THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE AS THE TOOL OF LEARNING OTHER CULTURES
On October 23 2017, the 13th Foreign Language Festival “Linguafest” was started at Poltava University of Economics and Trade (PUET). During this festival all university students can use their language skills taking part in different language contests, round tables, discussions and other events organized by the Chair of Business Foreign Languages.
The first day of the festival began with the exchange of cultures – the meeting of the first-year students majoring in Hotel and Restaurant Business and the foreign students taking the foundation course at the university. Ukrainian students hospitably invited foreign students to get acquainted with Ukrainian cuisine: they cooked Ukrainian national dishes (halushky, pancakes, baked meat, tarts and pies), as well as a cake and tea. During a warm conversation in English students learned out much about hobbies, life and study of each other, customs and traditions of different countries. Foreign students could understand the Ukrainian culture better because they arrived to study in Ukraine only in autumn and they are still adapting to a new country.
The most interesting part of the meeting was students’ sincere singing of national anthems. Students could demonstrate beauty and melodiousness of the anthems of Gambia, Turkey, Lebanon, Morocco, Yemen, Jordan, Pakistan, Sierra Leone, Guinea, and Ukraine.
