1. Read the extract and answer the questions.

Can you turn round? No don’t look at me, I don’t want you to pose. Look away if you can. That’s it. Hold it. Oh no, someone’s in the way – would you mind? Thank you very much! Just a sec. The sun’s going in. No it’s OK, I think. Here goes then – try not to blink. That’s it. Hope it comes out now.

1). What is the man doing?

а) He is giving someone a driving lesson. б) He is playing a game. в) He is taking a photograph

2). а) He is skillful in his job. б) It takes him a lot of time to do his job.

в) Someone prevented from doing his job perfectly.

2. Read the text From the History of the Olympic Games

While the origin of the Olympic games is not known exactly, there is a historical record of the ancient games beginning in 776 BC. Thereafter they were held each at four year intervals until 394 AD when they were abolished by the Roman emperor Theodosius after Greece had lost its independence. At first the program was confined to one day and consisted of only a single event, a race the length of the stadium. Afterward additional races, the discus throw, the javelin throw, the broad jump, boxing, wrestling, the pentathlon, chariot racing and other events were added and the duration including the religious ceremonies was extended to seven days. The games were restricted to Greeks, but competitors came from all the Greek colonies around the Mediterranean. A sacred truce was declared and enforced to permit participants to travel unmolested to the games. Women were not allowed as competitors or spectators. Before the contest opened all the competitors and their families, the trainers and the judges swore a solemn oath to keep the competition clean and fair and to give just decisions.

The games occupied such an important position in the life of Greece that time was measured by the four-year interval between them – an “Olympiad”. The greatest honour then to be attained by any Greek was the winning of the simple branch of wild olive given to a victor in the games. Kings competed alongside commoners; even the Roman emperor Nero sought Olympic honours. Winners became national heroes, musicians sang their praise and sculptors preserved their strength and beauty in marble. Their feats of skill and courage were recorded by the poets and writers of the time. The gracefulness and sportsmanship of the contestant and the method of winning were esteemed equally with the victory itself.

It was through the efforts of the Baron Pierre de Coubertin (1853-1927) of France, a brilliant educator and scholar, but not an athlete, that the Olympic games were revived. Having decided that at least one of the reasons for the glory of the Golden Age of Greece was the emphasis placed on physical culture and frequent athletic festivals, he concluded that nothing but good result if athletes from all countries of the world were brought together once every four years on the friendly fields of amateur sport, unminded of national rivalries, jealousies and differences of all kinds and with all considerations of race, religion, wealth and social status eliminated. He summoned an international conference at the Sorbonne, Paris, 1894, which was attended by the representatives of nine different nations.

The games of the first Olympiad of the modern cycle were held under the patronage of the king of Greece in 1896 in a new marble stadium constructed in Athens for the purpose. Subsequent games were held in Paris (1900), St. Louis (1904), London (1908), Stockholm (1912), Antwerp (1920), Paris (1924), Amsterdam (1928), Los Angeles (1932), Berlin (1934), London (1948), Helsinki (1952), Melbourne (1956), Rome (1960), Tokyo (1964), Mexico City (1968), Munich (1972), Montreal (1976), and Moscow (1980).

The games of the VI, XII, and XIII Olympiads, scheduled, respectively, for Berlin (1916), Tokyo, then Helsinki (1940) and London (1944), were not held because of the war. In 1906 a set of games were held in Athens, but these were not part of the official series.

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