ELISA ENGLISH's Blog 英語園地

Error Correction

If you happened to read the comments a so-called columnist left me before I erased them, you might have remembered what his/her correction was. 

I erased his/her comments because the correction was inaccurate and because of his/her vicious attack on me. 

To ensure that you won’t be misled by the inaccurate correction, I decided to share with you the error corrections that he/she made on my article.

The article that he/she chose to correct was a journal I wrote on 9/21/09, titled: I am letting the cat out of the bag. http://elisaenglish.pixnet.net/blog/post/1003794

In his/her comments, he/she criticized my English ability and stated that my usage of the words and grammar were incorrect.  To prove his/her point, he/she picked the following sentence I wrote to make the correction.

This is the sentence I wrote:

I usually wear it from the moment I get out of the door (走出家門)

to the moment that I finish my dinner. 

我通常從我走出家門那一刻開始穿它, 穿到我吃完我的晚餐為止.

This is his/her correction:

I usually wear it from the moment I get outing to the moment that I finish my dinner.   (Incorrect)

Let’s look at why his/her correction is inaccurate.

Get out of the door -> 走出家門

Get outing -> incorrect usage.

Correct usage of “outing” would be:

We are going on a family outing.

We are attending a corporate outing.

What exactly does “outing” mean?

Outing means: excursion, picnic, 郊遊, 遠足, 野餐, 戶外活動

So when I wrote “get out of the door”, I literally meant 走出家門.  I did not wear my body shaper to go on an outing.  So, next time when you correct someone’s journal, please be sure that you truly understand the author’s intent and don’t correct a right usage into a wrong one.