Transport

Trains travel into London from all over the country. They are very important for people who live in the suburbs or outside London and travel into London for work. 1,8 million people travel into the center of London every day. You can travel with another kind of train called the Docklands light Railway. For many people the journey by train takes them to a convenient underground station. London Underground usually called the Tube, was the first in the world when it opened in 1836. The different kinds of transport link up prettywell but sometimes you have to walk from one point in the journey to the next. People use a lots of other forms of transport in london. Some people use boats on the River Thames to go to work. There is one kind of transport that isn't very good in London - and that's the car. They move very slowly because there is too much traffic. The buses an Taxis travel more quickly because they have got special lanes on the road.

Shopping in Britain

In England no town is more than 170 kilometers from the sea. So it's no surprise that Britain has a very important history of ships and the sea. The British Navy was the biggest navy in the world at one time. Now it's smaller, but many other ships are still used for importing and exporting goods and for taking people on business or holiday. In Liverpool there is a great museum of maritime history. It's got several ships in the docks outside. In side it shows what it was like to be on some of the ships. Between 1830 and 1930 more than nine million people from all over Europe left from the port of Liverpool to start a new life in America or Australia. In the early twentieth century there were large numbers of very elegant passenger ships. They crossed the Atlantic from Liverpool or Southampton to New York in five or six days. The most famous ship was probably the Titanic. It sank in 1912 and over 1,500 people drowned. It was the worst disaster in maritime history. You probably know about if from one of the most expensive films ever made -Titanic! One of the most famous shipping companies is Cunard. It's got the world's biggest cruise ship, the Queen Mary 2, which crosses the Atlantic from Southampton to New York. The majority of people do travel around the world by plane but ships are still very important for moving goods. These metal boxes, or containers, are packed with clothes, television sets, computers, furniture and toys. The Southampton Container Terminal the unload more than one and a half million containers each year. So the sea still plays a very important part in life in Britain.

Horror

People like to be scared. They love reading horros stories and watching horror movies. Some of the most famous horror stories were written by British writers. The first was published by Mary Shelley in 1818. One of then put two great horror characters together when Frankenstein met count Dracula. Dracula contra Frankenstein was made by the Spanish director Jesús Franco in 1970.
Dracula's: The bedroom window was wide open and moonlight was shining into the room. Mina was on the balcony and a dark shape was leaning over her. It was Count Dracula! THe vampire was not drinking Mina's blood.
No, it was more terrible than that. Dracula was holding Mina's face to a long cut on his chest. He was making her drink his blood! The vampire turned his head. His eyes burned with a terrible red light. Blood was dripping from his red lips and long white teeth. The vampire had already taken his meal of blood! ony and a dark shape was leaning over her. It wa s Count Dracula!Te vampire was not drinking Mina's blood. No, it was more terrible than that. Dracula was holding Mina's face to a long cut on his chest.

supermarket

Supermarkets are an important part of daily life in Britain. The five biggest supermarkets sell 80% of all groceries - that's food and drink. Tesco is the biggest. It's got nearly 2.000 shops in GBritatin and is the third biggest supermarket in the world. In the larger supermarkets you can buy just about anything. The very big supermarkets are usually on the edge of towns and most people drive to them. And while they are there with their car, customers can buy petrol too. There are many more supermarkets now than 20 years ago. People find it very convenient to do all their shopping in one place. Tesco online delivers over 100.000 orders each week in Britain and Sainsbury's delivers 30.000. But not everyone likes supermarkets. So people without cars have less choice. Many supermarkets are open 24 hours a day and seven days a week.

The law

The most famous police station in Britain is New Scotland Yard in London, but they there are police stations all over country. They have all got a blue light outside to show they are police stations.
For most people the police are the face of the law. They can arrest people in the street, but they also give information.
We visited a new police station in Lewisham, an area in south-east London. A suspected criminal is being charged with a crime. Next they take fingerprints to check the person's identity. They also take mouth swabs for analysis of DNA. Suspects can be kept in the cells at the police station for several hours. This suspect spent a whole night in the cells.
Next day he went to court. Here three magistrates listen to evidence from the police and witnesses. They then decide if the person is guilty or not guilty.
The evidence that the police collect from a crime scene is analysed in the laboratories like this. They can examine and analyses material from the crime scene to find out exactly what happened.
The police are the most obvious part of the law in Britain. Their job is to make sure that people don't brak the law and to cach them when they do.

Soap Opera

The most popular British soap operas are Eastenders and Coronaiton Street, These are popular dramas about the lives of ordinary people. There are usually three to five episodes each week. Many people are addicted ti soap operas. Ther even buy soap opera magazines. These contain previews of the next week's shows, so that fans can find out what's going to happen next.
There also web sites for all the main soap operas. These have got information about the actors and stories from future episodes.
Estenders is set the east end of London and has been broadcast sience 1085. Coronation Street is based in Manchester and it is the oldest soap. It was first broadcast in 1960

Scotland

There are four main regions in Britatin: England, Northern Ireland, Wales and Scotland. Scotland is in the north of the Britain. Its famous for this lakes. There are a lot of plants and nature. The majory people of Scotland live in Glasgow and Edinburgh. There are a lot of historic buildings. There are a party's in Scotland, too. There are a rare instruments. Scottish people have got a traditional sports. Glasgow it's a good city, because there are a lot of architects. The Scottish wiscky it's a good wiscky. There are thousans of different wiscky.