Housing

Housing is a manifestation of human being, it expresses our lifestyle. In the past, people lived in caves and they decorated their dwellings. Housing has been shaping up along with people. Through shacks and palaces, we come from caves, to super modern houses. In every country, there is a different style of housing. However it has something in common – people, who live in a house, should feel pleasantly.Where do you live?What’s your house/flat like?I live in a small town Namestovo in the part called Brehy. There are loads of blocks of flats. I live in one of these blocks of flats on the sixth floor. Our flat has 3 rooms which are all set on the same level. The most occupy room is living-room because we watch TV there. When you enter our living-room straight ahead is a very comfortable sofa which I like to lie on. Beside the sofa is a small coffee table. By walls there are wardrobe. There’s also TV, video recorder and computer.

The room which I like most is my room that I share with my sister. On the walls there are a lot of posters of our favourite groups. Near the wall we have 2 tables. There is wardrobe as well. We don’t have there beds but we have one sofa which we spread out before going to bed. In the centre of my room there’s a small carpet on the floor to make the room warm and comfortable. The third room is my parents’ bedroom. There are wardrobes, double bed, bed tables, reading lamps and shelves where my brother has all his toys. In our flat there’s also kitchen where we meet whole family only during sunday’s lunch. It’s very small room and there’s place only for kitchen cupboard, fridge-freezer, gas cooker, table and 5 chairs. As in all other flats in our is bathroom. There are chest of drawers, bath and washstand.We know a lot of kinds of housing. Terraced houses are built in a row and are joined one to another to form a street. Two houses joined together by one common wall are called semi-detached house. A detached house stands by itself and is not joined to another house.

A bungalow is a one-storey house. A cottage is a small village house.Housing in Slovakia is still different in cities and villages. In villages and small towns you can see a lot of semi-detached houses and detached houses as well as cottages. In the country side you can find something which isn’t in cities.That’s stables because people in villages keep livestock. I think that living in the village has one disadvantage that everyone knows everybody and you cannot do something what your neighbours won’t know. Contra living in the city is that people cannot escape from city’s noise and pollution. Comparing in the city are more opportunities to find some job or some leisure activity. On the other hand country is more healthier and there’s more nature life surroundings and people feel there safer than in cities. Everything has some cons and pros so it’s only on us where we choose to live.What’s your ideal living?I don’t exactly know how I will live in 10 or 20 years. I like to have my own house. I’d like to have a big garden with grass. I hate gardening so there will not grow vegetable.

I’d prefer small house to the big one. I don’t want to have there a lot of rooms. Bright and big rooms are necessary in my ideal house. I’d like to have big kitchen with modern equipments which would do many things instead of me. It’s difficult for me to imagine more details because I think my opinions will change.Home means a lot of different things to everyone. As I see it, home’s a place where you can return any time you need some help or encouragement and you’re there welcome. In my view it’s a place where we were growing up so we have relation to it. Home isn’t only a building. Our parents made it for us to feel safe, loved and to have nothing to miss. Consequently home is mainly the atmosphere of our relationships.In Slovakia people live in houses or flats. We build our own houses and that’s the main difference between us and British and Americans. They buy their houses from commercial builders or from the people who are already living there. The buying and selling of houses is a big business there. Almost half of all British families own the houses in which they live. In order to buy a house a family in Britain does not need to have all the money. It is possible to borrow up to 90% of the value of the house from many special banks.

A typical British house is set in a small garden and has two storeys. British people are fond of gardening. A beautiful well kept lawn is a pride of every British family. The British like to spend their free time in their houses. Everyone in the family helps around the house to make it comfortable and nice.Living conditions of American people depend much on the amount of money they have. Many wealthy people have very large houses with many rooms, tennis courts and swimming pools. On the other hand, there are also people who are homeless. Homelessness is a big social problem in the USA. Many homeless people are alcoholics and mentally-ill or just unemployed people left without living means. In spite of that standard of living is generally very high in the USA, an average American family can live comfortably and well. In the centre of big cities many people live in apartments situated in in large apartment buildings. They usually rent apartments which are owned by big companies or private owners. The americans do not stay in the same house for their whole lives because some of them like to move to another parts of the country.Choosing a place to live in is a problem which everybody has to deal with at the beginning of his adult life.

After choosing the place and the type of our future dwelling, we have to start thinking about money because buying a flat or a house is usually very expensive, but we do not need to have all money. If you work, you may take out mortgage. Young people who cannot afford to buy a flat or a house often choose to live in rented accommodation. However, it is expensive too, so nowadays it is quite common for students to live in hostels, or for young families to live with their parents.Another problem of housing is that children who grow up in the housing estate don’t have so much opportunities to spend their leisure time. They just gad with friends and do a lot of vandalism because they’re just bored and they want to try something new. So I think that the city should try to fill up their time with more activities which they can be interested in.Our World is not never-ending, so buildings are built rather skywards than abroad. People kill vegetation for their homes. They don’t care about the future. From my point of view in a few years, there will be minimal greenness, so people ought to think of our atmosphere.