Speak about the competitive nature of sport

Sport is an essential part of our lives. Today everybody is interested in some sports even if this interest is only lying on the sofa and watching football or hockey matches on TV. Sport is an exciting and creative sphere of hard work and competitions, sphere where men and women try to suppress themselves. Not without reasons people say that sport is a world of its own and it doesn’t mean the same to everybody.

Sport has a competitive nature. Everything is based on rivalry between teams or individuals. So it’s surprising to hear people saying that sport makes good will between the nations and if only the common people of the world could meet one another at football or cricket, they would have no inclination to meet on the battlefield.

Nearly all sports nowadays are competitive. You play to win and the game has little meaning unless you do your utmost to win. On the village green lawn you pick up sides and no local feeling of patriotism involved, it’s possible to play simply for the fun and exercise. But as soon as sense of prestige arises and you feel that you and some other larger unit will be disgraced if you lose the most savage combative instincts are aroused.

12. What Do You Know about Pubs as a Typically English Institution? (Tape-recording “Down the Pub”)

Britain is famous for its pubs and the British are traditionally regarded as the nation of beer-drinkers. However the image of Britain as a beer-drinking country is out of date. Now Britain drinks wine.

I think a lot of the interest in wine is in parallel with the interest in cooking because nowadays the British are far more interested in what they eat and drink than they were 30-40 years ago.

The pub is a wonderful institution as you can eat and drink totally casually there. There is still a certain amount of masculinity about a pub. Wine bars, for example, are more for eating, more for younger people. Women go to wine bars far more freely than they go to the pubs.

There is a new trend towards becoming continental and more sophisticated. Many of the old-fashioned pubs are being redecorated. They are getting a new look. It has been going on for 20-30 years because the brewers try to make the pubs more fashionable.

But the British public, apart from some youngsters, stubbornly stick to the old-fashioned kind of the pub. And it’s noticeable in London that the chain of pubs which is extremely simple and has bare floorboards is the most successful chain of all. And you can hardly get through the door in the evenings.

13. Talk about the problem of keeping discipline at school. (Tape-recording “Problem Children”)

One of the difficulties of the work at secondary school is very often a disciplinary problem. A small minority of teenage pupils deliberately disrupt lessons to such extend that the teachers can no longer teach their classes effectively.

The fact is that the small children who are continually encouraged by their parents to express their individuality without any restrictions are naturally reluctant to accept school discipline when they grow older.

But it’s not fair to blame parents for that. Some within the teacher’s unions consider that the political nature of modern society is also responsible for that. Further more, modern teaching techniques which appear to stress personal enjoyment, might be teaching the child to put his own selfish interests before his duties to the community in which he lives.

Perhaps the problem might be solved by improving facilities for the sociological guidance of these problem children or by the better cooperation between the schools and the parents.

Some of the teachers in the western countries even believe that there ought to be a return to more old-fashioned methods. And this might produce the desirable result. As for me I don’t share this point of view because cruel measures will only make a person aggressive.

15. Give an account of current views on smoking in Britain and the USA. (Tape-recording “To Smoke or not to Smoke”)

Advertising is becoming more and more popular nowadays. It brings profits, creates competition and give you pauses when you are watching TV. But what do people advertise? Let’s turn to the statistic and see that the most advertised things are cigarettes and alcohol drinks. Smoking is rather trendy in our country. There is hardly a party without drugs or at least alcohol drinks. The consequences are awful: more and more people nowadays are getting addicted to alcohol, smoking and drugs.

I’d like to mention some facts about smoking:

- The smell of smoke on your breath and clothes puts people off.

- Someone who smokes 15 cigarettes a day can forget six to nine years of life.

- Smokers are burning a great deal of money.

- Your skin wrinkles faster.

Nowadays people all over the world understand that smoking is not just a bad habit; it appears to be a kind of social malady. Millions smokers are trying to fight, but in the USA it has become a battle. Smoking is now banned in many places so that other people don’t have to breathe in smokers’ choking tobacco smoke. When the campaign first started on the airlines they had only a couple of rows of non-smokers, which is may be 10% of the airplane. Now it’s like 75%.

The general trend is that the non-smokers are very vehement. They tend to scream, yell, jump up and down, pound their chests, beat on the floor and fight for their rights to live. Smoking in the USA seems to be a fighting issue.

In conclusion I’d like to admit that smoking appears to be a social malady. It means that if we want to overcome it, some social restrictions should be made. Human beings face many problems living in the most technologically advanced era in history. And if we are the masters of our fate we can still fashion a satisfying life in this fast-moving century.

Date: 2015-12-11; view: 1816