avoid this one i never say this i think my grandmother used to say it so it's really
used by older people we also can hear people say pardon but again this one is also more formal
used by not by younger people it's more by older people and excuse me notice with
these that you need to have the voice going up pardon or excuse me which one is the most common
what or what's that you do want to notice that the word what is used when you know someone
pretty well if you're at a job interview and you don't catch the question it would be rude if you
say what you would need to say sorry i didn't get that you would need to say something more polite
and finally i'm fine i saw a video on youtube once where the person was saying
americans never say i'm fine how are you well that's not true we say this all the time but there
are some other things you can say you can say i'm good i'm well which sounds a little more serious
or i'm great or you can also just add the word like fine good how are you so the
bottom line here is that there are other ways that we say these common expressions
but learn the common expression and don't worry too much about learning other ways to say it the
reason for that is that this is the most common one and that's what people use most of the time
the other reason is that some of the other ways of saying something have some slight
differences maybe they're said by only younger people or older people or maybe the meaning is
a little bit different finally you have a lot of things that you need to learn
so spend your time wisely i think that learning a bunch of other ways to say things is maybe not the
best use of your time and i especially don't want you to ever feel scared or ashamed of using these
really common expressions they are the most common ways that we say things so don't worry about it
i would love to know what you think let me know in the comments below if you have
seen this trend on youtube what do you think about it do you think it's useful to learn
a lot of other ways to say things or do you find that it makes you feel confused
and if you have any questions please make sure to let me know i hope to see you again soon take care