Hello, lovely people of the world.
I'm Maria.
And my name is Rory.
We are the hosts of the IELTS Speaking for Success podcast, the podcast that aims to help you improve your speaking skills, as well as your listening skills along the way.
We started this super podcast to give you a look at how a native speaker would answer some of the most common IELTS speaking questions, using gorgeous grammar and super vocabulary for a high score.
So today's a special day and we're recording all by ourselves unsupervised, because our producer is not here.
Yeah, something fishy is going on with him, actually.
That's funny, Rory, because today we're going to be talking about fish.
Yes, in Speaking Part 1, they can ask you questions about fish and fishing.
Rory, do you like going fishing?
I don't like going fishing regularly, although it's probably.
It seems like an entertaining prospect when you consider like how much of a city boy I am.
I did go fishing once though, with my dad, and I think I really wanted to go and I complained about it for a while.
I was like begging him to go.
And I think I might have romanticised it a little because it was awful.
I didn't catch anything and the weather was terrible.
So yeah, it just wasn't a good idea.
The one time that I did it, it wasn't a good idea.
Where do people go fishing in your country?
Oh, I suppose you could go anywhere.
We're surrounded by sea and water in general in all directions.
So you could go fishing by the shore. for example.
We also have some lakes so you can fish by the lakeside and I guess in the rivers as well.
We've got lots of those.
So there's lots and lots of places.
I think maybe there are even fish in some of the reservoirs.
Is fishing a good hobby?
I think maybe if you have the patience of a saint.
God knows, when I was younger I didn't.
But if you're patient enough and you have the skills, then it's a good hobby.
How often do you eat fish?
Oh, all the time, actually.
For someone who's not very good at catching fish, I'm very good at eating them.
So, I love seafood.
Tuna fillet's my favorite, but right now I usually have salmon steaks because it's a little bit cheaper.
Where do you get the fish from?
Well, I get mine from a supermarket, but I suppose there's a fishmonger in the supermarket if you want to get a more specialised kind of fish or have it prepared in a special way.
I don't really go to the fishmonger, to be honest, because I'm not very good with scaling fish or cooking them unless they've been pre-prepared.
So for me it's just easier to just buy it as if it's been prepared by a professional.
Do you keep fish as pets?
No, I can't afford an aquarium right now, but I think it would be nice to have a few goldfish in the future.
It's supposed to be quite therapeutic and relaxing, actually.
Thank you so much, Rory.
No problem.
Rory, so when we talk about fish and fishing, what is it?
Is it like fish is fish, are fish they eat?
There are a lot of fish.
There is a lot of fish fish, fishes.
What's going on with this language?
So I think it's an older expression if you say fishes, but it's still okay.
However, most people just refer to fish in general, like the uncountable noun.
So you can stick with that, although...
Since it's IELTS speaking test, then you should be using more specific language, like what kind of fish?
A goldfish, tuna fish?
What kind of fish?
Yeah, but also we say kind of there is lots of fish in the sea, right?
Well, there are lots of fish in the sea.
Gosh, this is so confusing.
So what do I do with this?
No, you could say there is a big fish in the sea called, I don't know, a basking shark, for example.
Or like, oh, what's this on your plate?
It's fish.
It's fish, yes, like eat, right?
And also kind of I enjoy eating fish.
It's delicious, right?
So we say like... But also you've used they, like them, referring to... They are delicious.
Right, so fish...
But you can catch different fish and they are delicious.
Well, it's such a weird word in English, so don't worry too much.
Don't panic if you can't get it 100 right all the time because, to be honest with you, for native speakers there's not much of a chance of doing that either.
It's really confusing.
It is.
Yeah, but normally we say fish, but not fishes.
No, no, like I say, vicious is a much older expression.
You maybe see this in the Bible or something, but not so much in real life.
Yeah, as I say, different kinds of fish or different species.
Yes, so you mentioned like goldfish, but also we have, for example, sturgeon, right?
You do, in Russia you've got sturgeon.
In Russia we...
We cook herring and we have this famous salad, you know, herring under this fur coat.
I've heard of it, it's just I really hate the smell of herring.
That's quite bad, isn't it?
But I think herring's one of the few fish I can't eat.
Yeah, you've mentioned tuna fillet.
Fillet, like this soft, fishy thing.
You can say fillet.
I say fillet, but both are fine, to be honest.
Because it's an accurate term for describing how the thing is prepared.
So it's okay.
We have tuna, we have salmon steak.
So, dear listeners, if you enjoy a particular type of fish, could you please Google it?
Have a look at the pictures.
Maybe you enjoy eel or what else do you have?
Like trout, cod.
Those are the main ones.
We go fishing, right?
And is it true that people who enjoy fishing are called anglers?
People who go angling are called anglers.
To be honest with you, I'm not very good at distinguishing between the different kinds of fishermen, because there's fishermen, there's anglers, there are fly fishermen and they all operate in different ways, I think.
But I'd need to check that because I'm not very sure about it.
Yeah, so if you use a fishing rod, you can be called an angler.
But yeah, that's a fancy word, so why not use it?
Yeah.
And you have special equipment to go fishing.
That's a fishing rod.
Yes.
And you need a fly and a hook.
You need a net, perhaps.
Oh, there are different kinds of net.
Actually, you can have well, there's a normal net, but you have a keep net as well, which is where you catch the fish live, and then you put the fish in the net and it's kind of in the water and not in the water.
So the fish are there, they can breathe and move around, but they can't escape.
So exciting.
Sorry, I was very into this when I was much younger, but now I'm terrible at it.
Fishing as a hobby could be entertaining, right?
Or for Rory, because he's mentioned he's a city boy, city boy Rory, it's quite dull, right?
Tedious.
Mind-numbing.
Right.
But it could be thrilling, right?
What did you romanticize, Rory?
I think I just thought it would be like a cool experience.
Like we'd constantly be catching fish and we'd like get to obviously take the fish home and cook it and everything like this.
Obviously it didn't pan out that way.
But it just didn't go how I wanted it to in my head.
And if you have a really strong idea about how something is going to be maybe it's not connected with reality a great deal then you're romanticizing it.
Yeah, so you didn't catch any fish, you didn't feel any sense of fulfillment, achievement.
Or accomplishment.
Yeah, it was a bit... A disaster.
Not everything I do has to be a success, though.
Just success with IELTS.
That's got to be a success.
Yeah, our podcast is a success.
We can fish by the shore or fish by the lake, right?
Yes.
Or go fishing by the shore or by the lake.
Or you can go to a reservoir of water.
Yeah, we've talked about reservoirs before in our previous episodes.
Our hardcore fans will know this.
Yes, about what a topic, what a topic.
Yeah.
Yeah, so reservoir where they keep fish and then you can maybe like catch and release it, right?
There's this catch and release fishing.
Yes.
The patience of a saint, Rory.
Do you have a patience, the patience of a saint?
Sometimes.
I like to think I'm patient most of the time.
We've talked about this before in a podcast.
So many references.
It's very meta.
But sometimes.
The patience of a saint, probably not.
I'm just patient, usually.
Sometimes I get annoyed with people.
And in this particular case I didn't have any patience because I wanted to catch lots of fish and I didn't.
Yeah, so to be a proper angler, you need to have the patience of a saint, to be patient.
Yeah.
We can get our fish at the fishmonger.
Or should I say at a fishmonger's?
Both are okay.
It's like butcher and butchers.
It's all right.
Fishmonger is a special shop for, well, selling fish, I suppose.
Yeah, well, we can say like in a shop, but also if you want to be super cool, you say fishmonger.
Do you say at, in?
Do I need an article?
You will need an article if it's... Yeah, always you'll need an article, but you won't need to worry so much about the preposition. to buy meat you go to the butchers yeah or to the butcher if you want to buy fish you go to a fishmonger yeah we've talked about specialized fish different types of fish and you don't like scaling fish right Well, yes, but scaling is not the kind of fish.
It's the process by which you remove the scales.
So you might skin an animal for its fur, like take off the fur, but you scale a fish when you take off the scales, the skin of the fish.
It's quite tricky.
I've tried it before.
It is, yeah.
Oh, very tricky.
It's also dangerous because the fish has sharp thingies all over and you can just really cut yourself.
So you wouldn't have an aquarium, right, Rory?
No, and for those of you who don't know already, an aquarium is a place where you keep fish, so quite a good place to talk about it.
But you can also have a fishbowl.
Yeah, a fishbowl or a fish tank.
Yeah.
And if I have a fish tank and there are different species there, I can say, oh, look at my fishes.
Yep, or my fish.
Or my fish, yes.
It's beautiful.
When we talk about eating fish, we can mention that fish is really nutritious.
Yes.
We can cook fish in different ways.
For example, we can have grilled fish, baked fish.
We can wrap fish in foil in this special paper.
Rory, which fish do you prefer?
Grilled, baked.
Oh, I will eat my fish... Raw.
In any way.
I've eaten raw fish before.
But I think the only thing you can't do with fish is barbecue it.
But maybe even then I'm wrong.
Yeah, you can barbecue fish.
Grill.
That would be cool.
I'd love to do that.
Nice.
It's nice to use the second conditional here, and you did it.
Like, it would be nice to have a goldfish, for example.
I wish I had a goldfish.
Oh, I wish I had, yes.
That's nice.
Not one goldfish, because he would be very lonely.
Like, several goldfish.
Oh, a clownfish.
Two goldfish and a clownfish.
Clownfishes would be expensive.
Nemo.
Nemo.
Would you like to have a Nemo in your aquarium?
No, I wouldn't.
That costs a lot of money.
Yeah, you should invest money in your fish.
I don't think it's legal either.
Maybe they're like an endangered species.
Yeah, dear listeners, you can check it out.
And the last word for us to remember is a school of fish.
That's so funny.
A school of fish.
Because we work for a school.
Yeah, because the English language is crazy about this, you know, groups of something.
So, I say a herd of horses, right?
A herd of sheep, but a school of fish.
Basically, a group of fish.
Yeah.
That's funny.
Rory, thank you very much for your fish answers.
There's nothing fishy about them.
We are cracking jokes today.
We are on it.
Dear listeners, now you can listen to Rory's answers again, and this time notice all the words and grammar he's using for a high score.
Thank you very much for listening.
Stay out of any fishy business.
Choose your fish right.
And remember to cast a wide net when you're looking for vocabulary.
Bye!
Rory, do you like going fishing?
I don't like going fishing regularly, although it's probably.
It seems like an entertaining prospect when you consider like how much of a city boy I am.
I did go fishing once, though, with my dad.
And I think.
I really wanted to go and I complained about it for a while.
I was like begging him to go.
And I think I might have romanticised it a little because it was awful.
I didn't catch anything and the weather was terrible.
So yeah, it just wasn't a good idea.
The one time that I did it, it wasn't a good idea.
Where do people go fishing in your country?
Oh, I suppose you could go anywhere.
We're surrounded by sea and water in general in all directions.
So you could go fishing by the shore, for example.
We also have some lakes, so you could fish by the lakeside and I guess in the rivers as well.
We've got lots of those.
So there's lots and lots of places.
I think maybe there are even fish in some of the reservoirs.
Is fishing a good hobby?
I think maybe if you have the patience of a saint.
God knows when I was younger, I didn't.
But if you're patient enough and you have the skills, then it's a good hobby.
How often do you eat fish?
Oh, all the time, actually.
For someone who's not very good at catching fish, I'm very good at eating them.
So, I love seafood.
Tuna fillet's my favourite, but right now I usually have salmon steaks because it's a little bit cheaper.
Where do you get the fish from?
Well, I get mine from a supermarket, but I suppose there's a fishmonger in the supermarket if you want to get a more specialised kind of fish or have it prepared in a special way.
I don't really go to the fishmonger, to be honest, because I'm not very good with scaling fish or cooking them unless they've been pre-prepared.
So for me it's just easier to just buy it as if it's been prepared by a professional.
Do you keep fish as pets?
Um no, I can't afford an aquarium right now, but I think it would be nice to have a few goldfish in the future.
It's supposed to be quite therapeutic and relaxing, actually.
