VIV'S
ENGLISH NEWSLETTER
By Viv Quarry. Edition Number 38 The twentieth of January 2004.
Study English in England with Cicero International - See Viv
for information & discount.
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Happy Birthday!
There are three birthdays in February - Joana (the 2nd), Danusa (the 8th) and Patricia (the 11th). In March there are two - Fernanda (the 14th) and Paula (the 19th).
Holidays
Viv will not be working during Carnival week, so no classes between the 21st and 25th of February. For local holidays (only in Rio de Janeiro), Viv will usually be working for those of you who would like a class. Just confirm to Viv whether you will be coming or not.
Cost of classes
Viv can only continue living and working in Brazil if he readjusts the cost of his classes according to the official Government rate of inflation. In 2003 the inflation rate was just over 8%, with some items like electricity increasing by over 20%. Therefore from February 2004, Viv will be charging (contact Viv for details) per hour. For students having 8 hours of classes per month, this will result in an increase of R$10 per month.
What's new?
Viv has designed a t-shirt with the same logo he uses to express his happiness or disappointment with your homework. The new t-shirt can be seen on the home page of his web site in January.
Everyone has got a back of notebook test in the next fortnight, and the students with the 10 highest scores will win a free t-shirt. If you haven't taken the test by the end of January, your score will not be included for the prize.
Don't forget that if you've been using the same notebook for over 72 hours (9 months for someone having two hours per week), if you get 20 out of 20 in the test you will win a month's free classes as well as a t-shirt!
Viv's library
If you borrow a book from Viv's library, please try to return it within one month. If you need to keep the book for longer, there's usually no problem providing you are continuing to read it regularly. If you aren't able to make progress reading a book, then return it to Viv, and if you want to, choose another one. If one of Viv's books is lying at home without being read, it means that it isn't available for other students to borrow.
Features
A few months ago a message was circulating on the internet in Portuguese. It was about how it's possible to understand a text when only the first and last letters of each word are in the right place. Here's the original text in English.
Part of the back of notebook test will be on the 'Word stress' section. Sometimes the meaning of a word changes completely depending on which syllable is stressed, and sometimes a word will change from a noun to a verb if the stress moves from the first to the second syllable.
These features of the English language are demonstrated by the second set of sentences on page two of this month's Newsletter. Best wishes for 2004 to everyone!