Hi, I'm Annemarie with Speak Confident English and welcome to your Confident
English Wednesday lesson. So it is September and I'm so excited to be here
sharing a new Confident English lesson with you today. If you've been part of my
community for more than three weeks then you know I've been on a little bit of a
summer break. Like many people where I live, I went away for part of the month
of August. In Europe (where I live), most people take a summer vacation in August
and then they come back to work in September with new energy. They feel
relaxed, they had time to enjoy the sun, maybe go to the beach or go to the
mountains and enjoy hiking. So, I'm back after a three-week vacation and I'm so
excited for today's new Confident English lesson.
I'm curious, when you go on vacation when you take a break in the summer or
the winter or maybe during a special holiday in your country, what is the very
first thing that you talk about with your colleagues when you go back to work?
Or with your neighbors when you return home from a vacation? Yes! You talk about
your vacation. You ask each other questions to find out what did they do,
where did they go, how did they spend their time. But if you have to do this in
English? If you need to talk to English-speaking colleagues when you
come back from vacation or your English-speaking friends and neighbors,
do you know what questions to ask? Do you feel comfortable asking them about their
vacation, their time off? If not, then today's lesson is perfect for you
because we're going to talk about five common questions that native speakers
use for small talk and just chatting when they come back from a vacation or a
long holiday. These are the same questions that I use with my friends, my
family and people that I know professionally when I haven't seen them
for a long time. So if you often feel nervous starting a conversation, asking
questions in English, participating in small talk but you really want to know
about someone's holiday or the vacation, then let's take a look at these five
questions. Now very quickly, if this is something that always makes you feel
nervous, you are always stressed when you have to start a conversation in English,
I do have a another lesson for you that I want you
to watch after you finish this. Last year I shared a lesson on how to start a
conversation with anyone in English and I shared three strategies to help you be
more prepared and feel confident, ready to start that conversation. So if this
always makes you feel nervous, I will leave a link to that other lesson just
below this video so that you can visit it as well and know exactly how to feel
more confident the next time you want to ask a question and get a conversation
going in English. So our first question for today's topic, one of the most common
ways to ask someone about their vacation when they come back is, "How was your
summer break?" How was your winter break? How was your holiday break? In that
question, I'm using the word break and in English we use that when we want to say
that we had a time where we paused going to work. Maybe we went away, we traveled
somewhere or we just took time to be at home, to be relaxed but we stopped
working for a long weekend, maybe a week, or two weeks. Maybe even a whole month if
you're lucky. But we often use the word break. A summer break. A winter break. A
holiday break. Or a long weekend break. Now the second common question that we
might ask is, "Did you get away for the summer vacation?" Did you get away for the
holiday? Did you get away over the winter break? In those questions, I'm using the
phrasal verb to get away and in English that phrasal verb means to escape or to
leave a place. Sometimes we really want to escape work. Maybe it's just so
stressful. We have a massive deadline. We're exhausted. So we
get away for the weekend. Maybe we go to the countryside to relax. Many people
during their summer or winter vacations get away to go to the beach or the
mountains to go skiing. So when you have the opportunity to take a vacation, do you
get away? Now our third question for asking about a vacation or time off is
focused on where they went, where did they go for their vacation? So you could
say something like, "Did you travel for the summer holiday or did you stay close
to home?" Did you travel for the winter break or did you stay close to home? So
the difference between asking someone if they traveled or if they stayed close to
home is how far did they go. Did they get on a plane to go to another region,
another part of the country, or a different country? Or did they just go to
a city, a town, or the countryside nearby? Somewhere that's easy to get to by car
or by train. Now those first three questions are all great questions to
start a conversation with someone in English about their vacation, about their
holiday. The next two questions are perfect questions to keep the
conversation going, to follow up. So if someone has traveled to another place
for their vacation or they stayed close to home - but again they went to the
countryside or they went to a nearby lake or a river - then you could ask, "Have
you been there before or was this your first time?"
Have you been there before or was this your first time? And this question is
really just a way to get more information, maybe hear some interesting
stories about their time away. And just getting to know them. Find out what they
did, how did they spend their time, why did they choose that place. And our last
question is my most favorite question from today. It's a question I always ask
when someone comes back from a vacation or from some time away. I always ask, "What
was the best part of your trip?" Or what was the best part of your vacation?
Everyone loves to talk about the things that they enjoy, so this is a super easy
question to ask. And almost everyone will be happy to answer it. And with that you
have 5 really easy questions that are polite to ask when you want to start a
conversation with an English-speaking colleague or someone that you live close
to and you want to find out more about: where did they go,
what did they do, and what did they like about their last vacation? So now I want
to hear from you. I want to know where was your last vacation? What was your
most recent time away? Where did you go? And yes, what was the best part about
your trip? You can share your answers with me in the comments section just
below the video. That is the best place to get practice and feedback from me
every week. As always, thank you so much for joining me. I love having you here
every Wednesday. I look forward to hearing from you in the comments and
I'll see you next week for your Confident English
Wednesday lesson.