It is Halloween! All Saints ´ Day

Halloween is celebrated on October the 31st every year. It originated from a pagan holiday and the Christian holiday of All Saints’ Day. The name Halloween is a shortened version of All Hallows’ Eve. Today, it is more of a fun day for children and has largely lost its religious roots. Halloween is probably most famous in the U.S.A. Irish immigrants took it to America in the mid-1600s and it slowly spread across the country. Halloween is not celebrated in many countries around the world although many people know about it. Some Christians are not so happy that people celebrate Halloween. They believe the holiday is un-Christian because of its origin as a pagan "festival of the dead." Halloween has many easily identifiable symbols. The colours orange and black are widely used. In particular, orange pumpkins and fires and black witches, cats and costumes are common features of this day. One of the biggest Halloween activities is trick-or-treating. This is when children knock on doors and ask for a small gift. If they don’t get anything, they’ll play a trick on the person who opens the door. Food also plays a big part of Halloween. Toffee apples are very popular and so is anything made from pumpkin. Halloween is also a popular topic for Hollywood. Many horror movies have been made about it. Because of this, Halloween is now known in many countries that never actually celebrate it.

Click here to practise the exercises and the listening.

Watch this video. Haunted History of Halloween
 

• A Cloze Exercise and a Podcast 
• Slideshows from the New York Times
• Not Just Halloween:Festivals of The Dead from around the world 
• HalloweenWorksheets and activities 
  
  
  
  This is Halloween song. Listen and fill in the gaps .

Leonard Cohen,Prince of Asturias Award For Letters 2011

Leonard Cohen´s fedora left on chair during his talk

Leonard Cohen ,a Canadian singer,songwriter,musician,poet and novelist.

He was awarded The Prince of Asturias Award and we can see him on the day of the ceremony.Listen to his speech,full of gratitude.A little bit confusing ,because while we try to listen to him ,the translator is putting his words into Spanish

Click here to read the his speech in Spanish and here for the translation in English.

Lorca´s Influence

He first read Lorca when he was a teenager.And in his speech,he mentioned the infuence that the Spanish poet had on him. 

As an example,I have chosen the song called "Take This Waltz".The lyrics are based on one of Lorca´s poems. I would like you to listen and compare with the poem.

Now in Vienna there's ten pretty women There's a shoulder where Death comes to cry  There's a lobby with nine hundred windows There's a tree where the doves go to die There's a piece that was torn from the morning And it hangs in the Gallery of Frost Ay, Ay, Ay, Ay Take this waltz, take this waltz Take this waltz with the clamp on its jaws Oh I want you, I want you, I want you On a chair with a dead magazine In the cave at the tip of the lily In some hallways where love's never been On a bed where the moon has been sweating In a cry filled with footsteps and sand Ay, Ay, Ay, Ay Take this waltz, take this waltz Take its broken waist in your hand This waltz, this waltz, this waltz, this waltz With its very own breath of brandy and Death Dragging its tail in the sea There's a concert hall in Vienna Where your mouth had a thousand reviews There's a bar where the boys have stopped talking They've been sentenced to death by the blues Ah, but who is it climbs to your picture With a garland of freshly cut tears? Ay, Ay, Ay, Ay Take this waltz, take this waltz Take this waltz it's been dying for years There's an attic where children are playing Where I've got to lie down with you soon In a dream of Hungarian lanterns In the mist of some sweet afternoon And I'll see what you've chained to your sorrow All your sheep and your lilies of snow Ay, Ay, Ay, Ay Take this waltz, take this waltz With its "I'll never forget you, you know!" This waltz, this waltz, this waltz, this waltz ... And I'll dance with you in Vienna I'll be wearing a river's disguise The hyacinth wild on my shoulder, My mouth on the dew of your thighs And I'll bury my soul in a scrapbook, With the photographs there, and the moss And I'll yield to the flood of your beauty My cheap violin and my cross And you'll carry me down on your dancing To the pools that you lift on your wrist Oh my love, Oh my love Take this waltz, take this waltz It's yours now. It's all that there is

En Viena hay diez muchachas, un hombro donde solloza la muerte y un bosque de palomas disecadas. Hay un fragmento de la mañana en el museo de la escarcha. Hay un salón con mil ventanas. ¡Ay, ay, ay, ay! Toma este vals con la boca cerrada. Este vals, este vals, este vals, este vals, de sí, de muerte y de coñac que moja su cola en el mar. Te quiero, te quiero, te quiero, con la butaca y el libro muerto, por el melancólico pasillo, en el oscuro desván del lirio, en nuestra cama de la luna y en la danza que sueña la tortuga. ¡Ay, ay, ay, ay! Toma este vals de quebrada cintura. En Viena hay cuatro espejos donde juegan tu boca y los ecos. Hay una muerte para piano que pinta de azul a los muchachos. Hay mendigos por los tejados, hay frescas guirnaldas de llanto. ¡Ay, ay, ay, ay! Toma este vals que se muere en mis brazos. Porque te quiero, te quiero, amor mío, en el desván donde juegan los niños, soñando viejas luces de Hungría por los rumores de la tarde tibia, viendo ovejas y lirios de nieve por el silencio oscuro de tu frente. ¡Ay, ay, ay, ay! Toma este vals, este vals del "Te quiero siempre". En Viena bailaré contigo con un disfraz que tenga cabeza de río. ¡Mira qué orillas tengo de jacintos! Dejaré mi boca entre tus piernas, mi alma en fotografías y azucenas, y en las ondas oscuras de tu andar quiero, amor mío, amor mío, dejar, violín y sepulcro, las cintas del vals.

Social Media For Learning English

 Social Media Learning English/Learn English /British Council

World Food Day

  

World Food Day 2011 theme: Food prices. From crisis to stability

October the 16th is World Food Day (WFD). This date is when the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations started in 1945. WFD itself didn’t start until 1979. It was created by the FAO at the Organization's 20th General Conference. Attendees suggested the idea of having a day to focus on food issues worldwide. Today, over 150 countries around the world celebrate WFD. The day hopes to raise awareness of many food-related problems. In particular, the tackling of poverty and hunger, and addressing potential disasters created by global warming and overpopulation. WFD has had a different theme since 1981. These have focused on poverty, hunger and malnutrition, food security, and the right to food.

Countries celebrate World Food Day in many different ways. There are events held all over the world. There are large campaigns in countries that experience serious food shortages. Many African nations organize thousands of activities. These have included planting potatoes in Angola to regenerating farms in Zimbabwe. In Europe, Spanish soccer star Raul served as the FAO’s Goodwill Ambassador and appeared in many campaigns in Spain. Agriculture plays a big part in many campaigns. The industry plays a relatively small part in many developed countries, but it is essential for the survival of billions in poorer nations. A key issue for the success of WFD is for rich nations to give more development aid to poor countries. 

 The reading is from

Click here to do the exercises and the listening.

There is another multimedia exercise here . 

It is called "A seat at the table",you will learn more about hunger.Of course there is seat for you,

read the stories and tell us you own story.

  You can watch this video It is from "The Guardian", Bangladesh-beating-food-damage-video.

A Personal Challenge:Lewis Pugh

 As a child his ambition was to be an explorer.

 He started his love of the ocean after moving to South Africa as a boy. He pioneered more swims than any other swimmer and can lay claim to having been the greatest cold water swimmer in history. When not swimming he works as a maritime lawyer in London and does motivational speaking.He says his swims are about competing against himself and his own limits, and campaigning against climate change
Let´s watch the video to know when and how he started with this ambition.

Lewis Pugh talks about his record-breaking swim across the North Pole. He braved the icy waters (in a Speedo) to highlight the melting icecap. Watch for astonishing footage -- and some blunt commentary on the realities of supercold-water swims.
You can read the transcript if you want by clicking here

Chocolate Week 2011

MAKE THIS CHOCOLATE WEEK ONE  TO REMEMBER

For further information click here

And to know why Dark Chocolate is healthy go to this link

Nice Weekend

 HOW TO MOON WALK

The Moon Walk is one of the most famous dance moves of all time. Done properly the Moon Walk can't fail to impress. Learn how to dance the Michael Jackson way with this simple three minute tutorial on the moon walk technique.

There are ten steps . Listen and watch the video 

Goodbye Steve Jobs

A creative genius, Apple founder Steve dies, aged  56.

A speech given by Steve at Stanford University in 2005

From Channel 4

Thursday 6 October News at Noon

For further information go to BBC

Amy Winehouse

From the BBC 

Tributes to the late singer Amy Winehouse are still being paid by artists, friends and family around the world. The Back To Black star was found dead at her north London home on Saturday.

 

• Download  a PDFcopy  from Breaking News English.
• Read and do the exercises.
• Now listen to the podcast.


• Back To Black, one of her best songs .Filling in the gaps exercise. Click here to listen  and I´ll give you the worksheets in the class.