Real Talk #67 – How to answer the question ‘how are you?’
Culips Everyday English Podcast
Culips English Podcast
4.8 • 979 Ratings
🗓️ 1 May 2026
⏱️ 27 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
How do you answer the question, “How are you?” It sounds simple, but native English speakers actually use a wide variety of answers. In this Real Talk episode, Andrew and Kassy share more than 30 common replies, including standard answers, sarcastic ones, and phrases people use on a busy or tough day. They explain what each phrase really means and the situations where you’ll hear it.
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🔑 Key expressions
Keep an ear out for these phrases during the episode:
- To put someone through the wringer
- A scholar and a gentleman
- Murky
- Not one’s cup of tea
- To be foiled
- To chuck something
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello, how's it going? My name's Andrew, and you're listening to Real Talk by Culeps. |
| 0:07.0 | Real Talk is our series where we teach you the English that you need to know for everyday real-world situations, such as opening a bank account at the bank, such as ordering at a restaurant, such as interacting with a taxi |
| 0:23.4 | driver or Uber driver, these kinds of real life situations. Joining me in just a second to help |
| 0:30.4 | me with this episode is my co-host Cassie, and we're going to teach you guys about something |
| 0:36.6 | that on the surface seems extremely simple. |
| 0:40.8 | But once you start to examine it and look at it a little bit more closely, you realize that |
| 0:46.8 | it's pretty complex. It is how to answer the question, how are you? How are you? Well, I'm fine. How are you? Right? This is one of the most |
| 0:57.1 | common basic things that we learn in English. Maybe this is one of the first questions that you learned |
| 1:03.2 | how to answer in English. And on the surface, yeah, it seems pretty simple, but it can be complex. |
| 1:09.4 | And we're going to break it down and teach you all |
| 1:11.7 | about it in this lesson because, you know, when we're learning English, we can control what we say. |
| 1:18.7 | Right? |
| 1:18.9 | When we speak any language, we can control what we say, but we can't control what other people |
| 1:25.0 | say. |
| 1:25.4 | And so maybe you have, in your your English repertoire a stock answer to this |
| 1:31.5 | question. Maybe every time somebody asks you, how are you? You just answer, I'm fine, thanks. |
| 1:37.5 | How are you? Right? That would be totally fine. But here's the thing, guys. We can't control what other |
| 1:43.0 | people say. And there are a myriad of ways that we can answer this question. |
| 1:48.8 | Myriad means many, many, many. |
| 1:50.9 | So there are many different ways that we can answer this question. |
| 1:54.4 | How are you? |
| 1:55.6 | And of course, native speakers are going to use all of these different ways. |
... |
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