Thank you letter.

As I told you last Wednesday, you'll have to write a letter for Christmas. Imagine you have just had a wonderful dinner at a friend's house. Write a thank you letter for them telling how much you enjoyed the food and the company.
Have a good holiday!

"for and against" composition

Hello, there!
As I told you in class the other day, this is the topic for your composition for Christmas:
"Advantages and disadvantages of having Christmas dinner parties with your family"
I hope you all have great holidays, rest a lot and come back in January full of energy!

Shopaholics!

Is your closet overflowing with never-worn clothing, the price tags still waving in the breeze? Is your attic bulging with boxes and boxes of shoes that have never touched pavement? Do you buy new makeup weekly or compact discs by the fistful? You might be a shopaholic.
Manhattan psychologist April Benson, author of "I Shop Therefore I Am: Compulsive Buying and the Search for Self," has seen firsthand how destructive compulsive shopping can be.
"One patient of mine got fired because she was compulsively shopping on the Internet all day. There are other people who neglect their children and park them in the mall constantly because that is what they need to feed their habit. Lots of marriages break up over compulsive buying. In fact, we don't call it compulsive buying unless there is some significant impairment in some aspect of your life." Famous shopaholics in history include Marie Antoinette, Mary Todd Lincoln, William Randolph Hearst, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, Imelda Marcos and Princess Diana. Their addictions ranged from clothing (Jackie O, Diana) to art and antiques (Hearst) to shoes (the heralded Marcos collection) to gloves (Mrs. Lincoln owned 84 pairs of them).
What do women want? In order of preference, most female compulsive shoppers buy clothes, shoes, jewelry, makeup and compact discs.
Men? Clothing, shoes, electronics (TVs, stereos, computers, etc.), hardware and CDs.
Sounds normal enough, right? So how does compulsive shopping differ from your last trip to the mall?
"Well, they don't buy one CD, they buy 10 CDs at a time," says Black. "They might buy five skirts, all the same, perhaps in different shades or slightly different styles, where a normal buyer would identify a need for something new or attend a sale and buy one item."
Adapted from moneycentral

The Three Wise Monkeys

I'm sure most of you have seen the image: three monkeys sitting in line, one of them covering its ears, another its eyes and the other its mouth. It's a very common picture, but do we know what it means?
The three wise monkeys are a pictorial representation. Together they embody the principle to "see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil". The three monkeys are Mizaru, covering his eyes, who sees no evil; Kikazaru, covering his ears, who hears no evil; and Iwazaru, covering his mouth, who speaks no evil. Sometimes there is a fourth monkey depicted with the three others; the last one, Shizaru, symbolizes the principle of "do no evil". He may be shown covering his abdomen or genital area, or crossing his arms.
The proverb has different meanings, with associations of being good of mind, speech and actions. However, in the western world the proverb is often used to describe someone who looks the other way when they see something illegal or inappropriate.
The oldest reference to the proverb is in the Analects of Confucius, in China: "Look not at what is contrary to propriety; listen not to what is contrary to propriety; speak not what is contrary to propriety; make no movement which is contrary to propriety". Probably, the phrase was shortened after its introduction to Japan, where the most famous representation is found in a carving over the door of the famous Tosho-gu shrine.
But, why the monkeys? The concept of monkeys originated from wordplay: The saying in Japanese is "mizaru, kikazaru, iwazaru", employing the archaic Japanese form "zaru" for negatives. The pronunciation of "zaru" is the same as one of the readings ("saru") of the Japanese kanji for monkey.
Out of curiosity, Mahatma Ghandi's one notable exception to his lifestyle of non-possession was a small statue of the three monkeys.
This post was originally Alan's idea.

Thanksgiving

Having thanksgiving about a week away, I'll just leave some historical info here:
Thanksgiving or Thanksgiving Day, presently celebrated on the fourth Thursday in November, has been an annual tradition in the United States since 1863. It did not become a federal holiday until 1941. Thanksgiving was historically a religious observation to give thanks to God, and is still celebrated as such by many families, but is now also considered a secular holiday.
Most Americans celebrate by gathering at home with family or friends for a holiday feast. Though the holiday's origins can be traced to harvest festivals which have been celebrated in many cultures since ancient times, the American holiday is tied to the deliverance of the English settlers by Native Americans after the harsh winter at Plymouth, Massachusetts and that event has become the pre-eminent foundation story for English North America.
The First Thanksgiving was celebrated to give thanks to God and the Native Americans for helping the pilgrims survive the brutal winter. Although half of the pilgrims who arrived on the Mayflower had already died, many more would have had it not been for the native Americans teaching the pilgrims to harvest foods. The first Thanksgiving feast lasted three whole days providing enough food for 53 pilgrims and 90 Indians. The traditional Thanksgiving menu often features turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes and pumpkin pie. Americans may eat these foods on modern day Thanksgiving, but the first feast did not consist of these items. On the first feast turkey was any type of fowl that the pilgrims hunted. Pumpkin pie wasn't on the menu because there were no ovens for baking, but they did have boiled pumpkin. Cranberries weren't introduced at this time. Due to the diminishing supply of flour there was no bread of any kind
Adapted from wikipedia

A Nice Recipe

Well, we are dealing with food at the moment, so I'll leave a traditional British recipe for all of you to enjoy!

Mozart

Since we were reading a text about Mozart last week, I would like you to have a look at his biography:

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works. He is among the most enduringly popular of classical composers.

Mozart showed prodigious ability from his earliest childhood in Salzburg. Already competent on keyboard and violin, he composed from the age of five and performed before European royalty; at 17 he was engaged as a court musician in Salzburg, but grew restless and traveled in search of a better position, always composing abundantly. Visiting Vienna in 1781 he was dismissed from his Salzburg position and chose to stay in the capital, where over the rest of his life he achieved fame but little financial security. His final years in Vienna yielded many of his best-known symphonies, concertos, and operas, and the Requiem. The circumstances of his early death have been much mythologized. He was survived by his wife Constanze and two sons.

Mozart always learned voraciously from others, and developed a brilliance and maturity of style that encompassed the light and graceful along with the dark and passionate—the whole informed by a vision of humanity "redeemed through art, forgiven, and reconciled with nature and the absolute". His influence on all subsequent Western art music is profound. Beethoven wrote his own early compositions in the shadow of Mozart, of whom Joseph Haydn wrote that "posterity will not see such a talent again in 100 years"

Adapted from wikipedia

American Health Care Reform

Dealing with health, I couldn't overlook the (in Obama's words) "historic" session that took place in the USA congress last Sunday, when one of President Obama's top priorities was voted: the reform that he is planning for the American Health Care system.

The House passed its health care bill late Saturday night by a 220-215 vote, with 39 Democrats in opposition and one Republican supporting it. Senate approval is considered less certain due to opposition by all Republicans and some moderate Democrats.

Obama called the support by many House members "courageous" in the face of what he called "the heated and often misleading rhetoric around this legislation."

The Affordable Health Care for America Act, or H.R. 3962, restricts insurance companies from denying coverage to anyone with a pre-existing condition or charging higher premiums based on gender or medical history. It also provides federal subsidies to those who cannot afford health insurance. And it guarantees coverage for 96 percent of Americans, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.

The bill still has to go to the Senate, where Republican opposition is even greater.

Adapted from www.cnn.com

Trick or Treat!

The American tradition of "trick-or-treating" probably dates back to the early All Souls' Day parades in England. During the festivities, poor citizens would beg for food and families would give them pastries called "soul cakes" in return for their promise to pray for the family's dead relatives.

The distribution of soul cakes was encouraged by the church as a way to replace the ancient practice of leaving food and wine for roaming spirits. The practice, which was referred to as "going a-souling" was eventually taken up by children who would visit the houses in their neighborhood and be given ale, food, and money.

The tradition of dressing in costume for Halloween has both European and Celtic roots. Hundreds of years ago, winter was an uncertain and frightening time. Food supplies often ran low and, for the many people afraid of the dark, the short days of winter were full of constant worry. On Halloween, when it was believed that ghosts came back to the earthly world, people thought that they would encounter ghosts if they left their homes. To avoid being recognized by these ghosts, people would wear masks when they left their homes after dark so that the ghosts would mistake them for fellow spirits. On Halloween, to keep ghosts away from their houses, people would place bowls of food outside their homes to appease the ghosts and prevent them from attempting to enter.

Adapted from http://www.history.com/

Monty Python's Argument Clinic

Dealing with humour, we couldn't forget the fabulous Monty Python. Enjoy!

Nirvana

Nirvana was an American rock band that was formed by singer and guitarist Kurt Cobain and bassist Krist Novoselic in 1987. Nirvana went through a succession of drummers, the most famous being Dave Grohl, who joined the band in 1990.

With the lead single "Smells Like Teen Spirit" from the band's second album Nevermind (1991), Nirvana entered into the mainstream, bringing a subgenre of alternative rock called grunge. Other Seattle grunge bands such as Alice in Chains, Pearl Jam, and Soundgarden and also the San Diego based band Stone Temple Pilots also gained popularity, and as a result, alternative rock in general became a dominant genre on radio and music television in the United States during the early-to-mid-1990s.

Nirvana's brief run ended with Cobain's death in April 1994, but the band's popularity continued in the years that followed

Anti-Paparazzi Law

California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has signed an anti-paparazzi bill making it easier to sue media outlets that use photos that invade celebrities' privacy.
Paparazzi photos are sold for incredible amounts of money, for example, a photo of Princess Diana and Dodi Al-Fayed sold for over 3 million dollars. This has created a lot of controversy, as photographers usually wait outside celebrities' homes to take photos or interview them. Sometimes they intrude into private properties or pay people for information.
Do you think Schwarzenegger is right making a harder law against paparazzi? Do you think he is just angry because, as a celebrity, he has suffered them?

Welcome aboard!

Hello, everybody!
We start the new school year, and this year I'll try to use this blog both for my advanced and intermediate classes. Any other students are also welcome to use the blog in any way they please, and, of course, visitors are also welcome!