A2 · Plans and experiences — Unit 1, Pre-intermediate to Intermediate English
A2 · Plans and experiences at Pre-intermediate to Intermediate level (CEFR A2–B1).
Reading: Plans and experiences
Sara has lived in Ganja for three years, but last month she visited her cousins in Istanbul. She had never flown alone before, so she felt nervous. Although the flight was delayed, she arrived safely. Now she is planning another trip: if she saves enough money, she will go to Tbilisi in spring. She has already started a travel fund.
The Istanbul trip almost did not happen. Sara had booked the flight in February, and three weeks before she was due to leave, her manager asked her to cover a colleague's shifts. She had never refused anything at work before. This time she said no, and to her surprise nobody minded.
Her cousins met her at the airport at one in the morning. She had not seen them for six years, since they last came to Ganja, and she had been quietly worried that they would have nothing to say to each other. They talked until four.
She spent nine days there. She had planned an itinerary of museums and had visited two of them by the end of the week; the rest of the time she sat in her aunt's kitchen, went to the market, and learned to make three dishes she had eaten all her life without knowing how.
The flight home was worse than the flight out — she has flown alone once now, and it has not made her fearless.
But something did change. Before Istanbul, she had spent three years saying that she would travel one day. She has now written a list of five cities on the inside of her wardrobe door.
Tbilisi is first, because it is the cheapest and because a friend from work has family there and has offered a room. If she keeps saving at the current rate, she will have enough by March. If the flights rise, she will take the bus, which is fourteen hours and costs a third as much.
She has also changed how she saves. Instead of putting aside whatever is left at the end of the month — which for three years was almost nothing — she moves a fixed amount into the travel fund on the day she is paid, before anything else leaves the account.
Her mother thinks the list is unrealistic. Sara has pointed out, more than once, that her mother said exactly the same thing about Istanbul.
This is the free sample from this unit. The full unit adds comprehension questions with an answer key, the listening exercises, flashcards for the vocabulary above, and a speaking task — with your progress tracked so the next unit unlocks when you are ready for it.
Common questions
What level is this unit?
Pre-intermediate to Intermediate — roughly CEFR A2–B1. If you are not sure of your level, the course places you with a short diagnostic before you start rather than making you guess.
Do I need to pay to use this?
The reading passage and vocabulary on this page are free to read. The rest of the unit — the remaining passages, the exercises, the listening, the answer key and the progress tracking — is part of the paid General English course.
Is this British or American English?
British English spelling and vocabulary, which is what most learners in Azerbaijan are taught and what IELTS expects, though both are accepted in the exam.