O podcast de hoje fala sobre expectations, e como dizer que algo não correspondeu às suas expectativas ou deixou a desejar.

Transcrição

Hey, what’s up? This is Ana Luiza with a new episode of the inglesonline podcast. To download or just listen to other episodes and download transcripts, go to inglesonline.com.br and click Podcast Inglesonline.

So picture this: there’s a new blockbuster out in the theaters. What’s a blockbuster? That’s a movie that makes millions of people go watch it and that makes tons of money. Think Harry Potter, Avatar, Transformers… Those were all blockbusters. So back to the story… Imagine that there’s a new blockbuster at the theaters and everyone is talking about it. Every time you turn around there’s a magazine cover, an interview with the lead actor, a photo, or someone saying they’ve watched it and loved it.

Not surprisingly, your expectations for this movie begin to mount. In the beginning, meh… You were not that interested. But you’ve heard so much from your sister, your friends and your coworkers that now you’re not only curious but you can’t wait to go see this movie. By now, you have high expectations for this movie. You are convinced that you’re gonna have such a great time at the theater. You buy your ticket online in advance, you choose the best seat in the house and you don’t even tell your friends that you’re going, ’cause you don’t want to hear your friends chit-chatting throughout the movie… No, you want to give this wonderful movie your complete and undivided attention. You’re so sure you’re gonna have the time of your life.

Can your expectations get any higher? Not likely. The state I just described is a state of high expectations, very high expectations. Sometimes our high expectations are met. And everyone’s happy. But very often, we have high expectations for something and we end up disappointed. Why? Because we’ve built this thing up in our minds, we’ve imagined something based on other people’s opinions, and… that doesn’t always correspond to reality or we realize

that we have a different opinion.

So if you go into a movie or into a play with high expectations, let’s say that there’s a good chance you may be disappointed. Sometimes we go to a restaurant with high expectations. Sometimes we sign up for a course, or buy a computer with high expectations. Now, some people say it’s better to always have low expectations in general about everything – this way, you never get disappointed. What do you think? I think this is hard to control and sometimes my expectations are high and sometimes they’re low. When I began this website, I had low expectations. I wanted to see it grow a little bit, I thought it would be cool if some people came by and if I made a little money with ads, but the truth is, Inglês Online grew beyond my highest expectations. So there’s an example of something I had low expectations for… my website. Sort of, sort of low expectations. Not that low.

And here’s an expression that is somewhat related to expectations: “measure up”. So let’s say you went to see the blockbuster and you had such high expectations that, after the movie ended… you were left with a feeling of “Is that it? That’s the movie everyone’s talking about? Huh.” You were less than impressed. You weren’t all that impressed. You expected a whole lot more out of this movie based on all the buzz. Now that you’ve seen it, you realize that this movie didn’t measure up. It did not measure up to your expectations. It didn’t measure up to what you were expecting. I guess in Portuguese we could say “Não ficou à altura”. The movie didn’t measure up to your expec...