dilluns, 30 de maig del 2011

MY ORAL PRESENTATION!! (3rd term)




1. Objectives.

We are Paula and Natalia and our presentation talks about hunger in the world. We have chosen this theme because we think that is really shocking that there are 16.000 (sixteen thousand) children in the world who die everyday because of hunger. This means one child dies every five seconds.

Our principal objectives were find the causes about it and learn more about hunger, because we think that it’s a really big problem actually and it’s been it for a long time ago.

3. What is mundial hunger?

Mundial hunger is one of the biggest problems of our world today.

The cause of the hunger is that, the people who suffer it, don’t have enough food to eat, and to feed their children and family. They have less than 1.9 kcal. Because of that, a lot of people die everyday, and we waste a lot of food.

4. Affected people:

954.000.000 (nine hundred fifty four milion) people in the world are underfed. 820.000.000 (eight hundred twenty milion) of these people are in developing countries.

5. Poor countries:

As you can see in this graphic, the most part of poverty is in Asia and the Pacific. Then, there are Sub-Saharian Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, Near Est and North Africa, and finally there are poverty too in the developed countries.

6. Natural causes.

There are many causes for hunger. One of them are the naturals causes.

People who live in very cold or very hot areas, have more problems to obtain food, because there's no good land to plant vegetables.

Moreover, the problem is that the land is not being used efficiently enough.

7. Economic causes

Most of food is produced in developed nations, like the United States. For it to get to countries that need it, there are huge expenses in packaging, transporting, and distributing this food.

8. Sociocultural causes

Many times, there are underlying cultural beliefs which prevent progress, as religion.

For example, in South Asia, society holds women responsible for all the key actions required to end hunger. But at the same time, trough laws, custom and tradition, women are denied the resources and the freedom of action to carry on these responsibilities. So it's not that women are incapable of making progress, it's simply that they are restricted by their own culture.

9. Sufficient food for all the people?

Yet there is plenty of food in the world for everyone. The problem is that hungry people are trapped in severe poverty. They lack the money to buy enough food to nourish themselves. It causes that they become ill, and this makes them increasingly less able to work, which then makes them even poorer and hungrier.

10. Consequences – healthy

Hunger causes some diseases:

AIDS (Sida): AIDS kills a little less than 2 million people a year, or about one person every 17 seconds.

The worst number of dead is in Africa.

Pneumonia: it kills more than 2 million children each year in poor countries.

Pneumonia is contagious and is commonly transmitted when an infected person coughs or sneezes small droplets that contain the germ into the air.

Diarrheal and cholera kill about 1.6 million people each year, almost all of them children. Diarrhea is most often a result of unclean water, unsafe sanitation, or poor hygiene.

Tuberculosis: is highly contagious and spreads through the air from coughing. If not treated, a person with tuberculosis infects of 10 to 15 people each year. Once thought to be under control, tuberculosis still kills over 1.5 million people each year.

Malaria: over a million people die from malaria each year. It's spread by mosquitoes.

Close to 90% of malaria causes occur in Africa.

11. Past, present and... future?

PAST: Major hunger problems have occurred through history, leaving millions of people dead or suffering from the effects of hunger.

FUTURE: The problem of world hunger can be solved. But we have to act, because it will be increased if we continue so, and it will cause serious consequences on children, society and the future of humanity.

12. Measures to solve it

· For adults, there are “food for work” programs where the adults are paid with food to build schools, make roads... This both nourishes them and builds infrastructure to end the poverty. For children, there are “food for education” programs where the children are provided with food when they attend school.

· Also, we can reduce or eliminate the transportation costs. If food is produced closer to where it is needed, costs are much lower.

· Companies need to realize that in order to make more money in these less developed regions, they must invest more as well.



ASSESSMENT OF THE PRESENTATION:

Good things: Good pronunciation, good organization with Natalia, good powerpoint, and very good information. Also, a good structure of the presentation, and good team work!

Bad things: I was a bit nervous, and my voice showed this.

Note: 9



Paula.

Carnival 2011!! (St. Pere Pescador & Castelló d'Empúries)

Carnival in St. Pere has been always so good, but specially this year has been very happy and very funny. I went there with Nessie, Aleix, Kevin, Natalia Sellés, Natalia Varela, Brian, Aura, Pau and Alexandra. We were a lot of people but we didn't dress up together. There were people, like Natalia Sellés, Kevin or Aleix, that were dressed up all day and night, but also there were some others who didn't dress up, like me and Alexandra.

In the night we all wento to the fancy dress dance and we had a very good time. Kevin, my last boyfriend asked me to go with him to the dance floor and dance, and finally we went to. There, we danced a little and we fell in love again. We are very good friends now, but I think that in the future it'll be something more than a friendship relation.

Then, my friends and I, the same people that went to St. Pere Pescador's carnival went to Castelló to the night party. Unfortunately it was raining, but we went inside for a drink. There, I met a lot of people from the institute and some others from Figueres, that I haven't seen for one or two years, and also two boys from Llançà. We drinked and danced a lot, and after the party Kevin, me, Nessie and Aleix went to our local to continue the party. We had beers, bikinis (to eat) and we watched a film: The exorcist. At 5 a.m. we went to bed, and we got up at 11 o'clock next morning.

We passed a very funny and friendly parties, and we are very happy to be all together because we are all friends, and I look to the other groups of friends and a lot of times they have a false friendship between them, only for suit each other.


Paula.

WRITING: Have musicians an important role in changing society?

I agree with the statement that musicians have an important role in changing society. In my opinion, music is the way people express themselves, and with what are they agree or not agree.

I think the music is necessary for all the people, and that we love music, to dance, to think about the planet, and to increase our good or bad emotions. Musicians have an importnat role in changing society because a lot of people want to be like them because they are idols, and they can influence the mind of society.

I must also say that not all the music and musicians can do this, becauuse, today, most of them only want to earn money, and they usually do that the people's mind only want to dance and have sex, and more stupid values that today the 50% of the people surely want.

The musicians and music that I'm talking about, is the music that has got messages inside, to make humanity aware. The real musicians.

In the future, if we listen and we are intelligent to understand what the songs are saying to us (example: Blowin' in the wind) and we change our acts and wind, then, musicians would have reached their real objective: change society.



Paula

NEWS! : BIN LADEN DEAD.

Osama Bin Laden, hunted as the mastermind behind the worst terrorist attack on U.S. soil, President Obama anunced that has been killed.

Bin Laden was located at a compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, which was monitored and when the time was determined to be right, the president said, he authorized a “targeted operation." A small team of Americans carried out the operation. After a firefight, they killed Osama bin Laden and took custody of his body. DNA testing confirmed that it was bin Laden.

Obama said that he was briefed last August on a possible but "far from certain" lead to bin Laden, but it took many months for the intelligence community to run this thread to ground. Then they developed more information about the possibility that they had located Bin Laden.

Sources said the attack was carried out by Joint Special Operations Command forces working with the CIA.

Bin Laden's death brings to an end a tumultuous life that saw him go from being the carefree son of a Saudi billionaire, to terrorist leader and the most wanted man in the world.



Paula.

NEWS! : BARCELONA REVOLUTION!! UP!!

The Spanish revolution 2011 started last week. Thousands of people have camped at Plaza Catalunya improvised campsite in order to protest and show their dissatisfaction with the current government and the political parties in general.

These spontaneous protests have been happening all over Spain since May 15, being the biggest in Madrid and Barcelona. They have been generated, communicated and promoted by social networks such as Facebook and Twitter.

People in Barcelona are fed up with that situation and, thus, they didn't hesitate to join the sit-in protest at Plaza Catalunya before the municipal elections set on 22 May, gathering the Spanish revolution 2011. The main square of Barcelona was divided into three zones, symbolically called Tahrir, Iceland and Palestine, which hosted performances of various kinds, among other things a possible police charge was role-played.

On Friday, the concentration at Plaza Catalunya for the Spanish revolution was massive. You could see very different people of all ages and profiles. From unemployed youngers with university degrees to old ladies and families with children demanding a change in Spanish society and politics. Protesters think political parties don't do anything worthy to solve the citizens problems and get out of the crisis. Unemployment rates continue growing up and there have been budget cuts in different sectors belonging to the welfare state such as education and health.


Although protesters were supposed to give up the protest on Friday midnight, they didn't. On the contrary they held flowers high and shouted after a minute of silence, making noise by hitting saucepans. The campsite remained on Saturday and Sunday, elections day. It seems the results of the elections were not satisfying and the Spanish revolution in Barcelona with the sit-in protest might continue...


Paula.

FILM REVIEW: THE PIANIST (I love Adrien Brody)

Little introduction:

This film I think it's really interesting because I love history and it's about the nazi movement and the cruelty of their acts. I think nazism ideology it really interesting and the people must know about it because they really thought they were doing right things for the humanity and that they were contributing to conservate the races and delete the worst kind of human, and that this was right and that was good morally.



Film review:

The film begins with a little family that were very very worried about the situation of the expansion of the nazis because they were living in Warsaw, Poland, and the nazis had already arrived, but they had done nothing yet.

The protagonist is a pianist and he's one of the big brothers of the family and he's the principal way of money for the family. He was doing a programme radio (playing the piano) and suddenly they were being bombarded. He run to his house and turned on the radio. They heard that the jew people couldn't live where they want, that they had to live together, in a ghetto, with all the jews, and that they had to hear a straight in their arms with a jew star.

Then, a lot of pubs and cafes began to close for the jews and they also couldn't go to the parks and the public places, but then the british and france declared war to Germany and the nazis. They were a little more optimistic.

From that, Szpilman begins a solitary journey across Warsaw being witness of the Nazi occupation. His reputation as a musician saved him from deportation. He struggled to stay alive, with enduring hunger, a lot of cold, loneliness and he had to stand the separation of his family.

With the help he had, he escaped the ghetto and hide in the ruins of the capital. He'll see the transformation of the city. Fortunately in the final days of the war, Szpilman reached a destroyed an abandoned house where he found a piano. There, he discovered a Nazi officer, but he heard the music he played, and the officer help him and spareed his life.

In conlusion, his musical talent and dreams saved his life.





Paula.

Megadeth + Slayer + Angelus Apatrida (01/04/2011)

An incredible concert, with three words.

This concert has been so important for me since I went to it. It was friday, and I went to school. Then in the afternoon with Kevin and his parents I went to. His parents left us there and we went with two lithuanian friends (brothers), Zyg and Simonas Valiuska. They are two of my best friends.



It was the first concert of Simonas, and we met Zyg at the KISS concert nearly a year ago. They'd stayed there since the morning, and then me and Kevin went with them. We were at the second and third line in the concert.

First, Angelus Apatrida. So good music!! The people there were so brute, and I hate it, but anyway, it was good, for the moment. Then, MEGADETH!! I was there for Megadeth, and they did it so spectacular, and a really good music, and finally Slayer. In Slayer I couldn't support it more and Zyg had to take me away from there because I have a lot of anxiety, and there I wasn't good, and also Zyg wasn't.


When the concert finalized, we bought a T-shirt, and then we went to Zyg's girlfriend's house, and there we slept. Next day we went to the new commercial area there in Barcelona, and at noon we catched a train to Figueras.

Special days, I can't deny it!!




Paula.

MEGADETH - IN MY DARKEST HOUR




MEGADETH - IN MY DARKEST HOUR:

In my hour of need, / En la meva hora de necessitat,
Ha you're not there... / Ha, tu no hi eres...
And though I reached out for you, / I pensar que jo vaig buscar-te,
Wouldn't lend a hand! / No em vas donar un cop de mà!

Through the darkest hour, / Durant la meva hora més fosca,
Grace did not shine on me, / La gràcia no em va somriure,
It feels so cold, very cold... / Es sent tant fred, tant fred...
No one cares for me...!! / Ningú té cura de mi...!!

Did you ever think I get lonely... / Vas pensar mai que jo estaria sol...
Did you ever think that I needed love... / Vas pensar mai que jo necessitava l'amor...
Did you ever think to stop thinking... / Vas pensar mai en parar de pensar...
You're the only one that I'm thinking of!! / Ets la única amb la que estic pensant!!

You'll never know how hard I tried, / Mai sabràs amb quanta força vaig intentar,
To find my space and satisfy you too! / De trobar el meu espai, i també satisfer-te a tu!

Things will be better when I'm dead and gone... / Les coses seran millor quan sigui mort i me n'hagi anat...
Don't try to understand, knowing you I'm probably wrong, / No provis de comprendre'm, et conec i probablement no faig bé,

But oh how I lived my life for you!! / Però ostia, com he viscut la meva vida per tu!!
Still you'd turn away... / Fins que m'has donat l'esquena...
Now as I die for you...! / I ara, mentre moro per tu...!
My flesh still crawls as I breathe your name! / La meva pell s'eriça quan dic el teu nom!
All these years I thought I was wrong... / Tots aquests anys, he pensat que estava equivocat...
Now I know it was you... / Ara sé que eres tu...
Raise your head... raise your face... your eyes!! / Aixeca el cap... la cara... els ulls!!
Tell me who you think you are, who?! / Diga'm qui et penses que ets, qui?!

I walk, I walk alone... / Jo camino, jo camino sol...
Into the promised land... / En la terra promesa...
There's a better place for me... / Allà hi ha un lloc millor per mi...
But it's far, far away... / Però està lluny, molt lluny...
Everlasting life for me... / Estirant la meva vida...
In a perfect world... / En un món perfecte...
But I gotta die first. / Però he de morir primer.
Please God send me on my way!! / Si us plau, Déu, envia'm al meu camí!!

Time has a way of taking time, / El temps té una manera de treure temps,
Loneliness is not only felt by fools!! / La solitud no només és sentida per idiotes!!
Alone I call to ease the pain, / Sol tracto de calmar el dolor,
Yearning to be held by you... / Pregan-te que m'abracis...
Alone, so alone, I'm lost!! / Sol, tant sol, estic perdut!!
Consumed by the pain... / Consumit pel dolor...
The pain!! The pain!! The pain!! / El dolor!! El dolor!! El dolor!!

Won't you hold me again?!! / No hem tornaries a abraçar?!!
You just laughed, ha, ha, bitch! / Només te'n vas riure, ha, ha, pècora!
My whole life is work built on the past, / Tota la meva vida està basada en el passat,
But the time has come when all things shall pass! / Però el temps ha arribat quan totes les coses han de passar!
This good thing passed away!! / Aquesta cosa bona ha passat!!



Paula \m/

This academic year is ending!!

This academic year is ending! Finally, here comes summer!!

I need holidays!! This year I've been studying and working a lot, and I think that I deserve it. I only need to complete this blog and do five more exams, and then I'll be free to do what I want.

This summer I'm going to work with my father most of the mornings, and I'll earn some money, specially I want it for my guitar!! This will be my new guitar:



Now I could make more progresses than with the other guitar because this guitar is specialized to play metal and hard rock, I'll surely enjoy it!

In the afternoon I'll go to Aiguamolls to do my research of a special bird, the Bee-Eater. Like its name says, it usually eats insects.



Also, in the afternoons and evenings I'll be able to play with my group and to do more concerts and to concentrate to play with them, and in nights... concerts and parties!

I'm so happy this year, because I've worked a lot for the exams, and my results are proportional to my work at home. Also, because of my results, my fathers have told me that I'll go to JUDAS PRIEST + SAXON + MOTÖRHËAD in Barcelona this 02 of August, and I'm so exited and nervous!!!



In conclusion, that I'm so happy to finish the school, and that this summer is going to be so good.



Paula.