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:

YOUR-SAY

FIGHTING FOR FREEDOM

A few weeks ago I saw a video about a North Korean girl named Yeonmi Park who talked about her story in the conference One Young World in Dublin in 2014. The video is quite famous and maybe you already have seen it, but if you don’t I totally recommend you to do it, because it’s worth it. It makes me think about all the misery, inequality and injustice in our world, and the way the media hide it from us.

Yeonmi explains how horrible the North Korean system is. For example, she says that the people are sentence to death just for telephoning unjustifiably abroad. Also, a thing that impacted me so much is when she says that she saw a friend’s mother being executed for seeing a Hollywood movie. Another thing that caught my attention is when she tells us that she saw her mother being raped (her mother protect her, because at first the man tried to rape Yeonmi).
She explains her story while she’s crying, but it surprises me how her tears are delicate, she doesn’t cry a lot, but when you saw her you know she has lived the worse. It’s like she has cried so much in the past, that now she doesn’t have more tears. And also, she is wearing a cute dress, with her hair perfectly done and she makes me think about a porcelain doll; a delicate doll that has passed through the worse.

This video makes me think about the refugees in Europe. They, like Yeonmi, are trying to escape from a hell, risking their lives to get freedom. There are so many injustices in the world, some of them we can’t do anything for it, but most of them we can. We are all humans and I think we all have the same right to live in freedom and with good conditions.

VIDEO:

FORMAL LETTER

15 Muralla Street
17486 Castelló d’Empúries, Girona, Spain

19th March 2016

Ms. Reynolds
8357 Marshall Road
20017 Pine Grove, Louisiana


Dear Ms. Reynolds,

The reason why I am writing this letter is because I am interested in babysitting your children: Lucy, Alice and George. My English teacher showed me your advertisement and I thought that this could be a nice experience for me to improve my English and learn lots of things.

I think I have some good qualities to do this job: I have two little brothers who are two years old both of them and I take care of them when my parents are not at home, so I have some good experience with it. I also consider myself responsible and friendly, and capable to adapt to everything. And, obviously, I am in love with children and I love spending time with them.

Find my curriculum vitae attached to this letter. Looking forward to hearing from you as soon as possible. Thank you for reading this letter.

Sincerely,
Paula Caball