Good Experience

I really enjoyed the experience of writing on the blog. In the beginning of the English class, I did not believe that I could write in another language. In the development of the course I began to enjoy writing about different things and also to leave comments on my classmates blogs.

I like the blog because I can write about interesting subjects (public or private). I think that blogs are more important than other social networks, like facebook, twitter or messenger. The blogs are much personal, and they represent better all kinds of people.

In the blog I did not wrote only about subjects of anthropology, I also wrote about my personal tastes, such as movies, my favorite trip, my favorite food and the Chilean football team.

In general, I like blogs because I really enjoyed writing on them in the second hour. In blogs it is very important the grammar, and because of this I have had very difficult times when writing some words or sentences in my publications. I had to use the dictionary to translate some words, because my vocabulary is very small, and that was a problem that I had to resolve in this first half of the year. The constant work on my blog helped me to improve my English competence and increase my vocabulary.

The advantages of using the blog were: improve my knowledge of English and improve my interaction with other persons. I have problems talking with other people in English, and I think that others may have the same problem; for this reason I believe that the constant use of the blog can really help to solve this issue. The constant use of the blog makes necessary the use of a dictionary, because in differents contexts we need many words for explain consistently and improve the ideas.

The disadvantage of using the blog, for me, was mainly the time that I have to write my publications. I have the habit of write in English very calm, and in the first classes of English it was very difficult for me to use the blog, and I always finished much later than the class hour.

South Africa 2010

I think the world cup is a social event of great magnitude, in which increase nationalism. The World Cup represents the struggle with other countries through football. It is interesting to see how football fans will do everything for going to South Africa.
I love football. I have seen all 2010 qualifying matches. I like to watch the matches of the Chilean national team, but I do not like the matches of tournament national club.
I will see the matches of Chile in my house with my best friend. All parties that we have seen Chile has never lost, so it's a sort of habit. I am considering the possibility of seeing the game on Monday 21 in the University, because that day we have an important class and for reasons of time I would be more comfortable. For Friday's match at 2:30 PM I would see the party in my house, because my classes will finish to mid day.
The participation of the Chilean team is with high expectations, because the team has a good offensive game, introduced several players from European football and was second in qualifying behind the first: Brazil
Chile is in Group H with Honduras, Switzerland and Spain. The Chilean team lost meet all these teams, but I am optimistic and I think that they can win. Switzerland and Honduras are found as the main rivals.
Possible victories of Chilean team are important because the great majority of the people will be with so much attention in each World Cup match. I stress that there is great joy when the team wins, but is very sad when they loses. The matches are very good for to meet with family, friends, and compatriots to see the World cup and enjoyed in company.

Dolphins

This photo shows dolphins from Japan. This is one of the many photos taken by Greenpeace during the twentieth century. I don’t know the name of the person who took the original photo, but I know that it was taken in collaboration between Greenpeace and the BBC of London, for the making of the documental “The Cove”, directed by Louie Psihoyos.

This picture shows the slaughter of dolphins in 2008 in the southern coast of Taijii, Japan. In this place fishers round up dolphins on rock formations, where they select some dolphins of them for captivity (Aquarius), but the great majority will become food, dolphin oil, and even an alternative medicine.

This bad ecological practice of Japanese businessmen may produce an ecological imbalance in the ecosystem of the Asian coast. The constant slaughter of this species could easily end up with their extinction. Today the river dolphins and other species are endangered.

Other thing that the picture shows is the cruelty of the fishers.

Although in reserves there could be find dolphins (common, of river, and other species), over 89% have disappeared over the twentieth century, specifically the river dolphin species. The reasons for its extinction are many: environmental pollution, overfishing and the alternative medicine purposes on Japan and China.

One of the intentions of this picture is to associate it with the documental of BBC of London: "The Cove”, which shows the dolphin slaughter process in the fishing boats.

I choose this picture because it shows what is really happening and also aware us about the cruelty and great damage that some fishers and businessmen produce. Also we must be aware of environmental pollution and endangered species.

Valdivia

My favorite trip was when I visited the city of Valdivia five years ago. I went there because I took part in a National Congress of Science and Technology organized by Explora Conicyt. I traveled with two friends from my Highschool on Arica. We were the regional winners with our scientific proyect: “Boron effects on Drosophila melanogaster”.

We stayed two weeks in Valdivia. The first day we visited the University, and there the organizers gave us a tour at the "botanical park”. We met many other young people from different regions who also went to the Congress. The organizers took us to multiple archeological sites, the theater, dances and exhibitions, but the best of all was a big party on a boat in the Calle Calle river. On the second day we discussed our project. The Congress Final was on the weekend, and unfortunately we lost on the last stage. But the experience was great; we met winners of the National Science Award, and also enjoyed fun excursions to the Corral beach, and to museums or monuments of the city, like the Marquéz Castle. We started to really enjoy the trip on the second week; we went to Niebla, were we camped for three days, we sail on the Calle Calle river and we visited villages in the region until we went out of money.

I really ejoyed this trip (although we didn't win), because I was with my best friends. In this trip we took the decision of study at the same University. We have been friends for 14 years.

My favourite group

My favorite musical group is Green Day. The kind of music of Green day is Punk-Rock. Green Day is an American Rock trio formed in 1989 for Billie Joe Armstrong, Tré Cool and Mike Dirnt. At the beginning, they called the band “Sweet Children”, and later they changed it to “Green Day”.

Green Day was one of the bands that promoted the Punk trend at the 90`s. The group made his first album, called Dookie, in 1994. In the 90`s Green Day made three more albums: Insomniac, Nimrod and Warning, but these albums did not achieve the massive success of Dookie. Later, with their album American Idiot released in 2004, they reignited their popularity within a younger generation; they managed to sell five million copies in the U.S.A. The Band is enjoying now the success of his new album: 21st Century Breakdown, which was released on May 15, 2009.

Green Day has been successful at the MTV Video Music Awards, receiving nine nominations for "Baket Case", the second single from Dookie, and six awards for "Boulevard of Broken Dreams", the second single from American Idiot. The band has also received 4 Grammy Awards of 18 nominations at the American Music category. Finally, the band was nominated for 9 Billboard Music Awards in 2005, winning 6 of them, including "Rock Artist of the Year" and "Rock Song of the Year."

I like this group because they have a good sound and it is from my school years. When I listen to their music, I remember good moments with my classmates.

My favourite piece of technology: My cell phone

My favourite piece of technology is my cell phone Nokia 5530 Xpressmusic.
My cell phone was a Christmas present of my mom the last year. She bought my cell phone in a store of Falabella in the center of the city of Arica. The main use of my cell phone is reproducing music with good quality of sound. I listen to music on my phone when I travel to the University in transantiago, or when I go home. I use my cell phone to speak my parents and my friends. Other uses that I give are take photos, a voice recorder and see movies. As you can see, I use my cell phone to listen music frequently on my travels, because I do not like the environment bored and sad of the people on the buses.
I like my cell phone because it has many tools, in particular has Wi-Fi connection, which is very important to check email and search information in recess. Also for me a cell phone with Wi-Fi is much more comfortable than a computer, at the times of emergency.
My life without my cell phone would be boring, especially in the travel of transantiago, and also sad, because I could not communicate with my family.

Crêpes

My favorite food is Crepes in the breakfast. The Crepes (crêpe in France)
The crepes are recipe made primarily of wheat flour, with which it produces a disc-shaped mass. Usually used as the basis for a dish or dessert applying all kinds of sweet or savory ingredients
The crepes are from the region of Brittany, in France, where are called krampouezh in the Candelaria festive season.
In the central Europe, the creper are called palačinka (Czech Republic, Slovenia, Croatia), palatschinken (Austria) or palacsinta (Hungary). In these countries the flour was brought from china.
The ingredients are;
1 cup all-purpose flour
2 eggs
½ cup milk
½ cup water
¼ teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons butter, melted
Preparation: In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the flour and the eggs. Gradually add in the milk and water, stirring to combine. Add the salt and butter; beat until smooth. After, cook in frying pan over medium high heat. Pour or scoop the batter onto frying pan, using approximately 1/4 cup for each crepe. Tilt the pan with a circular motion so that the batter coats the surface evenly. Finally, cook the crepe for 2 minutes, until the bottom light brown. Loosen with a spatula, turn and cook the other side. I recommend serve hot and add jam or sweet.
I like crepes, because they are delicious at breakfast, especially if they have jam.