Good afternoon.

My name is Dominic Bullock.

Can you tell me your full name, please?

My name is Philipp Geiser.

And can you tell me where you're from?

I'm from Germany, from the North West.

I live in North Rhine-Westphalia in a very small town, so I think you maybe won't know it.

May I see your identification, please?

Yes, of course.

Thank you.

That's fine.

Now, in this first part, I'd like to ask you some questions about yourself.

Let's talk about where you're living now.

Tell me about the town or city where you're living at the moment.

At the moment, I'm here in Oxford in the UK.

So yeah, I'm living in Oxford in a homestay with a host family.

And yeah, I really like the city.

It's really nice.

And yeah, I'm in Oxford for three more weeks, and then I will go home to Germany again.

Do you think you will move to a different place in the near future?

Yeah, I will definitely.

I will have an internship in a law office in Schwerin in the North East of Germany, so quite far away from home.

And yeah, I will move there for another four weeks.

And yeah, in July, August, I will move to Hamburg, also in the North, for my studies.

So there will be a lot of changing in the next few months.

Let's talk about email.

What kinds of emails do you receive about your work or studies?

Oh, many different kinds.

So first of all, of course, private emails from friends, maybe with photos.

Maybe WhatsApp is a little bit more popular at the moment.

But yeah, also we have some emails from time to time.

From university, I also receive emails, for example, for tests that I had to take or for some documents that I still need from the A-levels, for example.

And for work, I'm currently working in a language school as intern.

So I have several different emails there, for example, for homestay, when new students have to be allocated to other host families, from the other staff members when they need information, from the students themselves if they have a problem, for example, and don't know my telephone number, then they write an email.

Do you prefer to email, phone or text your friends?

Depends on the friends, to be honest.

So really good friends, I often call them.

So I'm here now for seven weeks in Oxford and my really good friends, I have like once a week, a little chat on the phone.

I think it's more personal than WhatsApp or than emails or something like that.

So that's what I really like.

For short messages, just to get information, I would rather prefer WhatsApp.

But yeah, good family members, good friends, I would always prefer a phone call.

But I don't really like emails.

So emails are kind of not very personal and really it's like distance when you write an email to your friends.

Do you reply to emails and messages as soon as you receive them?

Also depends on the message, to be honest.

So yeah, when it's really urgent, then I reply as soon as possible, whenever I have time.

And when there are emails that are not really urgent, not really important to me, then maybe I don't answer them.

Maybe I answer them a few days later, a few hours later.

It always depends on the situation.

Are you happy to receive emails that are advertising things?

Oh, no, I hate it.

It's really annoying if you have all these spam emails with people trying to advertise things to make you buy things.

I really don't like it.

I always delete these emails as soon as I get them to clear everything and to have the really important emails.

Let's talk about cars and driving.

How often do you travel by car?

Back in Germany, quite often.

And I really must say here in Oxford, I'm only using buses since I don't have my car here.

I came here by plane.

So I really miss driving, to be honest.

Why?

Because it's freedom, I think.

I think for Germany in particular, most people like their cars.

Most people, it's like a symbol for some Germans of freedom.

And I really like to go on the autobahn, to go on the highway, to go fast.

I really enjoy it.

And I really can relax while driving, hear music.

Of course, stay concentrated, but I really like that.

And I'm coming from an area where you need to drive.

There's no good bus transfer because it's a very rural area.

So you need a car to get to your friends and, I don't know, to go shopping or anything.

Who in your family drives the most?

My father, I think, because he's working 50 kilometres from where we live in Münster and he has to drive like one hour a day.

So I think he's driving the most.

What kind of car would you like to own one day?

And that's an interesting question, since there are so many different cars.

Maybe a fast sports car, a cabriolet, so where you can open the top for driving in summer when it's warm.

You have the wind around your face.

That's like maybe the real feeling of freedom then when you have a car like that.

So a cabriolet would be cool.

Would you like to travel in a driverless car?

In a driverless car where I can still influence the driving.

So I would still need a steering wheel to actually have influence on the drive itself.

But it would be really nice.

I think most people who are...

Now, I'm going to give you a topic and I'd like you to talk about it for one to two minutes.

Before you talk, you'll have one minute to think about what you're going to say.

You can make some notes if you wish.

Do you understand?

Yeah.

Here's some paper and a pencil for making notes.

And here's your topic.

Please don't write anything on the booklet.

I'd like you to describe a hotel that you know.

All right.

Remember, you have one to two minutes for this, so don't worry if I stop you.

I'll tell you when the time is up.

Can you start speaking now, please?

Okay.

This hotel I'm describing is in Greece, more particularly on Crete, so on the island.

It's a foster hotel where I've been with my family a few years ago.

So with my brother and my mother and father.

And it's really close to the sea, what I really like, because I like to go swimming.

I like to wake up and have a look on the ocean.

So that's really, really nice.

It's a Mediterranean sea, so good weather is always a nice thing.

We were there in summer.

It has 30 to 35 degrees, really nice.

Not too hot.

We were quite lucky, because usually they have like 40 degrees.

They have really good food.

They have a really good kitchen.

It was a nice thing.

So there was always different food in the afternoon.

The breakfast was really good.

Yeah.

And they had a really nice pool area.

So they had like three different pools, some for children and then pools that the adults could use.

That was really nice, because I really like to go swimming.

Just standing up, going out of bed, going in a pool.

That's really what I really enjoy.

And because it's close to the sea, we also were allowed to go fishing there.

So they offered like fishing trips, because I'm also fishing in Germany.

I really enjoyed that.

And what's also cool, they had a gym there in the hotel, which is rather big.

So just standing up, going to the gym, training, maybe have a little swim in the pool and then get back to the family, have breakfast.

That's really nice.

And they also had some bars there.

I was not allowed to drink at the time, but maybe if I would go there again, we would have some fun drinking.

But it was a rather big hotel, so I would, today I would prefer a smaller hotel with less people.

So that was like the disadvantage with this particular hotel.

So yeah.

I would prefer a smaller one, but it was really nice because it was really in the center of the island.

So we were close to different historic cities, Rhodes and other islands to visit in Greece.

So yeah.

And as I told you, the weather was perfect.

So I would really like to go there again.

Not maybe in that particular hotel.

Have you ever recommended this hotel to anyone?

Actually, I didn't, but my mother did.

So my uncle was there with his wife and my cousin.

So yeah, they went there.

Thank you.

Can I have the booklet and the paper and pencil back, please?

Sure.

Thank you.

Thank you.

We've been talking about a hotel that you know, and I'd like to discuss with you one or two more general questions related to this.

Let's consider, first of all, staying in hotels.

What are the sorts of things that are important when people are choosing a hotel?

Oh, several things.

First of all, I think the location is very important.

So of course, the area where you want to travel to, what important sites are there, different cities, museums, cultural things to do.

It's close to the sea if you have maybe a nice view from your room.

So these are first of all, I think the location, the country, of course, that's maybe the first thing that you ask yourself, which country do I want to travel to?

And the other thing, of course, then is the hotel itself.

So how big is it?

How many people are there?

It's maybe more entertaining hotel for little children where lots of people are.

Is it like a very small one in an old town of a city?

And why do you think is it that some people just don't like staying in hotels?

Because it's maybe a bit unpersonal.

So maybe that's why most people, they go for like these flat sharing platforms so that they kind of rent a private flat for a week or for two weeks for holidays, because it's more personal, because you're staying really in the old town, because you don't have to stick to certain times for breakfast.

So it's a little bit of your own time management.

You don't have to stick to it and you have more privacy as well, maybe because you don't have to, I don't know, look at the other visitors all the time staying with you for breakfast in the dining room.

And thinking more about luxury hotels, do you think that staying in a luxury hotel is a waste of money?

Depends on the hotel and where it is.

So if you have like a luxury hotel in the middle of Norway, of course, I would consider that as a waste of money.

Actually I don't really have to go to luxury hotels.

I could stay in a really normal hotel.

More important for me would of course be what city it is in, where it is, how fast I can want to see, want to visit.

So staying in a luxury hotel can be cool, can be interesting and really enjoyable for a few days.

But I'm considering there are other things that are more important to me than really staying in a luxurious hotel.

And from staying in a hotel, let's think about working in a hotel.

Do you think that working in a hotel is a good career for life?

A completely different topic.

Depends on the job that you do there.

So if you're for example a manager there in a really big hotel with lots of people staying there, you could of course promote and push or improve your career.

So when you really have to deal with a lot of people, you have to manage, have a good overview over the whole hotel, I think that is a really good thing to learn multitasking there.

The other thing is if you're for example a cook, so if you're really in a small hotel where you can really work on, so in a five-star hotel or four-star hotel, you can really deliver good food that the customers appreciate, so really you can concentrate on the quality of the food, create something new, create something special of course.

And if it's a really famous hotel in a big city, of course that will promote your career.

And after that, do you think that working in a hotel, in a really big hotel, whether it's luxury or not, is a very different experience to working in a small hotel?

Again that depends on the job that you're doing there.

For example, if you're a manager, then of course it's completely different because you have less people, but you can also, if you're in a smaller hotel, you can concentrate on the people you have, really take care of them like a private person that kind of advises them on their trip, on the things to do, so you can really get in touch with the customers.

That's maybe one advantage in a really small hotel, because you don't have to spend that much time on dealing with everything else, with the amount of people coming, the food, the cleaning, because everything is smaller, you can really concentrate and deliver a better product in general, so everything would, there would be an improved quality maybe.

In a really big hotel, you don't have to deal with lots of people, and I think that's very, very different, because you can't really get in touch with them.

And thinking about being a successful hotel manager, what sort of skills do you need, do you think, to become a really successful hotel manager?

Yeah, I already mentioned having an overview, so really managing people, managing everything, you need to be able to multitask, so you have to deal with lots of things at a time, so how many people are coming, how many are leaving, what's the staff doing, so the people that you have to give the tasks to, are the tasks okay, how do they interact with each other, is everything working, are the people staying, do they have a room, is the room free, is the room cleaned, what food do we offer the next weeks, what do we have to buy for that, the social activities maybe that the hotel offers, so there's a lot, there are lots of things that you have to keep in mind at a time, I think that's really the most difficult thing and that's really the skill that you need when you're a manager.