NEWS

A SUPERMARKET IN DENMARK WHICH FIGHTS AGAINST THE FOOD WASTE

In Copenhagen, Denmark, has opened a new supermarket called WeFood, which sells food, cosmetics and household items that other stores rejected because they are near their expiration dates, had been wrongly labeled or had damaged packaging, but are still legal to sell and safe to consume. This supermarket sells the products 30 to 50 per cent lower than in regular supermarkets.

The supermarket has already been a huge success: the first weeks after the opening, the people have lined up before the store’s opening every morning.

This project has been applauded for a lot of people in Denmark, because this country throws away about 700,000 tons of food every year, according to several estimates. Food waste is one of the principal problems in the world right now. About 795 million people are undernourished globally, according to the World Food Program, but about a third of all the food produced in the world (1.3 billion tons more or less) is lost or wasted each year. The cost of global food wastage is about 1 trillion dollars a year, according to the U.N. Also, wasting food contributes to climate change: producing, distributing, consuming and disposing of food uses significant amounts of energy and water, which causes over 40 percent of greenhouse gas emissions. 

Nowadays, some European companies and countries are taking steps to battle food waste. In Denmark, if WeFood’s popularity continues, it will open new supermarkets across the country.

PERSONAL OPINION:

I find this a very interesting project, which will help for not wasting so much food. I think it’s ironic how in the developed countries you can find as many food as you want (more than we need) and there are countries all over the world who don’t have enough food to feed their inhabitants. Once I read that with all the food we have at the moment, we could easily end with the hunger in the world twice or three times. That’s impressive, because it makes you think that we have the solution to this problem, but we don’t try enough to solve it.


NEW WORDS:

Surplus: excedent
Shelter: refugi, alberg
Undernourished: malnodrit, desnodrit


Link: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/denmark-wefood-food-waste_us_56cf5d6fe4b03260bf75fe15

YOUR-SAY

NO MORE GENDER ROLES

I want to share with you a video that I saw a few days ago that I really liked. The video is made by Ariel, a detergent brand, and talks about an issue that still have our society nowadays: rigid gender roles.

The video shows the apologise of a father to his daughter, who lives independently with her husband and her son. The father sees how her daughter is making all the household chores while her husband is sitting comfortably in front of the TV reading a newspaper with a cup of coffee. Then he realises she can’t do it all, and that her husband must help her, but he doesn’t. He also realise that he wasn’t a good example for her, because he was like her daughter’s husband, so the girl saw her mother doing all the household chores and she followed her example. That’s why he apologises, but he also wants to help her to change that. Therefore, he writes a letter apologising for that and then he comes back home. When his wife sees him come back, she quickly wants to take all the clothes to wash them, but the man stops her and decides to do it himself. 

In the past, in most cultures, a woman’s work was to stay at home doing household chores and taking care of the kids. Fortunately, with the pass of time, this has changed and nowadays in most places women have a job like men (even though there are some inequalities that must end), but there are some gender roles that hasn’t been eliminated, and one of them is taking care of the house. This, step by step, is changing, but there are a lot of houses where almost all the household chores are done by the woman. As I said before, this must be eliminated and both men and women have to take care of the house in the same measure.

VIDEO:

NEWS

A DEAF GIRL'S DREAMS COME TRUE WHEN TINKERBELL STARTS TALKING TO HER IN SIGN LANGUAGE

Shaylee Mansfield was 4 years old when she went to Disney World for the first time. She is deaf and she never expected that the Disney icons would be able to communicate with her, so she was shocked when Tinkerbell started talking to her in sign language. Shaylee’s expression tells everything: her mouth opens completely and her eyes widen.

Her mother, Sheena McFeely, is also deaf, and she enrolled her daughter into a school where everyone speaks sign language, so Shaylee grows up feeling included. For Shaylee, school it’s a very special place and now, Disney World has become a very special place too where she can communicate with people.

The family was invited back to Disney World three years later and Shaylee receives another surprise when Minnie Mouse also talks to her in sign language.

Currently, the theme park is making steps to become more inclusive for children with disabilities.

VIDEO:

PERSONAL OPINION:

When I saw the video for the first time I became emotional, because I imagined how Shaylee felt at that moment. I think it’s a great step for Disney to find ways to make feel all the kids special regardless if they have a disability.  

NEW WORDS:

Widen: eixamplar, ampliar

Enroll: inscriure

Footage: metratge

Link: http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/features/7080459/A-deaf-girls-dreams-come-true-when-Tinkerbell-starts-talking-to-her-in-sign-language-at-Disney-World.html

YOUR-SAY

LOOK UP

A few weeks ago I saw on Facebook that a German city called Augsburg have found a solution for people who are distracted on their phones while they are walking in the street. 

Well, as you perfectly know, while you are with your phone, you’re not paying a lot of attention to what happens around you, mainly because it’s impossible to truly concentrate to a lot of things at the same time. In the last few years, the numbers of deaths of pedestrians in the street has increased, and it’s surprising that lots of them are because the person killed or injured was paying attention to their phone and not to the street. Well, it’s not that astonishing considering our addiction to the phone (of course, not everybody, but most of us). So, this German city, Augsburg, decided to put small red lights in the street, just in front of a crosswalk, for people to see it and notice when they can cross it or they can’t. Because lifting your head and look at the traffic light or just watch if there’s any car crossing was too difficult and too complicated, of course. 

I also saw that in China, in Chongqing city, they even gave people who are all day at their phones their own walking lane.

In my point of view, I think this is going way too far. It’s not normal that a city has to make a personal walking lane for people who are texting in the phone, or that they invent a little red lights to put in the street for the people who are distracted enough on their phones to not lift their head and observe what they have in front of their eyes. Please, our addiction to the mobile phones is already killing us (literally). I think it’s very stupid and embarrassing to reach this level so, please, pay attention to what’s around you and if you are walking in the streets, don’t be all the way looking at your phone to avoid that a stupid red light in the street have to tell you when it’s safe to cross instead of raise your head and look it yourself.

YOUR-SAY

#GiveElsaAGirlfriend?

A few weeks ago the hashtag #GiveElsaAGirlfriend became Trending Topic on Twitter. It all started when a girl called Alexis Isabel twitted:



Then she twitted “Dear Disney, #GiveElsaAGirlfriend”. Some people liked her idea, and they started retweeting it until it became Trending Topic.

Of course, there are always people who are against it, so some people created the hashtag #CharmingPrinceForElsa. They argued that a lot of children watch and like Frozen, and it would be a bad influence if Elsa is lesbian (I totally disagree with it).

In my opinion, I think if Elsa has a girlfriend, this will not be a bad influence for the kids; I think it will help to normalise homosexuality among children. Also, it would encourage young children who are homosexual to know that they are not strange, and that is completely fine and normal to be gay or lesbian. It will be a great step for Disney to do it, because the LGBT community hasn’t been represented in Disney movies.

On the other hand, I think it would also be nice to let Elsa be independent. I mean, all Disney movies about princesses show the little girls that they have to found a man to be happy, but that’s not true. You can be happy without being married or having a partner. Elsa is a great example for being an independent woman, and feeling great about it.

Therefore, the best solution in my point of view is to let Elsa be an independent woman and create a homosexual character for another movie. I mean, create a movie which principal character is gay or lesbian.

NEWS

CLIMATE CHANGE MAKES DISAPPEAR FIVE ISLANDS IN THE PACIFIC OCEAN

Scientists in Australia have recently found that rising sea levels and coastal erosion have caused the disappearance of (at least) 5 islands in the Solomon Islands (Pacific Ocean). They believe that this could be the first evidence of climate change removing islands.

Also, the study found that in the island of Nuatambu half of the houses have been washed into the ocean, so some families have got to move into higher places in the island.

The increase and the disappearance of these 5 islands not only destroyed villages that have existed since 1935, but also have eliminated tropical vegetation that was at least 300 years old.

Across the Pacific, there are a lot of small islands which have been warning about the impact of climate change and alerted that maybe in some years their populations will have to evacuate the island because of the rise of the sea level.

PERSONAL OPINION:

If you search on the Internet, almost every day you can found news about the climate change, but only a few of them are in the headlines of a newspaper or on the TV news. Maybe it doesn’t seem so, but climate change is a VERY serious problem that we have right now and, even though the governments are starting applying laws against global warming, we’re not taking the problem enough seriously. Maybe we will realize its importance when it will be too late.


NEW WORDS:

Reef: escull (del mar)
Wipe: netejar, passar un drap
Flee: fugir


Link: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/05/09/disappearance-of-five-islands-in-the-pacific-blamed-on-climate-c/

NEWS

A WOMAN LOOSES HER JOB FOR NOT WEARING HIGH HEELS

Nicola Thorp was sent home in her first day of job in a corporate finance company called PwC for refusing to wear high heels with a 2-4in heel. She claimed that the demand was discriminatory but they said the uniform rules for staff request woman to wear high heels.

Thorp was expected to do a nine-hour shift escorting clients to meeting rooms, so she replied she won’t be able to do that in high heels. Also, she said that if they could give her a reason why wearing flats would impair her to do the job, then she will use high heels but, obviously, they couldn’t.

Then, after posting about the incident on Facebook, Thorp realised that there are other women who had experienced similar situations. Therefore, she launched a petition to achieve that the companies can’t force women to wear high heels to work. In less than 48 hours, 110,000 people have signed it.

Nicola Thorp also said that she holds nothing against the company necessarily, because they are acting following their rules and their formal dress code, but she said that dress codes should reflect society and nowadays women can be smart and wear flat shoes. She added that there’s also a sexism issue: companies shouldn’t be forcing women to wear high heels if they don’t want to.

The company (PwC) said that they have a dress code to ensure staff are dressed appropriately, but they will check their guideline with their clients and team members to see if it can be modified.


PERSONAL OPINION:

I think women shouldn’t be forced to wear high heels to work if they don’t want to. I can accept that there can be a dress code to ensure that an employee wears appropriate clothes and shoes and not flip-flops, for example. But a flat shoe can be as formal as high heels, and it’s someone’s decision to wear it or not, without worrying if this decision can make you lose your job. Nowadays there are a lot of women who don’t like or don’t want to wear high heels, and this fact doesn’t make them less feminine or less formal.


NEW WORDS: 

Guideline: normes, regles generals
Escorting: escortar, acompanyar a algú
Outsource: subcontractar


Link: http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/may/11/receptionist-sent-home-pwc-not-wearing-high-heels-pwc-nicola-thorp

BOOK REVIEW

ELSEWHERE, by Gabrielle Zevin

I’m going to do a review about a book I have read: Elsewhere, by Gabrielle Zevin. First, I’m going to explain a little bit the plot but without revealing the ending, because maybe some of you want to read it!

The main character of the story is Liz (Elizabeth Hall), a nearly sixteen-year-old girl from United States who is killed in a hit and run accident by a cab. After her death, she wakes up on a boat, so she thinks she’s dreaming (because she denies accepting that she is dead). The boat arrives to Elsewhere, the place where all the dead people go. Elsewhere is a place very similar to the Earth, but the main difference is that the people who live there age backwards. In this place, Liz meets Betty, her grandmother, and some good new friends (and also, she falls in love). At first, Liz doesn’t like Elsewhere because, who wants to be dead? But then she realizes her life in Elsewhere is like a second life, the same or maybe better than her life in the Earth.

The main reason why I liked the book is because it’s very original. I thought about what happens after death a million times and I imagined a million things, but when I read Elsewhere I discovered another perspective which I did never think about it. I also liked the love story that happens in the book, although it’s a bit predictable.

Maybe, what I didn’t like a lot about the book is that in some parts the writer of the book described not very interesting things; I mean, she described some chapters of Liz’s life which weren’t important at all and that made the book a bit boring in some parts. I would like the book to have a bit more of action.

But, a part from that, I enjoyed the reading of Elsewhere and I recommend it to my classmates basically because it’s not a very difficult book to read, so I think that is a good point for practicing English. Also, the story is original, even though in some parts it’s a bit boring.

Finally, this is a quote from the book that I specially loved and I would like to share with you:

ORAL PRESENTATION

GAP YEAR IN SOUTH AFRICA

In April, I did an oral presentation about a gap year in South Africa with my classmates Mar Oliva and Paula Valenzuela. As the title says, the main objective of the presentation was to explain a gap year in South Africa and also talk a little bit about the culture of this country.

In the table down below I will self-evaluate myself.

NAME AND TOPIC: A gap year in South Africa	COMMENTS	MARK
Presentation (10%)	I think the presentation was good, but maybe it wasn’t very very original. I would like to emphasise that our presentation was like a mini “play”, so some images on the presentation were representing places where the action took place.	0,9
Body language and eye contact (10%)	I think my body language is quite good, I use to make a lot of movements when I’m talking, but I think that’s a good point because it attracts attention from the audience. I read to my notes twice, but that was because I was a bit nervous.	0,9
Structure (10%)	In my opinion, the structure of the presentation was fine, because the ideas were organized.	1
Content (40%)	The content was adequate and we tried to do the presentation as different, original and entertaining as possible, so I think it was very good.	4
Language (20%)	Even though I tried hard to use more complex language, it’s a bit difficult when you are doing an oral presentation to remember all of them, so I didn’t used as many complex words as I wanted to. For the next presentation I will have to work harder on that.	1,5
Pronunciation and Intonation (10%)	I think my tone of voice was appropriate, because I normally have a tone of voice that is not too loud or too weak. Maybe, focusing on the pronunciation, there are some words that I didn’t pronounced them perfectly, but I think in general it was quite good.	0,9
FINAL MARK		9,2

VIDEO:

NEWS

"THE SIMPSONS" WILL HAVE ITS FIRST LIVE EPISODE


The famous American show “The Simpsons” will appear on the air live for the first time. That means, that the fans from all over USA (only in this country) will be able to ask Homer their questions, and he will answer them at the moment. Even though only people from USA will be able to ask questions, this episode will be transmitted in some other countries too. This will take place after the 595th episode, entitled “Simprovised”. This is the first time that an animated show does this (or, at least, that tries to).

The executive producer of “The Simpsons”, Al Jean, said that Homer will take questions for 3 minutes and then talk about events of the day. He also mentioned Donald Trump, saying that he’s sure that Trump will be one of the topics of the conversation, because people are going to talk about the election. In fact, in one episode in the year 2000, Lisa becomes president of the United States of America (in the future); the previous president was Trump, and “The Simpsons” show how he made the America’s economy decrease.

But, how do they manage to make Homer a live character? Well, the animation magic will be done by motion capture technology, which will track the movements of Dan Castellaneta (the man who does the voice of Homer) and immediately animate them.


PERSONAL OPINION:

I’m totally amazed about the fact that “The Simpsons” will make a live episode. When I first read the new I thought this was a very interesting and new idea, and I’m very curious to see how the episode will go. I think this special live episode will not be transmitted in Spain, but I’m sure I will watch it someday on the Internet, even if I watch it a year after it was released.

Therefore, in summary, I love the idea of a live episode for “The Simpsons” and I hope that maybe if it works well, some other animated shows will do it.

NEW WORDS:

Bumbling: inepte, incompetent
Strife: conflicte, lluita
Poignantly: de forma commovedora
Depict: representar


Link: http://fortune.com/2016/05/14/the-simpsons-live-episode/

YOUR-SAY

A VIDEO TEACHING YOUNG CHILDREN TO BE HOMOPHOBIC

A few days ago, I watched a video from a Jehovah’s Witnesses’ web. I’m not a religious person, so I didn’t watch this video because I believe in their beliefs; I watched it because I read some comments of people saying that the video was against gay marriage, so I felt curious to watch it. Indeed, the video was an animated short film about a girl who is at school and had to do a drawing of her family. Then, she sees a drawing of one of her classmates in which there’s a family formed by two mothers. She feels surprised and when she goes home, she tells her mother about the drawing that she saw. Then, the mother explains to the girl that Jehovah created marriage between man and woman, not between two persons of the same gender. But what it upset me the most was that at the end, the mother says that “people can change”, like if the homosexuality was an illness and can be cured. Also, the mother wants her daughter to tell that girl at school who draw her two mothers that they can change; that her mothers can stop being homosexual. 

This video it’s directed to children and young people, to make them think that homosexuality is not good, teaching children to be homophobic. Please, we’re in the 21th century, let’s accept everyone and understand once and for all that love is for everybody, regardless their sexual orientation. Being gay, lesbian, transsexual, bisexual… deserve the same respect as being straight.

The problem with religions is that they don’t want to change their mentality. They say that “it has always been like this”, which is a lie, because in all historical periods have existed homosexual people. The fact that marriage, in the past, was always between man and woman doesn’t mean that we can’t change that. In fact, we are doing it; nowadays in more and more countries the gay marriage is legalized. But the most important thing we have to achieve (in my point of view) is respect to each other and tolerance. We have to “normalise” homosexuality, as much as transsexuality, bisexuality… We are all different, but we all deserve the same respect.

VIDEO: