Shadowing Practice: Simplified Speech #163 – Kassy’s trip to Korea - Learn English Speaking with YouTube

Hello there everyone.

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Hello there everyone.

My name's Andrew.

And I'm Cassie.

And this is the Q-Lips English Podcast.

You're listening to Simplified Speech,

the Q-Lips series featuring clear,

natural, and easy to understand English conversations about interesting topics.

Today I'm joined by by my co-host Cassie.

Hey Cassie, how's it going?

Hey Andrew and hey everyone.

It's great to be here today.

I'm excited to study English together.

All right.

Yeah.

Cassie, it's great to actually have you here

because it's been a while since we've actually been able to record together in the same room,

in the same place at the same time.

And it's possible right now because you're visiting Korea.

Yeah, that's right.

I've been vacationing here for almost three weeks and I'm about to head back to Thailand,

but we could meet in person once before I left.

Excellent.

So I thought it could be fun for us to talk about your visit to Korea during this episode.

How does that sound?

Would that be okay with you?

Sounds great.

Let's do it.

Right on.

Great.

So we'll get started with that in just a minute, everyone.

But before we do, we wanted to let you know that we make study guides and transcripts for all our episodes.

They're designed by our team of expert English teachers to help you build your English skills and reach your learning goals faster.

To get unlimited access to all our study guides,

plus some great bonuses like invitations to our monthly live streams,

visit QLips.com and sign up to become a member.

We'd also like to give a shout out to one of our listeners named Jenny,

who is from Victoria, British Columbia, Canada.

Andrew, that was your old stomping grounds, right?

Yeah, my old stomping grounds.

That's right.

I went to the University of Victoria,

or we always called it UVic,

when I was a university student.

So yeah, I used to live in Victoria and that's why we can call it my old stomping grounds, right?

That idiom is used to refer to a place where you used to live or you used to hang out.

So Victoria was my old stomping grounds.

But Cassie, anyways, what did Jenny have to say in her review?

Well, she left a wonderful review and she wrote,

I've been a QLips member for a year and often listen to your podcast.

My son, Jesse, and I really love your podcast and believe your podcast is the very best one in the world.

Please do a shout out for us.

Your wishes come true, Jesse.

Yes, your wish is our command.

So Jesse, here's a shout out.

Thank you so much for listening.

And thank you for that very wonderful compliment.

Wow, Cassie, I don't quite agree that we're the best podcast in the world,

but I'm very touched that they think we are the best.

That's very nice.

But we're not done yet.

Jenny has also written another blurb.

Let's continue.

Okay.

As a link instructor, I recommend my students to listen to your podcast too.

I like the topic you talked about and the energy you put in your work.

We live in Victoria, British Columbia,

Canada, and would be so happy if Andrew could visit back with his lovely wife soon.

Anyway, best wishes to the Q-Lips team and Q-Lips listeners.

I love that.

Very nice message and review.

So thank you, Jenny and Jessie.

Yes, seriously, guys, thank you so much for your support.

We love reading each and every message.

And a huge thanks to everyone out there who has been supporting us with comments and reviews.

It really helps other English learners from around the world find Q-Lips and connect with us.

And it also, at least in my opinion,

Cassie, it lifts our spirits, right?

And motivates us to put our all into creating the best English lessons that we can.

And now, why don't we get started with our main topic of conversation,

which is about Cassie's visit to Korea.

So Cassie, you're back.

You recently moved away from Korea.

How long ago did you move away?

About six months ago, a little over six months.

Okay.

So about six months ago,

you moved to Thailand, but now you're back in Korea already for a long visit.

Why did you come back so soon?

Yeah, it wasn't the plan originally.

Um, didn't have a plan to come back in the two years I'm planning to teach in Thailand.

But it just so happened my aunt and my sister were supposed to come visit me in Thailand this Christmas vacation.

But plans fell through.

They couldn't make it.

And I missed Korea so badly.

Really?

Yes.

I was like, let's just go back for three weeks.

Oh, wow.

And my husband's like, sounds great.

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Well, we're certainly happy that you're back.

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I'm happy that you're back.

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It's great to see you.

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And yeah, let's talk all about this trip.

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So you missed Korea a lot.

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That's really interesting.

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Did you feel like you were almost homesick for your second home?

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That kind of feeling?

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Yeah, my husband and I joke about it a lot all the time because he's like,

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you never complain about missing America,

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but you always complain about missing Korea.

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I'm pretty sure you're Korean now.

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So what kind of things did you miss the most?

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I missed two things specifically.

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One, the food.

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I just love Korean food.

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Every single dish.

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I think there's only two that I've ever eaten in my whole life that I hate.

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One of them is red bean soup.

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For those of you who love that, I'm sorry.

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Red bean soup like pachuk?

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Pachuk.

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I can't stand it.

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But everything else, I had dreams about it in Thailand.

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The second thing is the weather.

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Thailand is great because it's endless sunshine,

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but it's also not great because it's endless sunshine.

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Sometimes you want variety, you know?

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And then three would be the traffic, I think.

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There's just a lot more sidewalks in Korea compared to Thailand.

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So sometimes it's a little scary or crazy walking around.

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It's hard to walk in Thailand,

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at least in my neighborhood.

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Okay.

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So you missed the food.

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You missed the variation in the weather.

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Sometimes it's rainy.

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Sometimes it's sunny.

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Sometimes it's hot.

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Sometimes it's cold.

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Yes.

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And also the safe sidewalks.

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Okay.

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Which is kind of funny for an American to say,

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because I feel like many Americans,

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when they come to Korea for the first time that's one

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thing they notice they think the sidewalks in Korea are a little bit dangerous compared to American

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or Canadian sidewalks

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because you'll have from time to time do notice this has gotten better in recent years

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but there are like delivery drivers who will ride their motor scooters on the sidewalks sometimes in Korea

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which can be a little bit surprising

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if you're not paying attention also there's like cars parked on the sidewalks often in Korea as well,

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which can be a little bit strange for an American, I feel.

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That's true.

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In Thailand, a lot of the streets just don't have any sidewalks.

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So it's really different.

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Each place is different.

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Yes.

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So, okay.

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You came back to Korea and you missed the food.

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So I'd be remiss myself if I didn't ask you about what you've been eating.

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Was there like a dish that you really wanted to try right away as soon as you got here?

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Not specifically, no, but I've eaten everything under the sun, Andrew.

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It has been a food trip for the ages.

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I've eaten everything from seaweed soup to Korean-style sushi, tons of Korean-style sushi.

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Korean-style sushi is more like sashimi where there's no rice and it's not in a roll.

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It's just like fresh fish or squid chopped up.

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And then they serve it to you on a plate with like some wasabi or red sauce.

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It's delicious.

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Yeah.

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Essentially, it's just sliced raw seafood, right?

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Yeah.

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And I know your husband is from Jeollanamdo,

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which is a province towards the southern part of the peninsula.

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And that area of the country is famous for food as having some of the most delicious food,

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but also famous for seafood as well.

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Exactly.

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And then also it is winter,

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which means that it is Kimjang season,

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which means that it is kimchi making season.

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Yeah.

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So all of my husband's family and friends,

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their refrigerators are just filled with fresh,

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delicious kimchi of every variety.

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Yeah.

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I have eaten so much kimchi the last three weeks.

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Now, did you get a chance to make some kimchi or just eat it?

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Not this year, but I have done it in the past.

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You've done it in the past.

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Okay.

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Awesome.

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what other things have you been up to do you do any activities

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or any tours

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or go to any attractions how you've been spending your time

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yeah we've done a lot of visiting of different families

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and friends

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and we also went skiing oh yeah yeah it was my first time in years it was really fun wow

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and we went on a weekday morning

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so it was really early i think we woke up at like 5 30 a.m to drive there

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but when we got there the slopes were empty oh yeah

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and i heard usually it's pretty packed in korea yeah

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so we rode up the lift and down the mountain like four or five times without

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any lines really wow you got lucky i think yeah wow

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that's awesome how was skiing again after many years of not doing it uh scary

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but fun i fell almost every time going down

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but only once how was the snow um yeah

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so for listeners who don't know thailand even in winter is like you know

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a nice balmy 26 to 30 degrees celsius right

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so we get on the airplane and then we touch down in korea

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and there's snow everywhere andrew yeah we've been having a really

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real winter like a genuine winter this year i feel like

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in korea it varies like you can't count on there being snow in seoul

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every year but this year i think throughout most of the country there's been really cold temperatures

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and lots of snow so

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that must have been like shocking to come from such a

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hot tropical place in thailand to suddenly being in this winter wonderland here in korea it was i think

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if i lived here full time i wouldn't love it as much because it would you know be cold forever but

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it's been so fun being here with the snow and skiing right after it snowed was amazing.

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So you had like fresh powdery snow?

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Yes.

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That's so nice.

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And Andrew, I don't know if you know this,

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but it snowed in Seoul,

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but it snowed in Guangzhou.

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I like what you did there, Cassie.

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You showed, I mean, you use the same word, right?

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It's snowed and it's snowed,

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but just the emphasis in your voice communicated that there was much more snow in Gwangju than in Seoul, right?

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Yeah.

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I think it was a record,

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the biggest snowfall in over a decade, something like that.

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Some of my friends who live there posted on social media and I saw some of the photos And yeah,

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we had like a few centimeters of snow in Seoul.

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It wasn't anything crazy, but it looked like a huge dumping of snow.

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Down south.

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Yeah.

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I think it was about 50 centimeters.

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Whoa.

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And my father-in-law drives a bus in the city of Guangzhou and it snowed constantly without stop for two days straight.

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I think it was like a Thursday,

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Friday, and he had to drive the bus on Friday, like that Friday.

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And I go, is it even possible to drive?

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He's like, I gotta do it.

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So he gets there, starts his route.

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He drives for eight hours and he gets through a single route.

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Really?

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Just one time in eight hours.

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Oh my God.

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Yeah.

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He was probably white knuckling it in the driver's seat.

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I know I would be if I had to drive a bus in a snowstorm.

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Yeah.

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He said the bus was doing pretty good,

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but he said all of the normal sedan cars that are not used to that weather.

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They were just swerving and couldn't move in the middle of the road.

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It was crazy.

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Well, it's probably nice for you to experience winter though,

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to be able to come back here and have some winter weather.

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Yeah, it's been really great.

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I think it also helps me appreciate Thailand as well.

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Like in just a few days,

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I'll be back with my t-shirt and shorts,

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living it up in the tropics again.

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I'm jealous about that.

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I have to say Cassie,

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have you noticed any differences between living in Korea and visiting as a tourist,

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like for a short trip?

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I think because I stayed in Gwangju at my parents-in-law's house,

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it felt almost like I was living here again for three weeks.

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It wasn't necessarily like a vacation,

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but more just like a coming home feeling.

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Oh, it was so nice.

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So Cassie, we're getting close to the end of this episode,

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but before we wrap up,

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I did want to ask you a final question here.

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And that is how is this trip comparing to trips that you've taken in the past?

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So I love living abroad,

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but I'm actually not much of a traveler.

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I don't like planning things.

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So planning big trips is stressful for me.

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What I do love is visiting family.

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And now it's really cool that I live away from Korea,

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but now I'm married to a Korean.

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I have Korean in-laws.

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So when I come back here,

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this is like a travel destination as well now.

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And so whether I visit Korea or the States or my family in Sweden,

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it's always amazing and it's stress-free.

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You know, I get there,

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my family has all the activities prepared, all the food ready.

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I can just show up and have a good time, you know?

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And this trip was no different.

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Yeah, you're really lucky that you have family in so many countries.

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I think that's kind of rare,

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right, to have family in so many places,

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Sweden, Korea, America, and so diverse as well.

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Yeah, it makes it hard to see each other frequently.

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But I think one special thing about my family is

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that we really work hard to see each other every year or every two years to keep that bond going.

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Yeah, that's great.

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Cassie, I think we'll wrap it up here for our regular listeners,

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but we're going to keep the discussion going a little bit longer on our ad-free members only edition of this episode.

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So if you're a Q-Lips member and you're listening to this regular episode,

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please make sure to go to our website and get the ad-free version so you can listen to the extra bonus content.

304

Thanks for listening and great job on completing an English study session with us.

305

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310

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or by leaving us a review and rating on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to Q-Lips.

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That's it for now, but we'll be back soon with another brand new episode and we'll talk to you then.

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Goodbye.

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See ya.

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Shadowing Practice: Simplified Speech #163 – Kassy’s trip to Korea - Learn English Speaking with YouTube

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Shadowing Practice: Simplified Speech #163 – Kassy’s trip to Korea - Learn English Speaking with YouTube

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About This Lesson

Key Vocabulary & Phrases

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What is the Shadowing Technique?