Talking to my boss It's a big pleasure to me to work in our company. I really appreciate the good treatment, flexible hours and the nearness to home. But after many considerations and calculations, I finally understood that it's not profitable to me to return to the work after my maternity leave, at current job conditions. I want to advance to salary and conditions that match my education and experience. And if you don't need an engineer at this position, I think it's a good point for me to search for a new work place, that interested in engineer and can offer working conditions accordingly. Anyway I want to thank you for a great experience, I've grew a lot as a person and as a professional during my work at the company.

How we did sport I don't like sport at all. Being a child I did a lot of sport (dancing, gymnastics, shaping ), but around the age of twelve I found out that there are so many things to do, much more interesting than sport. At school I have often skipped my sport lessons, since the sport's grade does not considered in the graduation average. I like to move myself, I like to walk a lot, to travel, and I can go for a long distances, but doing sport seems to me too boring and tiring. Today I'm 26 years old, and after two wonderful subsequent pregnancies I remained not only with two beautiful babies, but also with almost ten kilo of overweight, so I finally decided that I have to do something with myself in order to get my body back and wear my old clothes. First of all I tried to find a group activity, something like aerobics or Kick boxing, but there is difficult to find an appropriate time in my town. I can join the group only later in the evening, after my children are going to sleep, and there are no activities in this time. So I decided to try to work out at home, my husband liked the idea and joined me. For a first lesson I chose a 20 minutes hiit workout in YouTube , that seemed me perfect for the beginners. Approximately 3 minutes after the beginning both me and my husband felt extremely tired. 5 minutes later we understood that we can just turn off the TV, we couldn't move any part of the body. It was sad and funny together. We stood looking at each other and laughing. Our first sport lesson was not very successful...

Volunteering programs for students - part two At the second year of my degree I worked with 11 years old boy from a very difficult family. He had been seek for something like two years before I started to work with him, he had had a cancer and all the time was at hospital. A year when I was with him was his first year at school after the disease. He also had behavior and learning problems, so he was at the special education class. My job was to help him with study, with homework and adaptation and at our free time we could do anything we wanted. It was extremely difficult because of his family, that had some complicated conditions. His parents don't know even to read and write, and almost don't work. (I thought there are no such families in 21 century in modern and high developed country) His father just returned from the prison where he was because of dealing with drugs, and as I understood he continues with it. They had no ability to help to the boy. So you can figure out what level of education, culture and behavior this family has. Anyway It's very different from mine, so it was complicated and challenging to find the common language with both child and parents. But mostly we had had a good time, especially during the summer vacation when we had less homework and could spend time at swimming pool or walking at park or something else. After a year I was so tired from the boy (and especially from his strange parents), so I decided to change to work with grown ups. You choose new activity every year, and I've chosen to help to students from my major with study. I liked it a lot, I worked with the same couple of students, four houts a week with each one, during the whole year, so I have seen how our meetings helped them to improve their grades, to understand the material and to organize their time to the effective study. It was satisfying and not as hard as work with children. So I have been at this project for two years. I think this system is very useful for both sides - the needy person gets free and quality help, and a student gets a possibility to earn for the study doing relatively small number of working hours.

Volunteering programs for students - part one All the high education in Israel is pay, so students have to work hard in order to pay for their study. There many private nonprofit organizations that offer to students participation in various volunteering programs in return for part of the tuition. Usually students have to work for a year, four hours a week at social works (depending on the specification of the organization) for payment approximately equivalent to one semester tuition. There is a huge choice of volunteering activities so everyone can choose the one most appropriate for him. You can help children with study difficulties, people with chronic diseases, difficult teenagers, pensioners or students. All the programs have rather similar conditions. Most of students take a part at at least one volunteer activity, and I am not an exception.

Saint Petersburg Saint Petersburg is the second largest city in Russia (after Moscow), and one of the most beautiful places in the world. It's also called northern capital, museum under open sky and northern Venice. Saint Petersburg was founded by Peter the first at 1703, since he wanted to build modern and European capital in Russian empire. He chose a suitable geographical position on the shores of Baltic sea, Finn bay, but the climate was wet, marshy and terrible, and thousands of workers died building the city. That is the reason of other name - the city built on the bones. There is incredible amount of beautiful palaces, parks, museums and churches in the city. if you are interested in history, architecture, art, or just like exciting historical and culture monuments, you should visit Petersburg, and I promise you would not disappoint. Between the places you must see when visiting the city, is Ermitage, one of the largest museums in the world places in the former emperor's palace and offers a huge collection of art pieces. The other must monument is the fortress of saint Peter and Pavel, the church complex and the first buildings of the city. Petergof is an exciting suburb of Petersburg, the former tsar's residence, with amazing palace and park with hundreds of fountains. There are many more wonderful places in Petersburg, and to feel all the beauty you should see them by your own eyes.

Cats in my life - part two The kitten we adopted was tiny, weak, and ill with various cat's diseases. But several months later, thanking to our care and love, he became a big, beautiful and healthy cat, with long, soft, gray fur. He wasn't shiny clever as our first one, but he was much more friendly, loved to play and never scratched anybody. He had a perfect personality to live with a six year old girl that I was. Every day he was laying on my writing table, among the books , waiting for me from school and when i did my homework. He was amazing hunter and caught anything moved - birds, mice, small lizards and more. When we repatriated to Israel it was clear that he goes with us. He lived with us eighteen years, honorable age for a cat. Many years past, I have grown up, leaved the parents home and married. My husband didn't like cats at all, until one day I convinced him to buy a kitten. He obviously agreed to take a cat to pleasure me and I was a little bit worried if he would love it. But my worries were unnecessary, today they love each other so much. She's now two years old, silver colored, playful, very tender and loving people, even our two small children who sometimes can pull her tail... It's amazing how much positive emotions, love and fun bring animals to our life.