2. Speak about some typical unpleasant childhood memories that people might have. Describe an episode from your or someone else's childhood that changed to a certain extent your vision of the adult world. ("My memories of Boarding School", "The snowdrops").

I am in the strong believe that very few people or even nobody would argue that a happy home life gives people a base from which they can go into the world with confidence. Small children are bitterly frail like first snowdrops and they are desperate for the help and care of their parents. And parents from their own part ought to make their kids’ childhood the happiest and the most unforgettable time because if the life spent at home is difficult and full of bad emotions, future life won't give happiness and satisfaction.

A lot of parents say that they send their children to boarding schools because they have to work, pressed for time and have nobody to look after their children while they are away, but why should little boys and girls be deprived of their childhood!?

I'd like to tell you about two episodes from my childhood that changed my vision of the adult world.

The first one is the death of my neighbor. He was 17 then. He died in a road accident. His bike was too powerful for him —well, to go on that speed on a wet dark night. Over 70, the police said, straight into the back of a stationary track. That boy was an only child in his family. His parents were very cut up. My parents didn’t take me to the funeral, but I remember my mother wearing a mourning dress with six carnations in her hands.

The second story is about my playfellow Mike who was sent to a boarding school. He hated almost every day of his time there. Apart from having to keep to a great many rules and customs, many of which seemed to him stupid, they were never allowed to be alone. The thing is Mike was extremely dependent of being alone part of every day, so daily life at school was very hard for him. What was more, in the middle of a school term he developed a cough. The nurse said there was nothing wrong with him and gave him some lozenges. But two days later he was taken to hospital ill with bronchitis and pneumonia. His main memory of his stay at hospital was that the night nurses used to get together in his ward and play cards and chat. Keeping him awake when he was seriously ill did not bother them!

This story was a real shock for me, my soul was bleeding and I realized how deeply he was hurt. (I am sure that its better not to give birth to a child if you are not going to love, support and cherish it.)

3. Speak about the freedom of the will as an essential quality of human nature.(Is Freedom of the will a hard gift?)

Having created man free, i.e. capable of realizing his free will and being master of himself, God doesn't want to intrude upon his freedom. Man is free to accept or reject Him. God looks upon man as an individual, not as a puppet on a string, and respects his dignity. He treats man like His greatest value, for man is the only one in all creation that has God's spirit breathed into him.

However, freedom of the will is a gift, which is dangerous and hard to deal with. It implies a lot of responsibility. The New Testament has it, "You were called for freedom, only do not exercise your for fleshly indulgence". But our world is striving for evil more than for the good. Saint Fyodor compares our world in its wildness and apostasy to a horse, which is galloping desperately, not knowing where to go or what to do, because the rider is drunk. It is the image of mankind that is made drunk by sin, having used its freedom.

However sinful man is, God doesn't turn away from him. A new Adam, Jesus Christ, comes into the history of mankind to redeem people's sins and save them from spiritual death and slavery to sin.

4.Speak about the frustrations and rewards of teaching as seen by an American university teacher. (“Why I teach”).

Well, I guess everyone would admit that teaching is a vocation and if you are not cut out for it, it is better not to take it up: the thing is it is not an easy task as it may seem at first sight.

The narrator, an American university teacher, proves my words!

He says that teaching is not at all easy for him, he adds that teaching is the most difficult of all the ways he has attempted to earn his living: mechanic, carpenter, university administrator, writer. For him it’s a red-eye, sweaty-palm, sinking-stomach profession. Red-eye, because he never feels ready to teach no matter how late at night he stays up to prepare. Sweaty-palm, because he is always nervous before he enters the classroom. Sinking-stomach, because he usually walks out an hour later convinced that he was even more boring than usual.

But at the same time there are many rewards of teaching!

• He teaches because he likes the pace of the academic calendar and teaching is built on change. Even when the material he teaches is the same he changes, and, more important, his students change.

• He also likes the freedom to make his own mistakes, to learn his own lessons, to himself and his students.

• As a teacher he is his own boss.

• He likes to ask questions that students must struggle to answer.

• His job gives him variety and challenge and, what is the most valuable, the opportunity to learn by himself.

• In conclusion he admits that being a teacher is being there, being present at the creation, when the clay begins to breath. So, being around people who are beginning to breathe, he occasionally finds himself catching his breath with them.

Having read this story, I realized that teaching is a very difficult profession to follow but worth to be taken up as a great deal of rewardings covers all the struggles!!!