1.10 Travelling

Travelling is very popular among students in Britain. They don't have a lot of money, so it has to be cheap, but there are many ways of traveling at low cost.

The cheapest way to travel is hitch-hiking, but this isn't reliable and it can be dangerous, so it's better to use normal public transport.

If you want to travel by train, you can get a student railcard. With this you can buy train tickets at a discount. For international travel in Europe, you can get an Interrail card.

If you want to travel to somewhere more exotic, you have to travel by air, but this isn't as expensive as it sounds. There are a lot of shops which sell cheap airline tickets to countries like the USA, Thailand and Australia. They advertise in magazines and newspapers. A lot of these tickets are standby tickets. This means that you haven't got a reserved seat. You have to wait and see if the plane is full. So, you might have to spend a few days at the airport before you can get on a flight.

Magazines often carry adverts for "overland" tours especially to Africa and India, or Latin America. On these tours, you travel with a group in a mini-bus. It isn't very comfortable and you have to share the cooking, but it's a cheap way to see parts of the world that most tourists never go to.

While British young people are travelling to Africa and the Far East, many young people from Australia and the New Zealand travel to Britain. They get cheap airline tickets to London. Then they usually buy a used van and travel around Europe. You can usually recognize the young travellers from Oz because they often paint a kangaroo symbol somewhere on the van. (1350)

Ответьте на вопросы к тексту:

1. Is travelling popular among young people in Britain?

2. Which countries do people travel to?

3. What cheap forms of transport are available?

4. What is a standby ticket?

1.11 Easter Island

Easter Island is a tiny island in the Pacific Ocean. However, despite its location and size (one hundred and seventeen square kilometres), Easter Island is very popular because of its famous monuments, the moai - the huge mysterious statues, which look out across the sea. The moai were originally cut from the volcanic rock, and there are over 300 statues on the island.

Hundreds of years ago Easter Island had a large population. However, by the 18^th century, their way of life, the origins of their gods and the meaning behind their statues were no longer remembered. A civil war between the island's two rival groups - the Long Ears and the Short Ears - dramatically reduced the population. During this war, many of the statues were pushed over or destroyed.

Today Easter Island is governed by the Republic of Chile, and the currency is the peso. With a population of only 2,000, there are more sheep and horses on Easter Island than there are people. Most of the island's income comes from sheep farming and tourism.

Although 70% of the people on Easter Island are Polynesian, the official language is Spanish. However visitors don't come to Easter Island to find out about Polynesian culture: they come to see the statues. (1034)

Заполните таблицу об острове Пасхи:

a) Area

b) Population

c) Official language

d) Currency

e) Sources of income