Dave's ESL Cafe's Student Discussion Forums

[ClarissaMach]

Dear teachers,
could you please check the text below?
I was supposed to write a letter to a friend who asks me about a job I had last summer with an international company that organizes music festivals (this exercise belongs to one of those CAE papers):

Dear Jan,
It is nice to hear of you. I hope you are doing fine.
About your question, my answer is �yes�: I think you would like the job. If you apply to it, you will have lots of opportunities to hearing plenty of music, just like you want: last summer, I was able to do more than one free visit to music festivals.
At first, things might seem a little bit boring: in the first day, I thought I would have no chance of learning anything, for all I was asked to do was answering the phone and making coffee. But as days went by, things improved: I had the chance of doing some translation and also answering enquiries from English visitors � in other words, if you get this job, you will be able to use your English and get some useful work experience.
About the money, well, it is not bad, and I am pretty sure you could save enough for a really good vacation! By the time I applied to the job, I was able to make money enough to travel to Buenos Aires, Argentina, an old dream of mine.
Working with the international company was really worth after all. If I were you, I would no doubt apply to it.
Yours Faithfully,
Clarissa.
_________________
Stormy Weather.

[CP]

I would make a few changes, noted in bold.

Dear Jan,
It was nice to hear from you. I hope you are doing fine.
About your question, my answer is �yes�: I think you would like the job. If you apply for it, you will have lots of opportunities to hear plenty of music, just like you want: last summer, I was able to make more than one free visit to music festivals.
At first, things might seem a little bit boring: on the first day, I thought I would have no chance to learn anything, because all I was asked to do was answer the phone and make coffee. But as time went on, things improved: I had the chance to do some translation and also answer inquiries from English visitors. In other words, if you get this job, you will be able to use your English and get some useful work experience.
About the money, well, it is not bad, and I am pretty sure you could save enough for a really good vacation! By the time I applied for the job, I was able to make money enough to travel to Buenos Aires, Argentina, an old dream of mine.
Working with the international company was really worth after all. If I were you, I would certainly apply for it.
Yours Faithfully,
Clarissa.

Overall, very good, just a few problems with verb forms and a few prepositions. Those are very tricky in English, for native speakers of Spanish. I think you want to reword the part about making enough money to go to Buenos Aires. I think you mean, by the time the job was over, or by the time summer was over, rather than by the time I applied for the job. Also, I changed no doubt to certainly, since no doubt is more like probably, but I think you want something stronger than probably there. Good job.
_________________
You live a new life for every new language you speak. -Czech proverb

[ClarissaMach]

Thanks a lot CP! My native language is not Spanish, it's Portuguese, but they're very simmilar languagens in terms of grammar.
_________________
Stormy Weather.

[CP]

[ClarissaMach]

Well, "saudade" would be something like "Miss you". (It is said that there is no translation for this Portuguese word, but I am not sure about it... in English, as far as I'm concerned, there isn't a single word to express it).
_________________
Stormy Weather.