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Is Internet and new technologies addiction really a problem?

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Marky oo2

Comment posted on 3^rd December at 19.36

A problem? No way! From what I've seen it's something which people do when they're bored. It isn't an “addiction”. The problem is that real life isn't as interesting as the internet!It's more fun online!

Mygirl_Ruby

Comment posted on 3^rd December at 21.48

I agree with Marky. It isn't a problem if it's entertaining. The internet is less addictive than TV. Anyway, in my experience prople can be obsessive about everything.

HeyGazza!

Comment posted on 4^th December at 22.14

Marky's got a point, but I think the internet can be an addiction and some people need help. I've got a friend who's completely disconnected from real life. In most of his free time, he plays games online and when he isn't playing he's in the chats rooms. He's failed a lot of exams and he's less interested in everything. It's like illness. He needs to talk to someone.

Àlex0925674

Comment posted on 7^th December at 16.29

I agree with HeyGazza!. Internet and new technologies can be an addiction. Internet can be a useful tool to do homework for the school and things like that, but It can be an illness. For example, one day I was having dinner with some friends and they were chatting with the mobile phone among themselves. It was very stange because they could do the same without the mobile phones. Now, people can't live without technologies. Nowadays, people don't “read in” a book or a newspaper, people “read in” a mobile phone or a tablet.

Àlex

An environmental problem

We've got a problem: traffic jam!

I'm writing because I was in Barcelona with my family last weekend and we saw a big traffic jam, that was unbelievable. This photo shows the cars, motorbikes and lorries that we saw.

I think there are one or two reasons for this. Firstly, people don't want to sacrifice, therefore, people don't travel by bike because the car is more comfortable and as I said, people don't want to sacrifece for the environment. Secondly, there isn't enough buses and people can't travel by a transpont which don't pollute like a car. Also there is too much traffic because the roads are too narrow.

We must do something about this situation. Maybe the street lights aren't synchronized. I don't know, but we must definitely do something if we want an attractive city for tourism

Àlex

Eurovision Song Contest

Eurovision Song Contest is an annual song competition between the member countries of the European Broadcasting Union since 1956.

European Broadcasting Union is the principal world alliance of public media services, compraising more than 140 members between the acitves and the associates ones in almost all continents of the world.

Each member country chooses a song to be performed by an artist on live television and radio. Then, after all the actions, the countries vote to decide which song is the best.

Some artists who have participated in Eurovision have become very famous and popular, such as ABBA (1974), Julio Iglesias (1970), Céline Dion (1988)...

Ireland is the country which has won the contest more times, seven times to be more exact. France, Luxembourg, UK and Sweden have won the contest five times each other and the Netherlands has won it four times.

The country that has participated the longest without any winner is Portugal, which it debut in 1964 and has never finished in the top five.

Àlex

Halloween

WHAT DO YOU KNOW ABOUT HALLOWEEN?

When and where is it celebrated? It is celebrated on the 31st October in a lot of countries like England, Irland, USA, Scotland... In anglosaxon countries
Why is it celebrated on the 31st October? Because in the old celtic culture the 31st October was the end of the summer and the day of Samhain ( the god of the dead)
Is it a religious celebration? No it isn't, is a pagan festival
What does the word 'Halloween' mean? All Hallows Eve
Name 2 typical games.
-Eating an apple on a string
-Bobbing for apples and other gifts in a basin of water, without using your hands.
How do people celebrate it today? The kids do trick-or-treating to get candies.

HALLOWEEN HISTORY ( Post of English's blog)

Halloween (also spelled Hallowe'en) is an annual holiday celebrated on October 31. It has roots in the Celtic festival of Samhain and the Christian holy day of All Saints.

Originally Halloween was a pagan festival, around the idea of linking the living with the dead, when contact became possible between the spirits and the physical world, and magical things were more likely to happen. Like most pagan festivals, long ago it was absorbed into the festivals of the expanding Christian church, and became associated with All Hallows Day, or All Saints Day, which eventually fell on November 1.
The celebration of Halloween survived most strongly in Ireland. It was an end of summer festival, and was often celebrated in each community with a bonfire to ward off the evil spirits. Children would go from door to door in disguise as creatures from the underworld to collect treats, mainly fruit, nuts and the like for the festivities. These were used for playing traditional games like eating an apple on a string or bobbing for apples and other gifts in a basin of water, without using your hands. Salt might be sprinkled on the visiting children to ward off evil spirits. Carving turnips as ghoulish faces to hold candles became a popular part of the festival, which has been adapted to carving pumpkins in America.

The day is often associated with the colours black and orange, and is strongly associated with symbols like the jack-o'-lantern. Halloween activities include trick-or-treating, wearing costumes and attending costume parties, ghost tours, bonfires, visiting haunted attractions, telling scary stories, and watching horror films!! 

Why do we make Jack-o-lanterns?

The story of the Jack-O'-lantern comes in many variants and is similar to the story of Will-o'-the-wisp retold in different forms across Western Europe, with variations being present in the folklore of Norway, Sweden, England, Ireland, Wales, Germany, Italy and Spain.^[23] An old Irish folk tale from the mid-19th Century tells of Stingy Jack, a lazy yet shrewd farmer who uses a cross to trap the Devil. One story says that Jack tricked the Devil into climbing an apple tree, and once he was up there Jack quickly placed crosses around the trunk or carved a cross into the bark, so that the Devil couldn't get down. Another tale says that Jack put a key in the Devil's pocket while he was suspended upside-down.

Another version of the story says that Jack was getting chased by some villagers from whom he had stolen, when he met the Devil, who claimed it was time for him to die. However, the thief stalled his death by tempting the Devil with a chance to bedevil the church-going villagers chasing him. Jack told the Devil to turn into a coin with which he would pay for the stolen goods (the Devil could take on any shape he wanted); later, when the coin/Devil disappeared, the Christian villagers would fight over who had stolen it. The Devil agreed to this plan. He turned himself into a silver coin and jumped into Jack's wallet, only to find himself next to a cross Jack had also picked up in the village. Jack had closed the wallet tight, and the cross stripped the Devil of his powers; and so he was trapped.

In both folktales, Jack only lets the Devil go when he agrees never to take his soul. After a while the thief died, as all living things do. Of course, his life had been too sinful for Jack to go to heaven; however, the Devil had promised not to take his soul, and so he was barred from hell as well. Jack now had nowhere to go. He asked how he would see where to go, as he had no light, and the Devil mockingly tossed him an ember from the flames of hell, that would never burn out. Jack carved out one of his turnips (which were his favorite food), put the ember inside it, and began endlessly wandering the Earth for a resting place. He became known as "Jack of the Lantern", or Jack-o'-lantern.

Jack-o-lanterns were also a way of protecting your home against the Undead. Superstitious people used them specifically to ward away vampires. They thought this because it was said that the Jack-o-lantern's light was a way of identifying vampires and, once their identity was known, they would give up their hunt for you

Sleepy Hollow

Sleepy Hollow is the story of Ichabold Crane, a police officer, who is investigatinf the crimes in Sleepy Hollow. The people say that the murder is the Headless Horseman.

TV highlights

Writing unit 2: Writing about TV highlights

The highlight of this week's TV was the reality show El Foraster. Quim Masferrer went to Tortella, a little village in la Garrotxa. There, Quim met very strange people like Sisco, a person who weighs everything.

TV3's satire programme Polonia was also worth watching. In Thursday's episode, Artur Mas parodied the Jaume Sisa's song Qualsevol Nit Pot Sortir el Sol. There was a funny gag where all the people became very nervous because a tertullian changed his mind and they thought was a illness.

Finally, something which also caught my eye was Monday's episode of El Convidat. Albert Om was staying a weekend in Xavier Sala Martin's house. He interviewed Sala Martin and we saw his collection of jackets.

Àlex

Film review

The last film I saw was Vincent. It is a short horror film written, designed and directed by Tim Burton and it is narrated by Vincent Price

Vincent is the story of a seven-year old boy called Vincent Malloy, who pretends to be like Vincent Price. He thinks that he is a tortured artist and he likes a lot the tales of Edgar Allan Poe. He experiments with his dog Abercrombie because he wants to create a zombie dog.

When he was reading a tale of Poe he thinks that his imaginary woman was buried alive and he digs on his mum's flower bed to discober if his woman is dead.

The film finishes when Vincent falls on the floor and he thinks that he is dead.

Àlex

Boris Johnson. The next prime minister?

The hair, the gaffes, the humour... London's mayor is one of Britain's most colourful and popular politicians. And perhaps its most ambitious. Meet the high-flying Boris Johnson!

Over the course of a varied career, he has been fired from almost every job he's had or been forced to resign in disgrace. His biographer describes him as "the most ruthless, ambitious person I have ever met". One interviewer recently accused him of being "a nasty piece of work" live on TV.
Welcome to the extraordinary world of London's mayor, Boris , Who many think will one day become prime minister, although the man himself denies this. Indeed, he say:"My chances of beeing PM are about as good as the finding Elvis on Mars, or my being reincarnated as an olive".

The clue to his success lies in that quote: Boris Johnson does not talk like a normal politician. Johnson is more like a stand-up comedian than a politician, with his own, inimitable way of expressing things. For years, he has been a favourite guest on TV comedy shows because he is a fast with a joke as professional comedians. But behind the humour hides an incredibly ambitious man.

As a child, his often-repeated objective was to become "world king". Growing up, he decided on a more modest project: he would be content with just becoming either Britain's prime minister or president of the USA. Ultimately, however, the former seemed more realistic- and now every day it seems to become more probable.
There's one problem: Britain already has a prime minister, David Cameron. And not only are Boris and David  members of the same party, but they have known one another since childhood because both went to Eton, the most elite and expensive of England's private schools. Founded in 1440, Eton has already produced 19 British prime ministers. Prince William and Prince Harry also studied here.

But bizarrely, while Etonian origins mark Cameron as a member of the upper classes in the eyes of the people, Boris is seen as a man of the people. Despite his habit of quoting in Latin, people can imagine having a pint of beer with Boris in a pub.
 

Oral presentation: my last summer

My last summer

Hi I am Àlex and I’d like to explain my last summer to you.

The first week in the summer I went with my family to Paris. There, I stayed for three days in Disney and the other three days I travelled around Paris. What I liked the most in Paris were Versailles and the Napoleon's tomb. It was giant!

Then I went to Paignton, a small city near Plymouth. There I went to school. The school started at nine o'clock and finished at 12.30. After we had the lunch which was horrible). Then we started some activities, like bowling, going to the zoo, going by steam train to others towns... These days I was really tired because my host home didn't have shutters, the sunshine entered and I woke up very early.

In August I stayed in a neighborhood near l'Estartit. There I was sunbathing all the day, but some days I went to the city of l'Estartit. One day I went with my family and my friends to Tamariu, there we went with kayaks to the caves.

I liked a lot this summer, but I think that it was very short.

Àlex

Video

Powepoint

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1NGfmpC7-mRf0SegqMXQ1V96UnM8svrjBuPvPItJDJwg/edit?usp=sharing

 My classmates

Maria: She went to Zaragoza, then she did a rowling and English course. She also went to Granada.

Albert: he stayed in Paris almost all the summer.

Carlota: She stayed in Banyoles. Then se went to Palamós and Estartit

Lídia: She stayed in a summer camp and she went to Tarragona.

Eva: She went to Port Aventura, then se went to a summer camp in Besalu and another in Camprodon

Sergi: he stayed in Banyoles  and Sant Antoni de Calonge.

Enric: He stayed in Banyoles and Barcelona. HE travelled to Greece, Turkey...

Anna: she went to Gloucester. Then she sailed to Ibiza. She also went to Switzerland.

Pere: He went to Gloucester with more classemates and he did a football training in Banyoles.

Laia: She trained to the Spanish Championship of Rowing. Also she went to a lot of catalan cities.

Xènia: She went to the Spanish Championship of horse riding. On July she did a horse-riding training.

Marçal: He went to Gloucester with Anna, Pere... Then he went to Platja d'Aro.

Elsa: She went to a basketball campus. Then she went to Sant Antoni and finally she went to Escambell