at edmittance

Man: So multi-level marketing…
Woman: That is right.
Man: So what exactly is that?
Woman: Oh just. You can go into the website. There are just thousands. It is like I introduce two people. Two people introduce two people. And so there are tiers to this marketing.
Man: Like Amway?
Woman: Network marketing or multi-level marketing. Yeah.
Man: Tupperware and Amway. Are they examples?
Woman: They are good examples. Yeah. They are in the same category.
Man: How did you get involved in it?
Woman: A very good friend of ours introduced us to it when my husband and I came to the Gold Coast.
Man: M-hm.
Woman: We were approached by this couple who became friends and we were introduced by friends, which is the deceptive element in multi-level marketing because very often they recruit friends and because they are your friends you naturally assume…
Man: That they are ok.
Woman: Yeah… have your interests at heart. Unbeknowns to us our friends although they are good business people they themselves were quite inexperienced in this particular business so they actually without meaning to misled us.
Man: Right. Ok. And what product initially..?
Woman: Well this company is called Omega trend and it is a sort of a replica of Amway.
Man: Right.
Woman: And so they started with cleaning products and…
Man: They broke away from Amway?
Woman: Yeah. They actually are a breakaway from Amway though they didn’t like people to know that because of Amway’s rep.
Man: Amway has a bad rep?
Woman: Incredibly bad rep so that Amway had to change its name that many times to disguise its…
Man: Past.
Woman: Yeah past or…
Man: I thought Amway like…I have that heard it is expensive but the products are quite good.
Woman: Actually that is what most people say and I think there is something to be said for quality. I think it is quite good quality but the fact is there is a high profit margin so I think it is inherently unethical and they pump up the price and they have to because the different tiers of people have to make their profit along the way, to me, for me, I think it is unethical.
Man: And you felt you got burned? You felt like deceived. You weren’t happy with your experience?
Woman: I felt, yeah….

at Matt Hintsa

Mark: Hello, Mr Bestluck?
Peter: Hi there. Come on in. Welcome.
Mark: My name is Mark White.
Peter: Hi Mark. How are you doing?
Mark: Good.
Peter: Take a seat on the black leather sofa.
Mark: Thanks a lot.
Peter: Make yourself comfortable.
Mark: Thanks for agreeing to see me today. I am sure you don’t have much time.
Peter: No problem whatsoever.
Mark: I have come to ask you about your recent acquisition of Mosquito City…
Peter: U-hum.
Mark: … Airlines.
Peter: Yes.
Mark: Was it a sudden decision to buy the airline company?
Peter: It is one of my dreams come true actually. I had been thinking about this for quite a long time, although I hadn’t told anybody until very recently.
Mark: Oh wow! I have got a scoop.
Peter: You have got a scoop. Yeah. (laughs) It has just all happened (at the) beginning of last week.
Mark: Right..So..?
Peter: I phoned David Bowie. You know David?
Mark: Yeah
Peter: And he has..He said that I can buy his jets from him. Marvelous. At a very reasonable price as well.
Mark: you are buying a new fleet.
Peter: Yeah. That is right.
Mark: Right. So you have always wanted to be in the airline industry?
Peter: Not really. It is just something to do. You know. Something. A little bit of fun on the side.
Mark: With all your money?
Peter: Well, that is true.
Mark: Yeah. well. You plan to expand the airline company. Do you think that the Mosquito City Airport is big enough for this new fleet of jets?
Peter: Well, I do because I think that Mosquito City is becoming quite a phenomenon.
Mark: Uh-huh.
Peter: Everybody wants to come here.
Mark: Right.
Peter: And I can understand why because it is “Happy Happy Land”, if you know what I mean.
Mark: I must say it is a beautiful place. I have only just arrived myself a couple of days ago. I got a job. I am making a lot of money. I am staying at the hotel for nothing. This is a great place.
Peter: Just one day. Just imagine… one week … one month…one year.
Mark: How long have you been here?
Peter: I have been here sort of most of my life actually.
Mark: Were you born rich?
Peter: Well, I was born rich inside.
Mark: Inside?
Peter: It sounds a bit sort of corny doesn’t it but ahh..
Mark: No. Not really.
Peter: What is the point of being rich if you are not rich inside?
Mark: All that glitters is not gold.
Peter: Very true.
Mark: Money isn’t everything. So your fortune has grown since you inherited it?
Peter: It has grown considerably.
Mark: M-hm. What kind of industries have you invested in?
Peter: Well…actually I am building a golf course next to the new airport.
Mark: Right. Ok.
Peter: So you will have to come down and see it with me.
Mark: Yes.
Peter: How about tomorrow?
Mark: Ok. Yeah. That sounds great. I would love to.
Peter: Great. Fantastic.
Mark: What time?
Peter: Maybe..how about… I am laughing now … six o’clock in the morning?
Mark: Six o’clock in the morning.
Peter: Yes.
Mark: So early?
Peter: There will be my stretch-limo waiting for you outside your hotel.
Mark: Oh wow! Yes!
Peter: With a chauffeur.
Mark: Ok. Yes.
Peter: No problem.
Mark: Wow!
Peter: See you tomorrow, ok?
Mark: Ok. See you tomorrow. Bye bye.
Peter: Bye.

The Business Trip is an English dialog series with questions and answers for beginning learners. It is about Mr. Tanaka, who travels to the United States on a business trip. It contains 54 short episodes, followed by a series of questions and answers.

The Business Trip download (118.5 MB) consists of one PDF text file and three mp3 files, altogether over two hours of audio with transcripts. Listen to the three audio files in order:

• Audio File #1: Dialog (23:09) – Listen.
• Audio File #2: Dialog with questions and answers (58:00) – Listen and repeat.
• Audio File #3: Dialog with questions (48:31) – Listen and answer the questions.

To download The Business Trip, just enter your name and email below and the download link will be emailed to you right away.

The Business Trip Download
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The image used in the CD cover above is cut from Busy Man by JanneM and, like The Business Trip, is published under a creative commons license.

at elkrusty

A guy from Indiana talked to Mark about the war in Iraq.

Mark: Which oil cartel?
Guy: OPEC.
Mark: OPEC. Right. And they were gonna like stop everything being hitched to the dollar and like..?
Guy: No. We could have broke…. When they went into Iraq they could have broke the back of OPEC. The biggies are Saudi Arabia, Iran. Syria does not a have a place. Venezuela. Kuwait.
Mark: Indonesia.
Guy: Yeah, they are not a big enough supplier.
Mark: Twenty per cent. Twenty per cent they have.
Guy: They could have broke them if we could have got Iraqi oil. If we got Iraqi oil then if we had control we could produce enough oil out of Iraq, if it was stable to manipulate, to…
Mark: OPEC?
Guy: To stop OPEC from saying “Oh well we need more money blah blah blah. We will shut down.” They could have cranked it up. They could have done it. And they did it. There were no weapons of mass destruction. That was a joke. If you are going to do it then fine. Go ahead and break OPEC. See what happens later. The problem is…it was Rumsfeld. Rumsfeld had never talked to a policeman to know that when you go into a country, take over a country and you disband the military, you disband the police; how many police officers do you need on the street to control Chicago or New York? How many police officers do you need to do this? This is not…This is New York, Chicago, LA. Any city. This is not a city with all the obvious (going by…I read a book) ethnic difficulties of Iraq. They had no way of controlling Iraq. They had like …what?!…one tenth of the…