domingo, 15 de mayo de 2016

My English competence in 2016

From my point of view, my best writting contribution to my blog was the Gantz's recommendation because I felt proud of myself after finishing it. It was truly a good post since the content was very mature, the vocabulary was appropiate and I looked for some words in the dictionary, the structure was correct and the grammar okay. However, I think that BioShock's and Silent Hill's recommendations were accurate posts too.


Finally, about my oral presentations I don't think they were good enough to pick a best one. In addition, all of them were average not excellent and they're almost the same, I feel nervous and I mess them up. However, If I have to choose one It'll be the first term's one.




My progress from 1bat to 2bat

First of all, my earliest written task was an E-mail to my teacher and my last one was the Japan's description. The main differences between both compositions are the lack of connectors in my initial writting, the use of more complex grammar structures, the addition of more formal words and synonyms...etc.  The only element that back then was still okay is the structure, whereas the maturity of the content has greatly increased and so the vocabulary and grammar.

Regarding the oral presentations, the first one was an oral presentation with Aaron and Yuri and the final one was about my research paper. Both presentations are pretty similar, however, the principal contrast between them is that lately I've been feeling more secure when  I have to talk in front of my classmates and the improvement of my language variety. 


jueves, 12 de mayo de 2016

Description (place)

Batxillerat's end is nigh and as a consequence I should start thinking of a place that I'd to visit this summer. One of my favorite options is Japan, because I've been astonished by all the breathtaking and varied places that I have watched in films or photographs.

First of all, I'd like to visit old Japanese temples because of the serenity, quietness and peaceful atmosphere of this mystical buildings. In addition, the integrity of the temple with his environment is usually excellent due to the nature which perfectly combines with the Japanese mystical buildings. 

Besides, cities like Tokyo look pretty cool for me, the crowded streets, full of lights and many diverse places to have fun. However, I'm mainly interested in Japan since their culture is very peculiar and there are lots of modern areas with advanced technology and art.

In conclusion, Japan is a place with a mixture of unalike spaces and all of them seem very intriguing in a different way.


domingo, 8 de mayo de 2016

Human rights


Human rights are universal moral values or norms that determine how human behaviour should be like and what do we own for the simple fact of being a humans (inherit rights) , and in addition they cannot be taken away because it's against international laws regardless of the individual's status.

Most of the ideas that energizedthe human rights movement came as a product of the Second World War consequences and above all The Holocaust. Therefore, The United Nations adpoted the Universal Declaration of The Human Rights which consists of thirty articles and it's formed of civil, political, economical, social, cultural... rights.

As a whole, The Universal Declaration of The Human Rights is composed of thirty articles, but I'm going to focus only in one of them, the article 5: no one should be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

I understood all the words of the video, the vocabulary was very simple. This human right isn't respected in some schools (I think that in every school but I don't want to be so negative) because of bullying and in some police investigations, in order to get what they want cops may hit, torture innocent people. However, from my point of view, this right is respected in many places as normal people don't hit others.








Education is the key, School is the lock


"Education is about inspiring one's mind not just filling their head"



From my point of view, education shouldn't be just reminding facts and dates that has no use, in contrast it should be similar to Rousseau's conception of education, in other words, by ourselves, not filling our minds, but helping us to develop our mind with only the necessary assitence. In addition, the only way that we'll truly create new and innovatine stuff is if we let future generations -well, and everyone else- think by themselves, not what we want to. In other words, they just have to let everyone the freedom to think, new ideas, inspiring them...and so education doesn't have to make us remember unuseful information in order to stress us, this isn't really education, It's programming machines full of unneccessary data.   



Alien recommendation

Alien is a horror and science fiction movie directed by Riddle Scott and starring Sigourney Weaver. This film has been hailed by many filmmakers by the fact that revolutionized the world of cinema using a few decorated settings and very well implemented ideas.

The story focuses on the crew of the Nostromo, the ship ends its space round and is about to land on earth with all its crew members in a state of cryonics, when without knowing the central computer captures a signal of apparent relief and changes its course the origin of it. Then, the crew of the Nostromo wake up angry and have no other choice but to get off the planet from which comes the call and find out what's going on. Getting off, an alien with a hand shape sticks on the face of one of the crew members and then he enters in a state of coma. After researching the hand, they discover that the shaped hand alien was no danger itself, but what he introduced his victim in the stomach. Therefore, the larvae grow into the "eighth passenger" of the Nostromo.

One of the elements that make this film a masterpiece is its atmosphere, characterized by long dimly lit corridors with gases, emergency lights, metallic ceilings and  floors and windows with nothing but the empty image of the dark space. In addition, the atmosphere was frightening because we knew that a very powerful monster was loose and only six people had to flee from him or stop it.


Regarding the immersion, it was easy to identify with the characters because they were normal people who were caught in a situation of life or death, unlike other genre films that are rely on highly advanced technology and characters that are difficult to empathize with. However, there are many positive points since this film a classic  that everyone should watch.



Greece passes tax and pension reforms


Controversial new pension and tax reforms were passed by Greece's parliament on Monday.
The measures are needed to unlock further international bailout money, to be discussed at a meeting of eurozone finance ministers on Monday. But they are unpopular with Greek anti-austerity campaigners and unions. 

"We have an important opportunity before us for the country to break this vicious cycle, and enter a virtuous cycle," Mr Tsipras told MPs. Monday, he said, "is a very important day. After six years, the Eurogroup will meet to discuss debt relief". The meeting will talk about new debt relief measures with a view to avoiding the prospect of a default in July, when Greece is due make its next major repayment to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the European Central Bank. 

The reforms agreed by parliament include:
-Changes would not affect the majority of pensioners and moved towards a "sustainable" system.
-Before the vote, protesters in Athens threw petrol bombs at police, who responded with tear gas.
-Trade unions say the country cannot bear another round of austerity.

From my point of view, since 5 o 6 years ago we’ve been in recession almost around the world. One of the countries that have suffered this crisis the most is Greece.

The Issue is that Greece has to ask for loans and with these loans they only achieve more debts. This is why Tsipras says that they are in a vicious circle.


Colors by Between the buried and me

"Colors" is the fifth studio album by the progressive metal and death metal band Between the Buried and Me, released on September 18th of 2007 through the label Victory Records. The American band brought out many different influences within the structure of the songs featured on the album, such as jazz, acoustic pop, arena rock, and bluegrass influences.

"Colors" is an album in which the concept of division isn’t really clear. The cuts between songs only serve to separate the tracks; the album is intended more as a work with a beginning, an end and its various movements, in which we travel to a journey throughout the progressive sound. 

The album starts with a soft piano that leads into a small introduction entitled "Foam Born (a): the Backtrack" and goes up the intensity until it ends in a metalcore outburst and where we can already guess some progressive dyes then they have great prominence on the album. .. At this point we dive fully into "(b) the Decade of Statues". This topic is completely gender, metalcore without respite but with ultimately progressive guitars. It’s in "Informal Gluttony" where the most unexpected elements begin to be heard. To begin with, the intro, which sounds mystical, leads his way to the heavy forcefulness that characterizes the group. And yet, two minutes song peak surprise us with a melodic chorus that we can perfectly relate to any group of indie rock.

"Sun of Nothing" and "Ants of the Sky" are the most experimental duo. In the last 23 minutes, between the two songs we can witness a large repertoire with unparalleled comings and goings: fast metal riffs, acoustic and vocal melodies, melancholy passages ... And long scales that have been directly influenced by groups with epic progressive rock of the 70s. "Prequel to the Sequel" follows in the line metalcore and progressive mixes, "Viridian" is a small stop along the way to"White Walls", which is the climax, with a devastating and intensive start that doesn't stop until the end. In addition it concludes the album with a track of four minutes, one of those that make history. 


Kenya: Ending Refugee Hosting, Closing Camps


Last 6th of May, Kenya announced that they won't host more refugees, which contradicts their initial commitment respect the welcome of refugees. Kenya is the home of more of 463000 Somali refugees. However, the interior ministry principal secretary stated that they will close their refugee camps in order to not to jeopardize the national security. 

The policy regarding the host of refugees in my country is very ambiguous, basically they remain outside of these matters. Nevertheless, from my point of view a nice way of dealing with this issue but a very utopian would be that us, the citizens host some families in order to help them at least temporarily. 

BioShock recommendation

BioShock is a first-person shooter developed by Irrational Games , published on August 21th of 2007 in North America for the Windows operating system and the Xbox 360 console, three days later in some European countries and Australia, and August 31th in Spain.

Regarding to BioShock’s plot, imagine that your plane crashes in the middle of the Pacific, you don’t know where you are, hardly you swim and then you arrive to a lost lighthouse in the middle of nowhere. The gates of Rapture, the utopian underwater city, they open in order to let us know the horror what lurks behind its walls. So, the nightmare begins.

BioShock, based its charm on the exploration and immersion of the fascinating history of Rapture and the truthfulness and cruelty of a wild and violent world that doesn’t discriminate among its victims which are men, women and even girls.

On the other hand, the sound effects are another factor that makes the experience of visiting Rapture great. All weapons sound powerful, and shootings are a delight to the ears for its sharpness. But the real star of the sonorous shots is Rapture and its habitants.

The constant crackle of water pressure on the giant vaults of Rapture, the sounds of psychopaths wandering and singing in the streets, the awkward but thunderous walk of the Big Daddies and endearing but scary barefoot walking of the Little Sisters on the cold surfaces are so authentic, terrifying and unpayable. The atmosphere of a video game consists of both what we see and what we hear, and Bioshock is an excellent example.

In conclusion, in this recommendation I've basically talked about the audiovisual and story issues of the game. However, BioShock has an excellent gameplay, but It may feel a bit rough compared with FPS such as Call of Duty or Halo. To sump up, I highly recommend BioShock, It's an unique and satisfying experience.



Persona 4 recommendation

Persona 4 is a japanese videogame published by Atlus for the PlayStation 2 and it was released in 2008. Despite being a little bit old and not as famous as other American role playing games, I highly recommend playing this game. Not only does it have a great story, but it also has amazing characters, a great soundtrack and art work. The game takes place in Inaba, a fictional rural japanese town, and it begins with the murder of a famous journalist, but there is no clue to be found of who the culprit might be. Therefore, the main focus of the game revolves around Personas, avatars projected from one's inner self that resemble mythological figures and represent the facets worn by individuals to face life's hardships. Each Persona possesses its own skills, as well as strengths and weaknesses to certain attributes. So, the protagonists must fight to pass some dungeons and progresse with their investigation. 


Silent hill 2 recommendation

Silent hill 2 is a survival horror videogame published by Konami for the PlayStation 2, developed by Team Silent and its release date was the 24th of September of 2001.

First of all, Silent Hill 2 marked a turning point in its genre and for the next Silent Hill games, unlike other games that wanted to scare us to death, on the contrary Silent Hill 2 bet for a new kind of psychological horror in video games. It's clearly one of the best examples of horror modern in any media. If that weren't enough, Silent Hill's sequel is an evident example of how a game with good storytelling (full of symbolism) and true survival horror experience should be. As a consequence, this masterpiece moved many players more than a decade ago. It's hard to believe that Silent Hill 2 has more than a decade, especially since it looks very fresh and contemporary. Furthermure, without a powerful graphics engine, Silent Hill 2 managed to be visually pleasing, all this due to its art direction and its excellent atmosphere.

Moreover, the idea of playing as an anti-hero like James, his dark secrets and hidden past was something completely new at the time and it’s even nowadays. Silent Hill 2 was the first game in the series to show the existence of own torments of each character, double personalities and psychological traumas materialized. Few games have captured horror in such an intimate way; it treated sexual themes without showing meaningless obscenities. Silent Hill 2 didn't need to scare with jump scares or excessive gore or sex to be called "adult". The game managed to reach the depths of the player, conveying feelings of loneliness, nostalgia, melancholy and intrigue. It's a horror game, but it attacked our most vulnerable side: our hearts with a devastating history; and our psyche, posing a constant intrigue that will keep us hooked on the game until we finish it.

On the other hand Silent Hill 2 might have some negative points such as the short duration of the game or the rough gameplay. However, from my point of view this masterpiece has the appropriate length and the gameplay is the right for a desperate atmosphere.

In conclusion, Silent Hill 2 is a must play because of his excellent storytelling, immersive atmosphere, the depressive soundtrack which fits perfectly in every moment and his importance regarding the evolution of the genre.


sábado, 7 de mayo de 2016

Japan: Bullied LGBT Students Unprotected


In Japan, the government have taken measures to protect gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (they are called LGBT and they're the most vulnerable group to bullying) students from bullying, however, their methods of preventing bullying haven't been really useful, that's why in 2016 they're debating in order to changer they policy against this problem, which is growing progressively as it's spreading in japanese schools.

Regarding to our country, I think that bullying is present in almost every school and more than we think. I know a case in my school about a boy who wants to be a girl and, as it's expected he receives insults for being different. In my opinion, we as students can't do much to prevent bullying, our only options are telling it to the teachers or the police, that's why I'm not pretty sure about a useful way of helping people that suffers from bullying.