I.2.An annotation                                                  

Every nation and every country has its own customs and traditions. Britain is different from our own country. This is natural. In Britain traditions play a more important part in the life of the people than in other countries. Englishmen are proud of their traditions and carefully keep them up.

It has been the law for about 300 years that all the theatres are closed on Sundays. No letters are delivered; only a few Sunday papers are published. Foreigners coming to Britain are stuck at once by quite a number of  customs and peculiarities in the English life.

1.Purpose of the study

Why is it important not only study language, but to study culture too?What british traditions and customs do you know?

What is the attitude of  the British to their culture and traditions?

What similarities of British and Russian cultures do you know?

2.Our hypothesizes

If you know English language you will understand the british without difficulties.

It is not enough to know only English you have to study culture too.                                    

3.The methods of investigations         

Studying of regional geography books, and information from the Internet

Comparison of  British and  Kazakh  cultures

Analysis of the results

Conclusion-answer to the question “Why it is not enough to know only language for understanding the foreigner?»

                    II. Introduction

I. Customs and traditions in the UK

Every nation and every country has its own customs and traditions. Britain is different from our own country. This is natural. In Britain traditions play a more important part in the life of the people than in other countries. Englishmen are proud of their traditions and carefully keep them up.If you arrive in Great Britain you'll hear the word “tradition” everywhere. Englishmen have sentimental love for things and traditions. They never throw away old things.

In many houses in Great Britain they have fire-places and though their bedrooms are awfully cold, the English people do not want to have central heating because they do not want to have changes.

Therefore the Yeomen-Warders are dressed in traditional medieval clothes and the traditional dress of the Horse Guards regiment has existed since the twelfth century

It has been the law for about 300 years that all the theatres are closed on Sundays. No letters are delivered; only a few Sunday papers are published. Foreigners coming to Britain are stuck at once by quite a number of  customs and peculiarities in the English life.

                     III.Research part

1. Customs and traditions in the UK

Every nation and every country has its own customs and traditions. Britain is different from our own country. This is natural. In Britain traditions play a more important part in the life of the people than in other countries. Englishmen are proud of their traditions and carefully keep them up.

It has been the law for about 300 years that all the theatres are closed on Sundays. No letters are delivered; only a few Sunday papers are published. Foreigners coming to Britain are stuck at once by quite a number of  customs and peculiarities in the English life.

The 6 ravens have been kept in the Tower of London now for centuries. They used to come in from Essex for food cracks when the Tower was used as a palace. Over the years people thought that if the ravens ever left the Tower,  the Monarchy would fall. So Charles II decreed that 6 ravens should always be kept in the Tower and should be paid a wage from the treasury. Sometimes they live as long as 25 years, but third wings are clipped, so they can’t fly away, and when a raven dies another raven brought from Essex.

Some ceremonies are traditional, such as a Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace, Trooping the Color, the State Opening of Parliament. The Ceremony of Trooping the Color is one of the most fascinating. It is staged in front of Buckingham Palace. It is held annually on the monarch’s official birthday which was the second Saturday in June. Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II was Colonel-in-Chief of the Life Guards. She was escorted by Horse Guards riding to the Parade. The ceremony is accompanied by the music of bands. The procession is headed by the Queen.

In England the Queen opens the parliament once a year, she goes to the Houses of Parliament in the golden coach, she wears the crown jewels. She opens the Parliament with a speech in the House of Lords. The cavalrymen wear red uniforms, shining helmets, long black boots and long white gloves. These men are Life Guards.

In the House of Lords, Chancellor sits on the sack of wool. This tradition comes from the old times when sheep wool made England rich and powerful.

In the House of Commons there are two rows benches: one row is for the government and the other one is for the opposition. The benches are divided by a strip of carpet, which is also a tradition from old days, when that division prevented the two parties from fighting during the debates.

The Englishmen have love for old things. They prefer houses with a fireplace and a garden to a flat, modern houses with central heating. The houses are traditionally not very high. They are usually two-storied. British buses are double-decked and red, mail-boxes are yellow оr red , the cars keep to the left inside of road-all these are traditions. Nowadays  all red colors change to green colors. Queuing is normal in Britain, when they are waiting for bus, waiting to be served in a shop. People will become very angry, and even rude, if you “jump” the queue.

Most English love garden in front of the house is a little square covered with cement painted green in imitation of grass and a box of flowers. They love flowers very much.

The English people love animals very much, too. Sometimes their pets have a far better life in Britain than anywhere else. In Britain they usually buy things for their pets in pet-shops. In recent years they began to show love for more “exotic” animals, such as crocodiles, elephants, and so on.

Old customs and traditions may seem strange to visitors but the English still keep them up, which mix with everyday life in the streets.

British nation is considered to be the most conservative in Europe. It is not a secret that every nation and every country has its own customs and traditions. In Great Britain people attach greater importance to traditions and customs than in other

European countries. Englishmen are proud of their traditions and carefully keep them up. The best examples are their queen, money system, their weights and measures. The English always give people's weight in pounds and stones. Liquids they measure in pints, quarts and gallons. There are two pints in a quart and four quarts or eight pints are in one gallon. For length, they have inches» foot, yards and miles. 
If we have always been used to the metric system therefore the English monetary system could be found rather difficult for us. They have a pound sterling, which is divided into twenty shillings, half-crown is cost two shillings and sixpence, shilling is worth twelve pennies and one penny could be changed by two

halfpennies. If we look at English weights and measures, we can be convinced that the British are very conservative people. They do not use the internationally accepted measurements. They have conserved their old measures. There are nine essential measures. For general use, the smallest weight is one ounce, then 16 ounce is equal to a pound. Fourteen pounds is one stone. 

There are many customs and some of them are very old. There is, for example, the Marble Championship, where the British Champion is crowned; he wins a silver cup known among folk dancers as Morris Dancing. Morris Dancing is an event where people, worn in beautiful clothes with ribbons and bells, dance with handkerchiefs or big sticks in their hands, while traditional music- sounds. 
Another example is the Boat Race, which takes place on the river Thames, often on Easter Sunday. A boat with a team from Oxford University and one with a team from Cambridge University hold a race. 
British people think that the Grand National horse race is the most exciting horse race in the world. It takes place near Liverpool every year. Sometimes it happens the same day as the Boat Race takes place, sometimes a week later. Amateur riders as well as professional jockeys can participate. It is a very famous event. 
There are many celebrations in May, especially in the countryside. 
Halloween is a day on which many children dress up in unusual costumes. In fact, this holiday has a Celtic origin. The day was originally called All Halloween's Eve, because it happens on October 31, the eve of all Saint's Day. The name was later shortened to Halloween. The Celts celebrated the coming of New Year on thatday. On October 31st, the eve of all Saints’ day is celebrated. It is marked by costume balls or fancy-dress parties and is popular among children who play trick-or-treating game, and observe another custom-making jack o’lanterns out of pumpkins (the pumpkin is scraped out, eyes, nose and mouth are cut and the lighting candle is put inside). This is made to scare friends

   Another tradition is the holiday called Bonfire Night. 
On November 5,1605, a man called Guy Fawkes planned to blow up the Houses of Parliament where the king James 1st was to open Parliament on that day. But Guy Fawkes was unable to realize his plan and was caught and later, hanged. The British still remember that Guy Fawkes' Night. It is another name for this holiday. This day one can see children with figures, made of sacks and straw and dressed in old clothes.. Now people make bonfires and burn on them figures of ragged dummy (“a guy”) made of old clothes and straw. During the day children put the guy in the cart and ask the passersby to spare a “penny for a guy”. The traditional food is toffee.

In the end of the year, there is the most famous New Year celebration. In London, many people go to Trafalgar Square on New Year's Eve. There is singing and dancing at 12 o'clock on December 31st. 
A popular Scottish event is the Edinburgh Festival of music and drama, which takes place every year. A truly Welsh event is the Eisteddfod, a national festival of traditional poetry and music, with a competition for the best new poem in Welsh. 

                                           2. Holidays in Great Britain

There are 8 public holidays  or bank holidays in a year in Great Britain, that are days on which people need not to go in to work. They are Christmas Day, Boxing Day, New Year’s Day, Good Friday, Easter Monday, May day, Spring Bank Holiday and Late Summer Bank Holiday. The term “bank holiday” dates back to the 19th century when in 1871 and 1875 most of these days where constituted bank holidays, when banks were to be closed.

All the public holidays, except Christmas (25 December) and Boxing Day (26 December) do not fall on the same date each year. Most of these holidays are of religious origin, though for the greater part of the population they have lost their religious significance and are simply days on which people relax, eat, drink and make marry.

Christmas Day – is a probably the most exciting day of the year for most children. English children enjoy receiving presents which are traditionally put into the stocking, and have the pleasure of giving presents. Most houses are decorated with colored paper or holly, and there is usually Christmas tree in the corn of the front room. Christmas is usually time to be with family, to feast and to merry.

The traditional Christmas Dinner includes roasts turkey or goose accompanied by potatoes, peas and carrots, pudding – usually a coin or two will have been hidden inside it, and a part of the fun is to see who finds it.

An essential part of Christmas is carol singing. No church or school is without its carol service.

December 26 is called the Boxing Day. It takes its names from the old custom of giving workers an annual present in Christmas box. Today it is the day to visit friends, go for a drive or a long walk or just sit around recovering from too much food. In the country there are usually Boxing Day Meets (hunts-fox-hunting). In the big cities and towns, tradition on that day demands a visit to the pantomime. One of the more familiar pantomimes recalls the adventures of Dick Wittington (and his cat) who lived 600 years ago. He became London’s chief citizen, holding office as Mayor 3 times. Other popular pantomime characters are: Robinson Crusoe, Cinderella, Peter Pan, Red-Riding-Hood and Puss in the Boots.

New Year in England is not so enthusiastically observed as Christmas. The most common type of celebration is a family party. At midnight everyone hear the chimes of Big Ben and a toast is drunk to the New Year. The most famous celebration are in London in Trafalgar Square where there is a big Christmas tree (an annual present from Norway), a big crowd is usually gathered and someone usually falls into the fountain.

Another popular public holiday is Easter which comes in spring at different time each year (March or April). The world “Easter” owes its name and many of its customs to a pang festival called “ester” which is the name of the Anglo-Saxon goddess of spring-time.  In England it’s time for the giving and receiving of presents: Easter chocolate eggs – (an egg signifies the Nature’s reawakening) – and hot buns. Traditionally, chicken eggs are hard-boiled and dyed various colors and hidden around for children to find. Kids are also given eggs to roll down hillsides and the one whose egg remains whole and intact  is declared the winner. Carnivals and merry-making parades are held in many places on the day before Lent. Passion Plays dramatizing the Easter story are enacted widely in England. Many families have their Easter feast blessed by the priest by either taking their food to the church or by having the priest come home. Pretzels, a kind of bread, with their interlocked shapes, remind us of arms crossed in prayer and the now famous Hot-cross buns were first made in England for God Friday. There is a popular belief that wearing 3 new things on Easter will bring good luck.

There is also May Day, people choose the Queen of May, erect maypoles around which people dance. The Summer Bank Holiday usually comes on the end of August. It’s an occasion for big sport meetings – mainly all kinds of athletics. Three are also horse race meeting all over the country; there are large fairs with swings, roundabouts, coconut shies, bingo nag other games.

3.The feature of tea in England

British (population about 59 million) daily drink 165 million. Cups of tea, with 98% of Britons drink tea with milk, but only 30% of added sugar in your tea.

At tea accounts for 40% of all liquid drinks in Britain.

Of the total consumption of tea consumed 86% and 14% of home - away from home.

According to the British idea of culture of tea drinking, to the table, regardless of time of day, always served several different kinds of tea, so that everyone can choose the tea according to your preferences and mood. This is - an expression of respect, which permeated the whole ritual of English tea. Selected tea brewed in boiling water to rinse the kettle individually, even if packaged tea. Welding, regardless of class, must insist 3-5 minutes, otherwise the tea will not reveal all of its advantages.

While the tea is brewed, fed milk, sugar, lemon and so on. E., As well as a separate kettle of boiling water - to dilute the tea to the desired level of the fortress. As the cooling water kettles are replaced by new - it is also considered a manifestation of respect for compulsory English etiquette.

The tradition of feeding milk to tea deserves special attention. Milk - an indispensable accessory of the tea ceremony in England. It is added to many varieties of Indian and Ceylon teas to mitigate the effects of caffeine and make the beverage taste less tart. About that pour into the cup first, tea or milk, the British debate for over two hundred years. Supporters and opponents both versions give strong arguments in defense of their positions, but etiquette and admits he and the other mixing method. Instead of milk in tea sometimes put a slice of lemon or tangerine.

Traditionally served with tea and toast muffins. You can also offer bread, butter, biscuits, jam - all of what you can eat a cup of aromatic tea.

It is worth noting that in recent years in England used mainly tea bags, which accounts for almost 90 percent. In this conservative Brits are not abandoned Dummies. Just instead of loose tea bag they lay there. This is not the usual bag of thread (in England they are called "bags for one cup"), and a large bag for Dummies, which occupies 98% of the market of tea bags in the UK

Adult Englishman drinks a day, six cups of tea. Tea party usually begins early in the morning. About six o'clock in the morning the whole of England is drinking "morning tea". Whereas it is usually served straight to bed when the guest had just woken up. Strong morning tea helps relieve drowsiness in the cold cloudy weather, so often in the British Isles.

At eight in the morning - a hearty breakfast - breakfast, which ends with a cup of tea of the same name. Given fortress mixture composed of Indian, Ceylon and Kenyan teas, drink usually diluted milk.

Next on the schedule - lunch, something between lunch and dinner, during which necessarily drunk «a nice cup of tea» - a nice cup of tea.