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Describe a person from a different cultural background with whom you enjoy spending time: IELTS Speaking Cue Card

You should say

  • Who this person is?
  • What their cultural background is?
  • What activities you do together?
  • And explain how this experience impacted you.
Show all 193 answers

Cue 1:Who this person is?

  • Introduce the person by name and mention how you met them.
  • Share a brief description of their personality traits that you admire.

Example

The person I enjoy spending time with is my friend Aisha. I met her during my college days when we were both part of the cultural committee. Aisha is very friendly and has a great sense of humor, which makes her fun to be around.

Cue 2:What their cultural background is?

  • Describe Aisha's cultural background, including her ethnicity and any specific traditions.
  • Mention how her background differs from yours and what you find interesting about it.

Example

Aisha comes from a Bengali background, which is quite different from my Punjabi roots. She often shares stories about the rich traditions of Durga Puja and how her family celebrates it with elaborate rituals and delicious food. I find her culture fascinating and love learning about the different customs.

Cue 3:What activities you do together?

  • List some specific activities you enjoy doing together that reflect her cultural background.
  • Explain how these activities help you bond and learn from each other.

Example

We often cook together, trying out traditional Bengali recipes like fish curry and mishti doi. I also enjoy attending cultural events with her, where I get to experience her music and dance. These activities not only strengthen our friendship but also allow me to appreciate her culture more deeply.

Cue 4:And explain how this experience impacted you.

  • Reflect on how spending time with Aisha has broadened your perspective.
  • Discuss any personal growth or changes in your views due to this friendship.

Example

Spending time with Aisha has significantly impacted my understanding of cultural diversity. It has made me more open-minded and appreciative of different traditions. I now celebrate Durga Puja with her family, which has enriched my life and helped me build a deeper connection with my friend.

Conclusion

    Example

    In conclusion, my friendship with Aisha has not only been enjoyable but also transformative. It has taught me the importance of embracing cultural differences and has made my life more colorful and fulfilling.

    Following this structure will ensure you cover all the essential points while providing a clear and engaging response to the cue card topic.

    Tips to answer this Cue Card

    1: Avoid Generalizations About Culture

    Making broad statements about a culture can lead to inaccuracies and misunderstandings. It's important to focus on specific aspects of the person's background.

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    Tip

    Provide specific examples from your experiences with the person to illustrate their unique cultural traits.

    2: Neglecting Personal Connection

    Failing to explain your personal connection with the person can make your answer less engaging. It's essential to share why you enjoy spending time together.

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    Tip

    Include personal anecdotes or feelings that highlight your bond and shared experiences.

    Lack of Detail in Activities

    Being vague about the activities you do together can make your response less vivid. Detailed descriptions help paint a clearer picture.

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    Tip

    Describe specific activities you enjoy, including where you do them and what makes them special.

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    IELTS Cue Cards asked last week

    Reported by Leap students who gave IELTS

    Describe your favourite food at a traditional festival or a special event in your country
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    Reported by

    Anonymous student Band 7.5

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    Pitampura Test Centre, New Delhi

    Answer

    I like to taste different types of cuisine. Here I would like to talk about my favorite dish at my traditional festival of Onam which is Sadya. Sadya is popular in my city. We are experimenting these cuisines on Onam festival day. Onam is a famous festival in my city. All family members get together in my home and we make a delicious Sadya. There are many ingredients includes that Sadya. Moreover, we make a big feast that day as well as we create a lot of memories together and we wear that day the traditional dress called Sari and men wear the Dhotis. That festival is really important to us because the whole day we are conducting different kinds of games at our homes and all the family members came together. It's a memorable day in my life. This is the festival. We are making the Sambar and Aviyal. These all the kinds of foods are making with the vegetables.
    Talk about a toy you liked in your childhood
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    Reported by

    Anonymous student Band 8

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    Sector 34 Test Centre, Chandigarh

    Answer

    The toy which I liked in my childhood was a panda doll, which makes me pleasant and makes me more blush. The pandas are the most beautiful creatures of the world, which looks gigantic and has pooshy cheeks and they are like stars in the clouds and they dream in me. Furthermore, these have been given by my father. My father is a very very beautiful artistic person, who makes me think of that. Every day you will face every difficulties and make you suffer and move forward. Pandas are always seen in Japanese countries. It is my lifelong dream to visit a Japanese country and click a photo with the original pandas, which makes sounds better.
    Describe a time you were in a place where you didn't know the local language
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    Reported by

    Anonymous student Band 6.5

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    Whitefield Test Center, Bengaluru

    Answer

    As India is a very large country full of diversity, so there are many places which have their own language and speak their native language. The place which I visited and I didn't know about their language was Leladakh, which is about 300 km away from my hometown and it is a very good place as it consists of different kind of trees, animals and have many scenic views and I visited over there last year in summers as it was the best time to visit because it has many, it was cold over there and we had summers in our area so it was the best time to visit over there and I went over there with my whole family.
    Describe a time when your friend damaged something you owned
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    Reported by

    Anonymous student Band 7

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    Begumpet Test Centre, Hyderabad

    Answer

    When I was a kid, I had a little pencil box which had these four buttons which gave the pencil box an operative use. When you press the button, the box would open up. When you press the second button, a little part of it would slide out. Basically it was just a little electronical and a fun thing to have and I owned it when I was in 6th. One day after break, I was standing and talking there with one of my friends and another friend of mine was running through the hallway and accidentally she pushed my shoulder and my pencil box hit the ground and it broke into multiple pieces to the point that it was not functional anymore.
    Describe a book you recently read
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    Reported by

    Anonymous student Band 7.5

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    CBD Belapur Test Centre, Navi Mumbai

    Answer

    It Ends With Us is a book I read recently. It's by the author Colleen Hoare. It's mainly a story about two teenagers, Atlas and Lily, and how they just handle their life going through high school, adolescence, and just domestic violence at home. Both of them come from very, very different families. However, they have one common determining factor between them, which is domestic violence. The abuse that they've seen their moms go through is just insane, and they connect through that on a different level. They're actually in the same high school, but they never speak to each other until Atlas actually crashes into an empty house next to Lily's villa. When Atlas is homeless and he doesn't have anywhere to go, he just comes and breaks into the house next to Lily's, and Lily helps him with all the daily necessities like clothes and food, medicines and stuff. Furthermore, their friendship blossoms into love, but it doesn't really fructify as Atlas has to leave. This book really gave me a lot of knowledge about domestic abuse and how to deal with it.

    All Answers

    Here are all the answers by real-users practicing speaking for IELTS Cue Cards on our IELTS Prep App.

    Band 6-7

    One of my friends, his name is Irfan, he is actually a Muslim. His culture is completely different from mine. Myself, I am a Hindu. The friendship with him has made me learn about different cultures that have spread all across this whole globe. I have learned to respect all these cultures. I have learned a lot of new things from their culture and understood that they are the ones to be respected, not to be discriminated. They should be seen equally like every other culture. We should be able to enjoy each other's cultures and we should be able to impart knowledge with each other about each other's culture. By interacting with him, I am creating a lot of memories in my college. In the future, if someone asks me, what is the first thing that comes to your mind when you talk about college? It will be my friends and it will definitely include this Irfan. He is one of my best friends. Sometimes we casually fight with each other, not in a serious manner, but in a best friend way. He taught me a lot of things and it has changed my perspective of life, how to look at the future, what to do and what not to do. My parents are quite orthodox people and they often restrict me from making that much of a deep connection with this culture. But I find it very interesting.

    Band 6-7

    She is one of my best friends. In my childhood, when I was in first class, since my first, since in a first class to fifth class, we were studied together. And she is from Islamic background. She is Muslim. But I enjoyed the time with her. It's so good because when two different cultures meet, they were making good bond, I believe. And I spend the time with her. And her parents are also very happy with me because I am her best friend. And she is so happy with me always. We share a good bond together. Always whenever something happen wrong with us, we help each other. And her family is too good with me.

    Band 6-7

    Ok, so the person from the different background whom I know is my college friend Harshad Mehta. So he is basically native to Maharashtra state as India is a country which has a number of cultures together living. So he is from Maharashtra and I am since born and brought up in Mumbai. I don't know regarding the Maharashtrian culture in detail. So that's why he is my friend since we were in the junior college and we generally tend to go outdoors even for weekends. So we explore the world or explore the vicinity of the city together and we also share some common interests such as he is interested in cybercrime whereas I am interested in a bit of knowing the technology, he is an engineer by profession so working with him or being with him for a couple of days helps me a lot. So the advantages that I, the benefits that I receive by being with him is I come to know the various cultural practices and the festivals which are being celebrated by the Maharashtrian people which are native to Maharashtra and at the same time it gives me an idea regarding the dishes or the special dishes which are popular among the Konkani's peoples. So they are delicious as well as it adds up to my knowledge and also to my experience as well.

    Band 6-7

    When I was studying in my college, after my 12th, my friend whose name was Rohit, he was from different cultural background. He belonged to a Hindu family, whereas I belonged to a Punjabi family. We both represent different cultural backgrounds. When I started living with Rohit in our PG, I came to know about different things about his religion, like I started going, visiting mandirs, and I also taught many things about my religion. One day, I asked him to visit the Gurudwara, which is located near our college, and we enjoyed a lot there. Moreover, we also gained interest in each other's religion.

    Band 6-7

    A person that I would like to describe is my friend whose name is Ayush Jain. I have been to a school called Dadar Youth Assembly High School also in a short form which is called DPY High School. I was there from nursery to 10th standard which is my whole schooling. I met him during my junior KG where his parents left him at the school and we were in the same class. From that day we were friends. We stayed as friends for a very long time and even now we are very good friends. He is from a Jain community. He has some constraints of eating like he can't eat non-veg or he cannot eat some food which has like the onions or some type of ingredients in it. We are friends till now. We enjoy doing many things together like we both are fond of cricket so we mostly spend our time playing cricket or watching cricket. Also as I am currently studying for my masters and he is doing a job. His office is near my home so whenever he gets a free time or a break he usually comes to my house. We chat and sit together, spend a lot of time. Even we go on various trips like hill stations like Lonavala or beaches like Ali Bagh with our other school friends. His experience impacted me in the sense like we don't usually, we should not differentiate depending upon the cultures or traditions. We should treat everyone equally and stay equally.

    Band 6-7

    My friend's name is Gidaneo, and she's from the northern part of Ghana. I like her so much because their culture is a very beautiful culture. Their food is different. Everything about them is different, and it shows respect. How to show respect to both elders and both young ones. If you see an elderly person, you have to bow to greet. And by doing that, it shows respect and humbleness. And I really love that. Aside from that, when they are eating, they eat together to show togetherness. It has created a lot of impact in my life, and it has taught me a lot. How to respect, how to be humble to my elders, and how to bring people together.

    Band 6-7

    During my flight from Delhi, there was this person from USA. She was travelling in India. Although she is from India, she was brought up in USA as her parents were there. We first introduced ourselves and then we talked about this gaming app. Although I am not good at playing, I still enjoyed that game with her. It is still helpful for me now also. Sometimes when I am not that active or I would like to spend my time, I play this game. This helps to elevate my spirit. I am very thankful and grateful for having this conversation with her. I am still in touch with her.

    Band 6-7

    A person from a different cultural background with whom I enjoy spending time is none other than my wife, Ms. Juhi Reddy-GV. She is the most amazing person I have ever come across in my life. Also, she is the patient, she is as patient as ever with me. She has changed me and my perspective of the world as a person, the lens with which I see this world. She comes from a varied and different cultural background, that is Christianity. In spite of that, she goes to Sri Lord Balaji Venkateshwar Swami Temple in Tirumala Tirupati Devastanam. This has surprised me and not only does she go, she has had this positive impact of taking me also to the temple for a person like me who has never believed in God since my birth. This is the most and the best experience I have ever lived with. The activities that we do as a couple together is going to different temples on a Saturday morning, we do not eat anything on Saturdays, we worship Lord Venkateshwara till we can do anything else. Another activity that we do together is we play tennis every day in the morning from six to seven. My forehands are excellent, her backhands are excellent. This has impacted me in a way beyond I can describe in words.

    Band 6-7

    I have lots of friends and relatives, also cousins from different cultural backgrounds. But the most I used to spend my time with is one of my closest friends, Tushar Sharma. He belongs to South India as I belong to the North Indian part and I belong to the Jain community as he is from Hindu religion. So we both share different cultural backgrounds and customs. But we share some similar characteristics like empathy, curiosity and we both want to learn more and more and want to experience new things. So we met first time when we were in college and he was my classmate and I didn't have a conversation with him at first because we both are like introverted person. So we got the chance to communicate with each other when we both were assigned to the same college project in our third year. And that time I thought that Tushar is egoistic person but eventually it turned out to be the opposite of that and he is very kind, tranquil, stagnant and charismatic person.

    Band 6-7

    Well this is a favorable question to answer because not a long time ago I have spent four years with a person of a different cultural background of that from mine. This person is a friend of mine from engineering college. He is a Muslim and has his own cultures to follow. I am a Hindu and I have entirely different cultures and there are a lot of topics on which our cultures don't agree with each other. But what I like about this the most is that how I was able to understand his opinion, his perspective of looking at the world and he was also able to understand how I did things differently, how I was doing something in a certain manner which was not very appreciable in his culture. But the end goal of every religious thing that was there in his culture and mine was to pray and be good citizens. Now what was so special in this it was that I was able to understand and respect more of the multicultural diversity of my country and this gives me an experience of looking around the world with an eyes of a different culture. It make me deeply understand how everyone thinks that they are right about their culture. I meekly remember once I had a conversation about diet restrictions that is present in my culture and it's not in his. Well we Hindus cannot eat non-veg on every single day. While my friend says that if you can eat non-veg on a single day then you should not be restricted to eat it on other days. Like either you eat non-veg on every single day or you don't eat it at all. What's this that you are maintaining a balance in between?
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