1. I was born in Russia and I’m proud of this.
I can say that I truly love my motherland. But nowadays a lot of people leave our country and move to the other ones: America, United Kingdom, Israel e.t.c.
I don’t think that they are right. I think that no matter how difficult is the situation in our country at present, every citizen of Russia must remember about the gloriuos history, wonderfull culture and traditions of it.
A lot of the world-famous scientists – Lomonosov, Mendeleev, Timiryasev, Sechenov etc. -were born in Russia. The first sputnik and space ship started from Russia. A lot of discoveries and inventions in chemistry, geography, physics, biology and medicine were made by russian scientists.
The greatest poets, writers and composers known all over the world were also born in our country - Pushkin, Lermontov, Tolstoy, Gogol, Dostoevski, Griboedov, Tchaikovski, Rashmaninov and many others.
Russia won many biggest wars in History. Although we lost 29 millions people in Second World War, Russian soldiers conquered Berlin and saved the world from Fascism.
We must know our history and remember our ancestors. I believe that Russia will become the strongest and richest country in sprite of all the problems.
2. I am going to tell you about Moscow.
Moscow, the capital of Russia, is one of the largest the most beautiful cities in the world. The total area of the city is about 900 square kilometers. About 10 million people live in the city. Moscow was founded in 1147 by prince Yuri Dolgoruky.
Nowadays it is a political, commercial and cultural center of our country. It is also an industrial center with highly developed engineering, electric, light and chemical industries.
The heart of Moscow, the central and one of the most beautiful places is the Red Square. Here one can see the Cathedral of St. Basil, the monument to Minin and Pozharsky, the Kremlin, the History museum and take a walk in the Alexandrovsky garden.
Some skyscrapers decorate Moscow, including the Moscow State University, the oldest university in Russia that was founded in 18th century by Lomonosov. I can be said that Moscow is a city of students. There are over 80 higher educational institutes in it.
The are more then 80 museums in Moscow. The largest and the most famous ones are the Pushkin museum of Fine Arts and the State Tretyakov art Gallery.
Moscow is also famous for it’s theaters. The best-known of them is the Bolshoi thetre, the Moscow drama thetre ( MHAT), Sovremennik and Lenkom.
There are many parks and gardens in Moscow, that’s why its citizen like to spend their free time out home. The most beautiful and the lagest ones are the Gorky Park and the Poklonnaya Gora.
Moscow is a scientific center of our country. The Academy of scientists of Russia, the oldest university, many scientific institutes are located in Moscow.
3.There is a a lot of english-speaking countries in the world, for example: United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, the United States of America, Australia and New Zealand. English is used as one of the official languages in Canada, the Republic of South Africa and the Irish Republic. It’s also spoken as a second language by people in many parts of Asia and Africa.
But I would like to tell you about the USA.
The United States of America is located in the North America continent. It is one of the largest countries in the world. The population of the USA is about 250 million people. The administrative units of the USA are called states. There are 50 of them and the largest of the America’s states is Alaska. The capital of the country is Washington DC ( the District of Columbia). It was chosen as a permanent site for the nation’s capital in December 1800 by George Washington. The largest and the most imporatnt cities of the USA are New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Boston. There are many tall buildings in them that really scrape the sky, that’s why they are called skyscrapers.
Among the most famous sites of interest are the Great Lakes, Niagara falls, the Golden Gate bridge in San Francisco and other. There are many beautiful National parks and protected areas of wilderness in America.
The USA is a highly developed country. It is rich in such natural resourses as coal, oil, iron and natural gas. On the other hand, it exports a lot of raw materials, industrials and agricultural products.
By constitutional regime the United States of America is a federal republic. The American parliament ( called Congress ) has two chambers : the House of Representative and the Senate. The head of the State is the president, who is elected for four years and whose powers are limited by the Constitution. Now the President of the USA is George Bush Junior.
The flag of the country has 13 red and white stripes representing the original 13 states and 50 stars - for each of the state at present.
4. I was born in Buryatia that is situated in the Eastern part of Siberia and I can say that my native region is very beautiful.
There are a lot of large beautiful forests there, where one can see many kinds of different plants and animals. Cedar, larch, firtree, birch, pine and many other trees grow in our woods, as well as various kinds of berries, like cranberry, great bilberry, raspberry and the most popular one - foxberry. In august people begin to pick berries for selling and for eating.
We have such kinds of animals like bear, dear, elk, fox, wolf, and, of course, sable, that has very reach and beautiful fur, that’s why poachers kill it. Nowadays poaching is encreasing and it is one of the biggest problem for our region.
The most popular sight in Buryatia is lake Baikal, that attracts tourists from all the parts of the world. Baikal is the biggest freshwater lake on the planet and the deepest one. There are a lot of fish in the lake, the most popular of which are pike, grayling, whitefish and sturgeon. Only in Baikal one can see such kind of fish as omoul and such specie of animal as nerpa.
Every year a lot of tourists from different foreign countries come to Buryatia. People come to see all these reaches of nature and to enjoy this perfect fresh air, but we don’t understand what treasures possess and don^t spare them. Some people often leave rubbish in forests and on the coast-line of Baikal in summer and throw empty bottles in its watter, and make fires. If we don^t change our behaviour, very soon we can loose our wonderful nature forever.
5. When I was a child I didn^t have much problems, and the ones that I had were very lunimportant and stupid.
As I became more adult I understood that my life consists of different kinds of problems – personal and global.
The first personal problem for me now is to choose the way of my future life, that is, to realise what I want to be and what profession I want to have. Thats why I should consider in what institute I will get my education after graduating from the school. What my future life will be depends on the answer to this question.
Sometimes I don^t have enough time and energy to do all my home work. It is a big problem too, as it doesn^t let me study better.
Every time I hear from TV bad news about our country. It is getting on my nerves. Altough it isn^t my personal problem, it’s very unpleasant to hear such things about your home country that you love.
The biggest problem nowadays is drugs. There are very many teenagers now, who sell it and buy it. They leave school and drop heir studies and degrade and become thieves and bandits.
( Many times they told me to give them money. I was compelled to fight with them. But they are weak and each time they loose the battle and run away.)
Drugs endanger the future of our country and our town. It is a very big menace for all the people.
So, as every teenager I do have problems, but I don^t let myself give in / surrender ( сдаться ) and always try to fight them.
6. Now I want to tell you a few words about my family. My family is not very large, there are 5 members – my parents, my sister, grandmother and me
First of all I’d like to speak of my parents. My mother is a speech therapist by profession, but now she helps my father in his work. My father is a director of a restaurant and the brewery in our town.
My parents are hard-working people. My mother keeps house and takes care of us. She is very good at cooking and she^s got golden hands. We try to help her with the housework; for example we wash the dishes, go shopping and tide our flat.
My grandmother is a very old woman. She is 79 years old. She doesn^t live with us, but we come tosee her every day to take care of her. We love our granny very much.
My sister Yana is 21. She studies in Moscow. This year she is graduating from the University. She will be a lawyer but she can also work as a translator from English and French languages because she knows them quite well.
We all like to spend our time together. Sometimes we stay at home and watch TV or just talk, and on weekends we go out of town to Baikal or to visit our friends. We also like tom invite people to us and I can say that every guest who comes to us, goes back smily and in a good mood, because my parents are very hospitable and nice people.
7. When one finishes school one understands that its the time to choose a future profession and the way his life will be. It’s not easy to make a right choice of a job. It’s very important question for me - what I want to be when I leave school . A few years ago it was to make up my mind and choose one of the hundreds jobs. As a child I wanted to become an inventor or a scientist to invent different things to make peoples life better and more comfortable.
Then I decided to become an officer of FSS (ФСБ in Russian) , then a mariner.
But all of these ambitions are in the past now. I have considered this question for a long time and decided that the profession that siuts me most is a manager. It is very popular and demanded
( требуемая ) nowadays, just like a profession of lawyer or economist. I think that management coresponds my personal qualities because I like to communicate with people and to be a leader if its necessary.
I also want to say that the profession should be chosen according to the character and preferencies of a person. Children must choose their profession themselves because they must love the things they do, believe that people need them and their job brings them peasure, not just money.
8.People all over the world like doing sports because it makes them healthier, keeps them fit and it is just a great passing of time.
Every sports makes the one who is doing it you stronger, harder improves his reaction and qiuckness. What is more, some sports help to develope special physical skills and train particular groups of muscles. For example: skies, swimming and jogging helps to strengthen make legs and hands and trains one^s breath. Peole going in for bodybuilding can lift up large weights and their bodies become beautiful and relief. Team games like football, basketball, volleyball and hockey make you well- coordinated, quick and dexterious ( проворный) and teach how to cooperate wth the other players in order to win a game. Fighting sports, especially Eastern ones, like carate, aikido, oushou, help to develope all aspects of fitness – strength, quick reaction, dexterity, and spirit as well, because each of them based on philosophy. To my mind, fighting arts are the best sports.
For me sports is a hobby. I do some exercises every day, because it keeps me in a good form and makes me stronger. When you begin to go in for sports you can give up it after some weeks, because it is not easy to do hard exercises every day. But you must make yourself doing it, or you will not have any results. For example, if one wants to make his muscles grow he must keep on working very hard and consistently (последовательно ), from day to day to get some results.
As a child I went to many sport clubs and gave up it after half a year, but I^ve always done something to keep fit. Since last summer I do weight-lifting and push-up exercises to develope my muscles 5 times a week. Sometimes I go jogging with my father. I like it because it makes me strong and more active.
The ancient Greeks said there is a healthy spirit in a healthy body. I think thats true and every man, who respects himself must go in for sports. It is the way for healthy and long life.
9.More and more people realize that every educated person should know at least one foreign language.
The most popular and wide-spread ( распространенный ) language in the world now is English.
Spanish, French, German languages are also popular, but as much as English, because it is more difficult to learn them – because of their grammar and lexiks. They are spoken mostly in Europe and in the former colonies of France and Spain in Latin America and Africa.
English is spoken by more than 350 million people .It’s the language of aprogressive science and technology, trade and cultural relations, commerce and business. It’s the universal language of international aviation, shipping and sports. It is also the major language of diplomacy.
Hundreds and hundreds of books, magazines and newspapers are printed in English and all over the world. 75% of the world’s mail and 60% of the world’s telephone calls are made in English. Half of the world’s scientific literature is written in English too.
In Russia English is very popular : it is studied at schools, colleges, universities, and sometimes even at nursery schools. All the qualified specialists nowadays must know English.
Learning a foreign language is not an easy thing. It is a long and slow process that takes a lot of time and patience. But to know languages today is absolutely necessary for everyone.
I^ve studied English for about 2 years by now and I^m very glad to do this because I have always been interested in foreign countries, their culture and traditions.
10. Nowadays a lot of people in the world like to travel. The level of the technical deveplopment allows to voyage practically to any country of the world in the shortest time.
People travel by different means of conveyance, even on foot. But everybody likes to go to different places and see various sites of interest.
Some Russian tourists prefer to trip to foreign countries. I understand them, because it’s always interesting to visit a place where you have never been and to learn something new about the other nations, their culture and traditions, to see architectural monuments and famous masterpieces with your own eyes.
Every place on the Earth has its own sights, flaura and fauna and climate, which makes visiting it yet more interesting. So one of the main reasons for travaling is to get new experience and impressions.
To my mind, our country has a lot of places that are worth seeing. Although the climate of Russia sometimes is not very favourable, our forests are the largest in the world and there are lots of rare species animals and plants there. The lakes, rivers and seas in our contry are also very beautiful and picturesque ( живописный ), for example our lake Baikal, the deepest and the most pure lake in the world and the only place on the planet where you can find such a fish as Omoul.
The territory of our country is big enough and our historical and cltural heritage is rich enough to satisfy all the tastes and wishes of travellers. That is why the majority of the Russian tourists prefer to travel in our country. Some of them travel only for hunting and fishing, the others change places simply to spend their free time.
As for me I like to travel throughout Russia, to learn more about my motherland.
My favorite place for having rest are the surroundings ( окрестности ) of our freshwater lake Baikal, where the nature is so beautiful and calm and the air is so fresh. I also like to travel to the Black Sea where the climate is so warm and mild and where there is always plenty of fruits in summer.
11. The word «Ecology» is very popular word today. But what does it mean?
Ecology is a science which studies relationships between all forms of life on our planet and the environment. This word came from the Greek «oikos» which means «home». This idea of home includes our whole planet and its population, nature, animals, birds, fish, insects and all other living beings, as well as the atmosphere around our planet.
Ecology has become such an imporatnt science because with the progress of civilisation and technical develpment the environment on the Earth gets more and more poluted and the natural resourses – like drinking water, fossils ( полезныеископаемые), forests etc. get exhausted ( истощаются).
For example, every year the atmosphere is polluted by 100 tons of industrial dust and other harmful substances.
Big cities suffer from smog from large factories. Cars with their engines have become the main source of pollution in industrial countries. The forests Africa, South America and Asia are cut down for the needs of industries in Europe and the USA. As a result some species of animals, birds, fish and plants have disappeared and keep disappearing. Rivers and lakes dry up. One of the most known examples is the Aral Sea, which has become much smaller due to men’s activity.