Today I´m going to talk about food. Why? You may ask yourself: because it´s good? No. Because without it we can´t live? Maybe... Because it´s one of the most important things of the day? YES!
AMERICAN FOOD:
In America, lunch time is not very important, in fact, some people eat a sandwich moving from one place to another or even in their work while they are working. - Although pizza is an Italian food, in America, many people like to eat pizza in birthday parties, other celebrations, work meetings, ... Pizza is everywhere! - One of my favorite American meals is the steak.
- Some very typical meals are: hamburgers, fried chicken, fries, hot dogs, and meatballs. - Some American desserts are: cheesecake, brownies and apple pies (personally, my favorite desserts are brownies). SPANISH FOOD:
The Spanish lunch is so big that many people can´t work after eating, so they have to take a nap (“siesta”, in Spanish).
One of my favorite Spanish meals is white rice (with a bit of ketchup…). - Some typical Spanish meals are: "cocido madrileño", "chuletillas de cordero", "tortilla de patata", "paella", and many more.
John Ronald Reuel Tolkien was born on the 3rd of
January 1892 and died on the 2nd of September 1973. He was an
English writer, poet, philologist, and university professor, best known as the
author of the classic high fantasy works The Hobbit, The Lord of the
Rings, and The Silmarillion. He served as the Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon at PembrokeCollege,
Oxford, from 1925 to 1945 and Merton Professor
of Englis Language and Literature at MertonCollege, Oxford from 1945 to 1959. He was at one time
a close friend of C. S. Lewis—they were both members of the informal literary
discussion group known as the Inklings. Tolkien was appointed a Commander of
the Order of the British Empire by Queen
Elizabeth II on 28 March 1972.
C.S. LEWIS
Clive Staples
Lewis
(29 November 1898 – 22 November 1963), commonly called C. S. Lewis
and known to his friends and family as "Jack", was a novelist, poet,
academic, literary critic, essayist, , and Christian apologist. Born in Belfast, Ireland,
he held academic positions at both OxfordUniversity (MagdalenCollege), 1925–1954, and CambridgeUniversity
(MagdaleneCollege), 1954–1963. He is best known
both for his fictional work, especially The Screwtape Letters, The
Chronicles of Narnia, and The Space Trilogy, and for his non-fiction
Christian apologetics, such as Mere Christianity, Miracles, and The
Problem of Pain.
MODERN:
JEFF KINNEY
Jeffrey Patrick
"Jeff" Kinney (born February 19, 1971) is an American game designer,
cartoonist, producer, actor and author of children's books including the Diary
of a Wimpy Kid book series. He is also attributed as the creator of the
child-oriented website Poptropica.
He also Kinney was born and grew up in Fort Washington, Maryland,
United States.
He had an older brother, an older sister and a younger brother.[1] He attended
the University of Maryland at College
Park in the early 1990s. It was in college that Kinney
created the popular comic strip, Igdoof, that ran in the campus newspaper.
LINCOLN PEIRCE
Lincoln Peirce is the creator of the comic Big Nate, which debuted in 1991
and appears in 300 newspapers in the US and online daily at
www.gocomics.com, and is featured on the website Poptropica,
www.poptropica.com. He has also written several animated shorts for Cartoon
Network and Nickelodeon. A fan and collector of classic country music, Lincoln also hosts a
local radio show devoted to honky tonk and western swing on WMPG.
In addition to the Big Nate comic strip, Lincoln is the author and illustrator of the
New York Times bestselling Big Nate book series. His Big Nate books have been
featured on Good Morning America and in the Boston Globe, the Los Angeles
Times, USA Today, and the Washington Post. His released books in the series are
Big Nate In A Class By Himself, Big Nate Strikes Again, Big Nate On A Roll, Big
Nate Goes For Broke, and Big Nate Flips Out. He is currently workingon the sixth book in the series,
"Big Nate In The Zone."
CHRISTOFER PAOLINI
Christopher James Paolini (born November 17, 1983, Los Angeles, California) is an American author. He is best known as the author of the Inheritance Cycle,
which consists of the books Eragon, Eldest, Brisingr and Inheritance. He lives
in Paradise Valley, Montana, where he wrote his first book.
William Shakespeare (April 26, 1564 - April 23, 1616) was born in Stratford-upon-Avon (England). His
actual date of birth remains unknown, but is traditionally observed on 26 April. He was an English poet, playwright and actor. His plays have been translated into every major living language and are performed more often than those of any other playwright. Many people say that he is the best
writer known.
His most famous books are: Romeo and Juliet; Hamlet (especially famous by the sentence: To be or not to be, that is the question); A midsummer night's dream.
CHARLES
DICKENS:
Charles Dickens (February 7, 1812 - June 9, 1870). He was an English writer and
social critic. He created some of the world's most memorable fictional
characters and is generally regarded as the greatest novelist of the Victorian
period.His literary
genius was broadly acknowledged by critics and scholars. His novels and short
stories continue to be widely popular. Some of them are: A tale of two cities (by the way: this book inspired the tittle of this blog); The adventures of Oliver Twis and A Christmas carol.
Modern Writers:
J.K.ROWLING
:
J. K. Rowling (July 31, 1965 - ), is a British novelist, best
known as the author of the Harry Potter fantasy series. The Potter
books have gained worldwide attention, won multiple awards, and sold more than
400 million copies. They have become the best-selling book series in
history, and been the basis for a series of films which has become the highest-grossing
film series in history. She also wrote The cuckoo´s calling with the pseudonimous of Robert Galbraith, in 2013.
RICK
RIORDAN:
Rick Riordan (June 5, 1964 - ) is an American author best known for writing
the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series. He also wrote the adult
mystery series Tres Navarre and helped edit Demigods and monsters,
a collection of essays on his Percy Jackson series. He helped develop the ten
books of The 39 Clues series and wrote the first book in the series, The
Maze of Bones. In 2012, he completed a trilogy focusing on Egyptian
mythology, The Kane Chronicles, and has published four out of five
planned books of The heroes of olympus series, the sequel to the Percy
Jackson series that focuses on Roman and Greek mythology.
SUZANNE
COLLINS:
Suzanne Collins (August 10, 1962 - ) is an
American television writer and novelist, best known as the author of The New
York Times best selling series The Underland Chronicles and The
Hunger Games trilogy (which consists of The Hunger Games, Catching
Fire, and Mockingjay).
MOVIES? Yes, of course!
Here are some trailers of movies based on the books that these authors have
written:
Today I´m going to talk about cars (no, not Cars-the movie, cars as in automobiles).
First of all, I’m going to talk about European cars:
Audi, Volkswagen, BMW, Mercedes-Benz, Opel and Porsche are the best known German cars.
Seat is the best known car of Spain. But I have to say that there are many cars made in Spain, like Seat Ibiza in Barcelona; Volswagen Polo in Navarra or Ford Fiesta in Valencia.
Aston Martin, Jaguar, Land Rover, McLaren, Mini, MG and Rolls-Royce are the best known cars of the United Kingdom.
In France, the best known cars are: Citroën, Renault and Peugeot.
Alfa Romeo, Ferrari, Lamborghini and Maserati are the best known Italian cars.
And in Sweden these are the best known cars: Volvo and Saab.
From 1950 to last year (2013) all of the winners of Formula1 won with European cars, like:
Fernando Alonso (with Renault) or Sebastian Vettel (also with Renault).
OK! Now with American cars: Chrysler, Dodge (the car we brought from Boston), Chevrolet, Cadillac, Buick and Ford are the most known American cars.
As you can see, there are more cars made in Europe than in America.
Go back 70 years. Can you imagine? OK, you all think you can, but I bet you can‘t. Of what were you thinking?
OK. Now, let’s take a look at reality:
- Did you know that they arrested a person in a bus for not lending their seat to a white person in 1955?
- Did you know there were water fountains for blacks and others for whites; restaurants for colored and others for non-colored; schools for blacks and others for whites; busesfor colored and others for non-colored; and even bathrooms for blacks and others for whites?
-Did you know that some people called older persons “boy” or “girl” in sign of disrespect? Well, one day the father of Martin Luther King (M.L.K) said “ Thechild is a boy I’m a man.
- Did you know that M.L.K. was a very important person because he declared equality for blacks and for whites?
Martin Luther King
-Did you know that Obama was the first black president?(I know you probably do but I’m writing it no matter what)
-Did you know this fact encouraged people a lot?
Barack Obama
To finish I’m going to show you how bad was racism 70 years ago with this trailer of : 12 Years a slave.
Christmas
in Boston and in Murcia are very much the same:
- In both
cities, people who own stores decorate them with the Christmas spirit; some
people decorate their houses and, in both cities, the streets are lighted.
Murcia
- Families
get together to celebrate this Holiday and
also the new year.
Boston
However, there are
some differences:
- In Boston, instead of the
Three Wise Kings, they celebrate Santa Claus' visit, who delivers presents the night before Christmas (kids prepair their stockings for Santa Claus to put their gifts inside them).
Santa Claus
- Here, during the
night of the 5th of January (when the Three Wise Kings come to every
house to put the presents under the Christmas tree), people organize a parade
to see them. And it’s very common to eat the “Roscón de Reyes”, that night or
the next morning.
Three Wise Kings during the parade
The Hannukah Menorah
- In Boston,
nowadays, people on the street say: ”Happy holidays!” instead of: “Happy
Christmas!” because in Boston there are many cultures and they respect all of
them: some people celebrate Christmas but others celebrate, for example, Hannukah
(it’s a eight-day Jewish holiday that is
celebrated because theMaccabeessuccessfully
rebelled againstAntiochus IV Epiphanes; according to the Talmud -a late
text- the Temple was purified and the wicks of the menorah miraculously burned
for eight days, even though there was only enough sacred oil for one day's
lighting).
Snow in Boston
Snow in Boston
- In
American schools, after Christmas holidays, classes start the 2nd of
January and, in Spain,
because of the Three Wise Kings’ visit, we start the 7th of January.
- In Boston, during these days, it usually snows a lot and Christmas is really a "white Christmas".
But the most important thing
is that Jesus was born 2014 years ago and lots of people around the world
celebrate this.
