(continuing from my previous post) achievement in my work outweighed the joy to study English that doesn't always pay off as immediately. One of the biggest reasons I started to see less meaning in immersing myself in studying English is the fact that about 70-80% of the population can speak English as it is their second language, and most of them speak English that is easy to understand even when I go to the bank, dentist, insurance company, and so on. Of course, I still loved to study English, but my motivation had surely dwindled. Now, I'm back in Japan. The opportunity to speak English is almost nonexistent in my current life, and I think that became a huge reality check for me. I hate myself just resting in my laurels from studying hard in the past and not having as much fluency as I had back then. I have to face the reality and accept that I AM doing nothing but just slacking off. Dwelling in the past is just doing more harm than good. The other day, I was taking a stroll outside and pondered, "What am I doing? Am I ok with this?" I came to the conclusion that I want to go back in time when I was burning with passion, motivation, and curiosity about learning English. I just don't want to let all my efforts go to waste. And here I am on Italki.com to ask for your help. I will, to the best of my ability, do my best to help you learn Japanese!

I re-started to study English I lived in the U.S. for almost 8 years and also in the Philippines for 4 and half years. The 8-year period of my life in the U.S. was the culmination of my English study and I can even be proud of myself for staying laser-focused for such a long time. First of all, please allow me to explain how I spent the 8 years. (please note that I might sprinkle some vocab or expressions across the entire post that I want to use for my practice, so please feel free to ignore any minor mistakes even if you find it a bit out of context. I just want to use, recall, and cement them in my brain ^^) I studied English for at least 8-10 hours every day no matter how busy I was. I even studied 13 hours a day at least 3 days a week, and my favorite time was to reward myself for studying for a long time with an hour of online lesson that was usually a bit out of my budget or with something like an English dictionary or book on phrasal verbs/idiomatic expressions. I would listen to podcast or radio whenever I walk, eat, drive, or take a public transportation, or I would just think to myself or talk to myself all in English whenever I had nothing to listen to. I would wake up in the morning opening up a notebook to review what I learned the day before, and I would go to sleep (or fall asleep) while studying English. I would always make sure that I will not waste even a second doing anything that is irrelevant to my study. Then, I moved to the Philippines. When I was in the U.S., I was working with my boss and a few of my colleagues, so we were able to share the burden of our workload we had to accomplish. But in the Philippines, I was all by myself and had to fend for myself with everything from work to cooking meals three times a day for the entire period. So I stopped studying English due to the scarcity of my free time. My priority has shifted from improving my English to excelling in my work. The joy to earn a tangible (continue to my next post)

No doubt social media is changing everyone's life, from every way it can bring a impact to a person. The good thing is it can spread information quicker and easier. It can also help to present the information more vividly. It makes making friends so efficient. It is not only about keeping the connection with your familiar people, but also to explore new relationship out of your current circle. Young people has taken social media as the most important window to know the world. But when it comes to the changes social media brings to our interpersonal relationship, I would say there is more negative impact than positive impact. Because social media encourages a "FMCG" style relationship. There full of falsehood and deception. I say this may be too absolute, but it is indeed a serious problem on social media. It is hard to distinguish real good or real bad in the sea of information.

I read a book _________ 'Destination'. > > > > > >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

I put a ........ over my daughter's head. . . . . . 🙂

I didn't like the climb. I only wanted the summit. So I .........!

Dear Italki tutors, Would be grateful if u could check my IELTS response to this task: Some people believe that governments should have access to people’s mobile phone call records and messages for safety reasons. Others believe that this information is private and should not be available without permission. Discuss both these views and give your opinion. There are those who feel that governments controlling people’s phones can bring a number of benefits in terms of national security. Others, however, reckon that personal privacy should be respected, and I agree with that. On the one hand, some people think that accessing people’s phones enables governments to detect citizens posing a threat to society. Such measures might seem extreme at first glance. However, in such circumstances as war, they might be deemed protective. To illustrate that, since there is martial law in Ukraine, the majority of calls are eavesdropped on, and messages are monitored to identify people uncovering confidential information regarding military targets. As a result, the number of potential traitors has been dramatically reduced, minimizing the risks to other members of society. On the one hand, some people argue that privacy should be of paramount importance, and I agree. So why do I feel this way? If people’s rights are violated, they would be constantly living in fear and uncertainty. Consequently, they would not express their beliefs freely and would be more inclined towards migrating abroad so as not to be spied on. For instance, in recent years, a number of Chinese have been leaving the country for Western democracies because they could not bear the brunt of constant government control, resulting in them feeling more distressed. In conclusion, while opinions may differ, I feel that government policies aimed at tracking their citizens’ phones would result in people being anxious, and if we want them to stay in the country it is crucial to respect their inalienable right to privac