Improve your Vocabulary: Stop saying NICE & BEAUTIFUL!

Steve Banyan, you are stunning.

Hi.

James from engVid.

It seems that Mr. E thinks I'm stunning.

I am, but not the way you think, and by the time I've done this lesson, you'll understand

why this isn't correct, what he's saying.

Although the shirt is stunning, I like it, and maybe you do, too.

Let's go to the board.

Now, a lot of students - I did a video on "very", so if you want to see that after this,

it will be helpful.

It will explain to you how people use the same word too many times, and it leads to

a boring conversation.

We call it "redundant", where you say the same thing again and again.

But more to the point, or to be clearer, it loses accuracy.

When the words I have on the board are said by native speakers one to another, it gives

a picture.

I'm going to give you an example in a second, and if I know if I asked a native person this

and that, they would have a very different picture in their head.

And if you want to become like a native - sorry, become like a native, no one wants to become

a native - but if you want to understand native speakers a lot better, and you want to be

clearer in your speech, what you want to do is start taking some of these words that most

of you will use the words "beautiful", "cute", "nice", what else do you usually say, and

"cute".

Those are your four words.

I'm going to give you at least 15, and just for the heck of it, I'll give you three more

for a bonus.

You like that?

Let's go to the board.

And be careful and watch, because you'll notice some of these words are going to be repeated

in different categories.

The categories I've outlined here are "place", "personality", "conversation", a person's

physical appearance, but not in a - you know, they've got a big bum or whatever, and also

a little bit of - because we are all human after all.

Let's go to the board.

So, the first thing I want to talk about in place is this word "cute".

I know I just made fun of it and said, you know, people who don't - or English isn't

their first language, let's say.

I was going to say don't speak English, but if you're watching this video, you clearly

understand some English.

But I said "cute" was one of the words they go to.

That's because they think everything's cute, but we do have a meaning in English, and this

is funny.

If you hear someone say "cute" and they're talking about your house, they usually think

it's small.

If I go, "Oh, you know what?

Mr. E's got a really cute place."

It's nice.

It's like we talk about it for homes and condos, but we say it's usually small on the small

side and it's nice.

Nothing special, but it's nice.

It's, you know, you can go there and think it's nice, but you'll notice how small it

is.

And that's why I put up "condos" and "homes".

The rest of these are for homes, and they could be for galleries or museums or cities,

right?

But when it comes down to it, you use "cute" for homes and condos.

If you said it about a city, you'd be saying it's not really a city, it's small.

So, some people who come from London, England, or New York City, or Paris, or Cologne, they

come to Toronto and go, "Toronto is a very cute city.

It's very cute."

Because it's like a city, but not really.

It's lovely.

Anyway.

Next, "charming".

"Charming" means pleasant.

Once again, it means nice.

Remember I said "cute", "nice", "good-looking"?

It's different, though.

When someone talks about a place being charming, it means it has character.

There's something unique about it.

It's not just nice, it's got its own kind of flavour.

For instance, you go into some homes and they have gloss everywhere, and metal everywhere,

and white everywhere, and that's modern.

You probably wouldn't say it's got character.

Why?

Because it's modern.

Yeah, I know.

It's funny, because you think that's special.

But if you go to a house and it's got a nice wood-burning fireplace, it's got bricks on

the walls, you know, the wall's got bricks, and it's got a wooden floor, and it's got,

you know, brass going up the stairs, you'd go - the place was really charming.

It had this character to it, it's like from another time.

So, we talk about places that are charming as having character.

They could also just be something that has a lot of a cultural influence.

Like, I went to a Colombian restaurant two or three years ago, and they decorated it

as if it were out of Colombia, and outside it was Toronto.

So, I stepped inside, whoa, I'm in a different country, and I thought it was really charming

because it felt authentic, and authentic means real.

So, it made me enjoy the meal more, because I felt like I was having this real meal in

a real place that wasn't really there.

Okay?

Now, elegant is a bit different.

Elegant is sophisticated, it's stylish, you know, it's this elegant - well, this isn't

quite elegant, but you get the point.

So, when something's elegant, this might be a gold and black - a gold watch with black

leather band or something.

It's stylish, sophisticated, it has taste and gloss.

So, if someone has an elegant home, you know there is probably leather chairs in there

and a wooden floor.

Don't forget the fireplace.

Here's an interesting word, opulent.

Most North Americans won't think of this word when they describe a house, because when I

think of the house like this, I think of the biggest house imaginable.

Inside, they have columns, like Roman columns.

They also have wooden floors.

They will have ceilings that are 20 feet tall.

Extremely wealthy people have opulent houses, and this is because the things there are expensive

and they're luxurious.

Right?

So, they're not things - their couches are not coming from Sears or Walmart.

They're coming from Ralph Lauren couches.

You buy the shirt, they buy the couch.

Okay?

Opulence.

So, I'm going to give you a few more words, because this is for places, right?

So, I'm talking about your homes, if you're visiting someone's house, you might use some

of these words.

And even though we said "sophisticated" and "stylish", for instance, for elegant, I didn't

say it has to be just for wealthy people.

You can have an elegant home and not be wealthy.

It just means you've picked really good things and made the place look really good.

Okay?

But when it's opulent, you can smell the money, literally.

Right?

I smell rich Corinthian leather as I walk through the passages, or from the oak and

the pine stairways.

Right?

And the dust from the marble comes into my nostrils.

Now, these ways we can also talk about people's places, but usually, once again, I put them

down here, because this has to do more with a nice, wealthy, or affluent home.

Affluent means having money.

But the funny thing is, we also use these same words for nature, and you've noticed

I put the word "nature" beside it, because as I say them, you'll kind of go "Wow, yeah,

I've seen a sunset", and it can be truly stunning.

Perfect example.

So, if you say somebody's home is stunning, it doesn't necessarily mean it's filled with

lots of wealth.

It just means it could be so well put together, the colours are right, furniture is right,

that you walk in, you're like "Wow, this is really cool".

In North America, we have a lot of TV programs, renovation programs, where you see the house

looking one way, and it's okay.

You wouldn't say "Oh my gosh, this is terrible", you'd go "It's a house, people live here".

Then they come in and renovate, they fix the house, and you see the people walk in, they

go "Oh, wow, oh, oh", and they're stunned, because the change is so dramatic.

Because stunning means that something has hit you, it can be physical, but usually mentally,

something hits you, and it makes you stop.

Right there, you're stunned, and it's almost like you can't move, you're just...

So much information coming in that your brain doesn't know what to do.

Stunning.

And it means impressive or incredible.

And if you've ever seen an Italian sunset over a terrace in, I don't know, I'm trying

to think of now, Tuscany or something, you'd probably go "Oh my god, the sky is like

filled with colours, it's truly stunning".

It makes you...

Takes your breath away.

You probably want a glass of red wine when you're watching it.

Anyway.

The next which is similar to that is breathtaking.

These are things that give you a physical reaction to it.

We can say the same thing here, nature, once again it's about nature, usually it's usually

large and beautiful.

So, when you go into a forest or you're on top of a mountain, maybe you're on Everest,

you're looking down, and you look down on Everest and everything's so small and everything's

white and it's beautiful, and you're like "I'm on Everest".

And the sight is breathtaking, it means literally it takes my breath away.

It is so large, because the area, Everest, is tall, and so beautiful that it almost stops

you from breathing.

Stops you from thinking, stunning, stops you from breathing, breathtaking.

And it's usually a large, beautiful space.

So, you wouldn't go to a small condo, get in the condo and go "My god, it's breathtaking,

hold on, hold on, oh yes, it's breathtaking, let me look over here", it's too small.

Okay?

You can see it just by turning your head.

But if it's a large mansion with green rolling hills and they play polo up there, it could

be breathtaking, it's beautiful.

But nature itself is breathtaking.

Now, I'm going to give you a word, we don't usually use it for nature, but it can be,

and it talks about a very specific type of nature, but it would also talk about a very

specific type of home.

Rare and special.

If someone lives in a castle from 1572 and they've got it done, you know, with modern

things in it, but it looks absolutely perfect, you would say it's exquisite, because this

thing is rare and very special.

There's nothing quite like it.

So, if you go into, there's a trench, I think the Moranian, I can't remember the trench

that goes down to the water, so I won't even go there because I forgot, but let's say the

Amazon rainforest.

I mean, some of the places there are exquisite, because you look and there are flowers, there

are nowhere else on the planet Earth, and animals and creatures and people even that

we've never seen.

So, the rainforest is exquisite because it's rare and special, it's the only place on Earth

like it, right?

So, we should take care of it, but that's another conversation.

So, in this case, we've talked about places, and I've given you words that aren't just

beautiful.

Beautiful could be used here, but we have a better word, breathtaking.

It's not just cute or nice or good-looking.

We can talk about places as well as people, and that's kind of cool, because now you've

taken some words you've known and we're using them to show new words you can now use and

elevate your conversation.

And if you've noticed the way I said it, just saying, "Hey, your place is really cute."

I'd go, "Thank you.

I know it's small, you know it's small, but at least you think it's attractive."

So, you're getting much more accurate on the way you speak to people, and it's not just

about people are cute.

You can see we can use it in different ways, okay?

Next, let's talk about personality.

I know you want to talk about people, but you have your four words, and I want to break

that habit to give you a little bit more, you know, of an expansive vocabulary, a larger

vocabulary.

So, let's talk about people.

What do you say when you meet someone like, "Hi, my name's Jenny.

I'm on the cheerleading team, and I also like skiing, and I also like..."

And they're always so happy, and it's just like bubbles are coming off them, like pop,

right, or soda, if you're in the States.

It's like, what?

We say effervescent, bubbly, and fizzy.

Fizzy is what's in those drinks, like a cola, and those fizzes are making you feel good.

Bubbly means kind of excited and happy, so when somebody's effervescent, and trust me,

most people aren't going to say this word, so when you say, "I like Joanie.

She's got an effervescent personality", they'll be like, "Damn, where'd you go to school?

We didn't learn that in our school.

You go to dictionary?" and you go, "Yes, it's called my mind."

Okay, so, effervescent.

Now, we usually, I have to be honest, it's not usually used for men, and it's usually

used for younger women, and I'm saying, like, teenage girls up to their 20s will probably

be effervescent.

If you say an older woman is effervescent, it would be a compliment, but kind of a strange

one, because then she probably wouldn't want to be seen like a little girl.

And if you said a big, burly guy, "He's effervescent", they go, "I'll kick your butt if you say that

again."

Because he doesn't want to be bubbly.

Now, for some of you guys who think in a box, it doesn't mean gay, it means happy.

And it means, like, really happy and jumpy and full of energy, just like when you crack

open a Coke and the bubbles come up.

Next, demure.

This is a funny word to me, because it sounds so heavy and so depressing, but demure just

means to be shy and reserved.

So, for some of you guys who only know the word "someone is shy", this word is a little

bit more technical, because someone can seem shy, but they're reserved, meaning they're

not necessarily shy, they just don't like to speak.

They want to - they're conservative, so they speak when necessary and not - speak only

when necessary and not more than that.

So, if you say this man or this woman is demure, it doesn't mean they're completely shy, but

they are going to be reserved and they may be shy.

But it's also to speak to older people, because kids, you can say, are shy.

As a grown man, you don't want to say "he's shy".

If you say "he's rather demure", then it gets to play with reserved, so you're giving him

that kind of respect, but also the understanding of shy, so the other person understands, okay,

they're not going to be running around the room like James, talking to everybody.

Okay?

All right.

So, next, because we've got bubbly, then we've got almost the exact opposite.

We've got easygoing.

This is your kind of guy, as you come in the room, and you know what I'm saying?

You know, not Brad Pitt, but the other guy.

He's always kind of soft when he speaks, he's from Texas.

Can't remember his name right now, you know what I'm saying?

I forgot.

I can see his face, but I can't remember his name.

Easygoing is they're relaxed, and they're patient, so they're good with kids.

If you trip on them, they're like "No problem, it's okay".

It's not that they're weak and you can do anything you want, they're just, they're really

pleasant to be around, they're relaxed.

So they want you to be relaxed, they want everybody to have a good old time and just

relax.

Matthew McConaughey.

Hey, hey, you know him, never wears a shirt, McConaughey.

If you watch him talking, he's got a drawl, he's from Texas.

You just want to sit down and go "Can I go to bed now?"

He's really kind of cool like that.

That's Matthew.

Okay?

Charming, charming.

For those of you who know I like superheroes, you'll know I'm going to talk about the number

one guy.

But I'll give you the obvious one for you guys.

Tony Stark is charming.

If you watch Iron Man, he's charming, he knows how to talk to people, people like him, and

he's got that kind of swagger, he's kind of cool.

James Bond is charming.

James Greer, James Greer, or should I say Bond, James Bond.

People are like "Wow, he's so cool, man.

He's charming."

They're attractive, and they're - nice isn't quite the word there.

Nice is, they are nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

They might not say always nice things, but they will make you smile and go "That's funny.

He insulted me, but I thought it was funny, too."

Or "Wow, you said something that made me feel really good."

Charming people know how to speak to people that they feel good when they're around them.

Right?

And everybody has a good time because they are magnetic, they bring people to them.

Now, remember, this is just personality.

We haven't talked about what people look like.

I'm like, yeah, it's about time you up your vocabulary, because we teach people, you know,

tall, short, fat, and I'm like, why don't we do something a bit more and give them a

little bit more interesting conversation to have, because in your own language, you would

be able to describe a person more than "This man is tall, and he is very skinny."

You'd also say "He's very charming, I like him."

You know?

His wife has an effervescent personality, which would lead people to go "What do you mean

by that?" and expand your conversation capability.

Back to the board.

Next, we're going to go to open-minded.

This is interesting, because enough students don't know this.

Open-minded, and I say this because I would like to think I'm open-minded, but I'm in

North America.

If I went to another country, I may not be as open-minded, and in my country, but I'm

very open-minded, because maybe I don't have the ability to accept new ideas.

So, when you say somebody is open-minded, it means you can bring something they've never

heard about, and they'll go "Okay, that seems reasonable."

It doesn't mean they believe everything they're told, but they're willing to listen to new

ideas and think about them.

Now, some of you are like "What?"

I'm like "Yeah, me too."

It doesn't happen all that often.

It does.

You get people who are open-minded, but an open-minded person is really cool.

I mean, and if they had most of these things, if they were charming, easy-going, and open-minded,

the world is theirs.

People just love them to death, because these are rare people.

You want to get some of these characteristics, yeah?

I do, right?

I wouldn't mind being effervescent, a little bubbly here and there.

Now, I put these ones in blue underneath, just as I did blue over there, to show you

wouldn't say someone's enjoyable, pleasant, or enlightening.

This is conversation.

It's a way of saying "So, what was the conversation like with Mr. E?"

"Oh, it was rather enjoyable."

It means I had fun, I enjoyed it, it was nice chatting with him.

This one means fun, this means good.

It was pleasant, it was nice, and the last one is interesting, enlightening means I learned

something.

So, if you say a conversation was enjoyable, it means maybe they talked about a few jokes,

you talked about people you knew, and you had fun, right?

It was fun.

Pleasant, you can see the word "please" coming for pleasing, means it made you happy.

It was a pleasant conversation, it was a good conversation.

An enjoyable conversation doesn't have to be a nice or good one, it just means at the

time maybe you were debating and you had a good time chatting about it, that was enjoyable.

It doesn't necessarily mean pleasant.

Pleasant means it made you smile, it was nice, you talked about puppies and kittens, or someone's

having children, or someone's getting married, it was pleasant, it was nice.

Enlightening is interesting because it means when I finished talking to this person, I

learned something I didn't know before.

I grew as a human being, I learned something new, so it was enlightening, I learned something.

And that's really cool.

Now finally, let's get to the one that most people wanted to start with, and the reason

why I did these first is because I want you to learn something new before we go over something

you already know.

Some of these you're going to see, and you'll go, "We know these ones", and I'll go, "Yeah,

I know."

But you'll see how some of these are on the other side of the board, and then seeing how

I got you to understand the idea here, so when we go here, you can see, oh, it's not

just he is cute, she is cute, I can use it for something else, right?

I think I also have breathtaking, same thing, right?

So, let's go to the board and check it out.

Cute.

Cute means attractive.

It doesn't mean that they're beautiful, but if you go, "Hey, she's kind of cute", it means

they are attractive, and probably a little bit more than normal attractive.

You wouldn't say somebody who is 50/50 is cute, you'd say they're okay.

They're okay.

But if they're cute, they're a little bit better than that, you know?

He's kind of cute, she's kind of cute, it means I find you attractive.

Which is the next word, attractive.

Attract - what does it mean?

Like a magnet?

Brings it to you.

When someone is attractive, they bring attention to themselves.

You find them something nice and pleasant to look at, right?

So, when you say someone's attractive, you're going to say people look at them.

So, once again, they're not 50, like okay or so-so.

And by the way, okay and so-so are attributes you can say about someone.

If you say, "Hey, is James good-looking?", "He's so-so", which is true, it means not

great-looking, not ugly-ugly, but not great-looking either, "He's so-so", it's okay, right?

Handsome.

Well, when someone's handsome, it's usually they have that square - if they're a guy,

they have a square jaw, Superman.

Square jaw, high cheekbones, those eyes, right?

So, when we say handsome, it's usually reserved for men.

Funny enough, it's also for women.

Two types of women.

An older woman can be handsome, which means she is mature and attractive.

So when you look at her, she is attractive, but she's mature.

She's not 20, she's not 30, she's probably 40s, 50s, maybe 50s, 60s, and there's - she's

a good-looking woman.

I'm trying to think of like Dame - the one that played in the Bond movies, Judi Dench.

She's a handsome woman.

You go, "She's old."

I go, "Yeah, but is she ugly?"

"No, no, she's attractive."

Well, you can't say she's beautiful and ravishing, no, because they're like - but she is handsome.

She's an attractive woman.

He's like, "Yeah.

Yeah, she is."

Now, I said for an older, mature woman, now when a woman is younger, but maybe she has

a square jaw, like she has strong features, she doesn't look like a man because some of

you go, "She look like man, yeah?"

I'm like, "No, she doesn't."

But she might have high cheekbones, a square jaw.

It's not soft like Barbie, but she's good-looking, but there's a strength in her face.

I like to think of Rocky - Bridgette Nielsen from Rocky - when you see her, she's got the

blonde hair, and she's like, "I'm a Russian woman."

And you're like, "Whoa, she's good-looking, but I'm scared."

She's a handsome woman.

Not soft.

Sharp, strong features.

Handsome.

So this can be used for men and women.

Men is - any man can be handsome after he becomes a man, so you wouldn't say a boy is handsome.

Boys and girls are usually cute, but if a man is, you know, 16, 18 and up, he can be

handsome from 16 up to 80 if people think he's that good-looking.

And a woman, two different ways.

She can be younger and handsome with strong features, or a more mature woman who's handsome

because she's older.

Next, good-looking.

You've heard that one before.

Good to look at.

That's what it means.

Good to look at.

Good-looking.

Need we say more?

I don't think so.

I think you know what that means.

What about stunning?

I already explained it to you.

Do you remember what I said to this?

Like you walk into a wall, you're stunned, your brain goes, "What just happened to me?"

The same as when you look at nature, you get - when you see a sunset, you're like, "Oh

my god, it's stunning", and you just shut your mouth, and you look.

The same can be said when you see a human being.

You're walking down the street, minding your business, you've never seen something that

beautiful walk by you before.

You stop, you physically stop, your mouth stops, maybe your mouth falls open, and your

head just rotates.

That person's stunning.

It means so good-looking, they stopped my thought process.

They interrupted my thought process, that whatever I was thinking about, I stopped to

pay attention to them.

Remember I talked about breathtaking?

What does that do?

I'll give you examples, because I gave you the example here.

Nature can be breathtaking.

A father seeing his daughter walk down the stairs in her bridal dress, remembering she

was a little girl, now she's a woman, and she's wearing that white dress, thinking the

best he's ever seen his daughter, will have a tear, and he probably won't speak because

it's breathtaking seeing how beautiful she is.

A woman seeing her child for the first time ever, who might not say anything, she'll be

stunned, tears rolling down her face, it's breathtaking.

It takes your breath away.

Something is so beautiful, it stops, and we use this term because it stops a natural function

you don't have control over.

You breathe whether you think about it or not.

When something's breathtaking, you'll go, and it just stops.

Brain goes, "Don't breathe.

We've already been stunned, now we're not breathing.

This is incredibly beautiful."

Breathtaking.

Gorgeous.

I love gorgeous, because gorgeous has - to gorge oneself means to eat and fill oneself

with something.

Gorgeous, in this case, means to fill the eyes with something.

So if someone says, "Somebody is gorgeous", it means I want to eat you up with my eyes.

You're just so beautiful.

You're so beautiful, it's too good to be true, can't keep my eyes off of you, and that's

what it is.

You're so gorgeous, it's just like, oh, I want more of you.

I want to see more and more of you, okay?

These words, if you say - okay, if you say someone's cute, attractive, handsome, or good-looking,

those are nice, and people will say them in pleasant conversation.

Rarely will they say stunning, breathtaking, or gorgeous.

If you see someone talking about another person - okay, ladies, I'll give you this.

If you're a lady and your man doesn't know you're there, okay, and he's talking to his

friends, and he says to his friends, "My girlfriend's stunning, breathtaking, or gorgeous", you

are 100% stunning, breathtaking, or gorgeous.

If he only says it to you in your house when the doors are locked, the TV's turned up loud,

and there are no neighbours around, he is lying to you.

People don't use these words.

I make this story to tell you the truth.

People don't use these words unless it's true, and they will say it to anyone, because everyone

will say, "Absolutely, that's a gorgeous baby."

Babies can be gorgeous, because new life is gorgeous, right?

Or a baby can be breathtaking or stunning.

When you're an adult, it gets harder for people to say that because you're not a new life,

you've lived something, we all look different.

But when people say this in public, and sometimes you see it in beauty shows, beauty pageants,

look at her, she's gorgeous.

A lot of people in Hollywood like to throw that word around, I hate that.

You notice I didn't put "beautiful" because they say that word a lot as well, and you

know it.

But these words mean you're not normal, you're above, way above average.

So listen to them carefully.

And that's why you notice we use them for nature, right?

Because nature isn't normal, it's beyond us, it's above us.

So we're always in awe, and we think it's special, and it's breathtaking, it's stunning,

and nature can be absolutely gorgeous.

Red hot words for words you want to say that are a little bit more - okay, because we talked

about this, and I said you can't use these words all the time.

So what are you going to say when you're walking down the street and you see a - I'm thinking

un senorita, a guapita senorita, a good-looking woman, what do you say, right?

You can say this for men as well, by the way, "sexy", "sexy", because they make you think

of sex.

It means they have, if it's a man, broad shoulders, strong-looking, nice chest, you can be sexy,

he's got a good body.

A woman, if her body's like that, we say "sexy".

Hot, muy calor, very hot, right?

That was very hot, I said in Spanish, but she's very hot.

Hot means like sexy, like flame, they burn you because they're so good-looking.

Here's one, because I don't want you just going into lower language, the whole thing

is to make your language more expansive, as I said, "live", and you're going, "What is

live, teacher?"

I'm going to tell you something, don't worry, I'm going to guess about 40% of native English

speakers who just saw that word just went, "That's a spelling mistake, he meant 'live'."

I went, "No, I didn't, I meant 'live'."

This word means supple, flexible, moves with elegance, youthful.

So, when you see a lithe body, it's usually like an athletic body, think of a gymnast

or a ballet dancer, they'll have that body that just, you're like, "Oh, it's live", just

feels full of energy and power, it's youthful, it's beautiful, the way it moves.

So, if you say she has a lithe body, it's actually better than sexy and hot, because

sexy and hot, if you're a woman and you wear a top low enough and you walk the right way,

you can be sexy.

To be lithe means to move with this kind of balance and elegance and just this suppleness

of movement, almost, it's hard to describe except by watching some of our finest athletes.

You want somebody to say that about your body.

Now, if we want to go back to the hot and sexy way of saying things, just say ravishing.

Because when you ravish food, it means you eat it like an animal.

So, if I say you're ravishing, it means I want to eat you like an animal, you're just

so beautiful.

And that, my friend, is much better than saying hot or sexy.

Now, if you're in the bar with your friends and you see a girl over there and, you know,

two or three of you guys, you go, "Hey, she's hot."

If you say, "Hey, she's ravishing", they're going to go, "Have another drink and shut

up.

She's hot, not ravishing."

But if you read romance novels or if you're talking to your lady, you want to whisper

in her ear, "You look ravishing tonight", and she'll be like, "Ooh, all lithe in your

arms."

Cool.

See how we did that?

We've taken these two words and upped it.

You're welcome.

And speaking of being welcome, I want to make sure you know half of these words and it's

not just me talking up here and you're going, "Great, yeah, yeah, I hope you took notes

because that's something you should do when you watch these videos."

In fact, I'm going to reiterate that.

Please don't watch my videos unless you have a pen or a paper.

I know this is not always possible, but if you want to get the maximum out of every video

I do, take a pen and paper, write it down, and look for things you don't know if I didn't

explain it properly, because at the end of these videos, people make comments and you

can always leave a question and I've seen people answer them, alright?

Make this your lesson by doing something with it and not just watching passively, and you'll

notice within five, ten lessons, your English is going to just change.

Cool?

Alright.

Time for me to do the quiz.

Let's go to the board.

And we're back.

Let me see what we have available for us in our test.

Dun-da-da-dun-dun-dun.

As you can see, we have five questions on the board.

I think you paid attention to the lesson.

There were some things repeated, which makes it a little easier, but you got the different

meanings for words that you probably thought you knew, like "cute" was a cute person, knowing

that you can talk about an apartment and talk about the size of something.

And by the way, you can also talk about - if you think somebody's small or short and they're

attractive, you can call them cute as well, you know, because we usually think good-looking

people are taller.

That's just an aside, but keep that in mind.

Okay.

So, we have five questions here.

Number one is, "Her personality was something.

She was bubbly and fun."

What would be the answer to that one?

Ah, like the soda pop.

Remember I told you about that one?

Effervescent - sorry, I had an extra r - effervescent.

She was effervescent, bubbly, alive, like pop, exciting.

What about number two?

"He was very something, with a strong jaw and high cheekbones, like a Spartan warrior."

Yeah, handsome.

And what else did we say about handsome?

Handsome could be for women as well, if they're mature women, older women, or if they have

strong features, like - because handsome men have strong features, it's not just - you

can have pretty boys, pretty men that look nice, but they look kind of like women.

We don't call them handsome, we actually call them pretty boys.

Handsome can be for a man or a woman, meaning strong features that make them very attractive.

Okay?

How about this one?

This one might be a little tricky for you, because I didn't give you - I've given you

basically the answer at the very end, so you have to read the whole thing, so read it one

more time and think if you can get it.

Okay?

So, "She had a something nature.

She tended to be shy and quite reserved."

Now, those are the key words you should be looking for, shy and quite reserved, in what

she wore and her personality.

That's right.

Demure.

Remember we talked about demure being a little bit shy and reserved?

I said personality, but what I didn't mention, but I put it here, was what she wore.

Demure, if someone is demure, they will wear more conservative clothing.

So, if it's a woman, she'll wear a dress, but the dress will probably come up here,

go beneath the ankles, or down the knee, down low on her leg, and not show too much skin,

basically.

It's not that it's old-fashioned, it will be more conservative, right, reserved.

Or another word we say is modest.

There, see, you're getting vocabulary from me like crazy now.

If someone's modest, they don't like to show a lot, they keep things to themselves, they're

a little bit more quiet.

Now, oh, this is interesting, "The house he lived in was very luxurious and the most expensive

on the street."

Right?

"It was the something, the most something house in the city."

What would that be?

Luxurious, very expensive?

Opulent, his house was opulent, the most opulent house in the street - house in the city.

And finally, "She was so something, people would stop in the streets when they saw her."

What would that be?

I'll be honest, this is a trick one, so I'm going to give you a second or two to think

about what the possible answer would be.

Yeah, okay.

Some of you were smart and you caught it, I was trying to be tricky.

Because she could be - or she could be - because both of these things would stop someone's

normal behavior, right?

Stop their breathing, stop their thinking, stop their motion.

I did this one to show that just because I say one word has this meaning, it doesn't

mean in context, in the real world, that it always has to be this way or that way.

Once you have an understanding of these words, you'll notice that sometimes these two could

go here.

But definitely, you wouldn't put "stunning", "the most stunning house in the city" when

I'm talking about wealth and luxury.

This is the nuance of language or the subtlety or the smallness - the small things in language

that make you a future native speaker, right?

Knowing this will give you a leg up or give you the ability that other language students

don't have when they have that nice, good looking, handsome, cute as their whole thing

for describing people.

You can now not only say different words, but you know when you want to put different

words in to get more emphasis.

So, breathtaking is like "ah", stunning is like "oof", and you know by saying that, changing

those two words, the effect may be the same, but how you describe it puts a different picture

in my head or a different understanding of my body or the way I hear it.

Cool?

All right.

Of course, because you've come to the end of the video when you do the quiz, we have

a bonus section and I would like to give you the bonus now by giving you some other words

that can talk about things and people.

For instance, alluring.

If you say someone is alluring, you're talking about their personality.

You're saying they are attractive in a mysterious way.

You don't know.

It's sort of like - it's not even just for people.

If you have a cologne and you go "Oh, that cologne is alluring", it's like there's something,

I don't know, is it cinnamon, is it lemon, is it - what is in that cologne that makes

it smell - it's alluring.

It's mysterious, yet it's attractive, it makes me interested, right?

Personality, some people are alluring, and their personality is that you talk to them,

you don't know what it is about them, but they just make you attracted to them.

It doesn't have to be sexual, it could be - though it can be sexual, it's sometimes

someone's alluring is you just want to be near them because there's something about

them.

You talk to people a lot, they've got a lot of expertise or wisdom, and they attract you,

they're alluring.

Engaging is different.

Notice how they say this one's attractive, and this one's to create interest, similar

but not the same.

An engaging conversation makes you want to stay there.

See, with alluring, it attracts you.

Engaging, once you've been attracted, you can leave.

When someone's engaging, to engage means to create a connection.

So, when they start talking, they want - you want to be a part of the conversation, you

want to be there, you want to be part of it, right?

And they create interest, that's why there's a connection, they make you interested in

what they're talking about.

A lot of people find politics engaging, and some others find politics not that engaging

because it doesn't create a connection.

So, even though I'm using this word, if there's not a connection, there's just arguments,

you wouldn't say the conversation was engaging, right?

But if when you're done, you're like, "Wow, that was really - that was interesting, I

didn't know these things."

Not exactly the same as, remember we talked about the other one, enlightening?

Enlightening is like, "I didn't know that at all, wow, that blew my mind."

Sometimes conversations are enlightening, you learn something, right?

But maybe not engaging.

You will have many engaging conversations where you create a connection with another

person and you create interest in that person and the subject itself.

May not be enlightening, you might talk about the same things you've discussed, and it's

just fun, but a lot of engaging conversations become enlightening conversations, if you

go far enough and you get a deep enough connection.

Cool?

Now, exquisite.

This is an interesting word.

I don't use it that often, I don't have exquisite money, and you might go, "What?"

Well exquisite means rare and special.

We can use exquisite when we talk about - and a lot of times they will say if a woman is

beautiful, for instance, a man can be exquisite as well.

It means their beauty is special, it's not like any other beauty, it's different.

People can be beautiful, but this is different.

Why?

Because it's rare.

It's like one in a million people look like this.

Brad Pitts, they used to say Brad Pitt, Tom Cruise, the new guy, Patterson, who's going

to be Batman, they'll go, "He's exquisite."

Very few people look like them, and that makes them special.

Diamonds are exquisite, and that's why I said I don't use that word.

I am not exquisite, nor do I have exquisite money.

So a Ferrari's an exquisite car, rare and special.

Not everyone has one.

So you can use it for beauty, and you can use it for things.

Cool?

Next.

I say next, but it's homework time.

I always like to say thank you for watching this video, and thank you for making it to

the end.

And I know this sounds weird, but my gift to you is homework.

And why I give you that gift of homework is that which we practice becomes normal.

So if you start using these words from watching the video, doing the quiz I do here, doing

this for homework, then going to engVid and doing the quiz there, don't be surprised if

you have a opulent vocabulary, rich, decadent, yes, anyway.

So today's homework is - each question is worth 10,000 points for each one you get correct.

I would like you to answer below in the comment section, whether you're on engVid or on YouTube

or whatever platform you're on, answer the questions, there are three of them, and it's

worth 30,000 points.

If you get them all right, I'll say it's 50, all right?

People give you a thumbs up and thumbs down, I've seen it a million times before, it's

really cool, you get the right answer, and 12 people from across the planet or 20, I've

seen 30 people across the planet give you a thumbs up, it's nice having you on our team.

Okay, so first one is - she is one of a kind and something beauty.

Now, try and think of all the ones I taught you, all the adjectives, what is one of a

kind or rare?

Yeah, it's closer than you think.

Number two - his watch was covered, sorry, his watch was something, it was covered in

gold and diamonds.

What would be - what word do you use to say something that's got something that expensive

and just that luxurious, like diamonds and gold, just ripping with all this wealth, okay?

And the third one is - the view from the 50th floor, and I want you to think of a big apartment

building where you're looking down.

The view from the 50th floor was something.

Now, if you're 50 floors up looking down, what do you think that would do to you?

And what word or adjective would be the best one to use?

Anyway, that's the quiz we're going to do.

Thank you for coming and joining us once again, I love having you beautiful people part of

my lesson.

So, thank you.

That's the first thing.

Second, I would like you to go to www.engvid.com, well there'll be a quiz that accompanies this.

Don't forget to subscribe and hit the notification bell somewhere around here, that way any video

I do, you'll be notified immediately, cool?

And before I go, I would like to leave you a little quote for beauty, okay?

This is by Confucius, a Japanese philosopher from over 2,500 years ago.

He said, "Everything is beauty, or everything is beautiful, but not everybody sees it."

Cool?

So, keep that in mind, because now you have at least 15 to 20 words on beauty, and you

know how to use them.

So, you won't be one of those people who doesn't see it, because you have 20 ways of expressing

it.

It's been a pleasure.

See you later.

Ciao.