In this episode of Chinwag Tuesdays, Amanda sits down with Joe, the Sydney-based creator behind Joe Speaks Hindi. Joe has been learning Hindi for 27 years, spent a year living in a remote village in Rajasthan teaching English, and recently went viral on Instagram after being interviewed by CNN News18.

Joe and Amanda talk about what it actually feels like to learn a language for decades, why an accent is something to be proud of, and why there is no such thing as speaking "full English." They also cover the universal experience of making friends as a migrant, what makes someone genuinely good at learning something new, and the misconceptions people have about Australian culture and about going viral.

What You'll Hear in This Episode

● What sparked Joe's interest in India and Hindi

● A year living in a remote village in Rajasthan

● Why an accent is something to be proud of

● Misconceptions about Australian culture and family

● Making friends as a migrant is universal

● What makes someone genuinely good at learning a language

● Going viral and the CNN News18 interview

● Joe's most memorable moments in India

● Rapid fire: Australia or India

Connect with Joe

● www.instagram.com/joespeakshindi

Belén is an English teacher and translator from Argentina who spent two years in Australia on a working holiday visa, living in Brisbane, Tasmania, and Adelaide. In this episode, she talks about what it was really like navigating life, work, and language in a country she'd dreamed of visiting for years.

She was ready to go in 2020 — and then COVID happened. She waited three years, finally arrived in June 2023, and packed more experiences into two years than most people manage in a decade: au pair in Brisbane, strawberry picker in Tasmania, cherry packer near Hobart, cafe cook and barista in Adelaide, sandwich artist at Subway, hotel housekeeper, and eventually ESL teacher at a private English college.

The conversation covers what actually helped Belén's English improve most (hint: it wasn't the classroom), the moment she realised she'd absorbed Australian politeness habits and was saying please at restaurants back home, the challenge of being locked out of conversations when her partner's friends spoke only French, and the heartbreak of having her visa expire knowing she desperately wants to go back.

What You'll Hear in This Episode

• Why Belén waited three years before finally making it to Australia

• What the 88-day farm work requirement for a second-year visa actually looks like on the ground

• Which jobs gave her the most natural English immersion

• How Australian politeness norms felt completely foreign at first

• What it felt like to be locked out of a conversation in a language you don't speak

• The emotional reality of leaving Australia not knowing when you'll get back

• Advice for teachers and migrants who want to move to Australia

Connect with Belén

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mbelenbarberisLinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/mb-barberis

Jayanti arrived in Brisbane in 2017 to start her PhD, and her very first day in the research lab involved watching a fellow student struggle through a presentation in front of a room full of people asking tough questions. She thought: what have I signed up for?

In this episode, Jayanti talks about the journey from that intimidating first day to delivering a TEDx talk in front of 200 people, in her Indian accent, on her own terms. She shares what it took to get there, including years of Toastmasters, deliberate exposure to different audiences, and a shift in how she thought about vulnerability and failure.

She also gets into some of the cultural gaps that hit migrants in Australia harder than expected: the dry sarcastic humour you can't always tell is a joke, the discovery that Aussies have hobbies and actually talk about them, the word "arvo" almost ruining a social plan, and why saying "please" is not as universal as you'd assume.

And she tells a story about a date that knocked her confidence right before her biggest speaking moment, and how she decided to show up to that TEDx stage as fully, visibly Indian as she could.

Topics Covered

• Arriving in Australia as a PhD student and the culture shock of the first research group meeting

• How Australia's multicultural environment means learning not just Australian communication, but many cultures at once

• What Toastmasters actually does for confidence and why the incremental exposure matters

• Speaking to different types of audiences to build real communication range

• Why sharing your failures in Australia is often a strength, not a weakness

• The difference between Indian and Australian communication culture: politeness, humour, and identity

• The word "arvo," the magic word, and the word "candy" (Amanda's husband was not impressed)

• Why hobbies matter socially in Australia and how to build them into the life you already have

• How a comment about her accent almost derailed her TEDx week, and why it didn't

• What she would tell her younger migrant self about accent, identity, and self-esteem

Guest LinksLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jayanti-mendhi/

TEDxtalk: https://cms.qut.edu.au/tedxqut/speakers/speakers-pages/2022/jayanti-mendhi

Resources Mentioned

• Toastmasters — toastmasters.org

• Three-minute thesis competitions — check with your university

• QUT Open Day — mentioned as an example of non-conference audience building