arrow back icon Top Answers

Describe an expensive hobby you can't pursue daily.: IELTS Speaking Cue Card

You should say

  • What is it?
  • Why is it expensive?
  • Why do you wish to pursue it?
Show all 43 answers

Cue 1:What is it?

  • Begin by clearly stating the hobby you are referring to.
  • Provide a brief description of what the hobby entails and why it interests you.

Example

One expensive hobby that I can't pursue daily is scuba diving. It involves exploring underwater ecosystems and experiencing marine life up close, which I find incredibly fascinating.

Cue 2:Why is it expensive?

  • Discuss the costs associated with the hobby, such as equipment, training, and travel.
  • Mention any additional expenses that may arise, like maintenance or membership fees.

Example

Scuba diving is quite expensive due to the high costs of the necessary equipment, such as wetsuits, tanks, and regulators, which can easily add up to several thousand rupees. Additionally, I need to pay for training courses and travel to dive sites, which further increases the overall expense.

Cue 3:Why do you wish to pursue it?

  • Explain your passion for the hobby and what you hope to gain from it.
  • Share any personal experiences or aspirations related to this hobby.

Example

I wish to pursue scuba diving because it allows me to connect with nature in a unique way. I have always been captivated by the ocean, and diving gives me the chance to explore its beauty. I dream of visiting the Great Barrier Reef one day and witnessing its vibrant marine life firsthand.

Conclusion

  • Summarize your feelings about the hobby and its significance in your life.
  • Mention any future plans or hopes related to pursuing this hobby.

Example

In conclusion, while scuba diving is an expensive hobby that I can't engage in daily, it holds a special place in my heart. I hope to save up and dive more frequently in the future, as it brings me immense joy and a sense of adventure.

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: Vague Descriptions

Avoid being too general when describing your hobby. Vague answers can make it hard for the examiner to understand your passion and interest in the hobby.

bulb icon

Tip

Provide specific details about the hobby, such as what it involves, your experiences, and any unique aspects that make it special to you.

2: Ignoring Financial Aspects

Not explaining why the hobby is expensive can lead to an incomplete answer. The examiner expects to understand the financial implications of your hobby.

bulb icon

Tip

Clearly outline the costs involved, such as equipment, materials, or membership fees, and explain how these contribute to the overall expense.

Lack of Personal Connection

Failing to express your personal desire to pursue the hobby can make your answer less engaging. The examiner wants to hear your motivations and feelings.

bulb icon

Tip

Share your personal reasons for wanting to pursue the hobby, such as enjoyment, relaxation, or personal growth, to create a more compelling narrative.

calendar icon

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
anonymous person icon

Reported by

Anonymous student Band 7.5

location icon

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
anonymous person icon

Reported by

Anonymous student Band 8

location icon

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
anonymous person icon

Reported by

Anonymous student Band 6.5

location icon

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
anonymous person icon

Reported by

Anonymous student Band 7

location icon

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
anonymous person icon

Reported by

Anonymous student Band 7.5

location icon

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

Well hobby is source of our nature and life. Hobby is very important for our life because without hobby we live very boring our life. Here I would like to talk about the hobby I can't pursue daily because it is a traveling hobby. I love to travel and explore the new things about the earth. I love to learn about the nature and I associate for the nature. This hobby is expensive because my hobby is needed to more money and time but I have no more time and because of my routine work and studies. And I love to pursue these activities because I want to explore all things about the earth and these affect on my life. The traveling is reduce our stress and it is provide the chance for the family and friends meetings.

Band 6-7

An expensive hobby that you can't pursue daily is travelling. Travelling can be a hobby to somebody or it can be a personal interest. But for me, it is an expensive hobby. In fact, exorbitant at times. I have travelled quite a lot in the last decade. And when I was a child, I used to travel a lot with my family. My family, that's when I grew interest in this hobby. And why is it expensive? Because it needs a lot of funds to travel. You need to have a good budget. You need to keep a good budget aside to travel. And if it's solo travelling, it is costly. But if it's family, then it is way too expensive than you think. So travelling, air tickets, visas, the stay and accommodation, the food, and the tourist places, the visiting, everything costs. So for me, this is an expensive hobby, I feel. And the last visit was to Dubai, where I had to spend a lot much amount.

Band 6-7

So my favorite expensive no one of the expensive hobbies that I have is photography. I'd say photography I'd call photography as an expensive hobby because because you need the right equipment to capture images. Yes of course photography can be done with mobile phones which is a cheaper option but if I have to become a professional photographer I would need the right equipment so I think it's that's why it's an expensive hobby and why I would like to pursue photography is because I think I'm really good at it and I can see a career me making a career for myself in photography because I find myself when I do photography like I observe a lot I notice a lot and that's when I started capturing pictures and realized I have a thing for photography

Band 6-7

Golf is an expensive hobby that I can't pursue daily. For golfing you need golfing clubs. Golfing clubs start from 2 lakh rupees. And that's the reason it's quite expensive to buy golfing clubs. And to play golf there needs to be a large area available with proper maintenance that should be done daily. Furthermore, the maintenance should be monitored by someone. And my uncle is someone who maintains a golf course. And courtesy to him that I was introduced to golf. And when I started playing golf I got quite interested in it and I thought about pursuing it. But my studies coming in between was a major reason why I don't play golf daily. You know when you step on a golf course you see the large area of a land quite peaceful away from the city. You feel peace there. And when you play golf the precision required and the people you play with are quite important. You can make connections with the people you play with. And you drive a golf cart throughout the whole course. Maybe 9 hole or 11 hole. You go with people, you enjoy your time there. But it's quite time consuming too. So only people with you know people under them those that can manage their businesses come and play golf. Me being a student I didn't have that much time available with me. So I usually go on weekends to play golf with my uncle. And my uncle is actually a pro.

Band 6-7

Today I would like to talk about a hobby. So basically hobbies play a very crucial role in our day to day lives. It is a great deal to unwind ourselves from our daily and hectic schedule. So let me share you an expensive hobby which I like to pass and which is nothing but bowling. Bowling is a game where we have to play with a ball and we have to play with a ball. It is a very expensive hobby because it costs 500 rupees for entry. That's why I call it expensive because right now I am a student and I can't spend a lot of money, a lot of bucks on this. This is expensive because it is a western game and which requires a good kind of qualities of balls, amenity, a large space and that's why it is very expensive. I enjoy it because it is a great unwinding activity. I developed this essence in my life. There was my friend who asked me to get along with him for this game. And I went there and I had a try and suddenly it is very addicting hobby I found it. And then later I started to practicing again and again and again.

Band 6-7

Well, for me, an expensive hobby that I can't pursue daily would be playing snooker. It is also known as billiards. I think it is quite expensive because it is a very popular sport and it has a very fast ranging of competitions with also high awards, high level of awards with huge amount and also many players have like to participate in this type of competitions as it will create them more hype and also give them more followers in their city. This I think this sport is also expensive because the equipment which is used in this sport is of high quality which is of very high fare which I can't afford because I am of a middle class family and I can't afford that much of amount and I think I want to pursue it because I went to a competition with my friend when I first went. I was very extremely intense in the game and I kept myself involved in the game. After that, I once tried to play the game then I liked it so much, it was extremely so made me so therapeutic that I can observe the rules and play and I can concentrate on it so but after that I realized that I can't afford it because as to play a snooker board for one hour it will cost me around 300 rupees so I think it is expensive. For moreover, it also consumes a lot of time which I can't afford as I was a student in the university at that time when I wanted to play as a daily student.

Band 6-7

Well, I have many hobbies like playing badminton, cricket, reading, improving my skills. But a very thing that I want to do is to travel around the world. I like to travel around the world, I like to visit the seven miraculous things in the world like Petra in the Jordan, Pyramids of Gaza, Giza, sorry, Pyramids of Giza and Pink Lake in Australia, Northern Lights in the Norway, Cherry Blossom in the Japan and many things like this. I think it is expensive because you have to spend on air tickets, then on hotel, eating out, everything is expensive. So it is quite expensive hobby and I think I have to work a lot just to get done one of them. And one thing I know about myself is it is my dream and I can achieve it someday. Not all of these places but yes some of these which is quite affordable, which is a little bit affordable like Giza, Pyramids of Giza I think is affordable and Petra in the Jordan is affordable.

Band 6-7

Hobbies are one's way of escaping the cruelties and hardships of life. Sometimes life gets hard, work, family, friends, you know, it can get tiring, like a weight on your shoulders weighing you down. So when I don't feel like doing anything, I try to pursue my hobby of gaming. I have been a big fan of games, more so action games, story games, since 8th standard and I have been diligently playing them for a long time, although I do have to forgo of them for some time during my exams, but I have kept on consistently going with it. But it's an expensive hobby, the necessary equipment, the devices like a PS4 or a PC, those things are very expensive, plus the games themselves cost money. So it is not like I can just go out on a weekend and get a new game for every week. I have to space out my games and purchase wisely, because it's not good to forego your savings so much, and it's also not good to spend so much time in front of a screen playing a game, because you have got your work, your priorities and everything else to also take care of.

Band 6-7

From my young age, I always wanted to play a drum and perform in front of a massive audience. But since professional drums cost like around 50-60 thousand rupees, my parents could not afford to buy me a drum set back then. So I could not pursue my hobby with that. The one thing I regret about it is that there were a few options such as buying the drums on rent and buying electric drums. But I didn't accept that because I didn't think an electric drum would be that good as acoustic drums. But I regret that because my parents forced me to buy that electric drum but I didn't buy that. I like playing drums because since I was young, I was into music, I have learned flute, I have learned cajon. The next thing I would learn is drums.

Band 6-7

My expensive hobby is shopping. Yes, because shopping is something that I enjoy the most. Firstly, shopping is not a necessity. It is basically a luxury when it comes to me. It is very creative like any other hobby, be it painting, dancing, singing. Even shopping is all about very creative, leashing out your creativity at its peak. It's all about finding that unique texture, that unique colour of the outfit and matching up something that suits it better. And finding that bold and that pop of colour. It is so artistic is what I find. Secondly, it is very expensive because most of the time shopping is not about what your necessity is. You don't think about whether it is necessary or not. All that you just dwell into that creative thing. You are cheesing over that unique product that no one else will ever have. It's all about the satisfaction that you get from that rare and how you explore different colours, with different themes and different paintings and putting it all together. All this is about shopping.
1 2 3 4 5
ielts logo

Get the IELTS Prep App

Star rating icon

4.2

1M+ Installs

 app download banner image

Get the app link on your phone

+91

Or download app from

google play storeapp store
master ielts speaking ad