Reading
Ex. 1. Read the text and do exercises that follow.
Housing construction
People get apartments for an unlimited period of time. The size of an apartment depends on the size of the family.
The standard amount of housing space is 21 square meters per person.
The housing commissions decide who is to get the apartment first. As a rule, families with less than 5 square meters of housing space per family member get the new apartments first. A family of three has the right to receive a two-room apartment, a family of four - a three-room apartment, and a family of five - a four-room apartment.
Every month people have to pay their rent and utility bills - for gas, electricity, telephone services, running water, central heating.
Some 30 per cent of the population have more housing space than average level. And about the same number of people live in apartments with housing space below average.
Some ten million people live in shared apartments. One out of every four unmarried adults lives in a hostel or rents a room from a private owner.
Not long ago the government decided to sell state-owned flats to citizens as personal property. After a citizen buys the flat, he may sell it or give it as a gift; but no one may own more than one flat at a time.
Many people prefer to buy apartments or to build individual houses.
Do you know how to build a house? Some preparations have to be made before one starts building a house. The architect in co-operation with the future owner draws up a plan. They bear the following in mind: the size of the site, the purpose of the building, how the rooms are going to be furnished, what materials are to be used and how much money can be spent.
The supervisor plans and controls the various activities of the workers who build the house. The supervisor also sees to it that the materials are at the site when needed.
The following craftsmen are active when a building is under construction: bricklayers, plumbers (for the gas and water-pipes), carpenters, heating-mechanics, electricians, painters, paper-hangers and plasterers.
What is needed before you can start building?
Firstly, one looks into the finances.
Secondly, one finds a suitable building-site.
In the third place, you need a building-permit.
In the fourth place, you find the workers and get building materials: bricks, wood, glass, cement, lead, paint, wall-paper, insulation-material and so on.
a) Which is the most frequently used word in the text "Housing Construction"? How often is this word used?
b) Choose the ten most important words and expressions for the discussion of the housing situation in Belarus from those given below:
average, central heating, running water, rent, adult, hostel, shared apartment, telephone services, to bear in mind, to sell, to buy, personal property, to depend on, supervisor, size, craftsman, housing space, wall-paper, to be under construction.
c) Write the words you have chosen in the order of their importance, discuss your logical order with your partner and make some corrections if needed.
d) Your friend from Great Britain could not come to Belarus to live in a Belarusian family because of the shortage of housing space in the country. Tell him / her about the housing situation in Belarus. The following questions may be helpful to you.
Ex. 2. Answer the questions.
1. Do people get the apartments for an unlimited period of time?
2. Does the size of an apartment depend on the size of the family?
3. The standard amount of housing space is 21 square meters per person, isn't it?
4. The housing commissions decide who is to get the apartment first, don't they?
5. Who gets the new apartment first?
6. What are the rights of a family of three (four, five) members?
7. Do people pay their rent and utility bills every week or every month?
8. How many per cent of the population have more housing space than average level and how many have less?
9. Do ten or twenty million people live in shared apartments?
10. Where does one out of every four unmarried adults live?
11. May a citizen buy a state-owned flat? On what conditions?
Ex. 3.
e) Try yourselves as journalists. Write short reports (5-7 sentences) to a newspaper on housing construction in Belarus.
f) Your Belarusian friend's father is an interpreter. He is working at the International Conference on Housing Construction and Architecture in Modern World now. He asks you to help him interpret the following Belarusian speaker's report into English:
В Беларуси существует государственное строительство жилья, кооперативное и индивидуальное. Норма (стандартное количество) жилой площади в стране составляет 21 кв. м на человека. Есть (имеются) люди (30% населения), имеющие больше жилой площади, чем позволяет средняя норма. И есть люди (30% населения), которые имеют жилую площадь меньше средней нормы.
Ex.4. Develop the following situations making use of the words and phrases in brackets.
1. You've got a comfortable well-planned flat (a spacious kitchen, modern conveniences, a lift, a chute to carry rubbish down, a toilet / loo, a bathroom, tiled walls, papered walls, the floor is parquet [`pRkeI, `pRkIt]).
2. Your living-room is the coziest room in the flat (to look attractive, to receive guests, to make the room cozy, a good-sized room, a well-furnished room, a new suite of furniture, a fluffy carpet on the floor).
3. The kitchen is small but cozy and warm (build-in cupboards, to face south west, a lot of sunshine, a lovely view from the window, an electric cooker, convenient, gaily-colored curtains, to be covered with linoleum, a kitchen suite).
Ex.5. Describe your room / house, etc. to the partner who would make a sketch of what you are describing. Encourage / stimulate him by asking questions to mention as many details as possible.
Ex.6. Imagine that you can design your ideal house. Draw a plan and label the parts. Tell the others in the group what furniture and equipment you'd like to have in each room. What about the garden?
Ex. 7. Tell the class what you like and what you don't like about the place where you live. Then tell what things you would like to have done to improve your flat.
Ex.8. You want to rent a country cottage for your family. Phone the landlady ans ask her all possible questions. She may want to ask you as well.
Do you let a room? Do you want to rent?
Is it furnished? Do you want an apartment?
What / How much is the rent? Do you have children?
Are there any children in the neighborhood? How much space do you need / What do you need?
What are the amenities? How much rent do you want to pay?
Is there a telephone in the flat? Any bad habits?
Ex. 9. Read and say how different people feel about their houses. In what way are their characters revealed when they speak about the housing problems?
BILL
Well, I'm the sort of person who doesn't bother too much where to live. I mean the area where the house is. It can be in the town or in the country - honestly I don't care. But I do like comfort. I reckon at my age I deserve it. Cold, that's the thing I really can't stand. I must have a place with a good heating system - central heating is the best because it's so easy. Yes, I suppose there's one more thing, I must have a place of my own. I don't want to be sharing with people at my age. Perhaps I am getting old. I'm too attached to my independence now; I couldn't give it up to go sharing with other people.
MARY
I don't want to leave the place where I'm now. No, I don't really want to move at all. It's so cozy and I've got all my friends, round here. But they are going to pull them all down, all these old houses, so I suppose I'll have to move, I'd quite like to go out into the country actually, because I was born in the village and I do miss the country air. But the problem is that country places are so expensive. I can't effort it.