Unit four

TEXT 1

Assignment: Read the text and compare the way Londoners spend their leisure time with that of the citizens of our city.

Getting tickets

London is a world centre for music, theatre and arts festivals. Choosing what to see is easy; getting tickets takes cunning. You can buy tickets for pop concerts from ticket agencies (but you will usually pay a fee on top of the ticket price) or direct from the venue itself. Look in weekly national publications like Melody Maker, New Musical Express for details of rock and pop concerts around the country. In London, the weekly publications Time Out or What’s On in London are available from newsagents and worth buying. There is a telephone information service giving recorded de­tails of major pop concerts in London; call the London Tourist Board on [phone] (calls cost 36p per minute cheap rate and 48p per minute at other times). If there’s a major group playing, tickets usually sell out fast so make sure you know where the ticket venue is located and the first day they go on sale.

Shaftesbury Avenue is the heart of London’s established West End theatre land. The official Half-Price Ticket Booth in Leicester Square (administered by the Society of London theatre) is where many London theatre tickets are available on the day of the performance for half-price plus a service charge of up to £2. The booth is open Tuesday-Sunday from 12:00 for matinee tickets and Monday-Saturday from 12:00-18:30 for evening performances.

Tickets that remain unsold immediately before the performance are also sometimes available from the theatre box office at reduced rates. Some theatres offer standby tickets to students who may be asked for their student identification. The theatres operating student standby schemes are indicated by the symbol (S) in the printed theatre listings.

Performances start around 19:30 but Wednesday and Saturday matinees which start at around 14:30 might be easier to get tickets for if the show is popular. Some theatres now have performances on Sundays also.

Visitors are advised not to buy tickets from people who approach them in the queue outside the official Half-Price Ticket Booth or outside the venue itself. For long-running popular shows like Cats, Starlight Express, Phantom of the Opera, Les Miserables, you can either purchase a ticket from the ticket agencies (which carry a surcharge due to the heavy demand); or queue (often all day) for a return ticket; or ring the theatre at the beginning of the week to check if any tickets have been returned from agencies (often happens in quiet months).

TEXT 2

Assignment: Discuss the following article. Make up a plan and compare it with those of your group-mates.

Million people a year enjoyed Crimea’s spas and seascapes, according to the Crimean Prime Minister. Last year, however, only 2.6 million people vacationed in Crimea, the ministry reported. Domestic debt, industrial slow downs and an unstable currency hurts the Ukraine’s travel industry. Fewer Ukrainians can afford to travel and those who can tend to visit forcing countries. For the Ukrainians and foreigners, it’s generally cheaper to travel abroad than it is to travel within the Ukraine. One day in the Crimea costs about US$ 25 – one day in Turkey or Bulgaria costs about US$ 12 to 18. Moreover, Ukrainian travel price often do not correspond with the quality of services. Poor meals, dingy rooms and shoddy transportation command nearly the same prices as comfortable western accommodations in other countries.

To promote tourism in the Ukraine the industry needs a better state program to encourage competition among agencies. There is little profit for travel agencies selling vacation packages in the Ukraine. The tourism that does exist comes mostly from other Commonwealth of Independent States countries and from children’s school trips. Before the 1990s, Intourist hotel was usually filled with tourists. But the orientation changed. Now we can count only a handful of tourists among hundreds of businesspeople.

Domestic tourism in much more developed in foreign countries than is international tourism. That means, for example, a Frenchman is more likely to vacation in France than in, say, Germany. Each year, about 80 percent of the population of industrialized countries travels. In 1995, the European Community expects to earn US$ 380 billion from tourism. The tourism industry in some countries, like Poland, makes up 20 to 50 percent of the country’s gross national product. The tourism industry in the Ukraine makes up 1 percent of the country’s GNP.

A strong legal base would help keep tourism afloat in the Ukraine. There would be a law on the qualifications an agency must meet to be licensed. This law also should outline the rights of tourists and tourism agencies, which will increase people’s confidence in the Ukrainian tourism industry. A law providing this structure awaits Parliament’s consideration. The law is to put the Ukrainian tourism industry in line with international standards and demands.

Since August 1994, the Ukrainian State Committee for Tourism, in accordance with the Ukrainian law on entrepreneurial work, licensed more than 800 tourism agencies and organizations. Licensing protects the interests of tourists by guaranteeing agencies meet international standards and services, creates equal possibilities for all entrepreneurs at the tourist market, improves services and leads the industry to international norms. Licensing stipulates that a tourism agency should have necessary equipment, means of communications, bank account and well-trained personnel.

The Ukraine is trying to enter the international market of tourism to popularise Ukrainian tourist potential to attract foreign tourists. We have come to understand that only our joint efforts will help us achieve our goals and bring foreign tourists to the Ukraine.