About Myself

 

 

About Myself

From the very start I should say that it is not an easy thing to speak about myself as it is hard to have a look at yourself from aside, but at the same time who knows you better than you yourself do?

I am a girl of sixteen. When I look at myself in the mirror I see a blond girl with short straight hair, dark eyes and slander figure. As to my appearance I'm rather tall and slim. I have never thought I'm a beauty I whish I were more beautiful. I think that I'm even tempered, rather reserved, calm and modest. But sometimes I can lose my tempo and become either angry or sad. I like staying alone and sometimes I retire into my shell. But at the same time I like my friends, I like to laugh and joke. I have got a sense of humour. It means I understand humour and appreciate it.

There are many things in our life I like and some I dislike. I like when everything is OK. Being happy is one way of being wise. I like to study because knowledge is useful sometimes. I'm fond of reading as it gives not only knowledge, but wonderful moments of joy and pleasure. I am neither short nor tall, so I like to wear highheeled shoes, trousers or jeans.

I was born on the 25th of April 1985 in the town of Molodechno where I live now together with my parents and my younger sister (older brother). My early years which I remember badly, were typical of a child living in a town. I was born in a family of a teacher and a doctor. I was sent to a kindergarten at the age of three as both the parents were working. As all the children of Belarus I went to school at the age of six. Here I should say that it was my lucky chance to study for 11 years at the school of fine arts in the town of Molodechno . it turned out to be the best school in our town. There I got a proper training in such subjects as English, Russian and Belarusian literature and world culture. I usually did a lot of home preparation for them and I liked everything I was doing in them. I really tried hard in them. But despite my efforts I was not good at Math.

School for me was not only lessons and learning I had a lot of friends there. We organized extra class activities such as parties and other social activities. I actively participated in most of them.

I am sociable, so I have got a lot of friends among my schoolmates. As for me I appreciate people's hornesty, kindness, sense of justice and intelligence. I don't like when people are rude and aggressive.

I am stubborn at times. But to my mind being persistent is not always a bad thing. It means my aim, I never leave things half done. At times I feel dissatisfied with myself, especially when I fail to do something or can't do things the way they should be done. At the same time I think I am hard-working and diligent. My greatest problem at school was talking in front of the class. I always blushed and went red.

Very soon I'll pass my final exams at school and after a farewell party at the end of the June I'll say good-bye to my teachers who are very well-educated people with broad outlook and deep knowledge of the subjects. They encouraged me in my disire of choosing my future career. School meant a lot to me and it wasn't just learning and studying. I had made good friends there and met many interesting people. I faced a new life without school with a mixed feeling of sadness and joy.

I had asked myself a lot of times what I wanted to be when I left school. A few years ago it was difficult to give a definite answer. As the years passed I changed my mind several times. But it was only in my last year at school that I finally made up my mind what profession I would most like to have in future. I realized that my strongest desire was to continue specializing in humanities and learn foreign languages in particular. I hope my dream will come true. If I fail in my exams I'll try to enter the University again.

And now a few words about my inclinations. I haven't got any special hobby, like collecting something but I'm fond of reading books. They give me more knowledge of their people's lives and feelings and broaden my outlook. In my opinion, books are a source of emotional inspiration and romantic feeling . besides, books help me to continue my own education. The time spend on a good book is never wasted. Reading is a rewarding pasting.

And of course I like music! I'm fond of music of the 60-s, like the Beatles, the Rolling Stones and Elvis Prestly. The songs of the Beatles give me much delight and pleasure. Besides, I am a great theatre-goer. Whenever I have some time to spare, I go to the theatre. I'm not keen on television.

Sometimes I play different sport games for health and pleasure. I usually play such games as volley-ball, basketball, tennis, and sometimes football.

And the last thing I would like to tell you about things I hope to achieve in my life are: to have a very successful career, so this year after finishing school I try to enter the University, to build the home of my dreams and to find someone in my life to share all that with.

Big Ben

Big Ben is one of London's best-known landmarks, and looks most spectacular at night when the clock faces are illuminated. You even know when parliament is in session, because a light shines above the clock face.

The four dials of the clock are 23 feet square, the minute hand is 14 feet long and the figures are 2 feet high. Minutely regulated with a stack of coins placed on the huge pendulum, Big Ben is an excellent timekeeper, which has rarely stopped.

The name Big Ben actually refers not to the clock-tower itself, but to the thirteen ton bell hung within. The bell was named after the first commissioner of works, Sir Benjamin Hall.

This bell came originally from the old Palace of Westminster, it was given to the Dean of St. Paul's by William III. Before returning to Westminster to hang in its present home, it was refashioned in Whitechapel in 1858. The BBC first broadcast the chimes on the 31st December 1923 - there is a microphone in the turret connected to Broadcasting House.

During the second world war in 1941, an incendiary bomb destroyed the Commons chamber of the Houses of Parliament, but the clock tower remained intact and Big Ben continued to keep time and strike away the hours, its unique sound was broadcast to the nation and around the world, a welcome reassurance of hope to all who heard it.

There are even cells within the clock tower where Members of Parliament can be imprisoned for a breach of parliamentary privilege, though this is rare; the last recorded case was in 1880.

The tower is not open to the general public, but those with a "special interest" may arrange a visit to the top of the Clock Tower through their local.

Cinema

In England the cinema is usually called “the pictures”. In America the word “the movies”  is often used. Cinema-going is a favourite pastime in Britain. People go to the cinema once or twice a week. Cinema-going is more popular in industrial towns in the North of England and Scotland than in the South. However, especially if it is cold and wet outside, many people like to stay at home to watch TV.

Cinemas in England are usually large and more comfortable than the theatres. Often there is a restaurant, so that it is possible to spend an afternoon and evening there (if you have enough money, of course). Behind the cine-ma screen there is a stage, so that the building can be used for concerts and other performances.

British cinema-goers see mainly English and American films, though many of the foreign films are often shown in London and in the South of the country. 
In our country cinema-going is not so popular now as it was earlier. People prefer to stay at home and to watch TV or video.

I like to watch films very much. I prefer thrillers, comedies and horror movies, but I do not like tragedies and melodramas very much, and I hate soap operas, although they are becoming very popular in our country. My favourite film is ... with ... starring. It is really wonderful from the beginning to the end. There are a lot of films which are worth seeing, but this one is the best one to my mind.

Computer

When Charles Babbage, a professor of Mathematics at Cambridge University, invented the first calculating machine in 1812, he couldn’t imagine the situation we find ourselves in today. Nearly everything we do in the world is helped, or even controlled by computers, the complicated descendants of his simple machine. Computers are used more and more often in the world today, for the simple reason that they are far more efficient than human beings. They have much better memories and they can store much information. No man alive can do 500000 sums in one second, but a computer can. In fact, computers can do many of the things we do, but faster and better. They can predict weather, and ever play chess, write poetry or compose music.

The use of computers 
Just as television has extended human sight across the barriers of time and distance, so the computers extend the power of the human mind across the existing barriers.

Computers in medicine 
Computers are one of great importance in modern hospital. The chief use of computers is the storing and sorting the medical knowledge, which has been enquired in the last 50 years. No doctor can possible keep up with all discoveries. The only solution of the problem is store medical knowledge in a computer. Today there are medical computer centers were all existing knowledge of symptoms of various diseases and of their treatment is stored. Doctors feed data on symptoms in the computer and get the necessary information on correct diagnostics and treatment.

Computers that can be learn 
Ordinary computer can remember only the data stored in the hard disk. Now scientists have designed machines that are capable of learning from experience and remembering what they have learned. Such a machine is capable of recognizing objects without human help or control. Of course, they made many mistakes.

There is another similar machine, which can look at letter alphabet simple words, and they “say” thought a loudes speaker what it has seen. The machine has as certain learning power.

Computers at the school 
Information science with the ideas and message of processing and storing information is of great importance today. That’s why computer technology must be told in secondary school. The new subject “basic information science” and “computing machine” was introduced for the siner forms at schools. The pupils teach computers to anlestigate school problems. Contact with the machine increases the interest in learning, makes them more serious about studying new subject. School computers are used for not only studying information science, but also examinations purposes. Young people who finish the school must be trained to operate computers.

English Language

We live in the modern world and you can’t imagine an educated person who doesn’t know any foreign language. It is especially important nowadays. Some people learn languages because they need them in their work, others travel abroad.

English is a widely spoken language all over the world. You can hear it everywhere: in a street, in shops and restaurants, in offices. You don’t need to know Japanese when you go to Japan, or French when you visit Paris. English will help you to understand each other.

A modern engineer or even a worker deals with instruments and machines from other countries and must be able to read the instructions, which are usually written in English. Computer programs and games, most of Internet pages are also written in English. Science magazines are mostly published in English and scientific and business conferences are held in English as well. Diplomats and militaries use English to solve their problems.

Besides, the knowledge of English helps to know more about the countries, read many books in the original and to make new friends.

That’s why all pupils should master their English to become good specialist in any branch.

Fast Food

Have you ever enjoyed a hamburger, sitting on a lawn? May be you're against all these hot dogs and cheeseburgers, because it's a junk food. Anyway, it is always interesting to find out something about the origin and history of such trifles, which make our life more comfortable. They really make life more pleasant, especially outdoors, don't they?

Pop-Corn

It’s impossible to imagine American take-away food or snacks without popcorn. Clear as a day, it is made from corn. But what about the first part of the word “pop”. Actually, when you put a kernel of corn on a fire, the water inside makes the corn explode. This makes a “pop” noise. That is why we call it popcorn. It’s an interesting thing to know that not all corn pops. A seed of corn must contain 14% water in it. Other kinds of corn have less waters and do not pop. The American Indians, who popped corn a long time ago, knew that special sort. They introduced corn to the first settlers. In 1620 when Pilgrims had a Thanksgiving dinner they invited the Indians, who brought popcorn with them. Since that time Americans continued to pop corn at home. But in 1945 a new machine was invented that changed the history of the product. The electric machine enabled to pop corn outside the home. And soon movies started selling popcorn to make more money. The famous American habit of eating popcorn at the movies is well-known. Many people like to put salt or melted butter in their popcorn, some preper to have it without. Either way Americans love their popcorn.

The Hot Dog

The original name of the hot dog was the frankfurter, after the German city of Frankfurt. In the United States frankfurters, sausages on buns, were first sold in the 1860s. But for Americans the name “dachshund sausage” seemed to be a good one for the frankfurter. In actual fact, a dachshund is a dog from Germany with a very long body and short legs. Dachshund sausages first became popular in New-York especially at baseball games, where they were sold by men keeping them warm in hot water tanks. The men walked up and down the rows of people and yelled “Get your hot dachshund sausages here!” And in 1906 the newspaper cartoonist Tad Dorgan saw the men with the dachshund sausages and got an idea for a cartoon: he drew a bun with a dachshund inside – not a sausage but a dog. The cartoonist didn’t know how to spell the word “dachshund” and under the picture he just wrote: “Get your hot dogs!” The cartoon was a sensation as well as the name. If you go to a baseball game today, you can still see sellers walking around with hot water tanks and yelling, “Get your hot dogs here! Get your hot dogs here!”

The Hamburger

An obligatory item on the list of fast food, the hamburger has no connection to ham, but with the German town of Hamburg, which was famous for its ground steak. German immigrants to the United States introduced the “hamburger steak”. At the St. Louis World’s Fair in 1904, hamburger steaks were served on buns for the first time. It was convenient and tasty and became a usual way of eating hamburgers.

But how did the hamburgers become the most popular, most typical American food? The introduction of the bun is the important part of the answer. Another important part, due to which hamburgers have become well-known and favourite all around the world is McDonald’s, the fast food restaurant. The first restaurant was opened in San Bernadino, California, in 1949 and hamburgers were the main item on its menu, as well as the hamburger remains the main item in all McDonald’s restaurants today.

Coca-Cola

Coca-Cola The world famous fresh drink Coca-Cola first was an all-purpose medicine, made in 1886 by a druggist from Atlanta, who made a brown syrup by mixing coca leaves and cola nuts. The syrup wasn’t a success and then another druggist, Jacobs, had an idea of selling Coca-Cola as a soda fountain drink. He mixed the syrup with soda water. Soon everyone was going to soda fountains and asking for Coca-Cola. An immigrant from Ireland, Asa Candler bought the recipe of the drink and having registered the company, became its father in 1892. In 1899 the first bottling factory was opened. The shaped bottle, as we know it today was invented in 1916 to protect the trademark. And again the World War II helped to make Coca-Cola popular outside America, when the Coca-Cola Company sent bottles of the drink to US soldiers fighting in Europe. It became so popular with the soldiers that the US Army asked the company to start ten factories in Europe. It’s a curious thing but of 1903 coca leaves were no longer used in the drink. The exact ingredients and the quantities are not known – the Coca-Cola Company keeps its recipe a secret.

Narcotic

Narcotic - any of a number of substances that have a depressant effect on the nervous system. The chief narcotic drugs are opium, its constituents morphine and codeine, and the morphine derivative heroin.

Actions and Uses

In small doses narcotics have valuable medical uses, numbing the senses, relieving severe pain, and inducing sleep. They are also given preoperatively to relieve pain and anxiety. Common side effects include constipation, nausea, and allergic reactions. In large doses narcotics can be highly dangerous, causing stupor, coma, convulsions, or death. All narcotics are addictive; several morphine derivatives as well as chemically dissimilar narcotics that have been developed for medical use have fewer side effects and are less addictive than morphine, but they are also generally less potent. Unlike general anesthetics such as ether and chloroform , narcotics depress the respiratory center and in low doses relieve pain without inducing sleep. Respiratory depression occurs in newborns whose mothers have been given narcotics such as meperidine (Demerol) during labor. Narcotics differ from barbiturates and other sedatives in that they have no anticonvulsant action; also, narcotics relieve pain, while sedatives do not.

Attempts at Control

There are strict controls on narcotic prescription and administration in the United States. Nevertheless, addiction to narcotics, especially heroin, which has no legal use, continues to be a serious problem. There have been nationally and internationally based attempts to control the production of narcotics and to limit their export and import to medical use only. Large quantities are nonetheless grown in the "Golden Triangle" region of Myanmar and Thailand (cultivation in Laos was largely eradicated in 2005) and in SW Asia (e.g., Afghanistan, Iran, and Pakistan), Lebanon, Mexico, and Guatemala, and a large illicit traffic in these substances continues.

Valentine's day

St. Valentine's Day falls on February 14, and is the traditional day on which lovers in certain cultures let each other know about their love, commonly by sending Valentine's cards, which are often anonymous. The history of Valentine's day can be traced back to an obscure Catholic Church feast day, said to be in honor of Saint Valentine. The day's associations with romantic love arrived after the High Middle Ages, during which the concept of romantic love was formulated.

The day is now most closely associated with the mutual exchange of love notes in the form of "valentines." Modern Valentine symbols include the heart-shaped outline and the figure of the winged Cupid. Since the 19th century, the practice of hand writing notes has largely given way to the exchange of mass-produced greeting cards. The Greeting Card Association estimates that, world-wide, approximately one billion valentine cards are sent each year, making the day the second largest card-sending holiday of the year behind Christmas. The association also estimates that women purchase approximately 85 percent of all valentines.

History of Valentine's Day

February fertility festivals 
The association of the middle of February with love and fertility dates to ancient times. In the calendar of Ancient Athens, the period between mid January and mid February was the month of Gamelion, which was dedicated to the sacred marriage of Zeus and Hera.

In Ancient Rome, the day of February 15 was Lupercalia, the festival of Lupercus, the god of fertility, who was represented as half-naked and dressed in goat skins. As part of the purification ritual, the priests of Lupercus would sacrifice goats to the god, and after drinking wine, they would run through the streets of Rome holding pieces of the goat skin above their heads, touching anyone they met. Young women especially would come forth voluntarily for the occasion, in the belief that being so touched would render them fruitful and bring easy childbirth.

According to the Catholic Encyclopedia (1908), at least three different Saints Valentine, all of them martyrs and all quite obscure, are mentioned in the early martyrologies under the date of February 14:

a priest in Rome who suffered martyrdom in the second half of the 3rd century and was buried on the Via Flaminia.  
a bishop of Interamna (modern Terni) also suffered martyrdom in the second half of the 3rd century and was also buried on the Via Flaminia, but in a different location than the priest.  
a martyr in North Africa, about whom little else is known.  
The connection between St. Valentine and romantic love is not mentioned in any early histories and is regarded by secular historians as purely a matter of legend (see below). The feast of St. Valentine was first declared to be on February 14 by Pope Gelasius I in 496. There is a widespread legend that he created the day to counter the practice held on Lupercalia of young men and women pairing off as lovers by drawing their names out of an urn, but this practice is not attested in any sources from that era.

In the 19th century, relics of St. Valentine were donated by Pope Gregory XVI to the Whitefriar Street Carmelite Church in Dublin, Ireland, which has become a popular place of pilgrimage on February 14.

In 1969, as part of a larger effort to pare down the number of saint days of purely legendary origin, the Church removed St. Valentine's Day as an official holiday from its calendar.

Valentine

The influential Gnostic teacher Valentinius was a candidate for Bishop of Rome in 143. In his teachings, the marriage bed assumed a central place in his version of Christian love, an emphasis sharply in contrast with the asceticism of mainstream Christianity. Stephan A. Hoeller assesses Valentinius on the subject : "In addition to baptism, anointing, eucharist, the initiation of priests and the rites of the dying, the Valentinian Gnosis mentions prominently two great and mysterious sacraments called "redemption" (apolytrosis) and "bridal chamber" respectively".

Medieval era

Swedish calendar showing St Valentine's Day 14 February 1712. The first recorded association of St. Valentine's Day with romantic love was in the 14th century in England and France, where February 14 was traditionally the day on which birds paired off to mate. This belief is mentioned in Geoffrey Chaucer's Parlement of Foules (1381).

It was common during that era for lovers to exchange notes on this day and to call each other their "Valentines". A 14th century valentine is said to be in the collection of the British Library. It is probable that many of the legends about St. Valentine were invented during this period. Among the legends are ones that assert that:

On the evening before St. Valentine was to be martyred for being a Christian, he passed a love note to his jailer's daughter which read, "From Your Valentine."  
During a ban on marriages of Roman soldiers by the Emperor Claudius II, St. Valentine secretly helped arrange marriages.  
In most versions of these legends, February 14 is the date associated with his martyrdom.

Valentine's Day in the USA

Valentine's Day was probably imported into North America in the 19th century with settlers from Britain. In the United States, the first mass-produced valentines of embossed paper lace were produced and sold shortly after 1847 by Esther Howland (1828 – 1904) of Worcester, Massachusetts. Her father operated a large book and stationery store, and she took her inspiration from an English valentine she had received. (Since 2001, the Greeting Card Association has been giving an annual "Esther Howland Award for a Greeting Card Visionary".)

In the United States in the second half of the 20th century, the practice of exchanging cards was extended to include the giving of all manner of gifts, usually from a man to a woman. Such gifts typically include roses and chocolates. Starting in the 1980s, the diamond industry began to promote Valentine's Day as an occasion for giving fine jewelry.

In 1929 due to tensions between gangs in Chicago, members of a gang led by Al Capone killed several members of Bugs Moran's gang in what became known as the Saint Valentine's Day Massacre.