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Frenemies

Learn English with this friendship English lesson

Date: Jan 18 2013

Themes: Friend

Grammar: Imperative Form

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Intro

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2. Read and Prepare - Read the introduction and prepare to hear the audio.

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There’s a saying in English, “With friends like these, who needs enemies?” You say it when your friends do something that isn’t very friendly.

We like to think of friends as people who support us and want us to do well. But not all friends are like that. Some friends are actually frenemies.

A frenemy is a slang term for someone who is supposed to be your friend, but always tries to cut you down. Why do we keep these people in our lives? Listen to Vanessa tell Jason about a frenemy of hers in this English lesson about friendship.

Dialog

1. Listen and Read - Listen to the audio and read the dialog at the same time.

2. Study - Read the dialog again to see how the vocab words are used.

Vanessa

Jason

Vanessa: A girl I knew in high school recently got in touch with me on Facebook and I’m trying to figure out whether to accept her friend request. We always knew the same people in high school and we did a lot of the same activities, so I guess you could say we were friends. But sometimes I felt like she wasn’t very nice to me.

Jason: Really? What kind of things would she do?

Vanessa: When I ran for senior class president, she ran for senior class president against me. And I know that she didn’t even want to be class president! She was just doing it to run against me.

Jason: Oh, that’s weird. She just did it to spite you.

Vanessa: Yeah!

Jason: That’s not very friendly!

Vanessa: No!

Jason: Was it healthy competition though? Like, you just wanted to push each other?

Vanessa: No, we never joked about it or anything.

Jason: You guys don’t really sound much like friends to me. You sound more like frenemies.

Vanessa: That is the perfect way to describe it! We were always nice to each other on the surface, but underneath it all there was a lot of competitiveness. And it wasn’t always very pleasant. For example, I put my name in to be prom queen, even though I knew it meant a lot to her, and I ended up winning.

Jason: Oh. Well, maybe you should accept her friend request then, and be sure you post lots of pictures of yourself as prom queen.

Grammar Point

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Discussion

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An old friend from high school wants to be friends with Vanessa on Facebook. Vanessa isn’t sure if she should accept because the friend was mean to her sometimes.

Vanessa says she and her friend weren’t trying to push each other to be better. This wasn’t healthy competition. It was just plain not nice.

Jason says it sounds more like they were frenemies than friends. Vanessa thinks this term, which combines the words “friend” and “enemy,” perfectly describes the relationship.

Do you have any frenemies? Why do we keep these people in our lives? Do you think Vanessa should reconnect with her frenemy?

Comments

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Irene Forever

Ukraine

Dear Seiyf, thanks for thinking about me in such a positive way.

I am stronger with you and my close friends. You know many secrets about me and keep them in your mind.:) Let people think, I am strong.:)))

Thanks.

Irene Forever

Ukraine

Mess, I totally agree with you.

I don’t think the second chance can change my frenemy. We feel great without each other.:)

MESS

Turkey

To give a second chance? Yeah, maybe, if the person did not hurt me badly. Yet as the saying goes, one bitten twice shy. That’s to say, if I have an unpleasant experience, I am more careful to avoid similar experiences.

I am valuable. I am good. I am loved. I am accepted. I am unique. I am priceless. Everybody is a gem and everybody is valuable, so it is our right to cleanse our life off frenemies.

Harsh or a bit arrogant, but true. :)

Irene Forever

Ukraine

Dear Seiyf, welcome back.:) I ‘m happy to see you again.

Saying the word “forgive”, Oscar Wilde meant forgiveness itself.

For me it’s just disregard that I can grant to my frenemy. I don’t care about him/her anymore. I can love for long and throw away from my heart as soon as I am betrayed. But it’s a serious case.

Here on the Internet all is different. You don’t know exactly who are people surrounding you, and you actually don’t care about many of them. Still a few, very few are dear, right?

P.S. Seiyf, I’m not so strong as I seem to be, and you know it, my dear friend.:)

Irene Forever

Ukraine

Mahtab, :)

I like the phrase by Oscar Wilde: “Always forgive your enemies—nothing annoys them so much.”

We’d better focus our time on the real friends in our life.

great_ather

Pakistan

nice

Mahtab.bp

Iran, Islamic Republic Of

Irene with your comment I remembered that I had a frenemy too!:))

lhotse

Poland

Don’t you think that Venesa’s friend (or frenemy) could change? Maybe she was a bad girl previously but life is strenge and unexpected things can happen. I think Venessa may accept her on Facebook. This costs enything. She always can delete her later on if not happy with this contact. We don’t know why she wants to have a contant with Venessa. Maybe she wants to apologise Venessa? I always think we should give peple a second chance…

Irene Forever

Ukraine

Olya, your commenting here just what everyone including me should understand.

I totally agree with you.

Irene Forever

Ukraine

It’s a little complicated for me to give ther right characteristic for frenemies. Fortunately, I don’t have any in my real life. To have them means not to respect myself.

However, in the virtual word this issue needs to be considered carefully. When I have weighted my relationships on the Internet, I can admit to have at least one frenemy. It’s funny to confess, but that person doesn’t even realise which feeling I have had for a long time. :) How have I managed to understand that the person is my frenemy. It’s so easy to feel it from sarcastic and hypocritical comments, from prickly words. It’s really a fun for me to read them. I just realize where I am and how should I accept and filter all the info I get.

Why are we still friends? Interesting question, right? The answer is: we have never been friends. We have always been just people from cyber world who accidentally met on the same road. That’s why I don’t care about them. That’s all.:)

dreadslayer

Turkey

that girl was totally frenemy this is the great way to describe it indeed.according to this dialogue,Vanessa shouldnt accept her friend request,because she’ll want to spoil her life again.i dont like that type of people.we dont need them in our lifes.they always drag us to failure.they act like sneaky.we must figure out which people among our friends are really friends who want us to reach successful.Nevertheless,there wouldnnt be any intimaty between eachother.

kkannanbe

India

No, She shouldn’t do that mistakes. Frenemies are very danger peoples than enemies.

ballin25

United Kingdom

here soo cold i like goo hom pales

LXF

China

我不明白

ola33

Japan

Seiyf, I can’t believe there’re so many frenemies (friends in disguise) around. I can keep them very tight, in a bear hug :)). Now we need a Lie Wizard who will tell us the truth who is who :)

zanobya

Iraq

I hope all the world will be in peasess

Whisper of Hearts

Egypt

Ihave suffered from this Kind alot :)

omar saidi

Tanzania, United Republic Of

We have many people whose have a such habit , actually they don’t like to see someboby developed , always they r happy when u r suffering in a difficult condition at the u get nothing .

I suggest u would better stay away with them .

kt2243

Pakistan

no i don’t have such kind of people but i’m like that kind of person with my all class fellows i always want to win and try my level best to dish it out the person or make that person to lose…:)

Rockyy01

Pakistan

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