Episode 1

Who am I? What is this podcast even about?

Hello, friends. This is your host, Josh and this is the Comprehensible Australian Podcast, a podcast for those who are learning English as a second language and want to learn more about life in Australia. Welcome to episode #1. Who am I? What is this podcast even about?

So, I'm your host, Josh. Nice to meet you. I am an English teacher and I speak Australian English. I love language, so that's why I became an English teacher. I'm making this podcast to teach you English in an enjoyable way. You can use this podcast to learn English. Just listen. Don't worry about grammar. Don't worry about answering questions. This is not a classroom. Don't worry if you can't understand every word. Listen to my voice and pronunciation. Just relax and enjoy. Try to understand the general meaning. And not every single word. You can look at the transcript for each podcast and study the words which are new, those words that you don't know yet.

So in this podcast, I'm going to talk a little bit about myself, so you know. Who I am? To start, I'm 24 years old. I was born in Australia in a city called Melbourne. So Melbourne is the capital city of Victoria. Victoria is a state in Australia. Sorry, you probably you probably know Australia is a country in Australia. We have six states. So we have NSW, so NSW is a state we have Victoria which is my state, we have Queensland, we have Tasmania, we have SA and we have WA, so we have six states.

So I grew up in Melbourne. I have lived in Melbourne for. My whole life. I am a native English speaker, so English is my first language. That's because in Australia we speak English. Well, more specifically, we speak Australian English. So you may know that all around the world, many people speak English. The main types of English or varieties of English or kinds of English are British English, American English. But there's also Australian English. There's Canadian English. There's even South African English. There's even Indian English, Singaporean English.

But yes, I speak Australian English. We have our own words, so we have different words sometimes and we have a different accent. So maybe you can hear my accent. Maybe it's a little bit different to the American accent or the British accent. Lots of my students tell me that when they came to Australia for the first time, it was really difficult to understand the Australian accent. So yes, it is a little bit different to the British accent and the American accent. But I don't think it's too difficult. What do you think? Do you think the Australian accent is difficult?

Sorry, yes. I grew up in Melbourne and Melbourne is in Victoria. Victoria is in the South of Australia. So because it's in the South of Australia, we have Four Seasons. We have summer, autumn, winter and spring. So at the moment it is September, almost October. And in Australia in September, it is spring time, so it's spring. So I think at the moment now in the US it is, it's not spring, it's autumn, it's autumn in the US, they call it fall Australia, we call it autumn. In the US, they call it fall. But you can say fall. People will understand you.

So most people know that Australia is a really hot country and you're right, sometimes it is really hot. So in my city in Melbourne, yes, Melbourne. In summer, the maximum temperature, so the hottest temperature is around 40°C, so that's in the summer 40°C in my city. OK, but don't worry, don't worry. That is just in summer. In winter, the minimum temperature is around 1°C, so approximately 1°. It is so cold because it's the southern part of Australia in the north of Australia, it's usually or I don't know, it's usually around 25° during the whole year. But yes, in Melbourne we have both hot and cold weather. Maybe just like your city, I don't know.

So yes, I was born in Melbourne. If I'm 24 now, that means I was born in 1999, so I was born in 1999. That is 24 years ago. I grew up in the north of Melbourne. So I grew. Up in the north of my city. So in Australia, cities have smaller areas called suburbs. A city has lots of suburbs and people live in the suburbs, so. When I was a child, my suburb was Greenvale, so Greenvale is in Melbourne and I lived in Greenvale. Greenvale is the name of the suburb and it's a suburb of Melbourne. OK, so I lived in Greenvale when I was a child, so I went to school in Greenvale and went to kindergarten or preschool. You can call it kindergarten or preschool. Yes. So that's like school before you are five years old. So before you are five years old, you go to kindergarten. And then when you turn 5 or 6 years old, you go to school. So in kindergarten you play with other children.

So I played with other children. I learned the alphabet, you know, “ABCD”. Yes, I learned the alphabet. I drew pictures. I listened to the teacher. The teacher read stories. I sang songs. I played outside with my friends. So that was kindergarten. So after kindergarten, when I was five, I went to school. So I went to school for the first time when I was five years old. So first I went to primary school. Primary school was, yes, in primary school I was five or six years old when I started, and I finished primary school when I was 12 years old.

So after primary school I went to high school, so I started high school when I was 13 years old, and then I finished high school. I graduated from high school when I was 18 years old. So in Australia, well in Victoria, I don't know about the other states. Like Queensland, NSW, etc. In Victoria for school we have primary school and then high school. Like I said I I'm not sure about the other states but yes in my state Victoria we have primary school first, or in the US they call it elementary school. So first we have primary school and then we have high school. So my school was really, really big. The reason why my school was so big is because my school was on an old farm. So a farm is a place where animals live, like cows, sheep, chickens, goats, I don't know. Or sometimes they grow vegetables or wheat and things like that. Things that we eat. So my school was on a farm. OK. I know you're thinking, Josh. What do you mean, a farm? Is your school on a farm? Well. I grew up quite far from the city, so. Greenvale is about 30 kilometres from Melbourne city, so the city centre. So Greenvale had lots and lots of farms. When I was a child. And my school was built on a farm, so my school was on a farm.

Sorry, imagine this. I'm sitting in class. I am a school student and I look out the window. And I see cows. The cows are eating grass, so that was school for me. I went to school and my school was on a farm.

So when I graduated from school, when I finished school, I went to university. So I was 18 when I went to university for the first time. I studied engineering, so I studied electrical engineering. I didn't like engineering. It was really difficult. It was really hard. I had to study a lot. So I quit engineering. So, I didn't study engineering anymore. I stopped. So, after engineering I studied linguistics and then I became an English teacher at a school in the city centre. So I taught English in Melbourne. And I also taught English in Darwin. So Darwin is another city in Australia. But Darwin is in the north of Australia, so Melbourne is in the South. Of Australia and Darwin is in the north of Australia. Darwin is really, really hot. It's one of the hottest cities in Australia.

So something else about me? I also play music. So I play the violin. And I play the piano. Sometimes I like to sing. I play the violin in an orchestra. So, in the orchestra they have violins. They have cellos, they have violas, flutes, clarinets, drums. Lots of different instruments, so I play in an orchestra. Do you play a musical instrument? What musical instrument do you play? So I play the violin. When I was a child, I started when I was 8 years old. I was interested in the violin because my grandfather played the violin.

So my grandfather. That's my mother's father, so my grandfather on my mother's side. He was from Mauritius. My mom is also from Mauritius. Mauritius is a small country. It's an island. And it's between Australia and Africa, so between Australia and Africa there is an island called Mauritius. My mum came to Australia when she was about 14 or 15 years old. So she was a teenager when she came to Australia. My grandfather played the violin in Mauritius, but when he came to Australia he did not bring the violin. He left the violin in Mauritius. Because my grandfather used to play the violin, I was really interested in the violin and. At school in primary school, I had a violin teacher, and then I also had a violin teacher when I was in high school.

Sadly, my grandfather passed away when I was nine years old. But yes, I still play the violin now, and I really love the violin. The violin is my number one instrument. I love it. It's my passion. It makes me feel good when I've had a bad day, so sometimes I have hard days. They're tough days, they're bad days and I play the violin and I feel better.

So I said that my mom is from Mauritius and her first language is French, so not English, but French. So my first language, my native language is English. So my mum's not from Australia, but she has lived in Australia for a really long time. I think about 40 years. So she has lived in Australia for about 40 years. My dad is also from Sri Lanka. So Sri Lanka is a country in Asia. It's in South Asia. My dad’s or my father's native language, his first language is actually English, so English is his first language. In Sri Lanka they speak two or three languages, so they speak a language called Sinhala. They also speak a language called Tamil. And some people also speak English, so there are three languages in Sri Lanka, Sinhala, Tamil and English. So most people speak Sinhala. So I think I'm not sure, I think maybe about 80% speak Sinhala, about 20% speak Tamil and a very small number of people speak English in Sri Lanka.

So my parents met in Melbourne and then they had my sister. So my sister was born and then they had me, so I was born. So yes, I have a sister. My sister is 6 years older than me. She still lives in Greenvale and I don't live in Greenvale. I actually live near the beach. So I live near the beach, abeach called Bonbeach.

So, Melbourne also has lots of beaches. Many beaches, many beautiful beaches. I feel really lucky because I live near the beach. Most people don't live near the beach. It's really nice and summer when we have really good hot weather because you know I can go to the beach to relax. I can swim in the water. I can walk on the beach. Lots of people like to walk their dogs on the beach. And I don't have a dog.

My sister has a dog, but I don't have a dog. I have two cats, so I've got two Black Cats. Well, they're not black cats. They're black and white. So the first cat is called Dimitriy. And the second cat is called Nikita. So lots of people. They asked me, Josh, Josh, Josh, Josh, why? Did you call your cats Dimitriy and Nikita? So my cats have Russian names. I just think… I don't know. I just think Russian names are cute. They're a bit cute and they're a bit funny. So I called my cats Dimitriy and Nikita. So people usually walk their dogs on the beach, they don't walk their cats. Sometimes I walk my cats on the beach. It's a bit strange. It's a bit funny. Yes, I know, but yes, so people like to walk their dogs on the beach. So it's really quite nice.

OK, so that's a little bit about me. I hope you enjoyed listening to the comprehensible Australian podcast. My name is Josh and this was episode number 1. Who am I? What is this podcast even about? Join me next time for episode number 2. Have a lovely day, a lovely evening or a lovely night, wherever you are in the world. And I'll see you next time. Cheers.