This is an All Ears English podcast, episode one. Meet your English teachers. Welcome to the All Ears English podcast, where you'll finally get real native English conversation and fluency for business and life. We
We believe in connection, not perfection when it comes to learning English. Now here are your hosts, Lindsay McMahon, the English adventurer, and Michelle Kaplan, the New York radio girl coming to you from Boston and New York City, USA. Hey.
Welcome to All Ears English. In this episode, you will meet Lindsay and Michelle. You will find out which one of them has been living in New York City for 10 years, which one likes to scoop peanut butter out of the jar, and how we'll teach you to finally connect with native speakers in English conversations.
Hello, Michelle. Are you excited? Lindsay, hello, hello. Yes, I am so excited. Hello to our listeners. Guys, welcome, welcome to All Ears English. Guys, welcome to All Ears English. We are here to give you something brand new to help you learn real English with native speakers, okay? So, we want you to get to know who we are. So, Michelle, who
are you? Tell our listeners about yourself. Yeah. Guys, nice to meet you. My name is Michelle Kaplan. I am from the Washington, D.C. area originally. However, now I live in New York. I love to travel. I also like to perform. I have done stand-up comedy. I've been in a band. I like to write songs and sing. This
So I really like all that stuff, but also I love to teach. I've been teaching for years now, and I have my master's in teaching English as a second language. I really love working with students. So that's the short version of it.
That's awesome. And I love that you are in New York City. Michelle, you and I share that in common that I've also lived in New York and you lived in New York. You have lived in New York for the past 10 years or so. Is that right? Yes. For a long time, I've been here. Oh my gosh. Yeah. I know a lot of our listeners are curious about what it's like to live in the city. And you're going to get a lot of insight on that, guys, on All Ears English. And so that's why you should hit follow on this show to make sure you don't miss any of this
Awesome insight. So, Michelle, shall I introduce myself? What do you think? Yes, I was going to ask you. Yes, yes, yes. All right, Lindsay, tell us about who are you?
All right. So guys, my name is Lindsay McMahon and I am an English teacher and I'm also an entrepreneur. I love building companies. I love building businesses. I love understanding problems in the world and solving them. I love taking action. I also have a puppy. His name is Kiefer. He's super cute. He's a little lab Aussie mix. And I love
And, you know, we go hiking a lot. I like to take him outdoors. I'm all about skiing in the winter, hiking in the summer and traveling. So when I began my career as an English teacher, I lived in Japan for a year and a half and I taught English there and I learned Japanese. And then I went to South America and I backpacked around South America for a year to learn Spanish. I lived in Guatemala. I lived in Argentina.
And I did the Camino de Santiago in Spain. So I've done a lot of great traveling, a lot of language learning, and of course, lived in New York for a short stint. But now I'm here on the All Ears English podcast and so ready to share those experiences with you guys to motivate you to learn English in a new way. But Michelle, before we get into that new way, what we're doing here that's different, let's talk about the weirdest snack recommendation. Yeah.
So let's have some fun. Yeah. Yeah. Tell me what is the weirdest snack? Because you, you know, I've heard a few strange things about the snacks that you eat, Michelle. Tell us what is your weirdest snack recommendation that our listeners could try? Oh, this is, I mean, can I share two? Two? Okay. I suppose you can. All right. Okay. Okay.
OK, well, one is a peanut butter and cheese like I will eat like a peanut butter and cheese sandwich or or peanut butter and a deli meat. So like I'll do like a peanut butter and turkey, you know, sliced turkey sandwich or something like that. So do you put so is it like the peanut butter is taking the place of the mayonnaise? Is that what's happening?
I guess so. I don't know. I don't really like mayonnaise on my sandwiches, but I do like peanut butter. So it kind of makes it a little bit different. But the other thing is that I like to dip my popcorn in milk. So take a cup of milk next time you guys are having popcorn and dip your popcorn in it and then eat it and it's delightful.
Oh, that is so weird. Soggy popcorn? No. Yeah, it's like a cereal. No, it's very, you don't, it's not. Okay, let's be clear. We don't dip like the whole thing in and like dunk it like, and then it's like totally wet. Just do a little bit. You're going to hear a sizzle. Okay. And then you know that it's time to go.
but it's very good i love this i feel like you have much quirkier recommendations than i do this is so good this now would you do this dunking thing so you're not dunking but you're sizzling it okay would you do this thing like when you watch a movie is that how you have your glass of milk here and then you have your popcorn yeah oh yeah yeah yeah it's really good it's really good guys you gotta give it a try i mean lindsey you got anything good
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I've got, well, I've got one thing that's very, it's, it's, well, I'm just going to say it. It is taking my spoon. You know this, Michelle. We know each other. I know. Dipping my spoon right into the peanut butter. What's the theme here? It's peanut butter, clearly. Peanut butter. And just scooping it out. Sometimes even two scoops, maybe three if I'm feeling ambitious. Yeah.
But hey, I just love it. Just good, pure peanut butter. And I like the natural kind. I don't really like the fake kind, like the Skippy. It's not my thing. Just the natural peanut butter and just a nice scoop of that and then going off for a workout or something. So good because you get that energy. Do you like crunchy or creamy? Oh, my gosh. I actually like both. I don't discriminate. But I think if I had to choose, I'd probably go for the crunchy. I like that crunch. A lot of people don't like that, though.
I like I'm also I like both. But I think if I had to go for one, I would do the creamy. So I love it. I love it. I love it. So good. So guys, clearly, we have some interesting recommendations. You should try those things. But you're going to learn a lot on this show. Yes, about us about American culture, about how to really connect. And let's tell our listeners what our vision is for this show. What is our slogan? What is our meaning? Why are we learning Michelle? You
You're going to hear us say this all the time, but it's because it's so important and so useful. This is connection, not perfection. This is what All Ears English boils down to. When you really think of this show, this is what it's going to be, guys. Lindsay, what does connection, not perfection mean to you? So what it means is that your singular goal, the only reason we're all here learning English is
is to connect with a human being, right? If you really think about it, that's the point of learning a language. It's not about the grammar tables. It's not about memorization. It's not about your English teacher in a classroom. It's only about the person in front of you. And in some cases, that means the audience in front of you, right? If you're giving a presentation. But many times, it's just that person, maintaining that eye contact, making that person laugh, and having that relationship. That's what we talk about on this show, right, Michelle? Right.
Right, right, right. So if you are sitting here and thinking, oh, well, I'm always like working with my textbook, I'm sitting in my room, my dorm room or my apartment by myself looking at my textbook and just memorizing things, you know, there's a time and a place for that. But we are...
belief here is that you will learn more, much more by getting out into the world and connecting with people and not worrying about, okay, oh no, did I, was I supposed to have an S there? Or, oh no, I like accidentally used the present tense or the past. Obviously, this show also, we want to teach you correct English and we will teach you correct English, right? We are not going to say, eh,
It doesn't matter, right? That's not what connection, not perfection is about. Exactly. It's about that we're putting connection at the forefront. At the forefront. Such a good word for our listeners for today's first episode, right? So guys, if you are a global business professional, you are going on business trips around the world, you're doing conference calls with your colleagues in English, or if you're an international student, maybe you're doing a PhD in the US or in England, Australia, this
show is for you. So we're so excited to have you here. So what do our listeners need to make sure they do right now? Guys, we will be here four days a week. So hit follow wherever you are listening to this podcast. Make sure you follow us so that you never miss any of our episodes. We are so excited to have you on this journey with us. And we just...
We're excited to build this relationship with you as well. This is a real relationship. It's not just me and Lindsay, about the two of us. It's about you guys, right? We want to hear from you and we like to interact with our listeners. We're just excited, excited, excited to be here to help you with your English. Yeah, Michelle, that's exactly right. We're always thinking about you guys. And also, that's why we're on all the socials, right? Michelle, I mean, we are on all the socials.
We're even on WeChat in China. We are on Instagram. We're on Facebook, TikTok. We're on Clubhouse. We do regular rooms in Clubhouse. We're on YouTube. So go and find us on any channel that any social that you like to follow. And Michelle, in the next episode, we're going to kick off by starting to talk about interviewing in the United States for our business, for our listeners who are business professionals. So good. Awesome. Awesome.
Oh, I can't wait. Guys, we're happy to have you here. And yeah, guys, we're all in this together. We're very excited. Yeah, let's have some fun. Right, Michelle? All right. All right. I'll see you in the next one. Take care. Bye. Bye.
Thanks for listening to All Ears English. And if you believe in connection, not perfection, follow our show wherever you listen to podcasts to make sure you don't miss anything. See you next time.