A Quick Guide to Coping with Culture Shock

by Heather Pears

One sunny afternoon my cousin and I were seated on the small patio of a restaurant in the Hungarian countryside. The beautiful scenery was lost on us because we were busy staring blankly at the menu in front of us. Slowly the feeling of panic grew, nothing made sense! What was “galuska”, was it something I wanted to try? Suddenly a waitress set a big bowl of food in front of us, saying something that sounded like “Is good!” With that she was gone.

Fast forward ten years. I found myself standing in an underground subway having an emotional meltdown. I was paralyzed by confusion and anxiety. There were 6 sets of stairs radiating upward to street level and I had no idea which way to go. I couldn’t understand the signs and, even if I could find someone who spoke English, the people rushing past me looked too busy to answer my questions.

On paper, it seems perfect: the world of business using its money to help develop sport. In fact, over the last few years companies have given billions of pounds to athletes, teams and sports events.

But are the aims of business and sport really the same? And when business and sport forget their social duties, aren’t they letting down each other (not to mention sports fans)?

10 Tips for a safe holiday

Photo by Lynne Hand

by Christine Muir

The relaxed feeling of being on holiday can lead people to take risks with their safety that they would not take when at home. The following travel tips will help to make sure that your holiday is enjoyable and safe.

May Day

by Margaret Watson

May Day is always celebrated on the first Monday in May, which means that this year it will be Monday May 5th.

In my Shropshire school they had a Maypole. It is probably long gone, to make way for netball courts or climbing frames which can be used every day, but then it was only a once-a-year experience. Someone would climb up and attach ribbons in various colours to the circle at the top.  A little girl then held on to her ribbon and danced in an intricate pattern so that the ribbons crissed and crossed to form diamonds of colour. Well, that was the theory, but we were very young, totally under-rehearsed and the result was chaos, and one child nearly getting strangled in pink ribbon – but at least we enjoyed ourselves. I wonder if they ever got the ribbons untangled.

Fiction Stories Expand Your Vocabulary and Your Mind

by Michael Ugulini

There's no better way to build your English vocabulary than to read continually – and to read what you enjoy. We all love stories; they enlighten, entertain, inspire, and teach. In fact, they do all that, and build our reservoir of words too, without us even realizing they're doing so.

When you read a story, you are lost in another world. Your mind transports you to the book's place and time where you meet its characters. Some of those characters are so unique you are absorbed into their lives as much as the other characters in their sphere are.

Some would-be writers think they can dash off an article without learning the basics of grammar. Just as any crafts-person spends time honing his skills to make the perfect piece of craft, so must a writer work hard to write an error-free, grammatically-correct article. True, some errors are typos, but this reflects a certain laziness on the author's part. A writer should closely examine his article before sending it off.