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Have you heard of the state of Iowa? What is it famous for? Write down anything you know
about Iowa, and then listen to MaKrae and Olivia talking about their home state.

MaKrae:So we’re from Dubuque, Iowa, which is right off the Mississippi in the Midwest. And when you tell people, or if they ask you where you’re from, and you tell them Iowa, they’ll be like: “Oh! Wh-where’s Iowa?” And it’s … not as common…ly known as, like, California or … Florida or Texas. And … there are like a lot of prejudices about us, but … it’s still really good here.
Olivia:But Iowa’s very special, because we have fantastic countrysides and we’re a lot of, we are a lot of corn farmers, but we’re not all corn farmers. I mean [laughter] we’re not corn farmers! And Iowa, actually, we’re on the side of Iowa, where the Mississippi is right here. We’re a-, uhm, Dubuque is a lake … uh, river town and … it’s very historic. And that’s what I really like about it.
We have a lot of hills … over here, on uhm, the east side of Iowa. And … it’s very easy to get around, because all you have to do is just take a highway and then all of a sudden you’re in Davenport, Iowa … or something like that. And … It’s a good place to live, because we have all four seasons. Uhm, we definitely have winter, very cold winters –
MaKrae:– very cold.
Olivia:… right now …
MaKrae:A lot of snow –
Olivia:Yes.
MaKrae:A lot of snow and … ice and cold. It’s not … fun.
Olivia:Cloudy days … Yeah. Right now we’re in spring and it’s so nice and the f-, flowers are blooming.
MaKrae:It’s beautiful, just coming out of winter.
Olivia:Yeah. And then summers are hot and humid.
MaKrae:Very warm. Upper … upper nineties some days, maybe over a hundred on others.
Olivia:Feels like two hundred … degrees.
MaKrae:Yeah, with the humidity. The humidity gets bad.
Olivia:And then fall is just … a long, nice fall. I’ve always noticed that it was long …
MaKrae:Yeah …
Olivia:… and the –
MaKrae:And it’s just … medium cool all the time, windy, pretty. The leaves, they all change colours with s-s-, with fall and spring. So in the fall they’ll all turn oranges and purples and it’s just beautiful.
Olivia:Oh yeah, definitely. And then, uhm, we got a lot of animals. We have a lot of deer, a lot of deer and uhm, cows. You’ll see cows and … horses every once in a while.
MaKrae:Yeah. I actually live on a horse farm. And the hills here are really nice, because I do racing, but I don’t do, like, track racing. It’s more like cross-country for horses. So it’s really nice ‘cause you get to ride through the heal-, hills and the bluffs and it’s really pretty and fun.

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