What goes around comes around

One day a man saw an old lady, stranded on the side of the road, but even in the dim light of day, he could see she needed help. So he pulled up in front of her Mercedes and got out. His Pontiac was still sputtering when he approached her.

Even with the smile on his face, she was worried. No one had stopped to help for the last hour or so. Was he going to hurt her? He didn’t look safe; he looked poor and hungry. He could see that she was frightened, standing out there in the cold. He knew how she felt. It was those chills which only fear can put in you. He said, “I’m here to help you, ma’am. Why don’t you wait in the car where it’s warm? By the way, my name is Bryan Anderson.”

Well, all she had was a flat tire, but for an old lady, that was bad enough. Bryan crawled under the car looking for a place to put the jack, skinning his knuckles a time or two. Soon he was able to change the tire. But he had to get dirty and his hands hurt.
As he was tightening up the lug nuts, she rolled down the window and began to talk to him. She told him that she was from St. Louis and was only just passing through. She couldn’t thank him enough for coming to her aid.

Bryan just smiled as he closed her trunk. The lady asked how much she owed him. Any amount would have been all right with her. She already imagined all the awful things that could have happened had he not stopped. Bryan never thought twice about being paid. This was not a job to him. This was helping someone in need, and God knows there were plenty, who had given him a hand in the past. He had lived his whole life that way, and it never occurred to him to act any other way.

He told her that if she really wanted to pay him back, the next time she saw someone who needed help, she could give that person the assistance they needed, and Bryan added, “And think of me.”
He waited until she started her car and drove off. It had been a cold and depressing day, but he felt good as he headed for home, disappearing into the twilight.

A few miles down the road the lady saw a small cafe. She went in to grab a bite to eat, and take the chill off before she made the last leg of her trip home. It was a dingy looking restaurant. Outside were two old gas pumps. The whole scene was unfamiliar to her. The waitress came over and brought a clean towel to wipe her wet hair. She had a sweet smile, one that even being on her feet for the whole day couldn’t erase. The lady noticed the waitress was nearly eight months pregnant, but she never let the strain and aches change her attitude. The old lady wondered how someone who had so little could be so giving to a stranger. Then she remembered Bryan.

After the lady finished her meal, she paid with a hundred dollar bill. The waitress quickly went to get change for her hundred dollar bill, but the old lady had slipped right out the door. She was gone by the time the waitress came back. The waitress wondered where the lady could be. Then she noticed something written on the napkin.

There were tears in her eyes when she read what the lady wrote: “You don’t owe me anything. I have been there too. Somebody once helped me out, the way I’m helping you. If you really want to pay me back, here is what you do: Do not let this chain of love end with you.”
Under the napkin were four more $100 bills.

Well, there were tables to clear, sugar bowls to fill, and people to serve, but the waitress made it through another day. That night when she got home from work and climbed into bed, she was thinking about the money and what the lady had written. How could the lady have known how much she and her husband needed it? With the baby due next month, it was going to be hard….
She knew how worried her husband was, and as he lay sleeping next to her, she gave him a soft kiss and whispered soft and low, “Everything’s going to be all right. I love you, Bryan Anderson.”

There is an old saying “What goes around comes around.”

Travel Writing

Travel writing isn’t writing about your family’s vacation. It isn’t writing about what you liked or didn’t like about your last trip. And it definitely isn’t about writing about destinations so that you can travel for free.

Travel writing is writing about places, persons, and things in other places--also writing about how to travel, when to travel, and advice on traveling–all with the reader in mind. It’s about relaying your travel experiences to others so that they may emulate them or at the very least not make the same mistakes you did. And it’s writing about things in your own back yard that are exotic to everyone else---a local farmer's market, historic site, restaurant, museum.

To be a good travel writer, you need to be ON all the time, not just when you want to. When you’re on vacation, you do what you want when you want. You’re mind focuses on the place you’re visiting only when it wants to. But to interpret a destination for your readers, you have to look for new angles on the same old things while at the same time sharing your pleasure with your readers.

But before we go further into travel writing, we need to take a look at the readers that will devour what you say about a place. There are three parts to the communication process–the sender (the writer), the receiver (the reader), and the message. When you were in school, you subconsciously learned that the writer was the most important part of the process because in academic writing, that’s the case. But in general writing, including travel writing, the reader is the most important part of the process. If a writer doesn’t think about the reader before writing, the reader most likely won’t be interested or might possibly not understand what the writer is saying.

How did travel writing begin?
Travel has a long history. People have always traveled--from ancient caravansaries to modern resorts. But travel writing began, more or less, during Elizabethan times. Shakepeare got much of the background material for his plays, such as the "Merchant of Venice" and "Romeo and Juliet" from Elizabethan travel guides to Italy.

Why is it needed?
Travel writing celebrates the differences in manners and customs around the world. It helps the reader to understand other people and places. And it helps readers plan their own trips and avoid costly mistakes while traveling. But, most of all, it lets readers travel to far-off destinations that they may never see.

Inspirational Language Quotes

At ICL, we love quotes, they're inspiring in ways that make us reflect on certain aspects of our lives, our world. Here are some with learning and language as the theme:

❝If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his own language, that goes to his heart.❞
‒Nelson Mandela

❝One language sets you in a corridor for life. Two languages open every door along the way.❞
‒Frank Smith

❝The limits of my language are the limits of my world.❞
‒Ludwig Wittgenstein

❝Learn everything you can, anytime you can, from anyone you can; there will always come a time when you will be grateful you did.❞
‒Sarah Caldwell

❝Learning is a treasure that will follow its owner everywhere.❞
‒Chinese Proverb

❝You can never understand one language until you understand at least two.❞
‒Geoffrey Willans

❝To have another language is to possess a second soul.❞
‒Charlemagne

❝Those who know nothing of foreign languages know nothing of their own.❞
‒Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

❝Language is the road map of a culture. It tells you where its people come from and where they are going.❞
‒Rita Mae Brown

❝Language is the blood of the soul into which thoughts run and out of which they grow.❞
‒Oliver Wendell Holmes

Some words just don't translate...

When translating documents, articles etc.. We’re often faced with words that just don't translate at all, that don't seem to have an equivalent; in this case, the translator is faced with having to find a substitute.

A good example in Portuguese is the word Saudade. It describes a deep emotional state of nostalgic longing for an absent something or someone that one loves. It often carries a repressed knowledge that the object of longing might never return. It's related to the feelings of longing, yearning. Google translator incorrectly pins it as nostalgia, but it isn’t.

Saudade has been described as a "...vague and constant desire for something that does not and probably cannot exist ... a turning towards the past or towards the future." A stronger form of saudade may be felt towards people and things whose whereabouts are unknown, such as a lost lover, or a family member who has gone missing. It may also be translated as a deep longing or yearning for something that does not exist or is unattainable.

Saudade was once described as "the love that remains" after someone is gone. Saudade is the recollection of feelings, experiences, places or events that once brought excitement, pleasure, well-being, which now triggers the senses and makes one live again. It can be described as emptiness, like someone (e.g., one's children, parents, sibling, grandparents, friends, pets) or something (e.g., places, things one used to do in childhood, or other activities performed in the past) should be there in a particular moment is missing, and the individual feels this absence.

Well you get the point; it can take many sentences to explain to a foreigner what one word means....

English spoken in GB, the USA and Australia.

Australia, Great Britain, and America all speak the same language, but you simply have to visit each country to realize that, while they all speak English, it is far from a universal language. The English spoken in Great Britain, America, and Australia has many similarities, but a surprising number of differences as well. The main reason for this is the vast distance between each country. Here are some of the common differences you will find between these three versions of English.

Pronunciation Differences

Pronunciation between the three types of English is very dissimilar. In American English the "r" at the end of the word almost always affects its pronunciation, whereas in Australian and British English the "r" is often silent. Also, the emphasis placed on the syllables of the word varies from British, Australian, and American English. In Britain, the world adult has the emphasis on the first syllable, whereas in America it is placed on the second half of the word. Australian English is unique in the fact that many words have sounds that are eliminated. Instead of saying good day, the Australian speaker says g'day. The main pronunciation difference between the three, however, is the pronunciation of the vowel sounds.

Differences in Spelling

Not only do the three types of English sound different, but they are also spelled differently. In some ways, the spelling reflects the difference in pronunciation. For instance, Americans use the world airplane to refer to a flying mode of transportation. In Great Britain, the word is aeroplane, and it is pronounced with an audible "o" sound. Another common difference in spelling is aluminium, which is the UK spelling, and aluminum, the US spelling. Again, the difference shows the difference in pronunciation of the two words. In this instance the Australian spelling is the same as the UK spelling.

Another common spelling difference between UK English and American English is the use of -our verses -or at the end of the word. For instance, in the UK, colour, flavour, honour, and similar words all end in -our, whereas in America they are spelled with the -or ending (color, flavor, honor). In Australia, the -our spelling is almost universal.

Similarly, the endings -re and -re are different between the different English dialects. In America you will go to the theater or fitness center, whereas in Britain you will visit the theatre or fitness centre. Again, Australian English follows the British pattern.

There are other common spelling differences as well. For instance, in American English, words that sound as though they end with an -ize will always end in an -ize. However, in UK English, they typically end in ise (i.e. realize, realise). Also, British English often doubles consonants when adding a suffix when American English does not, such as in the world traveller.

Interestingly, the three languages also have distinct vocabularies. For instance, the "hood" of a car is called the "bonnet" in Australia and Britain. Australia has several terms that are not used in either of the other countries, such as "bloke" (man) and "arvo" (afternoon). Also, Australians use some phrases that are combinations of British and American terms, such as "rubbish truck." Rubbish is commonly used in the UK, and truck is commonly used in America.

Grammar Distinctions

Besides spelling and pronunciation differences, British, American, and Australian English all have some subtle grammar differences as well. For instance, in Great Britain, it is perfectly acceptable to use a collective noun (such as army) as a plural word ("the army are coming"), whereas in America collective nouns are almost always singular ("the army is coming"). British English also uses the irregular form of the past participle of several verbs (learnt rather than learned). Also, British English tends to drop the definite article in some situations. For instance, British English speakers may refer to being "in hospital" instead of "in the hospital." Australian English grammar tends to follow British rules.

Motivate yourself to learn English!

Imagine yourself in the future...

Imagine you can talk to native speakers just like you talk in your first language. Imagine other people wanting to speak English as well as you do. Imagine the possibility of writing e-mail to people from all over the world.


Remember that you are already good

You already know some English (you’re reading an article in English right now). That’s a big success! Now it’s time for more successes. Time to start using powerful methods of effective learning. Time to gain an impressive knowledge of English.

Remember there's always a lot more you can learn.

You are good, but your English probably isn’t perfect. You probably can’t understand English-language TV, read books in English, talk to native speakers easily, write letters without mistakes, etc.

You should never think your English is perfect. Even if you are the best student in your class, always try to find your weak areas and work on them. When you’ve learned to speak English well, your problems will be quite small: punctuation, rarely used grammar structures, rare words, understanding “street language”. Right now, your problems are probably more basic: mistakes in pronunciation, small vocabulary, grammar problems with the present perfect tense and conditional structures.

Use English whenever you can.

Probably the most important way to improve your motivation is to use English.

Using English is fun. It is simply very enjoyable to use your English to read a good book, understand a song, watch an interesting movie, get an answer to a computer problem, exchange e-mails with a native speaker, etc. The more you use English, the more you will want to use it.

This is great, because using English is learning English. When you’re reading an interesting article or watching an exciting movie, you are using your English, but you are also learning new words and phrases. When you’re writing a message on an English-language discussion forum, you are using your English, but you are also practicing your writing.

But using English can also improve your general attitude to English and increase your motivation to study English in other ways. For example, if you see that your knowledge of English pronunciation helps you understand a movie or speak more clearly, you will be motivated to study pronunciation even more. If you see that checking your sentences in a search engine lets you write error-free e-mail messages, you will want to keep doing that. If you memorize some words with SuperMemo and later you come across them in a movie or an article, you will want to add even more things to SuperMemo.

Talk to people about English

This is a very simple method, but it is very effective. Here’s how it works:

You usually talk about things which interest you. But the opposite is true, too. If you start talking about a boring subject, you will begin to get interested in it.

Imagine you are studying a subject that you hate. You are bored and tired, but you have to pass the test tomorrow. If there are people near you, you have two options: you can tell everybody how much you are suffering or you can tell those people about the things you’ve learned. If you choose the first option, you will only feel worse.

If you choose the second option, and start a conversation on the “boring” subject, you will begin to look at it in a totally different way. Suddenly it will become a subject worth talking about — therefore, an interesting subject.

How can you begin such a conversation? If you’re studying English, you can surprise another person by talking to him/her in English. Say (in English): Hi, I’m studying English and I hate it. Or you can say (in your first language): Hey, I’ve learned 50 English words today. Do you know what’s the English word for ...? If there are no people near you, you can telephone or send an e-mail message to your friend.

What will your friends say? Probably they won’t be very interested, but it doesn’t matter! The important thing is this: After talking about English, you will study it with more passion. Try it.

Find a friend who is learning English

If you can find a friend who is learning English and is on a similar level of skill, you will be in an excellent situation:

you will have someone to talk about English with. These conversations will increase your interest in English, as explained in the previous section.
learning English will be easier, because you will be able to discuss your problems with your friend.
you will study English more, because you will want to be better than your friend. :-)
You should meet your friend regularly. Ideally, he/she should live near you, or go to the same school as you. If you absolutely can’t find anybody willing to learn English with you, you can try to find somebody by e-mail. This is a worse solution: your conversations will probably be less frequent, and it is difficult to compete with someone who you don’t know well.

Spend some money on learning English

If you spend your money on something, you will want to use it. For example, if you buy an expensive tennis racket, you will probably go out and play tennis every day.

This rule is also true for learning English. If you want to increase your desire to learn English, buy a new dictionary, an interesting English-language book, English-language cable TV, etc. The idea is simple: You paid for it, so you will want to use it, and you will improve your English.

However, this method is helpful, because it gives you an impulse to start learning. For example, if you buy a dictionary of phrasal verbs, you will probably learn some words from it. Then you should try to use them. For example, write an e-mail message with these words. This will increase your motivation (as explained before), and you will learn more.

Read Unlimited Power by Anthony Robbins

Anthony Robbins’ book Unlimited Power: The New Science of Personal Achievement gives excellent advice on how to achieve any kind of goal. This book has changed the lives of many people, so you might want to take a look at it.

Remember that learning English requires action

One small action is more powerful than reading hundreds of articles. Yes, we know it is very hard to do things, even if they are good for us. We humans are lazy creatures. That is why not many people speak English well.


Don’t put it off. Begin now.

"stay" vs "ficar"

In Portuguese,   the verb "ficar" is used in many situations.  Brazilian learners of English tend to mix this up, basically using "stay" to describe many things. Sometimes it works, many times it doesn't. Some examples:

Fiquei muito cansado ontem =  I was/got very tired yesterday 

Vc pode ficar com isso = Keep this!

The list of examples could be long,  let's look at 3 definitions of "stay":

·         to spend some time in a place, in a situation, with a person or group, etc.: He stayed in the army for ten years.

·         to continue to be as specified, as to condition or state: to stay clean.

·         to hold out or endure, as in a contest or task (followed by with  or at ): Please stay with the project as long as you can.

As you can tell from the above definitions, the verb at times translates perfectly with "ficar":  I stayed at my girlfriend's house last night.

But keep in mind that there are many more uses in Portuguese for "ficar" than for "stay"  in English.

Stay also forms some phrasal verbs:

Stay up

Stay over

Stay away (from something or someone)

Stay out

Stay on

We've found that often students could use the verb to be:

Fiquei muito feliz em ter feito uma Pós-Graduação :    I was very happy .....

fico muito decepcionado com o SPFC:    I'm very disappointed with SPFC.

We hope this helps!