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Bài mẫu band 9 – Part 1: Work, View, Water Sports
1.What do you do?
So, I’m an IELTS teacher and I’ve been doing so for the better part of the last 7 or 8 years
2. What’s the best part about your job?
I think the most enjoyable aspect of what I do is the ability to meet people from all walks of life and having the chance to learn as much from them as they do from me.
- walk of life (n) tầng lớp xã hội
3. Does your city have any good views?
Well, Hanoi is not really you know, synonymous for its views. In fact, I think the city’s skyline is quite depressing but I would imagine if you go up to the skyscrapers in the city like Lotte tower where they have a sky deck or an observatory, you could technically get a pretty good view . But with all this pollution I don’t think it’ll be much of a view.
- synonymous: đồng nghĩa, khi nói 2 thứ “synonymous” với nhau, có thể hiểu là 2 thứ có mối liên kết chặt chẽ
- skyscraper (n) nhà chọc trời
- sky deck = observatory (n) đài quan sát
- much of a view (phrase) một khung cảnh đẹp
2. What’s the finest scenery you've encountered?
So, the most spectacular view that I’ve seen, bar none, is the view that I got in Hongkong, which is one of the must- go spots whenever you’re in Hongkong. You pretty much get like a full-front or unobstructed 360 degree view of the harbor below and you get the city, the central business district area, and some of the nature, the bay and overall it’s just a really spectacular view.
- must-go spot (n) địa điểm phải đến
- unobstructed (adj) không bị che khuất
- spectacular (adj) tuyệt vời
3. Are you willing to invest more in a hotel room with a splendid view?
I think it just really depends on the city. Most of the time, I think of hotel rooms or Airbnb as like simply places to crash, to sleep because the places I usually travel to have so much to offer outside of your hotel room so I usually don’t splurge on a room with a nice view. But if I find myself in a city where there’s not much to do and most of what I’ll be doing during the day is just slouching about in the hotel room then I will pay for an upgrade.
- to splurge on: vung tiền
- to slouch: nằm dài
- to crash: ngủ tạm
4. Do you engage in any water activities?
Well when you think of water sports, you’ll usually conjure up images of really adventurous activity but I think the most adventurous water sport I’ve ever played is swimming. It’s pretty dull, but that’s kinda paradoxical, because in Vietnam or in Hanoi specifically, there are so many bodies of water. You would imagine people would be more into water sports but that’s obviously not the case, at least not for me
- to conjure up: vẽ lên trong đầu
- adventurous activity (n) hoạt động mạo hiểm
- paradoxical (adj) mâu thuẫn
- body of water (n) = waterbody (n) vùng nước
5. Which water sports would you want to attempt in the future?
That’s a good question, I think I’ll give wake boarding a go. From what I see on TV and from what my friends told me, it’s a pretty interesting sport to play but with all the travel restrictions in place, I don’t know when I’ll get myself to a place where I can play this sport
Band 9 model essay – Part 2: Something challenging to use
Describe something you bought that was difficult to use at firstYou should say:What is it?When you bought it?What does it do?Explain how difficult was it to be used?
So as technology progresses you’d think that technological devices and gadgets would become more intuitive and easier to use but that was obviously not the case with the thing I bought. It’s called the gimbal which is kind of a camera stabilizer and I bought it at the HongKong airport, if my memory serves me right.At the time we were traveling through Hongkong and my wife suggested that I should make travel vlogs. Given that I travel so much and I think we were just browsing around and the salesperson suggested that we should give this a try and I think I paid 300 bucks for it which at the time I thought it was criminally expensive because it was 300 bucks for what was tantamount to basically a selfie stick.So it was extremely difficult to use at first because of the number of things. First of all, it is the interface. Now, I’m not the most tech savvy person in the world but at the same time I don’t think of myself as a technophobe either but the software that accompanies the device was just really challenging to navigate. The device itself was also really kinda awkward to hold and maneuver, it was really hefty and I guess I was just really inexperienced when it comes to camera equipment. But after a few days of using it, I slowly got the hang of it and it became a lot easier to use. The difference that it makes to the quality of the videos and the vlogs was just night and day. The shots were lot more stable and it just feels like something that was professionally produced rather than something that an amateur or home vlogger puts out on The Internet.
- intuitive (adj) dựa vào trực giác
- camera stablilizer = gimbal (n) thiết bị chống rung máy quay cầm tay
- one’s memory serves right (phrase) nếu nhớ chính xác…
- to browse around: lướt (mạng)
- to give something a try: thử cái gì
- buck (slang) tiền đô Mỹ (tiếng lóng) (1 buck = 1 dollar)
- criminally expensive (adj) đắt dã man
- be tantamount to: gần giống như
- tech-savvy (adj/ informal) người rành công nghệ
- technophobe (adj) người mù công nghệ
- to maneuver: điều khiển
- hefty (adj) nặng
- to get the hang of something: dần quen với cái gì
- night and day: rõ như ban ngày
- stable (adj) ổn định
- professionally produced: được sản xuất chuyên nghiệp
Band 9 model essay – Part 3: Consumption
Lưu ý: Các topic của Part 2 và Part 3 thường liên quan đến nhau.
1. Do you always feel the need to purchase the newest versions of everything?
No, I am utterly opposed to people going out there and buying the supposedly coolest or most innovative permutations of the things that they’ve already owned because I think when something is produced, there should be longevity to them. The user/consumer should be able to get as much use out of them as possible and they should last ideally a lifetime. At least that’s what I think about everything I’ve bought. Everything I’ve bought whether it’s technology or clothes or footwear, they’re built like a tank and they practically last a lifetime and I think given that the throwaway society we’re living in right now, given how much waste we’re producing every year, the only ethical choice that consumers can make is to buy things that last.
- be opposed to: phản đối
- innovative permutation (n) kiểu mẫu tân tiến nhất
- longevity (n) tuổi thọ, sự tồn tại lâu dài
- to last a lifetime: bền
- be built like a tank (slang) cứng cáp, rất bền
- throwaway society (n) xã hội “vứt bỏ” (khi mọi người ưa chuộng đồ dùng 1 lần)
- ethical choice (n) lựa chọn mang tính đạo đức
2. Why do so many people nowadays opt to buy items with logos on them?
I think it just comes down to a few key reasons, it just really depends on the category of the product itself . So when it comes to clothes, when people wear clothes with recognizable prints or logos on them , I think of that as style by association. People think they’ll be automatically stylish or fashionable if they associate themselves with certain brands, brands that are kind of trendy. But it’s not so much vanity when it comes to technology for example, I think a recognizable logo, brand recognition if you will, lends credibility to the products that people purchase and given the breadth of choice that we’re offered nowadays, going with something that is familiar I think gives us peace of mind that the thing has good qualities and it comes from a reputable source.
- To come down to: chung quy là
- recognizable (adj) dễ nhận biết
- style by association: tạo dựng phong cách bằng sự liên kết với các nhãn hiệu, hình ảnh.
- vanity (n) nông cạn
- to lend credibility: tăng độ tin cậy
- the breadth of choice (n) sự phong phú
- to give somebody peace of mind: khiến ai thấy an tâm
3. Should companies continue producing goods that people use briefly before discarding?
So as I was saying, I’m really against the idea of keeping things that are disposable but then again from a business perspective, I could see that a business has to be financially viable. In order to do that, they have to keep making products and then they have to be able to sell them because a company is responsible for the livelihood of so many people. So, if people, consumers, only buy things once and just keep them for the rest of their lives, obviously the economy will be in tatters and people would be jobless and the demand would decrease dramatically. I think sometimes it’s okay for companies to keep producing things that people would throw away after a short time, but ideally all businesses should strive towards permanence, longevity and sustainability.
- disposable (adj) đồ dùng 1 lần
- financially viable: sẵn có về mặt tài chính
- be in tatters: gặp khó khăn
- to strive towards: hướng đến
- permanence (n) sự lâu dài
- sustainability (n) sự bền vững
