Have you ever dreamed of being rich and famous? We can watch such persons on the news, we can see their photos in the newspapers and wish we could be them – rich, talented and admired. You might change your mind if you knew not only the advantages but also all the disadvantages there are to being famous. Yes, many people can find a lot of pluses of being famous and I want to speak about them.
The greatest plus of their position in society is much money. Famous people live in big beautiful houses, buy best clothes, can afford to drive the latest car models, eat in good and expensive restaurants, etc. Secondly, they are famous and their names are known to everybody. You can visit the best celebrities and parties. Every day you receive many letters from your fans where they write how they admire you. It seems that we can see only positive aspects of being famous. But I think all these advantages are not the real life of this kind of people. Being famous is very hard work. When you are famous, many paparazzi follow you every day and every time. So you are under control every time, and if you do something wrong, everybody gets to know it. Famous people worry constantly about their reputation. Sometimes paparazzi follow celebrities and take pictures of them in unflattering and compromising poses. For example, Britney Spears spends a fortune on security, but it doesn’t help. Another disadvantage is much stress. You travel all day around the world, go to award ceremonies and other events. And if you have stress, you may have to take drugs and alcohol. Without taking drugs many stars wouldn’t have coped with stress.
To be a successful and happy person is not only to be rich, to have much money. It also means to have friends, a family staying behind you, a girlfriend or a boyfriend, because without all these things you are lonely. But especially for famous people it is really hard to have many friends. It is difficult for them to know whom to trust. There are many examples when ex-lovers sell their private stories to newspapers. And the newspapers are prepared to pay a fortune for these photos, literally hundreds of thousands of dollars. Moreover, for example during a concert the clothes of famous people are very often stolen by their fans.
I can say that their life is really dangerous. And it is much harder to be a child of a famous person. May be many people think that they can have whatever they want: many toys, expensive clothes and the best private school. Yes, of course it is true. But being a child of famous parents also means shortage of attention because their parents always visit night clubs, different restaurants; generally speaking they are always busy. They often have to hire a nurse to babysit with their children. And finally if you are famous and have a lot of money you constantly have to save it, because there are a lot of people who want to steal your money.
Have you ever noticed groups of teenagers huddled together, gathered at the playground and occupying every free place? It is quite natural to question their motives or wonder why they're filling an afternoon by strolling aimlessly.
Children aged 12 through 15 often find themselves feeling as if they had no place to go. But let's just ask one question: why do teens often feel so as if nobody needed them? Why do they often dramatize and regard themselves as "unnecessary” people in our society?
There is an opinion that they behave so just because of their awkward age and actually we shouldn’t pay attention to their endless caprices. But I disagree with it. I don’t think that in this situation we should blame only teens themselves or their age or something like this. In my opinion the root of every problem arises in the family. I don’t want to blame parents now, I just want to call your attention to the fact that it doesn’t matter what conception of a "normal” family we have now, still family are people who should always support you, whom you should trust and who are always with you. But is it really so? How often we can hear from a mother or a father of a 14-year-old teenager, "You never help us!” When they are at home, teens frequently face the common parental concerns of "All you do is sit and watch TV or listen to music" and "You don't do anything." Isn’t such a kind of treatment from the dearest people a good justification for teens to behave in a wrong way?
I don’t want to say that teens should behave badly, miss their classes, start making friends with suspicious people and so on. I only mean that maybe if some parents stop looking for only bad in their offsprings and start noticing some good traits of their character, maybe then our "young adults” will change themselves somehow? Because this is really true that teens can be quite adequate people who perhaps just need some kind of support.
Above all, teens want comfort. Then parents should remember that a teen's perception of comfort differs greatly from theirs. The idea of comfort may be nice furniture, a clean house, a functional kitchen, etc. But teens’ perception of comfort equates to extreme privacy. And that really irritates a lot when your mother or father tries to show her or his love and caring before your friends’ eyes. So why don’t parents want to "occupy” a neutral position and act sometimes as their children want them to? Teenagers today are pressured about a lot of things, and in my opinion parents should find a way how to stay strict and loving people at one and the same time.
"Why are you watching these crazy Japanese cartoons all days long? They'll definitely drive you insane” - nagging one's parents at their dear son or lovely daughter who can't tear themselves away from their computers. Day by day more and more young people become interested in the popular Japanese art called Anime. What is it? Just a hobby? May be idleness and time-wasting? Or even addiction? Some people regard Anime as well-spun kind of entertainment which produces certain zombie effect on one's psyche. Others laud it to the skies admiring its deep philosophy and remarkable style. But the truth lies somewhere between these two points of view. I do think that watching Anime can be one of the ways of self-education, in this case, of gaining understanding of Japanese culture.
It is well-known that the best way to understand another culture is to plunge into it, to dissolve in it. But not everybody has a chance to move to another country and live there among native people for quite a long period of time that can be enough for understanding its customs and traditions. Another way which is cheaper and more available is to get acquainted with it by means of different culture carriers – painting, music, architecture, movies etc. Anime as a kind of visual arts and essential part of Japanese life can also be considered as certain "informational resource”.
I think, it's not a secret that Japanese culture is heavily symbolic and its comprehension can turn out to be very difficult for a European. Based on religion, mythology and epic, Anime world is saturated with different symbols that are fixed in mentality of Japanese people but can be recondite for us. For example, let's take some popular Miyazaki's Anime. Ko-dama from "Princess Mononoke” and Cat-bus bakeneko from "My neighbour Totoro” are spirits from Japanese legends and I really doubt that a lot of people from our country have an idea what they are, how they look and behave. But after watching these two Anime one (not everybody but the one who's interested in it) can get certain notion about these mythological spirits.
Anime can also illustrate a great deal of cultural aspects concerning every-day life, social relationships, traditions and etiquette. Do you need any examples? Well, first, let's talk about holidays. Do you know what is the most popular present for Valentine's day in Japan? Valentine cards? No. Watch... hm.. "Vampire Knight” for example and you'll see that on this day Japanese girls present hand-made (or bought if they cook badly) chocolate to those people they respect or like. Something about everyday life? Well, watch "Fruit basket” or any other school Anime and you'll find out that study year in Japan begins in April. Something about people's relationships? Do you know that it is usually a girl who first tells a boy about her "romantic feelings”? She can give him a letter with her "I love you” or just her lunch which is called "obento” to show her liking. A lot of people may disapprove of Anime because they see pron (let me use this euphemism) hints almost everywhere. Sometimes they are right. It's all because of the religion. In contrast to Catholic Europe and Orthodox Russia, Japan has never come across religion's disapprobation of sex. So, this aspect of people's relationships isn't "a delicate subject”. And you know, in Japanese religion homosexuality has never been regarded as something shameful, on the contrary, during the centuries the love between two samurais was believed to be the purest one. Reflecting cultural views Anime can also contain certain homosex hints even not being of the Yaoi genre.
A great deal of other examples can be provided but I guess that'll be enough. It's clear that all aspects of Japanese life are shown and even explained in Anime.
There are different ways of getting knowledge about this or that country. There are different means to understand this or that culture. There are different people who prefer this or that way or means. And I do believe that Anime can be deservedly named one of them.
What activity will Ryazan parents choose for their weekend? Should they just leave their children with grandparents? Are there any amusement park which can attract both children and adults?
So, what is a usual weekend for an ordinary family? Do you see mothers with the children in parks or yards? I do! And what about fathers? Where are they? When an ordinary wife suggests going to the puppet show, or to the circus, or to the exhibition for children, an ordinary husband says that it isn’t interesting at all and it will be better for children to stay at home and watching TV, or playing computer, because it is too sunny, rainy, cloudy, frosty, windy outside. In fact it happens just because there no places in Ryazan, which can attract everybody.
Going to the cinema takes only 2 hours, bowling – 3 hours, going to the Kremlin for feeding ducks – 2 hours, and what is the next thing? "We have Prioland”, "Parents can go to Solotcha with their children!”, "They can go swimming”, - you’ll say. OK, but what should poor parents do if it is winter? if they have no car? if it is rainy weather? Our city really needs some places independent of weather conditions, season or something else.
I think that the first try in this sphere is OZON club, especially "Akapulko” – so-called aquapark. This place can really comply with the wishes of all members of family: saunas, rides, Jacuzzis, pools, bars, a restaurant. The very idea to make a place of entertainment for all the family was great, many of my friends who have children waited for the opening, but … The opening changed their opinion, I don’t know why, but the owner of this "establishment” go as far as inviting girls with alternative behavior from "Casanova club”, and he or she continued doing it. The question is: "will sensible parents want their children to swim with such girls in the same water?” I agree that there are people who don’t worry about such trifles, and who will attend this "aquapark” from time to time. Well, I wish "Akapulko” to continue attracting that sort of people and to be successful in it!
"What do you say about carting in Ryazan?” – you’ll ask me. So, there are also some disadvantages. The first one: do you know the price? 350-400 roubles ≈ 10 euro for only ten minutes. I think it is too much. The second one: you have a daughter and it isn’t interesting for her. The karting also has driving school, but it is also too expensive.
Rollerdrome. I think that you remember this kind of entertainment situated in "Samohval” store. I like this idea, but the realization was non-professional. There was no advertisement, at the beginning of its work the administration didn’t allow to use own rollers, but didn’t provide visitors with rich range of sizes, the decoration was too poor – no drawn hares and cats on the walls, no obstacles in the form of mushroom for example, no music for children. I think that the owner of this place didn’t know for what audience it is created. Children and their parents weren’t frequenters, because the music was too loud, and everything is dark-coloured. Young people want rides, bigger area and no children at all. Finally "Rollerdrome” was closed.
Skating-rink. It isn’t expensive at all (100 roubles for 45 minutes), healthy, exciting, funny, you can get it with public transport and so on and so forth. But you can not skate there in every day you wish, because sometimes there are trainings of sportsmen or shows on the ice-arena, but you can find the schedule of such events on the official site www.ledoviy.com.
I think that the problem "Places for family entertainment” is really urgent. Birth rate (and the amount of divorces:)) is growing nowadays, but the amount of places for family entertainment isn’t. Why? What will be a result? Parents usually work 5 days a week. The only opportunity to be together is weekend. But they have no place which will satisfy the needs of all the members of the family. So everyone chooses his\her own activity, gradually drifted apart. Then children blame the parents for misunderstanding, and it is normal, parents sometimes don’t know their children enough, because they don’t spent time together at all. All the information adults take from school record book or from school teachers.
Problems in the marital relations also occur. "You don’t communicate with son!”, "You have no time for your wife!”, "You don’t think about your family!” These are usual reproaches to husbands. But there is really no interest for man to visit exhibition in his weekend. The sphere of amusement is very high-profitable, but it requires solid investment. So do you think that our city needs such places? Will it be profitable to built mini-Disneyland, but in enclosed space? or may be an aquapark? Will you and your friends visit this place?
During the last 20 years the sphere of cinematography came to the stage of high budget film producing. Money is spent on constructing decorations, paying off the contracts of world stars or for magnificent computer effects. But is it all for the sake of art? As a rule, cinema pieces produced for provoking thoughts and brain work has nothing to do with high budgeting. So, what is the border between budget and idea? How much money can be spent on a good picture? The question of time is also very important. Until 1990s the audience paid much attention to so called artistically proper films. But now we may ask anyone under 30 about which films made the greatest impression on him, and he would necessarily name the eternal list: the Matrix, the Lord of the Rings, Titanic, Avatar, Spider-man, X-men and so on and so forth. One wouldn’t argue about the quality of the pictures. It is of no doubt that a picture having a budget higher that $100 mln is a standard of high artistic manner and cinema art. Everything is perfect, everyone is in awe. It seems that these films are out of deep sense, but we shouldn’t forget about their main aim – to relax the viewer’s mind and to evoke emotions in him. We don’t notice that, but the main reason why we buy tickets for million dollars projects is to deep into the world of fantasy and to make the adrenaline appear in our blood. But there is another side about this topic. Let’s recollect what heritage we’ve received through the last 500 years. Masterpieces of Leonardo, Rafael, Picasso, literature pieces by Tolstoy, Pushkin and Shakespeare, magnificent music by Beethoven, Mozart and Paganini. All these things have two functions – they entertain and make us think at the same time. It’s a pleasant symbiosis of major art aims. But what would people recollect in 500 years from now? The art of our era is cinematography. It seems that having Avatar as a world culture legacy casts gloom thoughts over us. Many pessimists believe that today’s art makes the population of the Earth more stupid. Of course, there are thousands who would prefer watching Tarkovsky and Kim Ki-duk, but there are millions who would prefer watching Stone, Cameron, Zemeckis and others. The only conclusion that we can make to explain the situation is that in the 19th century there also were thousands who were reading Tolstoy’s books. Others were illiterate. Nowadays this balance is the same. So, let the entertainment cinematography live to keep the intellectual units in the society. Nothing bad will happen, this is the order that our world and its culture should follow. There is no place for pessimism. There is no place for panic.
We all know that nowadays travelling becomes a big part of our life. Every year millions of people all over the world spend their holidays travelling. There are many ways of travelling and as I think the most exotic, unusual, dangerous but really exiting kind of it is hitchhiking. Hitchhiking is a unique way of transportation that is received by asking people, usually strangers, for a ride in their automobile or other road vehicle. Especially it is really interesting for young, energetic and fearless people. And of course there are two viewpoints on this kind of travelling. Some people think that it is a great chance to test yourself. You can go and do whatever you decide. You have an enormous amount of freedom. You can see everything from the inside. It is a real chance to meet and talk to real people from across the world. It is a great possibility to look with new eyes at familiar things. Hitchhiking also has another significant plus it is a price especially for students. It is really economic. Some people are sure that this kind of travelling is much more sociable, it brings people, travelers together. They think that it is a huge test of ,for example, the friendship and you do need to be able to trust each other and rely on each other and it is really necessary and important not only during travelling but also in our daily life. It is not a secret that there are also many people who are completely against this way of travelling. Yes of course it is a very unique method to have a good time, make new acquaintances and see the world but it is also very and very dangerous. Yes it is convenient but unpredictable. How many hitchhikers go missing every day? How many drivers carrying hitchers go missing every day? To be honest nobody knows. Well it all depends on who picks you up. It's like playing Russian roulette. You should be really lucky person. And it is dangerous especially for girls to get into a car of a stranger and especially at night it's not safe. And it is easy to say that no hitch-hiking, no problem, but it isn’t true because we can say the same about many things. First of all you should be careful and observe some useful rules. Such as: Try to feel the driver’s personality, it’s fine not to get into a car with someone you don’t like the look of. Don't hitchhike if you are not in a good mood. Keep your money and your bag and passport on you. It is not a good idea to hitchhike alone. Travelling with a hitchhiking partner is therefore the safest solution. So, if you are a single hitchhiker, the ideal would be to find a single driver. And finally to make conclusions I want to say that it is your desire to choose hitchhiking or not, I only show you advantages and disadvantages of this unusual kind of travelling. Have you ever dream about this non-traditional kind of travelling? Do you know anybody who likes hitchhiking?
A very nice video about Hitchhiking from Iowa City to Santa Fe and back. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82uTD1FIXs4
Can we somehow stop the growth of number of homeless people in our country? Why are there so many tramps in Russia? If we start analyzing the whole situation concerning thins problem in the world then we can see some regularity. Let us take, for example, Europe. Do we see many homeless people in Great Britain, France, Germany? Statistic says "no”. But there are the same people in these countries as in our. Though their government try to cope with this problem. And I must say they do it quite successfully. The authorities give money for building shelters, they pay benefits So why is it so different in our country? First of all, I’d like to say that there are several types of homeless people. Why do people start leading such kind of life? There are several reasons for it. Of course if a child is born in such a "problem” family, then he becomes a homeless person "automatically”. But why do people become homeless when they are already adults, when they are mature people? Is it really so difficult to find your own path in life and follow it? We see that in Russia most of the tramps are alcoholics who don’t want to change anything in their life just because everything "suits” them. But if they don’t want to improve their own life somehow, then why do we let them spoil our own one? They just sit, walk, and lie at every railway- and bus-station. Sometimes it can be dangerous to walk in the evening because you can find a drunkard on a bench near your house. And thanks God if he just lies and sleeps because otherwise it can be a real "adventure” to enter the house. There is also one thing that irritates me a lot. And I think everybody faced it at least at once. There are some places in every city where homeless people gather more often. These are squares, parks and other places for entertainment. They stay here hoping for getting some money from tourists and local people. They usually say they are ill or their relatives need some medical treatment or, for example, that they need money to buy a ticket to get back home. And this is our mentality to trust them, to feel pity for them. Though it’s clear that in a few seconds after they have got the money and collected a necessary sum they turn round the corner and buy a bottle of vodka. But actually this is only their problem. Everybody can choose how to live and what to do. I’m quite ashamed only about the fact that our government can do nothing to "clean” the benches near, for example, Red Square from these drunkards. And we observe this situation in our capital! So it’s easy to imagine that throughout the country it becomes even worse. Whilst walking in such places I just always ask myself one question, "Why do we behave in such a way? Why do we not want to become a civilized country and "take” these people away, somewhere? Why do we not want to clean everything and be proud, at last, that we live in Russia?” I just sometimes try to guess what foreigners think about us when they visit our country and walk down the street. Of course there are many other reasons why people start living on the street. And I’m sure we shouldn’t treat them badly. We just must help them to find a way out from this awful situation. And by the way, quite often we can see an old granny who begs money to buy a piece of bread. Usually we say, "I’m not going to give a single ruble to these beggars because if they really needed money they would find any job and get their deserved salaries!” To tell the truth, I myself have the same opinion. But what should old people do? They are too old and ill to work, and the government only plays a mean trick on them. I think it’s impossible to describe the whole situation that reigns in Russia now. Every year we just say (actually for nothing) that we must solve and eliminate this problem, our government must think how to help homeless people. And unfortunately we don’t see any improvements. But maybe everything depends on the choice and wish of these tramps? Maybe we’ll never be able to make our society ideal? Or maybe we just don’t need it?
Follow the link to learn more information about Moscow beggars:
Everybody has at least once done some monotonous work. What emotions did it cause? Was it of use? Monotonous work is either some boring work you have to do for a long time or some work you just have to do again and again until you get used to it. As long as we’re going to become teachers of foreign languages and work in the educational sphere I’m going to speak about stereotyped lessons. There are some teachers that consider them to be the best activity for their students. Writing essays, dictations, translations, doing exercises relying on one and the same model and stuff like that. Such exercises help to develop stable linguistic skills of different kinds. They make students concentrate. But other teachers claim that without any novelties the educational process becomes dull and boring. Students can’t concentrate at all because they can’t get involved. They are just angry. Their anger disturbs them and the productivity decreases.
As for me, I’m the supporter of the second point of view though I admit that the first one has its right to exist. I believe that monotonous work doesn’t make our brains be fully active, it just causes automatic memorization. On the one hand, it’s good. The aim is finally achieved. But on the other hand, the more we like the activity we have to do the better results we’ll get. And one more thing: psychologists state that our knowledge is stable only when we are fully involved in the process of memorization. Here we come to some certain disagreement between the scientists of different fields: methodologists and psychologists. The first are sire that automatic memorization needn’t be truly involving while the second ones claim that without any involvement there can be no stable knowledge. I tend to agree with methodologists. And what do you think?
Now let’s come from theory to practice. I’m going to tell you a short story first. I study in the University and have German among the subjects I have to study. Our teacher of German is considered to be the best one in the department. her methods of teaching consist in writing dictations-translations and afterwards, when the theme is completely understood and the words are remembered, we come to real communication. So, at first she uses monotonous and boring tasks and then involves us. May it be so? Why not?! We automatically memorize new vocabulary items and grammar patterns and then we enjoy the lesson. It’s a certain compromise though monotonous work preoccupies quite a long time. As for me, I adore this teacher and can say it for sure that I’m completely satisfied with my achievements. And what is your attitude to this situation? Would you like to have such a teacher? So, different viewpoints have their right to exist. I’ve expressed mine and want you to tell me your thoughts. Are novelties in the educational process unavoidable? Are your teachers conservative or creative? Is it difficult for you to do monotonous work? I suppose it may turn out to be an interesting discussion. P. S. These links may be of use to you To make your speech reacher Boring work Why are some lessons boring?!
