British Cuisine

Some people criticize English food. They say it's unimaginable, boring, tasteless, it's chips with everything and totally overcooked vegetables. The basic ingredients, when fresh, are so full of flavour that British haven't had to invent sauces to disguise their natural taste. What can compare with fresh pees or new potatoes just boiled and served with butter? Why drown spring lamb in wine or cream an6d spices, when with just one or two herbs it is absolutely delicious? If you ask foreigners to name some typically English dishes, they will probably say "fish and chips" then stop. It is disappointing, but true that, there is no tradition in England of eating in restaurants, because the food doesn't lend itself to such preparation. English cooking is found at home. So it is difficult to a good English restaurant with a reasonable prices.

In most cities in Britain you'll find Indian, Chinese, French and Italian restaurants. In London you'll also find Indonesian, Mexican, Greek... Cynics will say that this is because English have no "cuisine" themselves, but this is not quite the true.

Customs and traditions of English speaking countries

Every country and every nation has it's own traditions and customs. It's very important to know traditions and customs of different people. It will help you to know more about the history and life of different nations and countries. One cannot speak about England without speaking about it's traditions and customs.They are very important in the life of English people. Englishmen are proud of their traditions and carefully keep them up. There are six public holidays a year in G.B.. Cristmas day is one of their favorite holidays. It's celebrated on the 25th of December. There are some traditions connected with it. One of them is to give presents to each other. It is not only children and members of family. It's a tradition to give Christmas presents to the people you work with. Another tradition is to send Christmas cards. All these cards are brightly and coloured. Most of big cities of G.B., especially London, are decorated with coloured lights and Christmas trees. On Trafalgar Square, in the center of London stands a big Christmas tree. It is a gift from the people of Oslo. It is over 50 feet high. Many families celebrate Christmas day in the open air near the Christmas tree in order to catch the spirit of Christmas. Children find Christmas presents in their stockings. The traditional english dinner on Christmas is turkey and pudding. Other great holidays are: Father's day, Mother's day, Halloween and other.

Leisure time

Everybody sometimes has a free time. Somebody prefers only to sleep in their leisure time, but most of us prefer to do a great number of interesting things. It may be reading, various types of sport games, watching TV, listening to music and so on. If we have a few day or a week we prefer to go to the attractive places. Many people think that pupils and studients have too much liesure time, but in my opinion, they are wrong. We are very busy. Many pupils have six or seven lessons a day and go to school five or six days a week. Even during weekend we learn our lessons. And we just have no time to go somewhere. Oldest of us are working after school or institute. As for me, a large part of my free time is devoted to reading. I like to read books about another countries, another times and another worlds. Also I read books about history of our country. Besides reading I like to do physical exercises. Me and my school friends often gather after school and play basketball, football or other active games. But my favorite hobby is travelling. Usually I travel in summer and often it is a trip to the south, to the warm sea. I think all people must have other occupations besides their basic work, because it extends the bounduries of the familar world and teaches us something new about people and things.

Fashion

Fashion is something we deal with every day. Even people, who say they don’t care what they wear, choose clothes every morning that say a lot about them and how they feel that day. What influences our choice of clothes is an interesting question. I believe that most of the people do not follow the fashion displayed on the catwalk. That kind of clothes is a product of famous high-class designers’ work, it is often very extravagant and extremely expensive. It is also not designed to be worn every day, but it is suitable for some special occasions.

However, we definitely borrow some ideas about fashion from music clips, videos, books and television. Movies also have a big impact on what people wear. For example it is known that more sunglasses were sold in America after the movie "Men In Black." Sometimes a trend becomes world-wide. Back in the 50's teenagers everywhere dressed like Elvis Presley. Musicians and other cultural icons as well as political and royal figures have always influenced what we are wearing. Newspapers and magazines reported on what Hillary Clinton was wearing when she was the 1st lady. The death of Princess Diana was a severe blow to the high fashion world, where her clothes were daily news.

Depending on their attitude towards clothes and fashion, people can be divided in three groups: fashion slaves, spending all their money on the latest clothes even if they don’t look good in them; fashion fans, who enjoy wearing modern clothes but not obsessed by them and people who just don’t care how they look. Personally I place myself between fashion fans and people who don’t care how they look. Although I enjoy shopping very much and like to try things on, especially when I look good in them, I don’t spend much time choosing and buying clothes. And of course I do it only when I really need something new to wear, and not in order to kill time.

My style and the range of clothes that I have are defined by the activities I engage in. Work occupies most of my time and therefore most of the clothes that I have corresponds with the dress code, registered in the policy of our company. According to the dress code, an employee is not allowed to wear certain items of clothing to work. For example, men are supposed to wear ties and business suits, and nobody is allowed to wear jeans, except on Fridays. Women’s clothes are not supposed to be skin-tight, too short and too open. All of the shirts are supposed to have collars. Clothes also can’t be too bright, the colors should correspond to the corporate colors – dark blue and white.

Shopping

People usually go to the shop two or three times a week to buy food. Less frequently people go shopping to buy clothes, usually it is women and teenagers.

And everywhere you go, you’ll find adverts. There are many varieties of adverts: on TV, on radio, in magazines, on streets and so on.

You can see your favorite sportsman or actor advertising cars, drinks, sports shops. Superstars make big money from advertising. For example, some football and basketball players make millions of dollars from advertising sport clothes or drinks.

What are the functions of advertisements? The first function is to inform. A big part of the information people have about houses, cars, building materials, electronic equipment, cosmetics, drinks and food comes from the advertisements they read. Advertisements introduce them to new products or remind them of the existing ones.

The second function is to sell. The products are shown from the best point of view and the potential buyer, on having entered the store, unconsciously chooses the advertised products. One buys this washing powder or this chewing gum because the colorful TV commercials convince him of the best qualities of the product. Even cigarettes or alcohol are associated with the good values of human life such as joy, freedom, love and happiness, and just those associations make a person choose the advertised products.

All those small ads in the press such as “employment”, “education” and “for sale and wanted” columns, help ordinary people to find a better job or a better employee, to sell or to buy their second-hand things and to find services, or to learn about educational facilities, social events such as concerts, theatre plays, football matches, and to announce births, marriages and deaths.

British Homes

There are 22 million homes in Britain - big homes and small homes, old cottages and new buildings, houses and flats. (Americans say "apartment" but British people say "flat"). Many British people love old houses and these are often more expensive than modern ones. They also love gardening and you will see gardens everywhere you go: in towns, villages and out in the country. Some are very small with just one tree and a few flowers. Others are enormous with plenty of flowers and enough vegetables and fruit trees. Two third of the families in Britain own their houses. Millions of these houses are the same with two or three bedrooms and a bathroom upstairs, dining-room and kitchen downstairs. To pay for their house, home owners borrow money from a "building society" and pay back a little every month. There are a great many different kinds of homes in Britain, but there are not enough! It is often very difficult for young people to find a home when they want to start a family. British homes are usually smaller than American homes. But like in America, in Britain the older generation of the family and their married children do not usually live together.

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