PRESERVING THE ENVIRONMENT:

DO IT YOURSELF!

Our hometown has got an unusual name, it's called the Academic Center of Siberia. Everybody calls it Academytown. It was begun at the end of the 50's near the city of Novosibirsk. Our maternal grandfather has told us a lot about the way it was planned and built, because he had been one of the first people to come and work here.

In the beginning, there was nothing but forest here. The planners actually counted every single tree before cutting some of them down and cleaning up the space for each building. Whenever possible, they had left the real forest trees standing. Today, when we play on our balcony at home, we can touch the branches of a huge pine-tree that's growing right near our house. Squirrels live in the tree, and we can see them play and chase each other, we also hear them chittering. We have a feeding-tray for them, and they come to us every morning for breakfast. A couple of woodpeckers come to peck at an old aspen-tree.

All the streets in our town are green in summer; the leaves turn brown, yellow and red in the Fall, but the pine-trees are always green. Huge heaps of snow pile up on the pines through the winter. If you are too close to a tree when all this snow falls, you may be buried in it! Some streets are alleys with pine-trees on the one side and birch-trees on the other side; some streets have rowan-trees and bird-cherry-trees. There are also trees and bushes whose names we couldn't find in any Russian-English dictionary, our teacher told us that they are to be found only in Russia.

One of the most beautiful places in town is called the Golden Valley. We know that the builders gave this name to the place in the Fall, when the leaves had changed from green to golden.

The Botanical Gardens are huge. Our friend's mother Dr. Olga Vasssilyeva works there. She has taken us on many excursions there and explained that many of the plants do not exist anywhere in Siberia, one can only see them in the Gardens. Many people like to walk around the Garden grounds, to watch the lakes and ponds. Nobody breaks any branches, there is no litter left among the trees. Squirrels and chipmunks, sparrows and many other birds come close to people to pick up crumbs. There are many places where you can see bird-feeders here.

Earlier, when the Botanical Garden first began to plant flowers outside, people used to dig out flocks, roses and little shrubs. They carried them away to their own gardens or vegetable patches, to grow for themselves. We asked Olga why the Garden people had not tried to stop the diggers. She told us, "We figured that soon there'd be enough flowers and shrubs for the people to begin exchanging among neighbors." She was right, nobody digs out any plants in the Botanical Garden grounds now.

Sometimes a curious sign appears near a part of the woods in town: "The woods are resting. Please do not walk here". It means that the paths have become too wide, and the botanists wish to shelter this part of the woods, to give it some time to become well again.

Our other grandfather had been the President of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy for many years. He traveled to many countries. He told us a lot about his theory of sustainable development. If one lake is polluted, all the fish, animals and birds in the area may die, the trees also perish, and men cannot live there anymore. It is easy to dirty a place - but often it is very difficult to clean it up. An artificial lake, which everybody calls the Ob Sea, was dug near Academytown. In the beginning it was clean, there was plenty of fish in it, and people liked to go fishing, boating and of course swimming and sun-bathing in summer. But many plants that were built nearby began to put their waste into the sea. The water became dirty and green with algae. The fish practically disappeared. The beach became dirty. Some years ago people began to clean up the place. Now it is much better, and not only fish but even crawfish came back. We understand that everybody, even children, can do a lot to preserve the environment. Pollution can be stopped if people realize that they all need a nice clean planet to live on.

Evgenia Koptyug, 8th grade, age 14

Irina Koptyug, 6th grade, age 11

English-speaking school 130,

Favourite Holiday

Our family favourite holiday is New Year. Lots of people enjoy this happy day, everyone celebrates it. An ancient tradition - to mount a fir-tree creates the holiday atmosphere and gives us moments of pleasure. Children can find in it's roots different New Year' presents. In Russian some families invite the Father-Frost, he lives in children' imagination and makes the holiday happy. Regrettably not every family can afford to hire him, because of necessity of our people. As for me, I believed in him until I was five-six, probably I'd better enjoy the present, then the guy who gives it to me. School students also enjoy this holiday maybe because they like to have a rest from school or university, college, and New Year gives chances for it, because they last for two-three weeks. On the whole peoples of different ages and nationalities enjoy this beautiful holiday..

Ilia Semyonov, grade 8, age 15.

How I went to the USA.

Last year my step-father had to go to the USA. My mom, sister and me had to go later. I knew that it's gonna be interesting, but I didn't want to devote the whole year to this journey, cause then I would have to miss the school year. So we went. Against my weal...

The first thing that surprised me was the San Francisco International Airport, where we arrived to. It was like a little separate city with it's museums, streets, shopping centers, and cafes, and everything. It was very beautiful. It had trees, little rivers inside. While we were traveling along the city, my father showed me my school. It was a one-floor building with a 1km*1km area. It had blue doors and white walls. I was scared. My school here looks extremely different. I didn't know the people, the habits, the schedule, but I had to go to school very soon. And I did. I got used to it in about to weeks. Another surprise were shops. They were large and colorful, nothing in common with Russian shops.

The educational system is also different. To enter a university we have to pass the exams, not like in US, cause there you just have to go to school and get some marks, no matter what marks.

That was my experience. I like the country itself, but I can't understand the people. They are so different. When I left from there, I already had some friends...It's really hard to leave friends, whatever you are leaving....

I really want to visit United States some time again...in the future... Because my family is still there...I miss them very much...

Name: Masha Kuznetsova

School: 130

Our school birthday .

In the 1959 our school appeared in Novosibirsk . In the 1961 it became one of the first English school in the country . The increasing number of students made it possible to create some traditions here . So , the first tradition was the celebrating of the school's birthday . And from the end of the 80s all the school went to the School Parade along the Morskoy Prospect . Mean , all the students and the teachers walk altogether along the biggest straight street in our town carrying school flag , balloons , dolls , school symbols and all that staff is coloured with white and green . Actually , our school flag has two colours : white & green , two stripes symbolizing snow on the green trees on winter . Yearby year more and more people come to our celebration to have fun here. Alumni come alsoto meet their teachers, their friends, to take part in our big parade. We all do love our great school , and we want other people in our town to look at us and at our holiday, to share with us our perfect mood . And we hope you will be interested in our school tradition and in our school at all .

Niculina Anastasia & Zaikina Tatiana

School 130

Alexander M Bannov

We are going to tell you about wonderful person, who is staying at our school from its' early beginning . Being very talented, young Alexander amazed foreign guests with his great pronunciation and also he was a perfect actor: he had the main role in the performance "My FairLady"( he was a proffessor Higgens). He finished school 130 in 1968. He enrolled St. Petersburg University and finished it gradually. Than he returned back to Novosibirsk with his wife & son. He started to work at school as the teacher of English. He was very gifted & students loved him.

Now Alexander M. Bannov is principal of school & we are proud of him.

school 130, Novosibirsk, Russia.

Bannova Anna, 16; Zagoruiko Maria,16.

New Year

Our family favourite holiday is New Year. Lots of people enjoy this happy day, everyone celebrates it. An ancient tradition - to mount a fir-tree creates the holiday atmosphere and gives us moments of pleasure. Children can find in it's roots different New Year' presents. In Russian some families invite the Father-Frost, he lives in children' imagination and makes the holiday happy. Regrettably not every family can afford to hire him, because of necessity of our people. As for me, i believed in him until I was five-six, probably I'd better enjoy the present, then the guy who gives it to me. School students also enjoy this holiday maybe because they like to have a rest from school or university, college, and New Year gives chances for it, because they last for two-three weeks. On the whole peoples of different ages and nationalities enjoy this beautiful holiday...

by Ilia Semyonov, grade 8, age 15.