YOUR-SAY

GENDER VIOLENCE

The last 25th of November was the international day against gender violence. Did you know that 1 in 3 women worldwide have experienced physical or sexual violence, mostly by an intimate partner? I think this is horrible. 1 in 3 women are a lot of women! And the worst of all is that, in the cases of violence by an intimate partner, most of them don’t complain or go to the police to report it. Because they can’t see it, they love their partners and tolerate this; or, also, because they are afraid of it and, somehow, they decide not to tell anybody. Anyways, they suffer. They are living in a constant nightmare. 

But violence can be stopped. It can be difficult, because this is something that is in men’s or women’s head (because there is also gender violence where women abuse men), and it’s very difficult to change someone’s opinion or beliefs. It’s not like a virus that can be cured by medications or vaccines. But it can be prevented. I don’t know exactly how, and I know that is something that can’t disappear all of the sudden. It needs time but, step by step, maybe within some years (I hope not too much) gender violence will disappear (or almost).

Personally, I don’t know why this terrible thing happens so much. I think one of the reasons it’s because these men (focusing on gender violence against women) think that they are superior to women. They are based on history, when in most of cultures women were considered much inferior than men. And, unfortunately, there are remains of this way of thinking nowadays. Gender violence against women is an example. So, these men think that their wife, partner, mother or daughter is and object. Well, it’s THEIR object, and they can do whatever they want with her. They think that women have to obey to man. And, worst of all (as I said before) is that most of the women didn’t complain or go to the police to report it. In these cases, I think it’s very important for them to have a friend or someone to talk with them about this because friends or family can help a lot. Now, there are a lot of campaigns against gender violence, helping women to report their problems. This is the case of my country, Spain, but there are a lot of countries (mostly in Africa or in South America) that don’t do these things, so it’s more difficult for women to solve their problem.

I think the worst of all is that a lot of the cases of gender violence end up with woman’s death. I can’t understand why they end up killing their partner and why there are so many cases. This is repugnant and needs to stop.

P.S. In this post, I focused on gender violence against women, because it’s what happens more. Unfortunately, this happens also against men and we don’t have to forget that.

FILM REVIEW

HACHI: A DOG'S TALE

Hachi: A Dog’s Tale is a British-American drama film released in 2009 that is based on the true story of a Japanese dog, Hachikō, a faithful dog who went everyday on a train station in Japan at the same hour waiting for his owner to get out of work. Even after his death, Hachikō continued waiting for his owner every day at the same time in the same place until he died. Actually, there is a statue of Hachikō in the train station that he used to wait for his owner. The film is a remake of a Japanese film called Hachikō Monogatari (“The Tale of Hachikō”) released in 1987. It’s a very emotional film that made me cry a lot, but I was worth it because the storyline is beautiful.

The film is about a college professor called Parker Wilson who, one day, picks up a dog who was lost in the train station that he uses every day to go to work. He decides to bring him home until he finds the dog’s real owner. He sees that the dog has a collar with his name, but the name is in Japanese. Then, he discovers that the dog’s name is Hachi (that means “eight” in English) and that the dog is an Akita, a Japanese dog breed. From that moment, Parker does whatever he can to find out who the dog belongs to, while he and Hachi start becoming great friends. Although Hachi is not like the normal dogs (for example, he can’t learn the type of tricks that dogs do), he demonstrates to be very loyal waiting for Parker every day in the train station when he gets off his job, even though Parker at first didn’t want to.

What I liked the most about the film is the storyline. I have to admit that I get emotional very easily when I’m seeing that type of films. But, with this film, while I was watching it I couldn’t stop crying. I think it was the film I cried the most watching it. This film is trying to teach us what loyalty is, doing it though the most loyal animal in the world: the dog. As everyone says, the dog is man’s best friend, is the only one that loves you much more than he loves himself. Also, I find impressive that fact that this story is real, Hachikō existed. I love what this film is trying to transmit to us, the values, the feelings that nowadays our society has destruct. Also, the actors, the music (the soundtrack), the story, the ambient… all these things create a pile of sensations that no other film has ever transmitted to me. Focusing on the main actor, Richard Gere, he did a great job. I think he was perfect for the role that he played.

I don’t think I have anything that I don’t like about this film. I don’t have anything to criticize; for me, this film is a 10. I recommend everybody to see this film, because I think it’s for all ages, no matter how old you are, this film is perfect for everybody. Well, maybe I don’t recommend a kid to see it, because maybe he or she won’t understand the message of the film or only will focus on how cute the dog is. A part from that, I think this is a good movie for everybody.

As I said before, for me this film is brilliant, so my rating is:

TRAILER:

NEWS

SCIENTIFIC PIGEONS

Some researchers have agreed that pigeons have a talent to diagnose breast cancer: basically, they can differentiate a healthy tissue and a tumor (this task can be very difficult for inexperienced human observers), but they are not as good reading mammograms.

The researchers decided to train pigeons because they saw researches saying that their visual memory is impressive (they can remember about 1800 images), they can distinguish identities and emotional expressions, letters of the alphabet…

Basically, pigeons have to look at an image of a tissue and have to choose if it’s a benign one or a cancer, choosing one color or another in a computer screen. To make sure they weren't memorizing the pictures, scientists changed them constantly, but pigeons passed the test with fantastic results anyways. At first, pigeons got right 50% of the answers but, after 13 or 15 days, their accuracy increased to 85%. But the amazing thing was that they did it even better when they were in groups of 4 pigeons, and their accuracy level reached 99%.

In conclusions, the results say that pigeons can be used as surrogates for human observers in some medical image perception studies. Also, this research proves that humans and pigeons are somehow connected, because both of them, for example, can perceive and categorize complicated visual patters.

PERSONAL OPINION:
Personally, I don't have really an opinion about this; just that I think this is a good process for science. But, in my opinion, I don’t think they will really use pigeons to do scientific tasks because I think that, if they will not use scientists to do it, they will use robots, not pigeons (although this article says that they are good predicting). Also, because pigeons are animals, and they like to live free, not locked in a lab doing strange tasks and they deserve to live free.


NEW WORDS:
Tissue: teixit muscular

Chores: tasques rutinàries

Surrogate: substitut
Kin: parent


Link: http://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/bird-brain-pigeons-make-good-pathologists-study-finds-n465787

YOUR-SAY

RACISM

The other day I was in Youtube, listening to Sia’s new song “Alive”. In the music video, it appears a little 9-year-old Japanese girl doing karate moves according to the song. Then, I looked at the comments and I saw a comment of a girl asking why an Asian girl was the protagonist of the video clip. There were people that answered telling her that she is a professional karate girl and, also, that karate was born in Japan, so it’s logical that this video is performed by a Japanese girl. But then, the girl started saying that Maddie Ziegler (the girl that is famous for being in most of Sia’s most popular video clips) is way more beautiful than the other girl. Then, people started getting mad and start telling her that both of them were beautiful and the fact that the Japanese girl is Asian doesn't makes her less pretty. Then, this girl started arguing with the people, telling them not only occidental people are prettier that the Asians, but the occidental people ARE SUPERIOR. Yes, kind of crazy. But she said that. I was surprised when I saw she said that. There are people that still think that?

Of course, (and unfortunately) there are still racist people in the world. There have always been; there are always people that think that they are superior or better than another one. For example, many years ago there has been racism against Jewish people in Germany or against black people in USA because of the slavery, etc. Nowadays, there are laws against racism and all types of discrimination saying that “we are all created equally”. But this doesn’t mean that now racism doesn’t exist.

Most of the time, racism is against black people and Arabic people, because many years ago, the “white” people considered them inferior, and that thought of superiority is still here unfortunately. I think one of the reasons why people are racist is because we tend to create stereotypes. For example, there are people that think that black people are bad, a bad influence, and when they saw a black boy they automatically thought bad things. Without knowing them, being totally ignorant. Or, now, with what happened in Paris, there are people that think that all Muslims or Arabic people are terrorists. Such an absurdity. I think that we don’t have to generalize; and, of course, the color of the skin is not a great point to base on to classify the people. There are good people and bad people independently from the color of their skin.

Normally, the racist are the white people, but not always. There are black people that are racist to white people. Normally, this happens because these black people creates a hate against white people because what they did to them in the past (for example, in USA, that black people were normally slaves) or because they are tired of the racism nowadays so they start feeling very angry and they end up being racist to white people.

But, changing the subject and getting back to Sia’s video, the girl that commented the video said that she was 12. All the people were arguing with her because of what she thought, but if that girl thinks that way is because her parents have influenced her. Well, it’s not always the case, but normally, it is. Parents influence their kids, and if the kids don’t change their mind, they will teach this to their children and racism will never disappear. Well, I don’t know if maybe one day racism will totally disappear. I think it’s very difficult, but it could be possible. I hope so.

SIA'S VIDEO:

ANOTHER VIDEO ABOUT RACISM:

ORAL PRESENTATION

Personally, I think our presentation was good. We chose an interesting topic and our visual resources (the prezi and the video) were fine. These resources helped our classmates to understand better what we were saying and it also made the presentation more interesting. I think that, in general, our pronunciation was quite good and the way we expressed our ideas was quite good too. In my case, there were a few times that I got stuck in some words or moments, but I tried to get on.

Also, we tried to look at the audience most of the time to get their attention and we didn't look at our papers or notes a lot. Talking about the time, our oral presentation was quite long (it lasted 14 minutes more or less plus the video).

NEWS

A STRANGE HOTEL 

Japan is known, among other things, for its strange inventions such as musical toilets and 3D printed fake food replicas. Now, they have surpassed themselves creating a hotel run entirely by robots in Nagasaki. In this hotel, called Henn-na Hotel (which it means “Strange Hotel”), robots will guide you to your room, clean it, bring your luggage into it… Also, thanks to internal sensors and an adaptive artificial intelligence, these humanoid robots will maintain eye contact with you, blink, breathe and answer your questions. They can speak in Japanese, Chinese, Korean and English.

In addition, this hotel has door locks that use face-recognition technology on guests, so they can enter in their room without a key. Also, room temperatures are controlled by body heat sensors that will automatically adjust comfort levels. Every room has a kawaii robot assistant that guests can interact with in order to set wake-up times, for example. Other strange robot is one of the receptionists, an animatronic dinosaur robot.

The use of robots and the automated services is done to reduce labor costs, save energy, reduce waste and develop a self-sufficient hotel powered by solar energy and machines. The hotel has 144 rooms and the price for staying a night there is $73.

PERSONAL OPINION:

In my opinion, I found this a very interesting, fascinating (and a bit strange) thing. It’s an original and different hotel, not very expensive and the rooms are nice. But, I think this is a little bit creepy. In addition, it’s always nice to walk into a hotel and receive a smile from the receptionist, not an artificial “hello” without feelings. Also, there are a lot of people without a job, and if we keep putting robots doing human’s jobs there will be even more people being unemployed. Robots are replacing people, and I don’t think this is a great idea.

NEW WORDS:

- Quirky: estrafolari
- Eerily: de manera horripilant
- Concern: preocupació


Link: http://thenewstack.io/hotel-run-entirely-robots-opens-japan/

YOUR-SAY

PERSONALITY OR PHYSICAL ATTRACTION?

When you meet someone for the first time, there are some things that you notice about them, like the way they dress, their body, their face's beauty, their hair, height… Basically, their appearance. It’s the first thing that we see in the first time, even before they say a word. It’s normal because, of course, we don’t see a person and know at the moment how their personality is; they don’t have a piece of paper stuck in their head that says how their personality is. So, we only see their physical appearance and we don’t know anything about their personality. In that point, some people ask: should we focus on the physical appearance over their personality? Or vice versa?

We are living in a society where someone’s appearance it’s very important. Also, our idea of beauty may be a bit unconsciously marked by the media: Internet, television, magazines… Although we all have an own opinion of beauty, the most of the people have quite the same idea, which is the one that says the media. For example, the prototype of the perfect women nowadays is slim, tall but with boobs and butt (called the 90-60-60). Of course, not for every men and women this is the perfection, but that’s what the media tells us. Also, we took as an example the celebrities; a lot of celebrities are recognized as being “the most beautiful people in the world”. For example, people like Angelia Jolie, Brad Pitt, Emma Watson… We have also lists that rank the celebrities based only on their looks. Because the appearance is the most important thing, right? That’s what they try to say to us. Well, I guess people have a tendency to be very superficial.

Talking about love, when you are searching for your “soul mate”, a good personality should definitely be at the top of your list. Of course you would like to have a partner that you are physically attracted to. Who wouldn’t want that? But you shouldn’t be in a relationship with somebody only because of their look. Remember that the outside beauty doesn’t last forever; the inner beauty does (well, yes, a person’s personality can change through the years but, normally, we have an own personality, and it doesn’t change that much as time passes). For example, let’s suppose that you marry a very handsome man or a beautiful woman but not intelligent at all. Yes, you have a hot partner at home, but you can’t hold an intelligent conversation with him. How cool, right?

In my opinion, I think that both of them are important. That people who say that only the personality matters… Well, I’m not totally agreeing with them. I think that, although having a good personality (or a personality that you find cool) it’s such an important thing, so is feeling attracted to your partner. Although, I have to recognize that there are people in the world that can be in love with a person only because of his or her personality. But, normally, for the most of the people, it’s necessary both of things. Also, there are people who are in a relationship with somebody only because “he/she is hot”. For me, this isn’t true love, it’s just physical attraction. And yes, you can have fun with them if they want you too, but I think that it isn’t good to start a relationship without feelings. So, as I said before, for me, both of them are important: you have to like that person in all ways; you have to love him or her inside and outside.

But now, let’s be honest. We have all been guilty of focusing on a person’s physical attributes. It’s a natural thing; it’s the first thing that we see in a person. Then, if you meet that person, you start knowing their character and personality. But there is something that I always ask myself: if you don’t like a person’s appearance, would you consider to give them a chance? As I said before, humans have a tendency to be superficial, so I think this is a good question to ask to yourself.

NEWS

TERRORIST ATTACKS IN PARIS

A state of emergency has been declared across France after attacks in Paris that killed at least 128 people. Also, 200 people were injured, 90 of them seriously. Eight assailants had died, seven of them had killed themselves with explosive belts at various locations and one had been shot dead by police. President François Holland said was an "act of war" organized by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) group.

France was on high alert for attacks because of a video that the ISIL group released on Saturday saying that they would attack France if France continued bombing of its fighters in the Middle East. They literally said “As long as you keep bombing you will not live in peace. You will even fear travelling to the market".

Yesterday, at night, the attacks began. The deadliest attack was on the Bataclan, a popular concert hall where group Eagles of Death Metal was performing. Four gunmen armed with explosive belts killed at least 80 young people who were attending to a rock concert at the Bataclan music hall. Luckily, dozens of survivors were rescued and the attackers were killed at the site. About 40 more people were killed in five other attacks in the Paris region. 14 of them were killed while they were at the restaurant Le Petit Cambodge by a gunman who opened fire with a Kalashnikov. There were five more locations in close proximity where shootings took place around the same time and killed more people, like bars or restaurants.

One of them happened near the Stade de France in the northern suburb of Saint-Denis, where the France-Germany friendly soccer match was being played. The President Hollande and the German foreign minister were watching it when the attacks occurred. The explosions were audible on television during the live broadcast. Police helicopters circled the stadium and Holland left to the interior ministry to deal with the situation. The match continued until the end, but people found out what was going on in the streets of Paris. At the end of the match, everyone got on the pitch for security reasons. 

This morning, France has woken up with security all across the capital, with about 1500 soldiers deployed in Paris. Also, all public transportation services have been cancelled. Residents in Paris were asked to stay indoors for precaution.

Barack Obama (USA), David Cameron (GB) and Angela Merkel (Germany) were all very shocked by the events in Paris and offered France their help. The leaders of other countries also gave their condolences for the French people in general. Also, the people around the world has sent support and their condolences to France and the French people using hashtags like #prayforparis, #jesuisparis and others through social media.

PERSONAL OPINION:

What happened in Paris was a terrible thing. It died a lot of innocent people. I just wanted to say that maybe we are giving a lot of attention to France because it’s “an important country” because these type of things (terrorist attacks) happens EVERYDAY around the world, specially in Syria. Also, in the same week that happened the terrorist attacks in France, it happened the same type of attacks in Beirut and in other countries. But France captured all the attention. All lives mean the same, have the same value; or it is better a French person that any other? The skin color or the religion didn’t make us different (or less important).

With this, I don’t want to say that what happened in Paris it’s not important. Of course it is! And it was a horrible thing. I just want to say that we are very hypocrite if we thing that what happened in France it’s more important than what happens to the other countries around the world that we consider “inferior” than us. A life is a life. And all lifes are equal.


 NEW WORDS:

- Gunman: persona armada
- Manhunt: cacera / recerca 
- Flank: flanquejar (estar al costat o rodejar a una persona o objecte)


Link: http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2015/11/reports-shooting-restaurant-central-paris-151113211237312.html

YOUR-SAY

MAN ON THE MOON

John Lewis's Christmas' Advert is now a typical thing for this time of the year. I personally love these ads because they’re always very deep, sentitive and always make me cry.

This year wasn’t different. The story is about one little girl who, one night, looking through her telescope at the moon, she finds an old man living there. She’s amazed, and she keeps watching him, but she can notice that the man is feeling alone and isn’t happy, so she wants to help him. She tries to send him a message in several ways, but she can’t do it. Then, on Christmas night, she manages to send a telescope to the man in the moon with balloons. The man smiles when he notices that someone cares about him, and he’s even happier when she can finally see the little girl in her house watching him and waving at him.

Personally, I liked very much, even made my cry! The part I liked the most was the end, when the man and the girl finally can see each other and both smile (and even we can see the man crying). But the most important and beautiful thing of the ad is the message that is sending to us: not to forget the people who are alone in Christmas (specially the old people) and make them feel wanted and that someone cares about them. It makes me think about how isolated many elderly people are all year round and especially at Christmas.

Like always, there were people who criticized the ad (it’s normal, we all can express our opinion about something). Most of the reviews said that the ad has got no logical sense. They said that, if this was real, the man couldn’t breathe, or the girl couldn’t send him the message and other things. But, I say, why this ad has to be logical? It’s an ad, it can be illogical, magical or whatever it wants. Also, it’s a CHRISTMAS ad, and Christmas, among other things, represents magic, so it doesn’t have to be strange if a Christmas ad is magical or illogical. Another thing is that the previous John Lewis ads weren’t logical (for example, the one which 2 snowmen fall in love), and the people didn’t criticized that (or didn’t criticized that much).

Another thing that people say is that this ad is telling us to buy presents to solve the problem of solitude. About that, I think they’re missing the point. This advert is telling us that it’s the little things and acts of kindness that have the power to make the most difference in society. Just checking up on your elderly neighbour, speak to them, inviting them to Christmas Dinner… These things mean more than any amount of money ever could. It’s not about buying things; it’s about caring for the people that they think no one is caring about them.

So, in summary, I’ve loved this ad and the message that is sending to us: “Show someone they’re loved this Christmas”.

VIDEO:

link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wuz2ILq4UeA

FAIRY TALE

THE THREE LITTLE PIGS

YOUR-SAY

LIVE THE MOMENT OR HAVE A MEMORY?

Last week, the American newspaper “The Boston Globe” published a photo of the photographer John Banding. In that photo you can see a group of people behind a fence photographing and recording with their smartphones the actors that were presenting the movie “Black Mass”. Then, you can also see a grown woman in the first line watching the same thing not through her mobile phone, but through her eyes.

A lot of people gave their opinion about it, showing their different points of view but, a part from that, I want to show you my own opinion.

First of all, I think it’s obvious that we’re so addicted to the mobile phone, the technology, the social networks… And we know it. We became so addicted, that if our mobile phone runs out of battery it’s such a big deal. A big, big deal. Or, if simply we forget our phones at home, we start “missing the phone”, especially when everyone starts using it and you can’t, so you start feeling strange and weird, out of place.

It’s like we depend on our phone. No, I think it’s better to say that the phone became a part of us. He follows everywhere you go, like your shadow. The difference is that your shadow stops following you in the dark; the phone doesn’t. And if one day you don’t bring your mobile phone with you, somebody else will do, and maybe you will end up playing games on your friend’s phone of both of you watching videos through it. It’s like a course. Also, the mobile phone is method of salvation. I mean, for example, if you are waiting for somebody, and you don’t know what to do, you take your phone and you start checking anything, even if it’s not important, just to not feel like a lonely person. Or, another example, if you are in the bus, you do the same thing I said before. Talking about that last thing, call me a freak but I saw a lot of films when the main characters met or fall in love in the bus, or in the underground, or even in the street waiting for something or someone. They just look each other and… love. But now, we can’t do this. We are always watching our phones; we don’t look at each other. We don’t look at strangers anymore. We don’t watch the birds flying in the sky as we walk. We just head down and watch our phones. A screen. 

Of course I know that NOT EVERYONE is like this. But I’m talking for the most of the people (especially the teenagers and the young people) who do this.

So, talking about the photo, I think it shows what our generation is like nowadays. As I said before, we’re always using our smartphones. A lot of people criticized that these people in the photo are not enjoying the moment as much as the elder woman, and I’m totally agree with them. Clearly, if you are recording something you have to be attending to the phone, making sure you’re recording it well and all these things. So, you’re not enjoying the moment as much as the other people (that aren’t using their cameras or phones) do. For example, I play the guitar, so three or four times a year I do concerts. My mother always wants to recorder it, to have a memory, but every time she ends up just recording a part of it, because she says that she wants to enjoy the concert and the music, and if she is recording, she can’t enjoy as much. And she feels the difference between recording, or just enjoying of the moment.

Well, recording or taking photos of the moment have good parts too: you have a memory for the rest of your life (unless you lose the photo or the video), and you can show this to anyone you want.

With this, you have the sensation of having been there, right? I mean, it’s normal, you have been there. But, if you think about it, and let’s suppose that you where recording all the time, it’s like you haven’t been there. Well, I really don’t know how to say that. I mean, when you were recording, you were watching it through your phone, so you technically never have seen it in your own eyes, just through a video. Because even the moment you were watching it for the first time, you were doing it through your phone. Yes, I know this is quite confusing, but I hope you understand me.

Basically, recording videos or making photos has advantages and disadvantages, but, in the end, do you think it’s worth it recording it, but not enjoying the moment? In my opinion, I think that nothing is worth than enjoying the moment and living the moment (quite hipster, right?). You only have the opportunity to see what you’re seeing once, so we have to just enjoy. Although I recognize that it’s cool to have a memory of a cool thing for forever. Obviously, I have a lot of photos or videos of different moments of my life that I love and I’m happy that I have them.

So, in the end, I think that we have to do both things: enjoy the moment and make photos and record things. Just a bit of all, because each thing has advantages and disadvantages. We don’t have to bring it to the extreme like some people do.

I know I haven’t talked much about the photo in particular, but the photo was just a thing to introduce what I wanted to talk about.

I let you a video that shows our addiction to the phone that I've found very interesting "I forgot my phone"

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OINa46HeWg8

FESTIVAL

ALBUQUERQUE INTERNATIONAL BALLOON FIESTA

The Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta is a festival of hot air ballons. The Festival basically consists of a lot of hot air balloons (it has arround 750 ballons) filling the sky. It's the largest hot air balloon festival in the world and approximately 100.000 spectators watch it every year.

In the festival, there are also special events or things: the Special Shape Rodeo (there are different types of balloons, like one in the shape of a cow or a baby), the Balloon Glows (it takes place at night, and all the balloons shine), the Fiesta Challenge (a game where balloonists attempt to drop a marker closest to a target), the America's Challenge Gas Balloon Race (where special long-distance gas balloons are inflated and then launched.The winner of the race is the balloon that travels the farthest), the Fight of the Nations Mass Ascension (where balloonists from each nation launch, one at a time, to their national anthem and waving their nation's flag)...

Where does it takes place? It takes place in Albuquerque, New Mexico (USA). In a big field where the people can relax and have a great time looking at the beautiful sky full of baloons.

When? Every year, during the early October and it's quite long: it lasts nine days!

Why? This festival started in 1972, because of the 50th birthday celebration for a Radio in New Mexico (770 KOB Radio). The manager of the Radio asked Sid Cutter (the first man to own a hot air ballon in New Mexico) if they could use his balloon as part of the festivities. He agreed, but then they wanted to have as much hot air balloons as they could, so they tried it. In the end, 13 balloons attented to the party and 20.000 people went to the celebration. In fact, they also did a competition of hot air balloons in the celebration (it was like a race).
The next year, the Fiesta became and international event because of the competition. They saw that the race was a good idea, so they decided to do the first World Hot Air Balloon Championship. Then, the next year, they did it again, and again, and again... until now (they are still doing it).

Video

REBEL SONG

SAME LOVE - MACKLEMORE

As a rebel song, I've chosen Same Love by Macklemore and Mary Lambert. I have chosen it because it's a song that criticizes the society and talks about the issue of gay and lesbian rights.

It was the third single from their 2012 debut studio album, The Heist. The song was adopted as an anthem by supporters of legalizing same-sex marriage. Macklemore explained that the song also came out of his own frustration with hip-hop's positions on homosexuality. He said: "Misogyny and homophobia are the two acceptable means of oppression in hip hop culture. It's 2012. There needs to be some accountability. I think that as a society we're evolving and I think that hip hop has always been a representation of what's going on in the world right now".

I actually love this song and what it represents. It's a calm song and the rhythm is perfect.

YOUR-SAY

"DEAR FAT PEOPLE"

These last two or three weeks there has been such a stir in the English-speaking community in the Internet. Just because a video of a blonde and skinny girl named Nicole Arbour who talked about the fat people. The video is called "Dear fat people", and in the video she talks about fat people, making fun of them and also telling them to loose weight (in a rude way). A lot of American and English youtubers (also from other nationalities but most of them were from USA and from England) reacted to the video making other videos showing their opinion of it. Most of the comments of the girl's video were bad, so Youtube had to close Nicole's channel. After some days, Youtube opened her channel again and even let the video in Youtube.

In my opinion, the video is not as bad as everyone says. Even though this video is SO rude (Nicole explains her opinion in a very disrespectful way and, of course, there's other ways to tell what she wants to say) I think everyone criticized her because she defended a position that is "socially incorrect". I mean, if for example a man tells a skinny woman that she is too skinny, nobody would say nothing; but, if a man tells an obese woman that she is too fat, everybody would be like "You're so rude! How did you dared to say that?! or would think something like this. With this I want to say that there are topics that we considerate tabu, like telling fat people that they are fat. But, I think that we have to change our mentality about that. Of course, I don't mean that when you see a fat person you have to tell them that they're fat, no. Because that will mean that you're rude and I'm not saying that we have to be rude to people. But telling a friend or a close person that they're fat and they should get slimmer for their own health it would have to be a normal thing, because you are caring for their health. As much as we tell people with anorexia or bulimia to eat and get fatter for their health, we have to do the same with obese people, because obesity is a disease like anorexia or bulimia.

Another point is that if a fat or obese person had done this video instead of that girl, people wouldn't had criticized that much, because it's accepted when "you laugh at yourself". People reacted so bad at the video because it was made by a SLIM BLONDE WOMAN. For example, if a black guy makes a joke about black people, its funny; if a bald man makes a joke of bald people, it's funny; and also if fat people make jokes about fat people, it's funny. But if a white man tells a joke about black people... that's racism. And I'm not saying that it isn't but, I think everyone should be able to make jokes about everything, as long as we're polite and not trying to offend anybody. We have to take life with a little bit of humor. A joke is a joke, and we have to learn to tell jokes and not get offended about that as much as we have to stop using jokes as a medium to hurt or offend people. 

Of course, this is only MY opinion and I know that everyone has their own opinion and maybe they will not think the same as me. With this post I don't want to offend anybody, I just wanted to do a reflection.

I give you the link of Nicole Arbour's video with subtitles in spanish (I recomend to see it to understand better my opinion):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LriDtaf9VAo

A LITTLE BIT ABOUT ME

Dear Anna,

I'm Paula Caball, I'm 16 years old and I'm from Castelló d'Empúries. I was born in Figueres the 16th of August of 1999. Well, to start my personal presentation, I'll tell you a bit of how I am physically: I'm not very tall, but also not very short, so I think I have a standard height. I'm slim, I have brown, straight hair and two big brown (with a little bit of green) eyes.

Talking about how I am personally (which I think it's more important and interesting), I think I'm outgoing and I try to always be a happy person. I think I'm also friendly, but sometimes I get sad or mad so easily. I mean, that I'm a very sensitive person and sometimes that's not a good thing. 

I love playing sports. I've been playing basketball since I was 10 years old with a team of my village, Els Esplais. I always wanted to do athletics, because I love running and I think I'm quite good in it but, in that time, all of my friends wanted to do basketball, so I went where all of my friends went. Then, I discovered that I actually liked basketball, and I kept playing it in the same team since I was 10 until this year. This year I had to stop playing it because last year I was so overwhelmed because of the studies and my after-school activities. I went to guitar classes twice a week and I also went to the basketball trainings twice a week (and obviously I also had to go to the matches) and that took me a lot of time (specially the trainings and the maches). Also, my mother wants me to get the First Certificate Exam, so she wants me to join English classes after school. I saw that I couldn't do everything, so I left basketball because it was the activity that took me more time. In fact, I wanted to still doing it, so it was hard to left the team. But I will not stop doing sport because I like it and It's healthy, so I'll go running twice a week (or maybe in some specific weeks I'll go once or three times).

As I said before, I go to guitar classes, so I play the guitar. I love listen to music, I don't know what I would do without music in my life (I think it just would be more boring). I also like to sing (even though I'm not a good singer) and playing the guitar at the same time, doing (or trying to do) covers of my favourite songs. But I have to admit that I'm not very good in it. Well, the important thing is that I enjoy doing it, so the other things just doesn't matter or are not as important.

 I will talk a little bit about my family. My father's name is Xavi and my mother is called Neus. I don't have any brothers or sisters even though I always wanted to. I love animals, specially dogs, and I always wanted to have a dog or any pet, but my mother hate animals (well, she's afraid of animals) so I've never got a pet. Well, when I was little I had two little fishes but they died after a year. Then, when I was 8, my grandmother bought me a little dog for me, but my mother didn't want him at home, so he lives with my grandmother. But I visit him and my grandma every two weeks (because she lives away from me). His name is Bobi, he's a yorkshire terrier and he's so adorable! He's so nervous but he doesn't bite, he just licks people. He's also a bit shy when he don't know people.

So, this is a little part of my life and how I am. I hope you like it and discovered new things about me.

FINAL REFLECTION

This is my last post in this blog and I'm going to do a final reflection about this last school year.

This year we created a blog and, at the begining of the school year, I was so exited about that. Now I think this blog was a good idea because it's a different way to work, also because most of the time we work with notebooks and books. And also we can do our blog on our own way, decorate it with our style... We had to do some "My world", and it was good because we could talk about whatever we want (our favourite music or movie, give our opinion about something...). But I have to say that, for me, sometimes it was quite difficult to choose a theme to talk about. I also have to say that some tasks of the blog were a bit difficult or very boring. Well, I have to accept that, because it's a work but, for example, the tasks about comic relief, suspense, gothic novel... I think were all the same and a bit boring. But, in general, I liked doing the blog.

My best post I think it was one "My World" that I talk about how hypocrite the people is criticizing skinny people and defending fat people, and then saying "everyone is perfect" (the link). I chose that post because I liked the way I expressed my idea. 

About the projects, this year we've done the project about dreams, the scary project, the love project and the project about photography. We did the project about dreams at the begining of the school year. The project I liked the most I think it was the love project. I don't know exactly why but I liked it. But I also loved the scary project. But I wish we could see a scarier movie because the one we saw was not scary at all. Finally, the photography project. It was the project I liked the least because, basically, I'm not very interested in photography. But, even that, I enjoyed it because I learned new things (as in the previous projects).

The part I liked the most about the projects was doing videos. Even though they take a lot of time to do them it's always so funny doing it with my friends. And, in the end, we're always very proud of us. Also, showing it to our classmates and seeing the other's videos it's always good.

In summary, I liked the way we worked this year, I think it's different to the other subjects.

MY WORLD

ESPLAIS

I've been playing basketball since I was 10 years old, when I was coursing 5th of Primary School. And I've always been in the same team: Els Esplais. I joined that team because all my friends were there and, you know, I was little so the only thing important were friends!

Since I joined the team, my teammates haven't changed a lot. I mean, we have been the same nice people together for years! 

But, in this season some little problems appeared. But, fortunately, not between us. We began the season very well, winning the firsts 5 matches, or when we lost, we played well. But, in mid season, we start losing matches, and played it badly. So that made lowering our moral.

Also, some of my teammates said during the season that the next year will not be playing basketball because of the studies. For example, Mireya next year will do a course in the afternoons, so she couldn't come. And me, for example, next year will be doing batxillerat, and basketball trainings and matches take so much time and I also do more extracurricular activities. So, I will not continue. 


That's why the team can't continue, it wouldn't be the same if most of us leave the team. But some of my teammates will continue playing in other teams, for example Maria will try to do a test to enter in UniGirona, one of the most important teams in Catalonia. I hope they accept her! Or some of them want to go to Bàsquet Castelló, the other team of the village. 

Last Sunday 31th of May we played our last match against Sarrià de Ter. We all wanted to win, to finish the season with a great victory. And yes, we won. We won doubling the points of the other team: 90 - 45! I'm proud of us because we made a grat game and we finished the season in the best way!

For me, this 6 years with those girls have been incredible! I shared great victories with them, as we have also shared defeats. I have learned a lot and I had a great great time. And I'm a bit sad thinking that this is over, but we will always remember our achievements as a team and all the lived moments.

Thank you to all my teammates for this 6 awesome years!!! I love you all! VISCA ESPLAIS!

MY WORLD

Last Sunday (17th May), I participated to the II Guitar Meeting of Figueres. In this meeting attended so many music schools in Alt and Baix Empordà, la Garrotxa and Girona. It also participate the only guitar orchestra of Spain, the Orquestra de Guitarres de Barcelona.

Every guitar school played their own songs (1, 2 or 3 songs) and then we played two songs together. The Orquestra de Guitarres de Barcelona played 3 songs too, and they were amazing!

On Saturday, we had to rehearse the  songs that we had to play all together. The songs were a bit difficult, specially because they were so fast. But we practice enough, and on Sunday we all made a great concert. Also, our director was the director of the Orquestra de Guitarres de Barcelona, so it was an honor to all of us.

I think it was such a good experience, because I could learn a lot and try new things. I also met new people. And, one of the bests parts, I could heard the other guitar groups and the Orchestra.

FAMOUS PHOTOGRAPHER

MY WORLD

ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES BETWEEN READING A BOOK OR AN EBOOK

Nowadays, we're so familiarized with tecnology. That's why it's not strange that we can read a book without having a book: we can read it through a screen using eBooks.

Personally, I prefer reading books, because I'm always connected to mobiles, pc... And, when I'm reading, I like to disconnect of all. Also, because I like having the book, like turn pages, smell the odor of the book... But, let's see the advantages and disadvantages of reading a book and reading an eBook.

                                                             BOOK:

ADVANTAGES:

- Books don't need energy to run.
- When you finish reading it you can keep it and save it.
- You can feel the book.
- The book is yours and you can do whatever you want with it.
- Also, the writer can sign the book.

DISADVENTAGES:
- It's more expensive.
- It takes up more space.

EBOOK:

ADVANTAGES:
- It's cheaper than a book in paper.
- You have all the books you want in the eBook. That means that it doesn't takes up much space.
- It's easy to carry the eBook, because it doesn't weights too much.
- You don't have to move or wait to buy a book. You can buy it instantatly.
- You can also search the definition on the eBook, because, most of it, bring an incorpored dictionary.

DISADVANTAGES:
- eBooks need Internet to buy any book.

- It also needs to charge the battery. And the battery can ends at any time.
- It exhausts your eyes.
- Not all the books have a digital version of it.
- You can't feel the same as the book. I mean, you can't turn the pages, smell the odor of the book...

MY WORLD

Last Saturday I went to a speech contest in Vilajuïga. Our catalan teachers (Quim and Ofra) signed up Mireia Colomer and I. 

The contest consisted of: they give us two topics: "What would you like to be invented?" and "What historical moment would you like to have lived?". They gave these topics on Thursday, so we had 2 days (aprox.) to prepare these topics. Our teachers helped us to prepare a good introduction and how to prepare the presentation. Then, on the contest, we had to choose one of these topics randomly and we had to expose it to the contest jurors and talk about it 3 minutes (in the contest we can't see the time so it was so hard to control it). The 5 best people, will go to the final.

Finally, on Saturday was the contest, so in the early morning we were ready to start. We were 24 participants from all the high schools from Alt Empordà. They divided us in 2 groups, and me and Mireia were in the first group. We were all so nervous! The participants had to go into a room where the jurors were. Into that room only were the jurors, and the parents saw us through a camera so we didn't see them, but they could see us. The participants couldn't see the other participants, so they were outside.

When it was my turn, I was so nervous because we couldn't bring any support like powerpoint or a paper, but once I started to speak, I started to feel so much comfortable and even though I forgot some things, it was good.

While the second group was exposing, the first group went to visit the "Celler Espelt" and vice versa.

Then, the most interesting part was when, finally, the jursos said the finalists. We were 24 people and it only were 5 finalists so it was hard to pass into the final. But... I passed! At that moment, I didn't expect it because there were people who had prepared a lot and me, compared to them... I thought I couldn't win. But I passed into the final so I was so exited.

The jurors give us 5 minutes to prepare the exposition. We had to expose the theme that we didn't do the first time. The first time I did "What would you like to be invented?", so this time I did "What historical moment would you like to have lived?". Personally, I think that the first one was better than the second one, so that's why I passed into the final and with the second one I had no opportunities to win, but I never lost hope. 

I was the second one to do the exposition, so I heard 3 of the other 4 participants, and I was so suprised. They did all very well! 

Finally, after a long 10 minutes, the jurors gave the final results. And I was in fifth place. It won girl from Ramon Muntaner, Olma Giró. The girl did it so well! She deserved to win.

I was very happy with my result, because I never thought I could get into the final. I also won an award, all the finalists won something: spend a day in "Forum Impulsa", that it's in june in Girona. Also the first prize was a tablet; the second, a GoPro and the third, a headphones.

I think it was a very good experience that will help me in the future and, also, I made some friends and I hope that I will see them again!

DESCRIBING A PHOTO

This is a photo of a flat-topped mountain with two cities in the bottom.

In the background, I can see the mountain covered with clouds. Also, I can see the blue sky with some stars.

In the right part, I can see a beautiful city illuminated with lights (because the photo was taken at night). Next to the city, There's the sea.

In the left part, there's another city. And, also, behind this city you can see another city or maybe it's the same city, I don't know.

In the middle of the picture there's a small light concentration, and it seems to form part of the left city, maybe it's a separated neighborhood. It stands out the main road that communicates the two cities.

In the foreground, I can see a rock with moss and maybe another plants.

This is a very cool photo. I love the contrast of the different parts of the photo. For example, the contrast between the lights of the city and the ground or the sky. Also, the clouds above the mountain are so beautiful and stunning.

LOVE STORY

BARCELONA

Last thursday 16th April the 3th, 4th ESO and 1th Batxillerat students went to Barcelona to spend the day here. The 4th ESO english students had to do some interviews to tourists (obviously, in english). 

In my group we were Nerea, Mar, Paula Valenzuela and me. We did the first interview to two girls from Belgium.

MAR: Where are you from?
GIRLS: Belgium
MAR: Ok. Is it the first time that you are here in Spain?
GIRLS: Emm.. Yes
GIRLS: No. Well, for me, it's the second time
MAR: Ok. And how did you come here? By plane, ship...?
GIRLS: Plain, plain.
MAR: How long are you going to stay here?
GIRLS: We leave tomorrow. We stayed three days at here.
MAR: Are you travelling with family or friends?
GIRLS: Friends, yeah.
MAR: What have you visited up to now?
GIRLS: Emm.. The Parc Güell, the Stadium...
MAR: Yes, Camp Nou.
GIRLS: Yeah, yeah
PAULA V: What do you like the most in Barcelona?
GIRLS: Shopping
PAULA V: Is there anything you don't like?
GIRLS: Emmm... The people in the shops are not that friendly.
PAULA V: Do you know any words in catalan or spanish?
GIRLS: Yeah, hola and buenos días. Buenas noches.
PAULA V: And do you think Barcelona is expensive?
GIRLS: No, not much.
PAULA V: Ok, thank you!

In the second interview we talk with a girl from Perú:

PAULA C: Could we ask you some questions, please?

GIRL: Yes, tell me. 

NEREA: Where are you from?

GIRL: I'm from Peru.

NEREA: Is it the first time that you are in Spain?

GIRL: No I've been... I grew up here, but I was born in Peru.

NEREA: How did you come here? By plane, ship or train?

GIRL: Oh, plane.

NEREA: Why are you in Barcelona?

GIRL: For my parents.

NEREA: How long are you going to stay here?

GIRL: I lived here for all my life so I'm not... I don't want to come back to Peru so I will be here for a long time.

PAULA C: Are you travelling with family or friends?

GIRL: For family, for family

PAULA C: What have you visited up to now?

GIRL: Sorry?

PAULA C: What have you visited up to now?

GIRL: No, I'm no... I'm not...

PAULA C: Yeah it's ok. So... What do you like the most in Barcelona?

GIRL: The most... I think it's the party but... haha but motions.

PAULA C: Is there anything you don't like?

GIRL: The weather. All the time changes. I think is in all countries.

PAULA C: Yeah, well thank you!