GAP YEAR IN ATHENS

Link: http://www.workaway.info/639218849353-en.html

WHAT NOT TO DO WHEN YOU RUN OUT OF IDEAS

In this post, I will talk about a thing that has bothered me since some time ago. About a year or so, I noticed that some of my posts have been copied. I am not talking about the idea or the theme of the posts, I mean that some of my writings have been copied by someone else literally; word by word.

At first, I didn’t focus on that too much. I didn’t give it importance, until one friend told me that I should tell my teacher or someone. I thought: “What a stupid thing to do, go and complain to the teacher. We look like children”. I don’t like to make people feel uncomfortable and telling them about it would be a bit awkward. This mind-thinking, however, changed recently, when I saw that nothing's gonna change if I don’t do anything. Then, I had a brilliant idea. I decided to make a “your-say” where I would talk about it and see if it would make any difference, and here I am.

On one hand, when it comes to the idea of working on a blog in English, it is quite hard. I think it is difficult to make yourself start to write the posts, mainly because of the limited time. On the other hand, it is a laborious task to think about the topic you could write about. In my case, every time I have any idea, I write it down. Then, when I think it’s time to start to write some posts, I really go for it. I must say that I end up enjoying it. I also like to make it perfect (even though it is impossible). I always think that considering that I will have to start someday to do the posts anyway, why doing it wrong? Let’s do it right and feel proud of it at the end. That’s the reason why it feels horrible when, after  putting so much effort into something, someone else takes it without even asking, without sacrifying their time. It is not about egoism, it’s about the work I put into it.

Finally, I would like to say that there is always a positive part in everything. In this case, I have to thank them. I get to write this post without even have to think about an idea or a topic.

I really hope this will never happen again.

EUROVISION 2017: PORTUGAL'S BALLAD WINS CONTEST

Salvador Sobral with his award.

This news was published on the 14^th of May by the BBC newspaper. This news talks about the Eurovision Song Contest hosted that same day in Kiev, Ukraine.

The news stats by announcing the winner, Salvador Sobral. It was the first time Portugal won this contest. It was Salvador Sobral who broke the bad streak of his country with his song Amar Pelos Dois in Portuguese. The love ballad was written by his sister, Luisa, who later joined him for a duet.

According to the news, Sobral was in a serious heart condition. That’s the reason why he missed the first week of rehearsals. The song won by 758 points.

On one hand, there has been other actuations which were the odds-on-favour. For example, Francesco Gabbani, representing Italy. On the other hand, there has been an incident in this event. During the actuation of Jamala – the winner of last year-, a man was flashing his bottom, wrapped in an Australian flag.

OPINION:
This year, the Eurovision Song Contest surprised me a lot. It has been the first time I liked some of the songs. My favourite one is Occidentali’s karma by Francesco Gabbani, who was representing Italy, even though I didn’t understand the meaning of the song. After making some research, the song was about how Westerns use Easters philosophies and culture but they will always be tourists or even immigrants.

I totally agree with the audience and the judges in awarding Salvador Sobral. His actuation was surprising for good despite it was also a little bit creepy his movements. It looks like there’s a full story about him behind, without considering his health condition which, by the way, it was so brave of him acting in that condition.  

BRITISH LAW STUDENT CAUGHT USING INVISIBLE INK TO CHEAT IN UNIVERSITY EXAM

This news was published on 5^th of May of 2017 by the Huffington post newspaper. The news talks about a British student who is studying Law in the University was caught cheating in an exam in an original way.

According to the news, the student was caught with 24 pages of notes written in invisible ink, hidden inside a book, which she was going to use for the test. It looks like she was inspired by James Bond when it comes to the gadget she was using during the exam.

However, the student was spotted cheating by her classmates. Her notes were immediately confiscated and she failed the subject as a punishment.

The Office of the Independent Adjudicator explained that this occurrence took place in 2016. They also revealed that in the past four years the number of cheating has increase a 42%.

When I read this news, I found it very funny. I was impressed by the technique the student used to cheat on the exam, but, unfortunately it did not work out well for her. It is quite sad that her classmates informed the teacher because it looks like she put so much effort to make 24 copies of her notes and to make work everything with the gadget. But, on the other hand, it’s unfair for the rest of the students who studied.

VOCABULARY:

Ink: tinta

Red-handed: con las manos en la masa.

Breach: infracción, violación

PARENTS' MOBILE USE HARMS FAMILY LIFE, SAY SECONDARY PUPILS

This news article was published on 23^rd of April by the bbc newspaper. It talks about the overuse of mobile phones and other devices by parents.

According to some studies made by the Digital Awareness UK and the Headmasters’ and Headmistresses’ Conference, secondary pupils reported that the use of mobile phones by their parents stopped their families enjoying each other’s company, leaving behind the fact that most of them use it in meal times.

Most of the children said that after asking their parents to put down their phones they didn’t took no notice, which that led them to feel ignored and upset.

However, children are also very addicted to different kind of devices, being online between three and five hours a day at weekends or even 15 hours a day. This causes tiredness and a lack of sleep but most of the parents aren’t aware of that.

When I read this news, I immediately thought of my parents. They often stay starring at their phones in meal times. They use their mobile phones even more than me. I don’t really like it. I really like when it’s meal time because it’s the time of the day where I sat with my family and when we talk a lot. With the homework and studies, I barely have time to even spend time with them. That’s why I really take advantage of that time.

I think that these devices will always be a discussion. On one hand, I think that it consumes you little by little, pulling apart the real life and people, but, on the other hand, I think that these technologies can be a beneficial use for everything.

VOCABULARY:

Lack of: falta de

Poll: votació, enquesta.

HAPPINESS

One of the most important topics about life is happiness. If you are unhappy, you are not really living your life. Happiness is just a state of mind, a good one, unique for each person. Sometimes it might look impossible to achieve it considering the bad things someone can go through, but, depending on the behaviour they have when they face those situations, happiness can be reached easily.

On one hand, the most important thing that makes me guarantee happiness is the circles. It’s primordial to surround myself with positive people: good friends and family. Only the real ones. That makes people feel loved and wanted.

On the other hand, I found it essential to tap into gratitude.  Sometimes the only thing we have to do to be happy is to stop for a moment and think of something or someone in our life that you are grateful for. Sometimes we only focus on bad things and with only changing that focus, we can end the pain easily. Be thankful always for what you have and appreciate the smaller things in life which we usually take for granted.

There can be a different cause of unhappiness. Some might be unknown and some we might have conscience of. Stress, the feeling of being useless, alone, lost and little in this big world, can be the reason of the sadness.

However, people can be unhappy not because of their life but because of the others and the world in general. I think this happens because we think just way too much. All the unfair things and situations in the world makes us feel sad. But it’s important to remember that being happy doesn’t mean being careless. It has nothing to do with the idea of “happy idiot”, the belief that anyone who is too happy must be not intelligent enough to see potential problems.

I think that the best think to do when you feel sad is to disconnect from everything. Going somewhere you like by yourself can help you to reduce stress, anxiety and sadness, without bringing any devices obviously. Even so, sometimes we can find the solution with social media. It is kind of stupid but, the idea of watching your favourite youtubers can help you to take off of your life, specially the funny ones considering that humour is a good ingredient to be happy.

In the following video, Will Darbyshire explains what exactly means having a happy place.

ISLAMOPHOBIA

Recently, the word Islam has been everywhere. If you turned on the TV, the media would be probably name it. If you checked the social medias you would see how many hashtags were dedicated to Islam. The mainly thing in common about it is that the word Islam is always related with something bad. It is quite funny because the word Islam and what goes behind it is the opposite to bad. This wrong comparison happens when people don’t bother themselves to do some research.

Since I was younger, I thought: “After all the mistakes the humankind has made throughout history, when it becomes to the discrimination of people and hate, they didn’t change anything about their mindset”. But as soon as I got older, I got to know that it’s all about the interests of people. It interests a lot the existence of hate.

A few days ago, I found a video where the 2016 finalists from the National Poetry Slam where performing such a good poem. The poem was about islamophobia. They talked very well about this issue, giving convincing arguments during the whole video.

I think that we don’t usually give importance to islamophobics because we rather focus on racism on black people, South Americans or Asians. Muslims have been forgotten about what they go through for something which is not even they fault. Hating Muslims for the actions of some is like hating Germans for what some of them did during the Nazi period to Jewish people, for example.

Here's the video which in 3 minuts leave things understood:

In the following video, we can see how Adam Saleh, a well-known New Yorker youtuber, was kicked out from the airplane from Delta Airlines because some passengers felt uncomfortable when they were talking in Arab, their native tongue. I have to say that it was the most ridiculous thing on behalf the passengers’ behaviour, waving their hands in the back, so disgusting.

In my opinion, I think that the worst thing is when low key racist people act against racism. I really hate when people complain racist people, saying that it so bad or unhuman, when in real life they are the ones. A clearly example could be seen during the election of the USA president. I had been hearing on repeat how Trump was so racist by people who actually are or act like it.

REVIEW: "GAP YEAR"

Last Wednesday we watch the first episode of the series Gap Year in class. This is an English TV series which its premier was on February of this year. It is characterised by being a comedy and dramatic series.

In the first episode, Dylan and Sean travel to China. Sean thought the travel was about escaping life back in the UK, with a purpose to live adventures However, as soon as they arrived, Dylan revealed that he booked the whole thing just to get back with his ex-girlfriend, Lauren. After, the two friends met a in a public toilet a group of American people who are also traveling: Ashley, Greg and May. Unluckily, Dylan left his money in there which, after, Greg found. Later on, the two groups met again. Dylan got back his money and then, they went to a festival next to the Great Wall of China. There, on one hand, Sean got into a fight, accidentally. He run out of the scene which is why he got lost. On the other hand, Dylan met Lauren. That meeting didn’t end well considering that Dylan was worried about Sean. Finally, the episode ends by Sean getting in a car, thinking that the driver might take him to the festival. Unfortunately, the driver was friend of the person Sean fight with before. He got kidnapped by them considering that he could get out of the car.

As I said before, this TV series is about Gap years. The episode starts with a good talk between the two friends, Dylan and Sean, with a woman about what they had in mind to do in China. She immediately denied those things. The two friends might have had elevated expectations about the trip and the woman knew that. Everyone thinks that traveling is fun, but in real life, it all depends on where you are going to. It is not the same going to China than to Thailand.

Another thing that I found it relevant is the tiny details in some of the characters’ behaviour. The first one was Sean’s impression about a natural park in China. Dylan kept saying how traditional and important it was but once they were there, it looked insignificant. Also, when May wanted to see the sunset from the Great Wall, they looked at it as if it was something they had to do because everyone does it.

Finally, when Dylan took a photo from the two strangers who were camping in the Great Wall, the couple pose like if it was the best time of their life, but, however, it wasn’t like that.

In my opinion, this TV series shows how Gap year works and tries to break the cliché in one way. The series represent how Gap years are not about having always a good time and living life freely because it’s very important to be responsible.

This episode was very funny, mainly because of Sean. I quite liked it but I don’t see myself watching the rest of it. I don’t really like the topic.

THE BEST EUROPEAN CITIES TO TRAVEL TO

In this post, I will talk about some of the cities which I would like to visit. There are European cities which are highly recommended to travel to and others which are not that famous.

Starting with the bests ones for me, Dubrovnik and Prague are the current cities I want to go to.

Dubrovnik, just like Split, Pula or Poreč, is one of the most symbolic town of Croatia. Dubrovnik is characterized for being and old town with a determinate aesthetic, when it becomes to the buildings. Apart from that, the most beautiful thing about the city are the views to the Adriatic Sea. I got to know this town because of Game of Thrones. It looks like King’s Landing is Dubrovnik in real life.

On the other hand, Prague, unlike Dubrovnik, is in Czech Republic and it hasn’t got a coast, but, even though, the city is full of rivers. It is considered a city with a bohemian heart, considering its architecture. I think the best time of the year to visit it is in Spring because of the vegetation. It must be such a good feeling waking through the city with a green landscape.

Moving to the northern cities, Copenhagen, Stockholm and Edinburgh are the most interesting for me. These cities are quite different to what I am used to.

Copenhagen is the capital of Denmark. The city keeps various lakes and rivers, where you can take a ride with a boat while visiting the city. There are a lot of palaces, cathedrals, parks and squares to visit. Copenhagen is well-known for being one of the most expensive city. This says a lot about the standard of living.

Edinburgh is a unique capital in Western Europe. There, you can find a medieval Old Town, which is the most iconic place of the city. I could like to go there in Winter because the city looks cosier.

Finally, Oport is one of the cities which I like most of Portugal. The reason why I really like the city is because of the colorful neighborhoods and its views. I would love to go there to get off everything, because it looks like really relaxing.

Dubrovnik, Prague, Copenhagen, Edinburgh, Oport, respectively.

"VICTUS: BARCELONA 1714"

Victus: Barcelona 1714 was written by Albert Sánchez Piñol and it was published in 2013 by La campana editorial.

This novel is about a man, Martí Zuviria, who hires a German writer to basically write up his earlier life. The novel starts with an epic adventure he lived. After that, Martí had to go to the Bazoches castle (France) to prepare himself us a military engineer. After hard-work and the death of his great professor who was a famous engineer, Martí lived a battle in Almansa even though he didn’t pass the final exam which would make him an official engineer. After going back to Barcelona - where he met a woman –, he fought in a lot of battles in favour of the French monarchy. But that didn’t last forever. After the retirement of the ally, Martí decided to join Antonio de Villarroel’s army. Unluckily, after working so hard on the planning of the trenches, walls and other important war important elements, the war was won by the Borbon’s army.

The title of the three parts of the novel is very curious. The author based on the famous Latin expression Veni Vidi Vici to name each part, but, the last one is called Victus, because, on September 1714, it took place the fall of the city of Barcelona where the Catalans lost the war. That is also the reason why he named the book like that.

For the Spanish class, we had the opportunity to read a book, which apart from help us with the mark, it is a great excuse to read. In this second term, I decided to read this novel because it gained me a lot and I wanted to read it since the first term of school. I must say that It has impressed me a lot. A part from being a historical novel, which I like them a lot, this novel has something different. The author, from the firsts lines of the book, makes the reader feel like one of the characters, like if they were there, living the story.

The way the author made the character’s talk is amazing; the dialogues between each character made me being stuck with the book during days, without leaving it. But, the best thing of all is the way that the plot makes you think about the little details of life. The death of your loved ones, the struggle you suffer to become who you want to be and the most difficult sacrifices you have to do to make a better place for your loved ones are the top things that this book shows you.

DESCRIPTION OF A PERSON

In this post I will describe my sister. My sister is older than me; she is nineteen years old. There is just three years of difference between our ages, that explains why we are so close and we comprehend each other without any difficulties.

From the psychologist point of view, my sister can be described from a lot of different ways. She is an open-minded person and this helps a lot when it becomes to talk about something. Apart from that, I must say that she knows everything about everything. She can talk perfectly about politics and economy situation, science novelty, music, films, etc. That is why I always tell her that she is a very cultured person. She perfectly knows how to argument her thought.

When it becomes to her personality, I must stand out her sense of humour. She is very cheerful and such a joker. She is always laughing, even in the most serious moments. She knows how to cheer up a person who is having a bad day and knows when and how to help people when they don’t even ask her.

What she can’t put up with two-faced people and those who only act for their interests. She is a hard-working and a strong person. No matter what she goes through she never gives up. That’s one of the best things about her and one of the things I look up to. She fights for her dreams and demonstrates day after day the reason why she is where she is now. She is very organised, but even though she sometimes gets stressed considering that the career she is studying at this moment is hard and it requires a lot of work.

Physically, she is not that tall but neither short. She has dark wavy medium-sized hair and dark eyes too. I can’t describe her style because she doesn’t follow any. She just wears what she likes without having to discuss if it is trendy or not.

She loves to read books. If she had her own library, she would go out of there. She also likes to go to the cinema and watch series. I have to say that she has a good taste for it.

Finally, I would like to say that being her sister is such a pleasure but it has also its negative part, I will always be compared to her and that’s bad because I can never be as perfect as she is. I am happy to have someone like her in my life. It is so good to have a best friend forever.

SCIENCE LIMITS ON GLOBAL ISSUES

As we all know, science has changed our lifes mainly for good. However, science has its own limits, for example, when it becomes to the global issues. In this post, I will talk about a global issue which is the violation of human right and the intervention of science on it.

Human rights are the basic rights and “freedoms” that belong to every person in the world, from birth until death. They apply regardless of where you are from, what you believe or how you choose to live your life. They can never be taken away, although they can sometimes be restricted. These basic rights are based on values like dignity, fairness, equality, respect and independence.

The problem comes when these rights or “freedoms” are not respected. There are a lot of facts which infringe them. For example, the West Bank barrier or the current settlements in Palestine, the immigration and refugees banning and the utility of chemical weapons on civilians.

If we look at the science role in these violations, we can say that science helps a lot to carry through these actions. All the chemical weapons created, the machinery and equipment used between other many devices are designed from science. With this idea, we could say that science has its own limits which create a lot of problems in real life.

Some of the science limits which influences some of the human rights violation are obvious but some of them are not. On one hand, science does not make moral judgments about anything. On the other hand, science doesn’t guide us when it becomes to know how to use the scientific knowledge.

As a conclusion, I must say that science limits influence a lot some of the human rights violations and, at the same time, these science limits are an important weapon for industrialised countries to take advantage from poor countries which doesn’t have power to own scientific knowledge.

OSCARS 2017

About a week ago, the 89th Academy Awards ceremony took place in Hollywood to honour the best films of 2016. It was hosted by Jimmy Kimmel. This year, in general, everyone was surprised by the winners of every important category.

There were many films (and actors) that were the odds-on-favour to win the most valuable prize a celebrity could get. La La Land, for instance, was one of those. The successful musical had fourteen nominations (best picture, best director and best actor, amongst others), which is the exact amount of nominations that Titanic had in the 1998’s Oscars. The film did pretty well by taking home six golden figures. The other applauded film that night was Moonlight, followed by Fences and Manchester by the Sea, which won three, one and two Oscars respectively.

However, this Academy Awards ceremony did not only shine for its winners, but it also stood out for its critics of Trump’s policies, the diversity of its nominees and its epic fail ever made in the Oscars’ history. Jimmy Kimmel kicked off the Oscars with some basic jokes. It even looked like a Jimmy Kimmel Live! monologue.

Some of the winners of the night (from the left to the right): Mahershala Ali,

Emma Stone, Viola Davis and Casey Affleck.

Getting though the winners of that night, first of all I will start with the best director award. The winner in this category was Damien Chazelle for La La Land. He is the youngest director to win an Oscar. On one hand, for the best actor and actress, the awards go to Casey Affleck, for Manchester by the Sea as Lee Chandler, and Emma Stone, for La La Land as Mia Dolan. It looks like Casey is following the same steps to success as his brother, Ben Affleck. On the other hand, for the best supporting actor and actress went to Mahershala Ali, for Moonlight as Juan, and Viola Davis, for Fences as Rose Maxon.

As for the best original screenplay won Manchester on the sea and for the adapted one Moonlight. There were many others winners like for the Best Animated Feature Film, Zootopia, for the Best Foreign Language Film, The Salesman (Iran), for the Best Documentary-Feature, O.J.: Made in America, for the Best Documentary-Short Subject, The White Helmets, etc.

During the lasts months of last year, I was making a list about all the films I would like to watch. Most of the nominated ones were there. But I have to admit that I have not watched any of them yet. This is what happens when you have no time.

This year, if we compare it with the last one, the Oscars did justice with people from another country if we look at the winners. Winners like Mahershala Ali or Asghar Farhadi, for not talking about the exceptional cast of Fences, Hidden Figures, and others, demonstrate just the opposite as what racist people think. Muslim people winning the Oscars, making such a good appearance (except Asghar) and speech, have possible turn all people bodies.

"THE WALLED OFF HOTEL"

While I was surfing on the Internet I found an article from a newspaper which talked about a new hotel which will be opened in Palestine on the 11^th of March. I found it interesting and amazing, that is why I decided to talk about it in this my say.

As we all know, since the construction of the Apartheid Wall, this created a lot of discussion. However, it did not lead us into a solution but to more conflicts and tension. The wall has isolated more than a half million of Palestinians. It was repeatedly rejected by Amnesty International and The United Nation, but it looks like they can do nothing about it.

Today, fifteen years after the construction of the wall, a British artist, known as Bansky, will inaugurate his own hotel called “The walled Off Hotel” in front of the Apartheid wall. It has ten bedrooms and each of them includes a work of art from the artist.

The name of the hotel has a metaphoric meaning. “Walled off” means separated by a wall. Considering that the hotel is in the other side of the wall, the name explains perfectly the situation of the Palestinians.

The artist and his representative team clarify that the hotel is not just a work of art but a lodging for clients. Apart from that, the main objective of the hotel is to attract tourists and travellers to one of the most abandoned place of Palestine where the economic situation is terrible because of the control by the Israeli government. According to the artist, a lot of people said that that location was had the worst view of the world and they asked him why he would like to build a hotel. He answered that he wanted to make people realise and see the worst view of the world to react to it and hopefully do something about it.

It is not the first time Bansky makes such a works of art in the Gaza Strip. In 2015, the artist went there to paint the walls of the territory to satirise and to report.

I think that is a great idea this. The paintings he has made are fabulous; he got to represent the Palestinians so well in each one of them. But he didn't use only paintings, he also designed the hotel in such a way that he makes so obvious the terrible situation there.

These are some of the paintings and designing made by Bansky: 

DO WE WATCH TV ANYMORE?

When I was little, I was always watching TV. As soon as I got home from school or my after-school activities, I would watch my favourites cartoons. Watching TV was just like my way to spend time. But at the same time I was growing, the amount of homework was increasing and with that my free time was reducing, until now, that I do not even turn on the TV.

It was not long ago when I realised that I do not watch TV anymore. I think it was at third of ESO, when school homework started to increase. But the causes of it are not only because of school work, there are some facts which changed my way of “living”.

First, I would like to say that the television industry was created to entertain. But little by little, the idea of entertaining has hanged. I do not know if it is because I have grown up and nothing in the TV looks entertaining or it’s just my point of view. In the second place, I think that the main cause would be the shortage free time I have (putting to one side school).

In my opinion, I am glad of not watching that much TV. But, however, I spend a lot of time surfing on the internet. This has brought me positive things like negatives ones.

On one hand, Internet provides me with the ability of select the series and shows to watch whenever I want. The biggest inconvenient of TV is that people have to make time to watch it, meanwhile with the Internet services, people can watch what they want without having to make time. But, with the new companies, like Netflix, this concept has changed, of course. On the other hand, lately, the most of TV shows and series doesn’t attract me that much. Youtubers have also influenced a lot people. It is more easy to watch them everywhere and any time. It is more pleasant, even though I start to think that YouTube is becoming more like a big TV company. When it becomes to the news, I haven’t watch them for a long time. The fact that we can access to social media apps from the mobile phone makes easy to check quickly the news (meanly the most recent) and helps you to keep updated of what is happening around the world.

As a conclusion, I have to say that it is not bad to watch TV when you know how to. When I say that I haven’t watch it for a long time I don’t mean that I never do, but first I check its programming from the mobile phone. For example, about a week ago, I watched the film The imitation game in the TV after checking what films they would transmit. As for the utility of Internet as an alternative of the television is, technically, not a big difference, but for my actual situation it makes a big difference to my time.

IS SCIENCE THE NEW RELIGION?

Did you ever ask yourself the reason why science is always right or why we explain everything from the scientific point of view? Because I always do, mostly when the philosophy classes started. One day, I was talking with a friend about science and its new innovations and possible new theories. Then, she said: “How do we know for sure if the scientific explanation of everything is true? Every day I am becoming more aware that science is just the new religion, not just for Atheists but for religious people too.” I got surprised by her thoughts and since then I always think about it.

From my point of view, since we are little, we are taught to base everything we see on science. As far back as I can remember, I always tried to find an explanation for everything (just like everyone does):  the meaning of life and its cycle, how are the planets held in the universe,… and it seems that science has always found an answer for every question.

The problem comes when we start to think for real. If we focus on the explanations they give to us it is always introduced by “The theorem of…”, for example, the gravitation theorem or the evolution theorem. As the name says, every explanation is a theory. The scientists are not sure about anything, and that is why they use the word “theorem”.

When it becomes to the similarity between science and religion are not obvious, but even so, there are some points of each which are alike, for not saying the same.

On one hand, science has its own “priesthood”, which are the well-known scientists. Their opinion and statements are not questioned, until someone better than them demonstrates the opposite or something new. For example, Bohr’s atomic model was accepted until Schrödinger idealized another atomic model. Nowadays, the actual atomic model is more actualized from the Schrödinger’s one, but even so, who guarantees us that the actual atomic model is the one for real? We have to believe that the atomic model is correct to understand the substances.

On the other hand, talking about believing, science implies having a little bit of faith even if we think it is nonsense, considering that science knowledges are based on experiences. As I said before, no one guarantees any explanation that science contributes. This indicates that we can never know for sure anything that comes from the experiences (experiments). We only have to believe in science and have faith.

As a conclusion, I only have to say that everyone who says they are not religious because they do not believe in anything are lying. They believe in science. It is true that science has changed our lives (in the negative or positive way). The kinematic principles, the different forces and energies, … are nothing more than laws that we have to accept without question it to comprehend the way that life works. I have to say that If we could recollect each scientific law and principle, we could write a holy book.  

FRIENDS MET UP IN MALAGA

This article was published on the 13th of January by the Dailymail newspaper. This news is about two friend who met in Spain because it was cheaper than getting the train.

One of the friends, Lucy Walker who is from Birmingham, planned to visit her friend Zara. She realised that the trip would cost about 105 pounds. However, she realised that she could travel to Malaga for 20 points with Ryanair, after looking online, and her friend’s flights from Birmingham to Malaga cost 55.29 pounds with Vueling, despite the English cities are only 200 miles apart and between the UK and Malaga 1,500 miles.

According to the girls, they also found a cheap hotel where they would spend three nights. During the days in Spain they visited Malaga and Granada.

This is a diagram which shows the prices and distance between the cities and UK - Malaga.

OPINION:

Personally, I think this is the best opportunity that someone can have to travel. It is a perfect excuse to visit new places. On the one hand, the two friends had bad luck for the expensive train tickets. But, on the other hand, that is a good thing because now they can meet somewhere unusual.

When it becomes to the costs of the trip they took, this is low. As the girls said, in Spain the life is cheaper than in England. That’s a point in favor.

The Ryanair company did such a good job to create this new promotion, just as Vueling did. Now we can travel without having to spend a lot of many, depending on the country where you want to fly and with which class, of course.

NEW ZEALAND WHALES: HUNDREDS MORE STRANDED

This article was published on the 12^th of February in the BBC newspaper. It talks about the hundreds of whales found in the Farewell Spit’s beach.

According to the news, there were found more than four hundred whales on Thursday. Abot 300 died, but a group of volunteers managed to refloat a hundred of whales. Also, they try to keep cool the rest of the survivors with water and wet pieces of hankies. The Project Jonah, an environmental group, has a plane flying all over the see to study the whales’ movements.

The reason why the whales are arriving in the land is not clear. But, even so, experts have different theories. On the one hand, they think the whales were pursued by sharks, considering they have shark’s bites. On the other hand, they think their navigation went wrong.

As reported by the news, it is not the first time whales and other aquatic mammal, like dolphins, were found in Farewell Spit.

Volunteers trying to cool a whale.

OPINION:

The fact that these whales ended up in the Farewell Spit is so sad. For me it is shocking to see that number of whales in a beach. But it looks like the people from there are used to it. That is the reason why there are a lot of maritime professionals and experts. I think that’s a good thing; if anything happens (like this time) they can react and act immediately.

As for the number of volunteers from that town is extremely amazing. Seeing people from different ages helping those poor animals is a sign of solidarity.

VOCABULARY:

Receding: que s'allunya.
Stranded: encallat/da.