商務禮節美語第62期:成人教育(1)

Lisa請Shirley吃飯，有事徵求Shirley的意見。

Lisa:Hey, Shirley! Want to join me for treat!

Shirley:Wow! Sure!

Lisa:I must confess I have an ulterior motive for asking you to lunch.

S:'s long as you're buying!

L:I really want to pick your brain about something I've been thinking a lot about.

S:I'd love to help if I can.

請別人吃飯，可以說 my treat, 也可以說 it's on me. 原來，Lisa請Shirley吃飯別有用心，She has an ulterior motive. motive是動機，ulterior is spelled u-l-t-e-r-i-o-r, ulterior意思是暗藏的，別有用心的。Lisa告訴Shirley, I really want to pick your brain about something. to pick someone's brain意思是跟某人交談，獲取信息，徵求意見。

L:Well, as you know, I have a Bachelor's degree in English literature and that's served me well so far, but I've always wanted to do some post-graduate e even get a Doctorate!

S:Wow! Just the idea of going back to school fills my head with pain.

L:But you have a Master's 't that helped your career?
S:Yeah, I'd have to say it has. But I'm still paying for it, you know.

L:I know education is expensive, but it's been my lifelong dream. Call me crazy, but I've always wanted to have that PhD at the end of my name.

原來，Lisa是考慮要回去上學。她已經有了a Bachelor's Degree學士學位，想再拿個Master's Degree碩士學位，甚至是a Doctorate博士學位，這是她的lifetime dream這輩子夢寐以求的。Shirley承認，碩士學位確實對自己的事業有幫助，但是在美國接受高等教育很貴，I'm still paying for it.我上學的錢到現在還沒有還清。Shirley還說，

S:Well, getting a Doctorate degree would mean close to a decade of school. Can you afford that? Can you survive that?
L:I certainly can't afford it, but I'm sure I could find some good student loans.

S:I think you need to separate the dream of having a PhD from the reality of years of more schooling. It's not as romantic as you might think.

L:Yeah....I keep thinking about what I'll do with a Master's or Doctorate. I love language but I don't think there are a lot of well-paying jobs out there for experts on Shakespeare.

S:Uh huh, that's for sure. You might find that your only career choice is teaching other graduate students.

Shirley勸Lisa不要把回去讀書想得太好，要看自己經濟上能否承擔得起，Can you afford that? 還要看自己能不能堅持下來，Can you survive that?Lisa會不顧一切卻追求夢想嗎？我們下次繼續聽。