| Hi, everybody! Welcome back to Ask Alisha, the weekly series where you ask me questions and I answer them, maybe! |
| Okay, let’s get to your first question this week. |
| First question this week comes from Bhavna Singh. |
| Hi, Bhavna! |
| Bhavna says... |
| Hi, Alisha! Can you explain the difference between “as soon as” and “no sooner than”? |
| Okay, sure! Let’s talk about “as soon as” first. |
| So, let’s take a look at an example sentence. |
| “I’ll leave the house as soon as I finish my homework.” |
| In this example sentence, we have two actions, “leaving the house” and “finishing homework.” So, “as soon as” shows us that one action will happen once another action is completed. So, in my example sentence, “I’ll leave the house as soon as I finish my homework” means when this action is done, “finishing homework,” the first action will happen, “leaving the house.” |
| So, when we use “as soon as,” the first action actually happens last. “I’ll leave the house as soon as I finish my homework,” means that this action is the one that needs to be finished before the first action can happen. |
| Let’s compare this to “no sooner than.” |
| So, let’s take a look at an example sentence. |
| For example: |
| “He’s going to arrive at the airport no sooner than 12 o’clock.” |
| This means that some action is going to happen and we want to express that the action will not happen before a certain time. In this case, he’s not going to arrive at the airport before 12 o’clock, but sometime after 12 o’clock is possible. So, in this case, he’s going to arrive at the airport no sooner than 12 o’clock expresses this idea. |
| So, “as soon as” is used to talk about one action happening before another action, and “no sooner than” refers to one action not happening until a certain point in time or maybe until something else has finished. So, I hope that this helps you. Thanks very much for the question. |
| Okay, let’s move on to your next question. |
| Next question comes from Soukaina. I hope I said your name right. |
| Hi, Soukaina! |
| Soukaina says... |
| Hey, Alisha! I was watching an English movie and I heard the sentence “We have chemistry.” What does it mean? I hope you answer my question. |
| Yeah, great question! “We have chemistry,” this doesn’t usually mean Chemistry class like in school. When we’re talking about chemistry between two people, it means romantic chemistry or maybe just friendship kind of chemistry. Chemistry means that two people get along really well. They understand each other, the conversation flows easily. It’s not hard to work with that person. It’s not hard to talk to that person. They get along really well. |
| We tend to use this expression a lot more in romantic relationships. When you go on a date with someone for the first time, you might say, “We had chemistry” or “We had no chemistry” meaning it was really great and we could talk easily or it wasn’t so great and we didn’t really have a good flow. |
| So, this “chemistry” refers to how well we can interact with another person, how easy it is to talk and be friends with or to be romantic with another person, so I hope that this helps you. Thanks for the question. |
| Okay, onto our next question. |
| Next question comes from Llywyllyn. I hope I said that right, Llywyllyn. |
| Hi, Llywyllyn! |
| Llywyllyn says... |
| Hi, Alisha! What is “daylight saving time”? I’m very confused. My country does not have this. |
| Great question, yeah! In the USA, we have this thing called “daylight saving time.” You might also hear daylight savings time used, but this refers to changing the times on the clock twice a year. So, when we want to gain an hour of time, like when the sun goes down very early in winter, there will be a day each year when everyone in the country has to set their clocks forward or back to gain or lose an hour of time. I know this probably seems really strange to you, if your country doesn’t have this practice or doesn’t have this custom, but in the US and maybe in some other countries that use daylight savings time to try to get lots and lots of sunshine in the day, this is what happens. Everybody changes their clocks one hour forward or one hour back depending on the season, so I hope that this helps you. Thanks very much for the interesting cultural question. |
| Okay, onto our next question. Next question comes from Wael. |
| Hi, Wael! I hope I said your name right. |
| Wael says... |
| Hello, Alisha! I read something like you cannot use “forget” if you want to mention the place you left something. |
| For example: |
| Don't say: I forgot my book at home. |
| Instead, say: I left my book at home. |
| My question is, what if I really want to refer to the fact that I actually forgot my book at home. What should I say? |
| Yeah, interesting question! I’ve never read this before, but no, it’s completely okay to say “I forgot my book at home” or “I have forgotten my book at home.” It’s completely correct. You can also just say, “I forgot my book.” That’s 100% correct too. There is no problem putting a place after “forget” here. |
| “I left my wallet at home” is also completely okay. So, in this case, when you’re talking about leaving or forgetting something in a location, you can use either verb and you could also include a place with either verb as well. Both are totally fine. Don’t worry about a place with “forget” or not. You can use either, so that’s a very interesting question, but thanks for asking! |
| Okay. Let’s move on to our next question. |
| Next question comes from Anderson. |
| Hi, Anderson! |
| Anderson says... |
| What does the expression “I dropped the ball” mean? |
| Great question! “I dropped the ball!” Okay. This is a sports kind of expression, right? So, of course, we can use it to mean dropping an actual ball if you’re playing sports or something. But you will hear this used in business situations, in work situations, maybe when you’re making plans with someone. |
| “To drop the ball” means to not take care of your responsibility. So, for example, your friend expected you to make a restaurant reservation for a party. You didn’t do it. They might say, “You dropped the ball! You were supposed to do that!” So you, imagine yourself as a player in a game or you have some responsibility with the ball, like to make a shot or something like that, but if you don’t do it, you don’t fulfill your responsibility. |
| We express that sometimes with this expression, to drop the ball, so you didn’t do something you were supposed to do. You were supposed to maybe continue making plans or you were supposed to continue communicating with someone, you did not do it. You failed to do your responsibility, someone might say, wow, you really dropped the ball there. So, I hope that this helps answer your question. Thanks for an interesting one. |
| All right! That is everything for this week. Thank you very much for your interesting questions, as always. Thanks very much for watching this week’s episode of Ask Alisha and I will see you again next time. Bye! |
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