话匣子英语:采访毛拉
Harp: Yes. Today I’m interviewing Maura. Last week, she interviewed me. We think this is a good idea for all of you to learn a little bit more about us, especially because there are a lot of new listeners who might not know lots about us.
Maura: Right. It might be a New Year’s resolution to start listening to an English podcast, and you might just have tuned in. So now is your chance to get to know Harp and me a little bit more.
Harp: Yes. So let’s get started. Now, Maura, why don’t you tell us a little bit more about you. Where did you grow up?
Maura: Well, I was born and raised in Kitchener, Ontario, Canada. And my parents and even my grandparents were born in Canada, which is actually pretty rare. And I lived there most of my life, until I went to university. Then I moved to a city called Guelph and I went to university there. After that, I travelled around a whole bunch, and then I ended up in Montreal.
Harp: Sounds exciting. Now, tell me about Kitchener because I’ve never been there. I know it’s close to Toronto, but was it fun growing up there?
Maura: It was fun. I mean, of course I had lots of friends but it was very suburban. And usually I answer this question by something that I read in a travel guide once. One of my friends, who was Australian, had a travel guide to Canada and I was curious and I looked up Kitchener in the travel guide. And the advice actually was that unless it was Oktoberfest, Kitchener wasn’t a place worth visiting. And it’s a bit sad and funny, but it’s true. Kitchener used to be called Berlin and it has—still has—a lot of German people. And so in the month of October, we have a really big Oktoberfest. It’s the second biggest Oktoberfest, next to the one in Germany, so it’s a pretty big deal. We also have something that’s interesting outside of Kitchener. We have lots of cute little small towns. And we also have a really famous market called the St. Jacobs Market. What’s really cool about this market is there are a lot of Mennonites who sell food and clothes and crafts at this market. And so outside of Kitchener, you can see Mennonites. They’re a rare group of people to see and it’s interesting to see these kinds of people.
Harp: Very interesting. I had no idea the Oktoberfest was that big. We should go one time.
Maura: Yeah. We should. It’s pretty fun.
