3. Talk on how parents feel about their children travelling on their own for the first time.

It goes without saying that parents is always get worried when their children go abroad to visit new places and get to know other ways of living. Without any doubt traveling is necessary for all of us as it broadens our minds and horizons, it’s kind of relaxation and a wonderful opportunity to get away from it all. When children go on a journey they relax their body, refresh their spirits and renew the energy. But they may not even guess that their parents can’t sleep for a while thinking of them. Just imagine, a father or a mother helps the child to get ready for the first travel abroad. At the luggage store they want to buy him a suitcase, but he heads for the duffels and says that suitcase are more for old people.

The American boy went to London and called his father and reported that London was like no place in America. The boy was really fascinated by visiting new place in Europe, he hiked though a crowd of Scottish sheep and climb the mountain in a rainstorm. In France he tried to speak French, but French he learned from the cassette didn’t hold the water in Paris.

His father asked himself what it was all like. He was never been himself outside the US and when he was young he made a list of experiences he intended to have before he reached 21, but he had never done them. So when his son called, he sat down all the kitchen table and hung on every word. He just sat and listened. He had never listened to a telephone sp intently and with such pleasure as he did then. It was wonderful and moving for him to hear news from his son that was so new for him.

And when his 15-year-old son returned home from abroad with a dozen rolls of exposed films and a hundred dollars in uncashed traveller’s cheeks, he sat amazed. Father says that the night when your child returns with dust on his shoes from a country you’ve never seen is a night you would gladly prolong into a week.

4. Talk about stereotyped ideas that people may have about the way of life in oyher countries.

Nobody wants to be average. So generalizations about nations aren’t usually welcomed, though sometimes they are quiet accurate. The dangers may go even deeper, when someone tries to generalize from his own limited experience.

The Americans, for instance, are the nation, about which numerous stereotyped ideas exist. They are created, as a rule, by the people who have never been to the USA, but nevertheless, they are apt to assure others categorically the country isn’t worth visiting. They invent false stereotypes, which in fact, turn out to be nothing more than inaccurate information, gathered from 2nd hand sources.

For instance, you may hear that the whole pace of life among Americans is dreadful. It’s a perpetual everyday strain. The social pressures are tremendous. This may seems appalling to people committed to the idea of actually living in town which is unheard of in America. It’s supposed that Americans don’t even know about slipping away at weekends to some peaceful place in the country, because countryside is entirely occupied by all those immense suburban housing developments. The idea of typical American housewife is even more amusing. It’s believed that she has nothing to do but go mad from boredom and frustration.

Another prejudice about the Americans is that their habit of taking showers is the mania about personal cleanliness. Am-n food is described as flavorless, stuff with no decent fruit and vegetables. Finally, even Am-n children are said to be unbearable.

However, even coming to the US, you get surprised to see quite the opposite and it wouldn’t be some local atipicality, because in reality the pose of Am-n life isn’t a dreadful rat-race at all, although it has certain peculiarities, one should be ready to adopt oneself to. As for social pressures, I think, they do exist everywhere. I’m sure Americans give a good example of hard work and optimistic life-style. This «can-do-spirit»proves that with the necessary willingness and inventiveness one can overcome all the difficulties. So, Am-n tend to be trendsetters in lifestyle. And, as for stereotypes I’d say that in nowadays mobile world of traveling and active interaction any stereotype ideas will soon be nonsense.