Do you ever think of how often we use expressions in our daily lives? During my class I teach about idioms. Koreans talk about "sokdams", or proverbs, I just call them sayings or expressions. Like, "some people eat to live and some people live to eat". What about, "sometimes you eat the bear, and sometimes the bear east you". I am very careful when I speak to people from other countries in not using expressions. They usually can't understand them. When people that are learning English hear something like, "No news is good news" they aren't sure how to take it. Even though it can mean different things they don't understand either of them.
When I say it I mean that not hearing anything means there is nothing bad. Many people contact you only when there is a problem, so if you don't hear from people (get no news) you should realize that there are no problems (is good news). How do people learn these expressions, how did we learn these expressions? I guess you just have to be exposed to them enough you become accustomed to them. We memorize them just like we memorize vocabulary words. There are a lot of sayings that come under this umbrella. If you ever talk to someone that is from another country, even if they are from another English speaking country you need to think about the expressions you use.
If they act like they can't hear you it could be that they just don't understand the expressions you use. Sometime try to speak without using expressions. You will find you use them in more than 25% of the things you say. I am always amazed with things people from the South say. Where do they come up with the bizarre ways of saying things? I should make a list of those sayings I hear periodically.
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