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IELTS Speaking Part 2: IELTS Cue Card/ Candidate Task Card.

Describe an interesting person you know.

You should say:

• what sort of person he/she is
• how you first met him/her
• what he/she does for the living

and explain why you think this person is so interesting.

Model Answer 1:

I have a few friends who I consider to be interesting.  All of them are considered to be highly successful professionally except one. Here I would like to talk about that one friend of mine who can’t really be called a successful person, but I still consider him to be a bit more fascinating than the others.

His name is Seikh Farabi, and I have known him for more than 15 years to call him an interesting person. We grew up together in the same town for a significant part of the time before we parted from each other. Now he lives in another town which is about a couple of hundred kilometres away from my place, but we still keep in touch with each other over the phone.

Anyway, Farabi is a man of little words, but when he talks, he does so with a certain type of conviction and authority which can be hard to ignore by any person who doesn’t know him well.  In other words, Farabi has an uncanny ability to convince any person to believe in something which the person would never otherwise believe. Farabi doesn’t really like to laugh either unless he has a very good reason to do so. But, if I remember correctly, Farabi wasn’t really like this when I first met him at a college parade, celebrating our independence day, about 10 years ago. Back then, he was a rather funny and talkative person. But, once he lost his father about 10 years ago, he became a completely changed person.

By the way, Farabi doesn’t really do anything for living since he is from a very wealthy family. Instead, all he does now is to write devotional poems and studying religion.

Anyway, I consider this friend of mine so interesting, mainly because he likes to learn about things which regular people like us probably would never care about. I find him fascinating also because he knows exactly how to attract and hold the attention of other people by using a few words.

Sample Answer 2:
Wow, this topic is tough!  Not because I don’t know anyone interesting enough, quite the opposite.  I think everyone is interesting if you take the time to get to know them.  It is so easy to make assumptions about people, and then when you come to talk to them you find out all sorts of unexpected and extraordinary things.  When I first joined my running club I thought all the other runners had always been amazing athletes and found running easy – not like me, I was lumbering around sweating as they sprung ahead gazelle-like!  Then once I got talking to them I found many had their own stories, turning their lives around after a setback such as illness, or obesity, everyone ran for a reason. To spend time with friends, to get time to reflect, to enjoy the outdoors; to improve their physical or mental health.  Every one of us is unique and interesting.  That’s just from my running club, if I think my wider social circle, the possibilities are endless!

So, who shall I choose?  I like people who can surprise you, who are curious about the world, don’t judge and are confident enough in themselves to pursue their own dreams in their own quiet way, wherever that may take them. OK, so I know who is all of those things!  I’ll tell you what sort of person they are, how we first met, what they do for a living and I think from all of that it will be very obvious why they are so interesting to me!

So, this person is one of the kindest, nicest people I’ve ever met.  I can tell you exactly when we first came across one another.  I had just relocated to Sheffield and didn’t know a soul.  One day I went for a walk from my house to the open countryside of the Peak District, and snow started to fall.  I ended up at a coffee shop on an alpaca farm, quite high up.  The snow was over a foot deep and still falling.  I went into the coffee shop and this man and his wife were there.  He was a farm manager, and she ran the coffee shop.  There was a roaring fire in the corner and they both made me welcome, we chatted and I dried out with a steaming hot chocolate before heading back home through the snow.  I’d been worried about relocating on my own to a strange city, but these people were so friendly, I felt at home, this move was going to be OK.

Some months later, I started volunteering at the farm, and I got to know Fred, the farm manager really well.  I found out that he’d done loads of different things in his life.  He’d travelled the world fixing x-ray machines at airports; he’d worked as an engineer; his wife and he had had various businesses including trading in second-hand goods and antiques.  Now they’d taken on this rural coffee shop and he was managing a farm.  It seems there was nothing he couldn’t do!  He and his wife were incredibly friendly and social, both could instantly put anyone at their ease.  You know how some people can just talk to anyone?  Well, Fred is like that.  Animals and children instantly adore him.   Whatever he turns his hand to, he seems to do with natural ease.  He was just as happy dressing up as Father Christmas or supervising a ‘spit-off’ between alpacas.  That’s what you call it when you put a male and female together to see if the female is pregnant.  If she is, she will reject the male forcefully – hence ‘spit off’!  We spent hours and hours together on the farm, working in all weathers and doing extraordinary things.  Lugging water down to far fields when pipes were frozen; herding animals together to move them from one field to another, or simply playing with the goats, dogs or other animals that could be great fun to interact with.  He patiently taught me practical skills like driving the tractor, and how to inject the alpacas or trim their feet.  We laughed all the time.  I think from the outside we were probably unexpected friends, but we got on brilliantly from the start and even today can talk each other into the ground when we do meet up now and again for a coffee and catch up in town.

Fred is retired now, but still as busy as ever, he helps manage a pre-nursery school doing their books and administration, but also going in to help play with the kids when he can.  He also has a couple of energetic dogs to keep him up and about every day.  What makes him so interesting I think is his breadth of life experience.  He has seen and done so many things, yet he is unassuming and generous.  In all the years I’ve known him he’s never had a bad word to say about anyone – despite been given cause to do so.  He is generous with his time, always sees the best in other people and adoring of his wife.  They have been together for a very long time indeed, but still, always hold hands together when I see them together walking down the street.  He isn’t just an interesting character, he is an inspirational one too.  He has quietly ploughed his own path as the saying goes, and he is a loyal and wise friend too.  In an age when many people feel compelled to constantly remind you how impressive and interesting they are through Facebook, celebrity or even what they wear – he is a breath of fresh air.  He genuinely has compelling stories to tell and interesting insights to share, but only with those who bother to take the time to stop and ask.  Every street, every bus stop, every café probably has someone like him.  It is always worth a cautious smile and a shy ‘hello’ in a new place, you might encounter someone more interesting than you could possibly imagine if you just keep an open mind and take the time to ask questions and listen as well as talk!

[ Written by - Lucy Marris:  Careers Adviser (UK), TEFL teacher (Vietnam) ]

Sample Answer 3:
Mr. Albert Jonathon is our physics teacher and he is perhaps a very interesting person I know about. As a person, he is a very talented and honest person. He is also a very good teacher, and a veteran of science. However, he is a living contradiction who believes in many superstitions even after being a man of science. I mostly like him because of his creative and effective teaching style and I find him interesting because of his personality and interesting activities.

I first met Mr. Albert when he came to our class as a physics teacher. I was in my second semester then. He is basically a lecturer in our university and this is his main profession. Apart from that, he writes for a science magazine and also works there as a part-time consultant.

There are many aspects I find very interesting about him. First, the way he dresses is quite primitive and outdated. Someone mistakenly will think him as a clerk or as a jobless person instead of being a professor of a large university. Interestingly his preference for wrist-watches and shoes are quite exceptional and all of his watches and shoes are branded and must be very expensive. Again, as a physics teacher when he tells ghost stories, you won’t believe him. He is a gifted person with a quite remarkable way of teaching and inspiring others. I personally like his teaching style very much. Then his fascination with stamp and coins is also interesting. He has some hobbies which are popular among children and could hardly be seen among adults. Finally, he has a rich collection of books but he never lends any books to anyone. As an explanation, he once told us that people hardly return his books.

Everything I know about this person is quite interesting to me. Thus he is probably the most interesting person I have ever known.

Sample Answer 4:
I have met with Joseph, an Asian boy, at Australian National University in Canberra, Australia where I am having my undergraduate courses now. He is the guy who is different from others. He is quite interesting too.

Joseph belongs to a converted family in India. His parents were not Christian at the beginning and later on converted to Christianism. Thereby, he is quite influenced by both religions and cultures. He is quite interesting in the sense that he does almost all the things in unusual ways. He prefers to avoid the traditional methods to perform acts. He never tells a lie or hits other. But if he is injured or insulted, he never takes revenge. This is the basic difference between him and the rest of us which appears very interesting to me.

I cannot exactly recall the day when I meet him first. Might be it was the first week at university when I met him. He was a latecomer on the class and still, he is. It is an ordinary norm to apologise for the late but he did not. Rather entering into the class, he took his seat silently. Since he sat beside me, I asked him why did not seek apology for the late, with a smile he replied that he does not apologise for being late as it was not his mistake. The watchman did not allow him to enter the university compound as he failed to show the identity card. In fact, identity cards for the new students were issued after two weeks of the inauguration. This was the type he used to be and it was the first meet of mine with him. The friendship between us grew stronger gradually.

Joseph has no relatives in Australia. So, he lives alone. But the expenses are huge. To meet his needs and expenses, he works at a coffee shop as a part-timer. With his ready wit and smart answers, he enchants the customers in the shop. So, all the regular customers love him much and he is well tipped. As a result, his earning is very well and leads a decent life. But it should be admitted that he is a hardworking individual. He works for six hours a day. He takes a break only for a half-day and that is only on the days when we have classes in the evening. He is planning to settle permanently in Australia and dreams of being a computer programmer in future.  

He is interesting. He is mind-blowing. There are numerous reasons to consider him special among us. He does all the tasks in different manners than they are usually done by others. He uses pencils to write on his exam scripts with the logic that a pencil makes mistake removal easier. Besides, he likes to talk on the old-fashioned land phone. He does not use cell phones for communication. So, often it is difficult to get him when he is most needed. Usually, he remains silent but once he starts talking, it becomes difficult to beat him in logics. I do not know how he manages to create all the logics. Only this ability has made him a bit different than all, I believe.  
 

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