Our national drink

An afternoon meeting with friends would not be a proper meeting if the Argentinean national drink was not present. I imagine that you know what I am talking about. That loyal companion that must have been part of many unforgettable moments in your life as well as it is in my life: the mate.
The mate, as I said, is the national drink and one of our most established cultural traditions. When a friend of yours enters your house, the most likely thing to say is: shall I prepare mate? And a high percentage of the answers are positive. The mate is so established and popular that no matter where you are, it is likely to find somebody drinking it.
Mate can be bitter or sweet; there is a tendency to say that bitter mate in much preferred by men, while sweet mate by women. I do not agree with that since, in my opinion, there’s nothing better than drinking bitter mate and relaxing. And, as you know I’m a girl.
There is a Guarani myth that explains the origin of yerba mate. It says that one day the Goddess of the Moon and the Goddess of the cloud decided to visit the Earth but, in their visit they encountered a Yaguareté who tried to attack them. A man protected the two goddesses and, to express their thanks, they gave this man a new plant to prepare a “drink of friendship”.
Preparing mate can be considered a ritual; a careless prepared mate won’t taste as good as one which is prepared with love and devotion. Mate is considered safe by the United States Food and Drug Administration. Studies show that yerba mate exhibits significant cancer-fighting activity.
So, what else can we ask to this companion? Mate has been with us in our worst and best moments in life. It acts as psychology and friend whenever you need to calm down and think about something. It is a good fellow when you have to spend hours sitting and studying. It is part of our lives and culture, we cannot deny it.

Enjoy this video about a peculiar mate drinker.

My tiny baby!

Whenever I arrived at home in my hometown, he is the first to welcome me rejoicing. He is my tiny baby: Pinky. He is my pet, my favourite one, the one that is mine since at home there are 4 more dogs. He is a 3 year old Chihuahua and he is really special.
The Chihuahua is the smallest breed of dog in the world. The first dog of this breed was discovered in 1850 in old ruins in Mexico, in the state of Chihuahua. The breed was named after this state. The height of these animals is between 30 and 38 cm and their weight is between 2 and 3.5 kg. Colours are varied.
My little baby lives in Victoria with my family since such a hyperactive creature is not the best complement for a shared flat in the city. Besides, I’m never at home and he would have felt really sad and lonely taking into account the characteristics of this breed. They do not like being along. Chihuahuas tend to be extremely loyal to only one person. And that is me when I am home. If he is resting on my lap and anyone dares to approach me he would start snarling and barking. He is my loyal protector. He is a chihuahua but he feels a rottweiler. He is beige and he was a birthday present 3 years ago.
This tiny creatures have their advantages, they are little, compact and easy to handle and they do not consume a lot of food due to their size. But the disadvantages are sometimes unbearable, they are so bad tempered and they have so good lungs that they can keep barking at the air for hours, without stopping or getting tired.
My baby is like that, once he kept barking at a fly for 15 minutes. Well, this fly was bothering him, flying around him. I really love him. They may come over as hysterical the first times you met him, but, if you get o know this creatures they are really special.

Perspectives

“Carrefour” is a French word that means “crossroads”. As you may know, Carrefour is also the name of a French international hypermarket chain. Taking into account its size, it is the largest hypermarket chain in the world.
There are several Carrefour supermarkets all around our country. You must have entered one of them at least once, I imagine. So, you must be well acquainted with the company’s sign. The sign is tricoloured: red, white and blue. These are the tree colours of the French flag.
I have to admit that I was sick and tired of seeing this sign. I stepped on it whenever I entered the hall of my building and the floor was covered with leaflets which contained information about the week sale. Every day when I put the household rubbish out I saw it since we tend to use Carrefour’s plastic bags, with its sign on them, as rubbish bags. While going to college or coming back home by bus I saw it thousands and thousands of times a day. I was continuously exposed to this well-known sign. What is the point of all this? You must be wondering. Well, let me tell you:
After seeing the sign millions of times, one day- I think a week ago- , I was talking to one of my students. As you know teenagers and computers are always together, teenagers can spend hours chatting on Facebook, uploading photos, commenting on them and joining different social groups. And, when they are not in front of the screen, they keep on commenting on this. So, this girl told me: “today I joined a great group in Facebook, the name is: I ALSO HADN’T REALIZED THAT THE CARREFOUR’S SIGN WAS A LETTER C”. As soon as I heard this, the sign came to my mind once and again, and now I could see it. It was a white letter “C“on a red and blue background. Have you realized it?
So, what is the moral of this story? That sometimes it does not care how many times you have seen something or how much you think you know it but, it is not until somebody else comes and shows it from another point of view that you realize that you were wrong. It is a question of perspectives!

The platypus

You must have bump into many different strange animals on the bus, walking in the street or even at school but I bet you that none of them was as strange as this one: the platypus.
The platypus is a mammal that lives on the east coast of Australia. It is usually described as a hotchpotch of a variety of familiar animals: duck, otter and beaver. Platypuses have a bill that resembles a duck’s bill and webbed feet such as those of ducks. Male platypuses have poisonous stingers on their feet. The body of the platypus is similar to the beaver’s body; it is 35 to 40 cm long and with a flattened tail that is 10 to 15 cm in length. The body and tail are covered with a thick, soft brownish fur similar to the otter’s fur. This fur consists of three different layers. A platypus can grow to a maximum weight of 1 to 2.4 kg and live for an average of 14 years. The most peculiar characteristic of this animal is that they reproduce by laying eggs but they are mammals. There is only another animal which shares this characteristic with the platypus- the echidna. Platypuses do not have teeth, their diet consists of insects, larvae, shellfish and worms. They are considered one of the most unlikely animals in the world.
Why is that I decided to write about this animal? Well, it is because I am exposed to it every weekend when I watch the Disney cartoon Phineas and Ferb with my little niece. This is a Disney series about a particular family which has adopted a platypus as pet. It is said that the creators of this series chose to introduce this animal due to its striking appearance.
It cannot be denied that every day we learn something new. Even when you feel that you may be wasting your time watching cartoons but at the same time you are making a little person in your family extremely happy.
Enjoy these videos about one of the most peculiar animals on earth in its two versions: real life and cartoon.

New coins!

I don’t usually collect anything but as soon as I saw the first one I knew I wanted to have the five of them. And I do! I am talking about the five new one peso Argentinian coins which started circulating a few months ago. The government announced that these commemorative coins were starting to be in circulation in June. As I previously mentioned they are commemorative coins, they are part of the bicentennial celebration of our country.
What is special about them? If you look at them from a distance you would say that there is no difference between them and the ordinary one peso coins. The new coins are bimetal just as the other ones but the difference is that they depict five different popular Argentinian areas:
Pucara de Tilcara: it is located in Jujuy, outside the city of Tilcara and is a famous historical site. The Pucara de Tilcara is the ruins of Inca’s fortifications that were built about 900 years ago. This place was declared a national monument on 2000.
Aconcagua: it is the highest mountain of the world outside Asia. That is to say, it is the highest peak in the Southern and Western hemispheres. Aconcagua is situated in Mendoza and it is 6962 meters of altitude over the level of the sea.
Glaciar Perito Moreno: it is a glacier located in the “Parque Nacional los Glaciares” in Santa Cruz. It is one of the most important tourist attractions in Argentina.
Mar del Plata: as you must all know, it is a famous seaside beach resort in Argentina. It is located in the city of Buenos Aires on the coats of the Atlantic Ocean.
Parque Nacional el Palmar: it is a national park located in my beloved province of Entre Rios. It was created in 1966 for the preservation of the Yatay which is a type of palm tree.
You must have seen one of them. Maybe for you they are just coins, but I find them really nice because of the reason they were launched and because of their depictions: It is more than money, it is a place in your country you should be proud of.

Wisdom teeth

Four years ago, my four wisdom teeth were removed. We all know that they exist, that most people need to have them removed at a certain point in their lives. But, what are they? Why there is no room in our mouths for them?
Wisdom teeth are the third and final set of molars. They usually appear between the ages of 17 and 21. That is why they are called “wisdom” teeth, since they appear at an age in which we are already young adults. Most of us have the wisdom teeth and, if you are unlucky you may have more than four of them, a case known as supernumerary teeth. In some cases, wisdom teeth may not need to be removed. This is when they are aligned and when there is enough room in the jaw for them to grow in. But, in most cases, there is no room for them and they do not grow properly aligned so they need to be removed.
There are two different theories which attempt to explain this phenomenon of a set of molars for which there is no room in our jaws and that does not grow at a convenient age in our lives. One of these theories claims that in former times, due to the diet, teeth loss was common at an early age. So, wisdom teeth used to grow so as to fill the space left by those teeth that had been lost. They acted as a kind of replacement. The second theory supports the notion that, in the past, human being’s jaws were much larger and as a result they allowed for a larger number of teeth. As our body has developed, nowadays, our jaws are smaller but the number of teeth does not correspond to our actual jaw size. The result is a mouth crammed with teeth that need to be removed as soon as they are visible or tangible.
I do not know about your experience, if you have had your wisdom teeth removed or not, whether you have them or not, or if while reading this you may start thinking that that minor discomfort that you sometimes feel behind your second molars is just your wisdom teeth that are starting to come through. The only thing I know is that lost my wisdom at the dentist’s four years ago!

Idioms

An idiom is an expression, word, or phrase that has a figurative meaning that is separate from the literal meaning or definition of the words of which it is made.
It was not until the other day, while I was watching a film (My name is Khan), that I realized the importance of idioms. The protagonist of the film was an autistic person and he was only able to understand the literal meaning of words. So, whenever a person used an idiom or a figurative meaning of a word, this man kept misinterpreting what the other person said. There are so many things that we take for granted an idioms are one of them. That phrase which means this, may be interpreted as something not only completely different but also sometimes ridiculous by a person who gets the meaning of its constituents separately and not as a whole. Here I will write a list of those idioms which in that case could result in total confusion. Just imagine situations in which someone may interpret their literal meaning:

“Out of the frying pan, into the fire”: If you get out of one problem, but find yourself in a worse situation, you are out of the frying pan, into the fire. (Spanish equivalent: “De Guatemala a Guate-peor”)

“Flogging a dead horse”: If someone is trying to convince people to do or feel something without any hope of succeeding, they're flogging a dead horse.

“To kick the bucket”: to die. (Spanish equivalent: inf. “Parar la “pata””)

“Get up on the wrong side of (the) bed” also “wake up on the wrong side of (the) bed” : to begin the day feeling unhappy and uncomfortable. (Spanish equivalent: “Levantarse con el pie izquierdo”)

“To be like a bull in a china shop”: to often drop or break things because you move awkwardly or roughly. (Spanish equivalent: “Como elefante en un bazar”)

" To put your cards on the table": to speak honestly and openly
about your feelings and intentions. (Spanish equivalent:"Poner las cartas sobre la mesa")

" To add fuel to the flames": to say something that makes a
difficult situation worse. (spanish equivalent: "Echar leña al fuego")

My last lesson: an ICT lesson

For our intensive practice period, we, teachers to be, were asked to design and teach an ICT lesson. All of us were well aware of the theory related to the topic: an approach to teaching which involved the introduction of Information and Communication Technologies. This sounded great, and as students we have been part of this type of lesson but now it was our time, and we had to put into practice what we knew about this acronym. This is what the practice period is about, isn’t it?
The name of the unit I was dealing with was “The Media” and we have been working with lots of articles and the passive voice structure so, the most appropriate task to assign was writing an article. The approach to writing was process writing but the question was how to transform an ordinary writing lesson into an ICT writing lesson. Arriving at the answer was not so difficult. The first thing I did was look for an online tool to create newspaper articles. This meant googling “how to create a newspaper article” and the answer was there. I was lucky enough to find a tool which was not only effective but also incredibly easy to use. You just needed to type inside the blank boxes and after a click your article was there, ready to be downloaded and printed. I created a short article myself to be used as model for the writing. This was the most interesting part of my lesson: my students reading a newspaper article which seemed to have been cut out from a real newspaper and the topic of which was how the performance of class 1st A had improved, how their performance in the English class had improved. They found it really funny and their faces showed their astonishment. The lesson went on as an ordinary process writing lesson up to the moment in which I wrote the name of a website on the blackboard and my e-mail address. Students were supposed to create, with what they had written, a newspaper article alike the model they had been working with. They weren’t used to be asked to work with their beloved computer very often. So, they were really excited about it. They created the articles, attached them to an e-mail and send it to me. It was group work so the articles were not many; I created a slideshow with them and sent it to my students. All of us enjoyed the experience. ICT lessons are easier to design than what we think and they are remarkably effective. TOOL

Survival

I had thought about “Survival” as the topic for my presentation but I had never thought that I was going to explore the topic from this point of view: tribal peoples struggling to survive. It was when I googled the word that I found “Survival”, the International Organization for Tribal Peoples, that I started reading and reading and I realized this issue deserved to be dealt with.
The first thing I was shocked by, was the number of indigenous that lives in our planet. About 150 millions across the world and in 60 different countries. Of course this is a minority in relation to the world population but I used to think about indigenous people as a minority of hundreds, never of millions.
Another factor that I found really interesting was that “they” and “we” are affected by the same things: deforestation, pollution. All these things are destroying the places tribal peoples dwell in and as a result, these people are being displaced. But, if we stop to think, that is exactly the same that is happening to our planet, I mean, we live in the same planet and we are all well aware of global warming, pollution, etc and their negative consequences on the biodiversity, soil, environment. Of course, as I mentioned in my presentation everything that is done is done in the mane of progress and is disguised as positive and prosperous.
They are different in the same way you are different from you neighbour: you wear different clothes, listen to different music, have different lifestyles, have different tastes but tribal peoples and you are both human beings, something that goes beyond those differences that I previously mentioned. So, their rights should be respected in the same way your rights should be. It is not fair that they need to be continuously struggling to survive in a world that belongs to them in the same way that it belongs to you. Besides, they were the first to be here, weren’t they?

Here I leave you the link to the Survival webpage. I hope you enjoy it. It is really interesting.

SURVIVAL

This is a painting by Ernest Descals. It is part of a series of paintings which illustrate a story about some strange beings -Anunnaki, Annunakis,Anunnakis,Annuunaki- coming from another planet(Niburu) and who settled on Earth and are among us. The name of the painting is ANUNNAKI-ANNUNAKI-DNA-ADN-GENETICA-GENETICS-NIBIRU. I chose it because at first sight I could relate it to science and technology.
Research on DNA has been carried out for decades, and findings have been applied in different fields in technology and science. For example, genetic engineering is one of them. It is also called genetic modification and it is the human manipulation of the genetic material of organisms. Genetic engineering techniques have been applied to various industries, such as medicine and agriculture with great success.
Another field in which DNA findings have been of great importance is in forensics. Blood, semen, skin, saliva, hair, all these can be found at a crime scene and contain DNA information. This information is used to identify a matching DNA of an individual and as a result, crimes are solved much more efficiently than in former times.
DNA information is clearly applied in many fields.

Do we speak the same language?

“Gender differences in communication” was the topic for a presentation I delivered in my phonology class and, as I found it so interesting, I wanted to share it with you.
It is said that men and women not only think differently but also speak differently. How is this explained? Just read and I am sure you will find plenty of examples from your own experience to illustrate each point.
Men and women are considered equally intelligent (of course) but they tend to see the world from different perspectives: men think compartmentally and women think globally. This means that “they” (men) store information in different compartments which resemble a file cabinet drawer system. When one drawer is open the others are closed. When they are spending time with friends they completely forget about their girlfriend/s. Women, on the other hand, tend to see life from a more global perspective, thus, making connections between different things that belong to different aspects of her life. A women looking at a men t-shirt in a shop window may associate it to a similar t- shirt that her boyfriend wore in their first date and as a result she may text to tell him that she loves him.
As I said, men and women also speak differently. While women speak in paragraph form supported by lots of details and the bottom-line (sentence that summarizes the idea) at the end, men tend to speak in phrases without a lot of detail and with the bottom-line at the very beginning. Another characteristic of women is that they use “hint language”. They tend to express needs, whishes or desires framed in the form of questions, raising their shoulders as if they don’t know what the answer is. Something men will not decode since hints are not part of their language. Men tend to take language very literally, focusing on the content rather than in the hidden meaning.
So, I hope this helps you understand why sometimes, when talking to a man, things may not go as expected. When you are communicating with the opposite sex, try to bear in mind all these differences.

My cartoon

The topic
It was like “hate at first sight”. Since the very beginning, when he appeared in the mass media, Ricardo Fort was an individual who evoked a feeling of disgust on me. Always showing off, always talking about himself and considering himself a hero just because he is a millionaire. Let alone his falling in love with a different girl every week so as to avoid people suspecting him of being gay.
As weeks went by, he was becoming more and more popular. People everywhere- at the bus stop, on the bus, at the supermarket, at the butcher’s- talked about this “material” man who not only fosters materialistic values but who also seems to be made of plastic. Who his current girlfriend was, who the following one was going to be, his clothes, how much money he spent shopping in Miami, his Rolexes, his Rolls Royces, his play, who he quarrelled with: such were the bizarre topics on which many Argentinians keep their mind. I couldn’t believe it! A character like this one deserved a cartoon about him.

Being a cartoonist
This was the first time that I dared to create a cartoon and I really liked the experience. The design software was very easy to use. Maybe, options as regard drawings were not that varied but, I was lucky enough to find a character that fitted Ricardo Fort’s personality: a lion.
Cartoons enable you to express yourself and convey different meanings just by using pictures and a few words. They are a powerful an effective tool when it comes to criticise or support any aspect. Besides, they do not demand much effort on part of the reader and they are very easy to create. It was a great experience.

Hachiko

Last week I saw a film during the end of which I could not avoid crying. “Hachiko: a Dog’s Story” was released in August 2009 and was directed by Lasse Hallström and Richard Gere as its main protagonist. This film portrays the story of a dog which faithfully waited for his master at the train station for 10 years even after his master’s death. At the end of the film there is a notice which claims that this story is a true story. So, I decided to find out more about this dog. Hachiko belonged to the Akita Inu breed. He was born in 10 November 1923 and was adopted by Hidesaburō Ueno, a professor at the University of Tokyo. The professor commuted to work every day, during Hachiko’s early years, he accompanied his owner every day to the Shabushy station and when he arrived back to the station at night the dog would be there, at the same place, at the same time, waiting for his master. The daily scene of the dog and the professor became so familiar to the people working in the station and other commuters that all of them greeted, fed and took care of the dog.
One day the awaited train arrived but, every time the doors of the station opened the dog saw someone else passing through them, not the professor. That day he did not came back. He had suffered from a cerebral hemorrhage at the University and had died before coming back home. But this did not prevent the dog from going every day, at the same time, to the same place, for the following 10 years to wait for his beloved master. Hachiko was finally found dead at that same spot on 8 March 1935.
Hachiko has become an icon of loyalty to the local people. Every year a ceremony is conducted in his honor. This ceremony takes place at Shabushy Station where a life-size bronze statue of the loyal animal has been erected. Hachiko has also become the protagonist of many didactic books for children. Hachiko is a local hero.

Culture

Dog meat
Nutritional value per 100 g (3.5 oz)

Energy: 1,096kj (262 kcal)
Carbohydrates: 0.1 g
Dietary fibre: 0 g
Fat: 20.2g
Protein:19 g
Water: 60.1 g
Vitamin C: 3mg (5%)
Calcium: 8 mg (1%)
Iron: 2.8 mg (22%)
Potassium: 270 mg (6%)
Sodium: 72 mg (3%)


I can imagine the baffled expression on your face. A strong feeling of disgust must have aroused on you while you were reading the table above. What is this girl talking about? You must be wondering. Is she kidding?
Well, everything started some months ago when I received an e-mail. This e-mail had been created by an animal rights group who was fighting against the slaughter of dogs. Yes! Dogs are considered livestock in many countries, mainly Asian countries. So, that animal that is playing in your back garden or lying on the floor next to you or sleeping on your lap while you are reading this may be delicious for some people. In the e-mail you could see a lot of pictures which illustrated how dogs were killed and later prepared in a great variety of dishes. It did not matter to whom I showed the pictures, reactions were always the same: Disgusting! Revolving! I can’t stand seeing them!
As I consider myself an open-minded person. I decided to find out a little more about this issue. And, I discovered that dog meat is consumed in a surprising number of countries all around the world and it has been consumed in almost every region at some point in history. But, this is not what I wanted to concentrate on. What I am interested in is in showing you to want an extent the place you are born and grown up in and the culture you belong to shape your view of the world. What is accepted for you and what is not. Which things are edible and which are not.
As I said reactions to the idea of eating dogs were always the same. But what makes a dog meat barbecue so disgusting and a meat or lamb or chicken or pork barbecue so tasty? And for me the answer is only one: culture. I admit that the pictures were revolving. Cruelty was depicted in each one of them. But, have you ever seen any picture taken at the slaughterhouse? I looked for some and the only thing that I found different, between those in the e-mail and these ones, was the size of the animals. I am afraid I may come over as a promoter of the killing and consumption of dog meat. By no means! I love dogs: I actually have got 5 at home. The fact is that I have always been interested in culture and tolerance.
If you are susceptible just do not click on the link below. I am including some of the pictures. Sorry...

PICTURES

Sunday, Bloody Sunday

Yes...
I can't believe the news today
Oh, I can't close my eyes
And make it go away
How long...
How long must we sing this song?
How long?How long...
'cause tonight…we can be as one
Tonight...
Broken bottles under children's feet
Bodies strewn across the dead end street
But I won't heed the battle call
It puts my back up
Puts my back up against the wall
Sunday, Bloody Sunday
Sunday, Bloody Sunday
Sunday, Bloody Sunday
And the battle's just begun
There's many lost, but tell me who has won
The trench is dug within our hearts
And mothers, children, brothers, sisters
Torn apart
Sunday, Bloody Sunday
Sunday, Bloody Sunday
How long...
How long must we sing this song?
How long?
How long...
'cause tonight...we can be as one
Tonight...tonight...
Sunday, Bloody Sunday
Sunday, Bloody Sunday
Wipe the tears from your eyes
Wipe your tears away
Oh, wipe your tears away
Oh, wipe your tears away
(Sunday, Bloody Sunday)
Oh, wipe your blood shot eyes
(Sunday, Bloody Sunday)
Sunday, Bloody Sunday
(Sunday, Bloody Sunday)
Sunday, Bloody Sunday
(Sunday, Bloody Sunday)
And it's true we are immune
When fact is fiction and TV reality
And today the millions cry
We eat and drink while tomorrow they die
(Sunday, Bloody Sunday)
The real battle just begun
To claim the victory Jesus won
On... Sunday Bloody Sunday
Sunday Bloody Sunday...

I had always liked this song by U2, but it was not until my first year in the teaching training college, during my social studies lesson, that I really realized what the lyrics were about. What was the “Bloody Sunday”? Had it actually existed? To my surprise it was a well known historic event in the UK.
As you may know, U2 is an Irish rock band and this is quite significant since “Bloody Sunday” took place in Derry (Ireland). “Bloody Sunday” is an incident which occurred on 30 January 1972, an idle Sunday, in which 14 people were slaughtered. Who were these people? Why were they killed? By whom?
Most of the victims were unarmed members of a civil rights group who were part of a protest and who suffered from brutal and bloody repression by the British Army. But, protesters were not the only ones who were shot at, some of the victims were just bystanders whose mistake was to be in the wrong place, at the wrong time. As I said before, the victims were 14, 7 of them were adolescents. Not every victim died of gunshot wounds- two of them died after being run down by vehicles from the British Army- and of those who did, 5 were shot in the back. What is even more indignant is the fact that up to now, none of the murderers have been condemned on the basis that they acted recklessly and for fear of a savage attack carried out by these protesters- unarmed protesters.
“Broken bottles under children's feet
Bodies strewn across the dead end street”
I found these two lines vividly illustrative. Just by reading them, you can have the mental image and the nasty feeling of how terrible being there must have been. I think that those who died in this event and those who found themselves part of it out of the blue deserve this song so as to be remembered.
I hope you like it.

Political Art.

"I think that the political reading given to my work is fundamental, that it can’t be left aside, and that if it is cannot be completely understood. What’s more, I feel that a mere esthetic reading of my work would be a betrayal.” Antonio Berni.
Delicio Antonio Berni was born in Rosario, Santa Fe, in 1905. He is a distinguished painter who in 1926 went to live in France and when he came back to Argentina in 193 initiated Political Art in our country.
Political art is not propaganga. Political Art is a way of participating in the political phenomenon independently of any political party. The aim of it is to encourage social transformation.
I decided to write about this artist since he was born in Rosario and since I find his works really interesting. Besides, he is the creator of a well known character in the teacher training college: Juanito Laguna, a boy from the slums whose life was pictured by Berni in a series of paintings. The first one was exhibited in 1961.
The paintings I found most interesting are “Unemployed”, 1934(“Desocupados”); “Midnight in the World”, (1936-1937) (“Medianoche en el Mundo”) and “The Hired Hand’s Family” (1975) (“La familia del peón”). These paintings are clear illustrations of what Politic Art is. The first one pictures a group of men and a woman with a child living in the streets waiting lucklessly for an opportunity to lead a better life. In “Midnight in the World” we are shown the unfortunate life lead by homeless people, suffering from illnesses, awaiting their tragic fate. And the last one, “The Hired Hand’s Family”, pictures the desolation of the working class family.
I hope you like the paintings and the fact that now you know who Juanito Laguna is. For me, up to know, he had been an unknown character whose name only reminded me of the constantly incoming mails delivered by the Juanito Laguna movement.

The easy way out.

Here I will share an experience with you girls. This happened to me during my practice period and reminded me why I decided once that I wanted to be a teacher.
During the observation period there was a boy who really called my attention from the very first day. He was always sitting at the back, without participating at all and whenever he was asked to answer a question by the teacher only silence was his response. He seemed to be very shy and having a vulnerable personality. Before starting my practice period I decided to talk to his teacher about him but the only response I had was: “He never studies, he fails in every subject, there’s nothing to be done” and here is when I thought let’s give it a try. I will do my best to help this boy and that is what I did.
He was the one to whom I paid more attention, whenever I explained something, an activity for example, while the others were solving it I went to his desk and explained it to him for a second time. In the first week there were no signs of improvement except the fact that he started to pay more attention to what we were doing, still unable to participate. But, in the second week, when I saw that he was starting to solve activities I started to call him, and he felt confident enough to raise his hand whenever we were correcting something or they were asked to participate. And he was doing well, he was able to solve every activity, at the end of each class he came to me and asked if I could explain to him what they had to do for the next class. He wanted to work and participate and feel part of the group.
The day of the exam came and, when correcting them, to my surprise he got a “very good indeed”. When the marks were read to the students by the teacher, something unexpected happened. I looked at him and he was crying. I couldn’t believe my eyes; I went to his desk and asked him what the problem was. He just cried and repeated: “I studied a lot”. “But come on” I told him. “You have only made a few mistakes, it is a high mark, why are you crying?” and the response was: “I had never got one of those, I thought I had failed”...
Future teachers: Never take the easy way out.

Wear sunscreen

Girls, I wanted to share this video with you because for me it has been of great help. I watched it for the first time when a friend of mine sent it to me attached to an e-mail which said: great video. The first thing I read was the title and I thought: “Skin cancer” I know, I shouldn’t’ sunbathe at peak hours. But, I gave the video a chance and I was surprised. No! It’s not about skin cancer and it’s not a Hawaiian Tropic advertisement. It is a video that at least for me resembles a bible which teaches you how to live, in what way, it tells you so many truths that you don’t consider until you watch it and feel it. It makes you think, and it makes you feel confident. It happens to me that whenever I have that negative feeling that things are going too wrong I start recalling phrases from this video and a smile spreads over my face.
• “Enjoy the power and beauty of your youth.”
I really like this one. Some days you may feel that you are the ugliest person on Earth, that you deserve nothing but to be eradicated from society. No clothes will fit, your hair is dull, your face is full of freckles and you hate that tiny mole next to your right ear despite the fact that you are the only one who notices it. Well, those days: Remember this video!
• “The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind.”
Another good one! Don’t you think so?
“I won’t pass the exam”, “It will take me another year to finish my studies”. Of course, they are not minor issues but you don’t have to kill yourself because of them. It’s part of the process.
And, tell me the truth. Sometimes you even find yourself extremely worried or angry because a glass has been broken, or because there’s no more coffee left. Don’t you?
Girls, such is life! Those are not real problems. Trust me!
• “Accept certain inalienable truths: Prices will rise. Politicians will philander. You, too, will get old”
Do I need to expand on this one? I think all of you know what it is talking about...or not?

Just enjoy the video. I hope you like it. I really do!
(Sorry but subtitles are in Portuguese. Don’t pay attention to them or if you cannot avoid reading them, it may be a chance to start learning a third language. ;))

WEAR SUNSCREEN

The World Cup in the classroom.

Girls, what I want to do here is share an experience with you. Well, as you all know, the World Cup has become the talk of the country. And, the classroom does not escape from reality. Younger students are always exchanging stamps to complete their albums. Elder students are always judging the Argentinian coach’s decisions and criticising the players. So, I thought: why not taking advantage of this situation? I have to ask them to stop talking about the topic. Why not spending a whole lesson talking about the World cup using the target language? And that was what I did. I used the World Cup as context for a group of activities related to countries and nationalities with little students and, I presented a text about the World Cup for reading comprehension to the elder ones. And let me tell you that the results were amazing. They were so motivated that they really enjoyed the class and were eager to participate or to find out more about the World Cup history for example.
Motivation plays an important role in this issue. As we all have studied motivated students are more willing to participate and take risks, and are so interested in communicating that they manage to express themselves in the target language.
So girls I think that it is important to take these things into account, I know that sometimes we have to follow a book, we have many restrictions but we cannot deny reality. What is happening outside the classroom is of interest to the students. Almost any topic can be used as context to practise any grammar structure. If not texts can be found. For example, I will include at the end a link of a website where you can find texts about the World Cup for different levels. So, if you want them to pay attention to you just pay attention to their interests...

http://www.saberingles.com.ar/reading/index.html

White comedy

I waz whitemailed
By a white witch,
Wid white magic
An white lies,
Branded by a white sheep
I slaved as a whitesmith
Near a white spot
Where I suffered whitewater fever.
Whitelisted as a whiteleg
I waz in de white book
As a master of white art,
It waz like white death.
People called me white jack
Some hailed me as a white wog,
So I joined de white watch
Trained as a white guard
Lived off the white economy.
Caught and beaten by de whiteshirts
I waz condemned to a white mass,
Don't worry,
I shall be writing to de Black House.

A bit shocking, isn’t it? This must be the work of a black man you may be thinking. And you are right! This poem was written by the poet and novelist Benjamin Zephaniah. He was born in Birmingham (England) but he is a British Jamaican Rastafarian who has proved to be an advocate of racial equality.
In this poem what he is showing us is the negative connotation the colour black, which is the colour of his skin, has in our society. He substituted the word “black”, which is part of the construction of so many words with negative denotation, by the word “white”. In this way he makes us aware to what an extent we associate black to evil, impurity and dirt and white to goodness, purity and cleanliness.
It is something to reflect upon. Don’t you think so? So many times we may find ourselves fighting for racial equality without realizing that the language we are actually speaking can be far from tolerant.