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Do you have time?
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As we all known , in western culture , sometimes a sentence will have different meanings. If we misunderstand what others menan to say , it will be a joke .
When someone says , ''Do you have time ?'' what will be your answer. It will be an embrassed suitiation if you give a wrong answer .
In our oral English class , one of my classmates shared her experiece with us . She was walking in the street and suddently a foreigner walked to her and asked , ''Do you have time ?'' . " I don' t have time today , but i will have time tomorrow " my classmate answered. She realized that she had misunderstood what the foreign friend mean to say .
In fact, the foreign friend wants to ask ''what time is it ?''.
Yeah , the sentence ''Do you have time?'' have two different meanings.
One meaning , is ''are you available ? " of ''Are you free?'' , is well known to us . Meanwhile it has another meaning , which is easily to be neglected . It 's ''Do you have a watch ?'' means ''what time is it now ,please ?
So in order to avoid such like joke and misunderstand , we can give a proper answer base on the suitation when someone ask you ''Do you have time ?''
I had a lesson from it, which is unforgetable.
Post comment Comment (14 replies)
- Reply Angela_smile
- It also gives me a lesson. Thank you.
- Reply minyingtao
- I really know the last meaning!Great,I've learnt a new oral English sentence
- Reply waywendy
- minyingtao: I really know the last meaning!Great,I've learnt a new oral English sentencethanks for visitting my blog
- Reply touringchina
- hello,tutor,I LEARNT countless of new knowlege.all right,thank you.well that's one more for the trophy canbinet,thank you very much.
- Reply waywendy
- touringchina: hello,tutor,I LEARNT countless of new knowlege.all right,thank you.well that's one more for the trophy canbinet,thank you very much.you are welcome . you are also my teacher
- Reply maud
- Hehe, yes, I can see how this might be tricky sometimes. Often when we want to ask the time, we say "Do you have the time?" whereas when we want to know whether you have free time, we are more likely to say "Do you have time?" So maybe that can help you distinguish between the two separate meanings!
