RUSSIAN AND ENGLISH HOUSE

All of us want to live in a warm place with all modern conveniences. But not every person manages to do it. People in different countries live differently. I would like to describe you the average house of English family & Russian family.
Many families in Britain live in flats, but most people live in small houses built close together joined to another on one side only by one wall in common. They are called semi-detached. They are usually consist of 2 floors. British prefer to say upstairs & downstairs to first (ground) floor & second (first) floor. Downstairs are the living rooms. They are a drawing room, a sitting room & a kitchen. Upstairs are the bed rooms, a bathroom & a nursery for the children. The drawing room means that it is the largest room in a house & the one with the best furniture. This is the room where the British receive their quests; though when the familiar friends come in they generally talk in the sitting room, which is used by all the family & is not as formal as a drawing room. Almost in every English house there is a fire-place, it is usually in the sitting room. They think that electricity is cleaner but a coal fire is more homely. Around a house there is a front garden & back garden. The front garden is a smooth grass lawn, you can see also there a few flower beds. Back garden is more useful, but less pretty than front one. Vegetables, potatoes, cabbage, cauliflowers, peas & lettuce are grown there.
This house is a dream for common Russian, but it is a bit simpler in Russia. The majority of Russian population lives in blocks of flats. In a house which is not very large (has 3 or 5 stores or only 1 entrance) everybody knows all secrets of the neighbors & share their negative or positive feelings & emotions with near-living people. When a house is large (has 9 or 16 stores & many entrances) neighbors don�t know even the names of each other. In front of a house there is a children�s playground. There are several flats on one floor. Usual Russian flat consists of entrance hall, two or three rooms, kitchen, toilet & bathroom which are not very large. Some people live in private houses or cottages with gardens around. I think that living in private house or cottage is more comfortable because you have a large area at your disposal, you don�t have a quarrel with your neighbors when you make a noise or when you listen to the music in high volume, in summer you can get a sunburn in your garden.
In both English & Russian houses people have modern conveniences such as central heating, electricity, gas, cold & hot running water, telephone. They also have different furniture & appliances.
Depending on personality & financial situation people make their house & home.