Jisoo’s Favorite English Idiom! Learn “That’s a Pity” + Ways to Say Sorry in English

- So, I saw that Jayson

from Blackpink said her favorite English phrase was this,

- My favorite English sentence is,

"That's a pity!".

- And because Blackpink deserve everything good

on this planet,

we're going to do a lesson on it.

So for example,

her friend tells her that, "My boyfriend cheated on me!"

and she wants to show sympathy to give her comfort.

Now to say, "Oh, that's unfortunate!"

"That's sad!"

Yes, she could say,

"Oh, that's a pity!" or

"That's a shame."

But this expression is kind of interesting.

So today I want to show you different ways to use this,

alternatives you can use for this,

and also why you probably don't want to use this expression

in a situation like this.

(upbeat music)

First, and this is why this is confusing.

If you feel shame, you feel embarrassment or humiliation,

like if you see your dad dancing at a party and he's drunk

you might feel embarrassment or humiliation.

You could say this,

"I'm so ashamed."

Remember the adjective "ashamed," a-shamed, not shame.

I'm so shame, no!

That's a noun.

This is the adjective,

I feel so, I am so ashamed.

This adjective describes your feeling,

but the situation is, "shameful."

"Oh, this is so shameful."

Describe the feeling, "I feel ashamed."

To describe the situation, "This is shameful."

"You are shameful."

"You cause embarrassment."

"You cause humiliation."

- Shame!

- And pity, that's different.

To feel pity for someone means you feel sad

because of their bad situation.

Like,

if his friend doesn't have a job, doesn't have anything.

I don't know.

Doesn't have anything good in her life,

he might feel sad for her situation.

As a verb, "I pity her."

As a noun, "I feel pity for her."

"I feel petty for her."

But definitely don't say this directly to someone.

Why? Because you're pretty much saying

"Oh, you have a bad situation,

and maybe you don't know

or you're not strong enough to get out of this situation."

So people don't like when people pity them.

So definitely don't say this to someone,

if you feel this way.

It's a bit like you're saying, "Oh"

(beep)

So you want it to be careful with these expressions

particularly with the intonation

because sometimes it might sound sarcastic,

like you don't really mean it,

you don't care about their problem.

Why is that?

Because "That's a pity!" and "That's a shame!"

is really only for small, bad things.

Not big, bad things.

For example, if you want to go out somewhere

but "How's it raining?

That's a shame,

I go out later."

You see, it's bad but it's small.

It's not that big or important.

And that's the feeling behind, "That's a shame!"

or "That's a pity!"

So if you set it for something big like,

"What happened?

Did you break your leg?

That's a shame!"

See, it kind of sounds like you don't really care.

So if it's something big, don't say, "That's a pity!"

or "That's a shame!"

So when do you use that?

Remember that you're saying, "Ah, that's unfortunate."

Or maybe even, "I regret that this happened."

So a better example of when to use these expressions

is something like this,

- I love you.

- Sure. It's a pity you have tiny baby hands,

but I still love you

- Really, you're not ashamed of my tiny baby hands?

- Never (smooches).

Or, "Ah, I'm really wet.

It's a shame I didn't bring an umbrella."

Okay, another more common way

to show sympathy for someone is this,

"I got fired"

"That sucks."

This isn't a swear word,

but for some reason people don't like when kids say this,

so keep that in mind.

Also, you could say,

"Oh, you lost your job,

that's awful!"

Now for pronunciation, you have some options.

Me being from London

I tend to pronounce the "L" like an "L" like a W sound.

So it sounds like awful, awful!

"That's awful mate!"

But you might want to pronounce the "L" the true "L" way.

Awful, that's awful!

Both are fine.

Both are equally correct.

You just choose your favorite style.

So a stronger, more vulgar,

informal swearing version of this,

you could say,

"Oh, mate, that's shit!"

Again, remember that this is a swear word,

so don't say it to your boss or any formal situation.

You have an option,

if you're describing the situation as an adjective,

"That's shit!"

But we can also describe the situation as a noun.

In that case, we could be like

"Well, that's a shit!"

Or in the negative way,

"Well, isn't that a shit?"

Again, you just choose your favorite style.

So maybe she could react in disbelief.

Like, "Oh my God, he cheated on you!

I can't believe it."

Of course, very simply you could just say, "Oh no!"

But stronger, you could say,

"No way!"

"You're kidding."

"Are you kidding me?"

The stressed word should be "kidding," right?

So that is where the emphasis comes.

"You're kidding."

"Are you kidding me?"

Sometimes I hear students say like, "Are you kidding me?"

No, just be careful,

that is where the stress is.

The strongest level of disbelief.

Again, this is vulgar informal.

Don't use it around your boss, teacher, formal situations.

It's not safe.

You could say this,

"Are you fucking kidding me?"

The street is obviously on the strongest word.

So it's here, "Are you fucking kidding me?"

Say it with me.

Let's do pronunciation,

"Are you fucking kidding me?"

What I like to do with that last one,

I extend the fucking,

So it's like, "Are you fucking kidding me?"

Play with it,

be creative, language is for fun.

Okay, what if someone dies?

How do you show sympathy?

The most standard thing to say

when someone dies is, "I'm so sorry."

That's it.

You don't need anything extra.

Again, you have options,

"I'm sorry,"

"I'm so sorry,"

Or "I'm sorry to hear that."

Doesn't matter if you read it in a text message,

that's the expression,

"I'm sorry to hear that."

Or the super formal version would be,

"Ah, my condolences."

This is more common for written things like,

so in an email, card,

but usually commonly,

say this and you'll be fine.

But again, that's a big thing, right?

So, "That's a pity!"

"That's a shame!"

that would sound like you're being sarcastic again.

"Oh, your whole family died?

That's a pity!"

So definitely not for that situation.

If you did something bad,

or you need to apologize,

very easily you can say these,

of course you can say "Sorry!"

but other options could be,

"Oh, this is yours, I'm Oh, my bad, Sorry!"

Or if you did something really bad, you could say,

"Oh no, I think I just gave you a dog COVID,

I'm ever so sorry!"

So that is for something really big.

There are many other options,

and I made a whole video about ways to apologize.

You can click here to see that whole thing.

Okay, your friend is sad,

you want to help them feel happy again,

feel good again,

what can you say?

"Don't worry!" or,

"Hey, cheer up!"

Sometimes this can sound sarcastic too.

So I would recommend don't use this one too much.

Use a different one.

"It's gonna be okay!"

"Don't worry, it's all gonna work out!"

Now, a good phrasal verb "work out,"

Yes, like in the gym,

when you train in the gym, you work out.

But when you want to say

this thing will be good in the future,

or it will have a happy ending,

"It will work out!"

An example could be,

"I had a stressful day yesterday,

I had lots of work, but everything worked out.

In the end, everything was good."

It's all gonna work out!

It's gonna be okay!

Cheer up!

Don't worry!

For this situation you can say, "Don't worry!"

But not, "No worries!"

"No worries" replaces "It's not a problem."

So you can see that doesn't work well in this situation.

Use "No worries!" for like your response to, thank you.

You wanna say, "Nah, no problem."

Or "You're welcome."

That would be good, not for this.

For "No worries," I've put that in a different video.

You can see that, click here.

And finally, what if this person is acting like

this is the biggest problem ever

but actually in reality,

this problem is tiny, it's small,

it's nothing, it's so stupid

and this person should stop complaining.

Say this,

"My girlfriend broke up with me a year ago."

"Oh my God, get over it mate!"

To "get over something,"

you might remember this phrasal verb.

It means to remove all of your bad feelings

about something that happened

and forget about it,

continue with your life,

get over it.

Or yes, of course he could say,

"Mate, get over it, it's not the end of the world!"

So yeah, when someone is exaggerating

these are good expressions to use.

It's not the end of the world, get over it!

So for me as a teacher is always really fun

to see people enjoying learning English.

So when I saw that interview I had to make this video.

Any excuse to talk about Blackpink and I'm happy basically.

So have you ever had any of these situations?

Have you ever had to say a similar expression

in your language?

Let me know in the comments,

what happened, which expression did you use

and how would you say in English?

Also this lesson,

this is in my "Ultimate English" eBook.

You can download it.

The link is in the description

I'll see you in the next class.

(upbeat music)