Activity 1

Russia's таксофоны (payphones) are not what they used to be. In Moscow, for instance, new phone-card-operated таксофоны were installed in the mid-1990s when devaluation of the рубль made coin money obsolete.

Coins – копейки and one-, two- and five-ruble coins – are back in circulation, but the old coin-operated phones are definitely on the way out. Over the last decade more and more people have given up on уличные телефоны-автоматы (another name for payphones) altogether, preferring the convenience of сотовая связь, or cellular communication.

To learn more about using a 'мобилка' (short for мобильный телефон), open the home page of one of Russia's largest providers of cellular telephone service, Мобильные Телесистемы, or МТС.

http://www.mts.ru


1			The first thing you'll need to do is to pick out a phone. Along the top of the МТС home page you'll find a collection of links. Click on "Телефоны и аксессуары." On the left-hand side of this page is a list of the various brands of telephones sold by МТС. Click on a few to see and read out the prices following the model: "Телефон ____ стоит ____". If you can't remember a number, consult Appendix F in your textbook on page 351. FYI: "у.е." (условная единица, or relative unit) usually stands in for the U.S. dollar in published prices, but it's almost never used in speech. When reading out the prices, replace "у.е." with доллар. A Little Help: You learned about case usage with the numerals 1-4 on page 255 in the textbook. Case in compound numerals is determined by the last numeral in the series. For instance: двадцать один доллар, двадцать два доллара. Numerals five and above take the genitive plural, which you will study next semester. For this exercise, you need only the commonest masculine plural ending: -ов. You saw this in the phrase "в пять часов" on page 281 of your textbook. Hence, двадцать пять долларов.




2			Of the phones you looked at, какой телефон самый дешёвый (cheapest)? Сколько он стоит? Какой телефон самый дорогой? Сколько он стоит? If you have a cellular phone of your own, look for it in the list. Сколько он стоит? А сколько Вы заплатили за Ваш телефон? Did you pay more or less than the МТС price?




3			Among the links atop the "Телефоны и аксессуары" page you'll find "Роуминг и зона обслуживания." The first word is a cognate. What does it mean? The phrase that follows means "coverage area." Click on this link. This page features maps of the areas served by МТС and its "дочерние компании," or affiliates. Find the areas served by МТС on a map of Russia.




4			The Russian phrase for "time zone" is: часовой пояс. Russia extends over 11 of them! In relation to Moscow, the other MTS coverage areas are ahead or behind by the following number of hours: Калининградская область: минус один час Омская область: плюс три часа Амурская область: плюс шесть часов Complete the following statements (you'll find all the cities mentioned on the MTS coverage maps): Когда в Москве час, в Калининграде __________. Когда в Калининграде три часа, в Омске уже __________. Когда в Благовещенске четыре часа, в Калининграде __________.




5			А ЧТО ДАЛЬШЕ? For information on Russia's time zones, try the following sites: http://www.c-s-r.ru/rusinfo/karta.htm (Time zone map in Russian.) http://www.worldtimezone.com/time-russia2.htm (Time zone map in English with current time.) http://greenwichmeantime.com/local/russia/index.htm (Extensive information and maps in English.) Russia's other major cellular service provider is Би Лайн. You'll find their website at: http://www.beelinegsm.ru

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