Last post!

I can’t believe how fast has passed this year. We’re almost finishing classes and this is already the last post! I’m scared about feeling that the time flies, we’re getting older every day and there is still a lot of things I want to do but I don’t know if the times will be enough to do everything.

Well, talking about today’s topic, I liked this subject, because I had been like 3 years without English classes, so I needed to strengthen the oral part, and practice. This subject has also allowed me to learn new things, so it has been really helpful, specially the blogs, that are a very good tool to improve the writing skills, when we redact our posts and reading, when we read and comment our classmate’s post.

I thing I still need to practice the spoken part. It has always been difficult to me to talk in English and sound naturally fluent; because I try to think in Spanish and then I translate it, but I’ve always heard that the better way to learn and speak properly is thinking in English the things you want to say, because you sometimes get “lost in translation”, some things are not translated as we understand it or they simply don’t have any meaning in our language. I think I should start reading books in English again (regrettably, with all the things I have to read and study at law school, every time I read less novels and see less my friends), start again watching movies in English without subtitles (thanks to law school again because I haven’t seen a movie in months).

Outside the class, I don’t have many opportunities to practice, but I have a friend that is dating with an Austrian girl, and as she doesn’t speak Spanish, and I don’t speak German, we talk in English, so is very fun to practice with her. Besides that, I just can dream with travelling to an English-spoken country and practice there.

My future job

When you start studying any career, you begin with a lot of expectations and think you will like every subject of the career you chose, because it will help you to get your title and work in the area you want (or at least I did).

Now I realize I have to face subjects or teachers I don’t like and things are not exactly as I expected, but I am still on my way to reach my goal: having my degree of lawyer. I have two future jobs I would like to have: being a lawyer at National Consumer Service or being a judge.

So far, I have not taken any major and try to learn new thing about that, but when it is possible, I would like to take courses about consumer protection and legal argument. 

I would like to have a job that keeps me in movement and always doing new things, and allows me to help people directly. I’m not the kind of law student that is only worried about the money they will earn when they work, I really want to make this world a fairer a better place for at least one person. But it doesn’t mean I will work for free, of course, people have to receive a fair remuneration after studying several years as hard as we do.

About my strengths and weakness, I could say I am very self-demanding. I hate doing things bad or making mediocre works, and sometimes I get very stressed with that… I think I should learn how to make things well without getting so stressed. I think that counts as a good and bad thing about me. Another weakness, is that I don’t like working with people, or having too much human contact xd I am kind of antisocial a lot of times. And a strength, I am very responsible and I will never present a demand out of time or something like that.

In two years more...

When I think about two years from now it looks to me like a lot of time… but when I start thinking about things that happened 5 years ago and I feel like they were yesterday, I realize that it is a very short time.

In two years I will be doing my third year at law school, a very tough year according what I’ve heard, and I hope I don’t fail any subject because it will take me more years to finish my career (and that is something  I really like to avoid). In third year you can postulate to study a semester abroad. You must have very good grades (along with a lot of money) to go, so I am trying since now to have a good grade point average, and save a bit of money too… in the worst case, if can’t go to study to other country, at least I would have had collected enough money for doing something fun.

I would like to do is going to Brazil with my best friends from here to years more. We always say we will do that trip, but we’ve never saved all the money that is required or agree a date… but I hope in two summers from here we can do that. Also boyfriend and I have always wanted to go to Punta Arenas, so if I can get a lot of money I could do both things.

What I can do now for trying to do that in the future is just saving money… I work all summer since 3 years ago, so it has allowed me to do things at holidays, for example, or to buy things that with the money my parent’s give to me I couldn’t get.

Other thing that I would like to do is being an assistant of civil right. It’s my favorite subject and so far I’ve had very good grades, but I will have to make merit because it’s very hard to be accepted when you are just in third year. So I will have to study a lot during these years and try to be the best student in my class to reach that goal.

 Hi there!

I think the most important place where you learn about environmentally friendly practices is at home. You can learn it at school, watching TV, by social networks, but I think the most important is practicing at your home.

My mom is very interested in the topic, so she has always taught to me and my sisters we must take care of the planet, the trees, the rivers, the gas, because is where we live and if we destroy our planet and waste all the resources, in the future we won’t have  a proper place to live. All the manufactured thing take years to degrade and being part of nature again, and while they stay as garbage they cause countless damage to the animals and environment.

I live in Ñuñoa, where like 5 years ago (I’m not sure) a recycling truck started picking all kind of plastic bottles an container, glass, bags, paperboards, tetra-pack boxes, old newspaper, cans… Since then we have 2 different dumpsters: one is for real garbage and other one is for recycling.

I love using my bike as mean of transport. Besides of saving money, I save gas, and that means less air contamination, along with making exercise. Sometimes I must use public transport, so I leave my bike at “bicimetro” station and take the subway. I think it is a very good action the State did, because allows you to mix both means. But there are still very few stations with that service, and sometimes is full.

In Santiago is missing several things, as a recycling truck in every commune, proper bikeways, and mainly, educate people about taking care of the environment. It would help us to have a better health and allow us to have a better quality of life.

When I first read today’s theme I immediately thought in my favorite sport: Rhythmic Gymnastic.

It’s a discipline that combines dance and music, but without dancing, ballet and acrobatic movements, using implements, as ball, hoop, ribbon, or clubs. The gymnastic present a routine that can be grouped or individual, making beautiful figures with implements, exchanges, jumps, etcetera. The judges determinate the winner watching, for example, the execution and difficulty of the exercises, the creativity of the routine, perfection of movement, leaps or pirouettes that gymnastic do during the minutes they have to perform their routine.

Rhythmic Gymnastics starts as sport in the years 30, at the URSS. Newly in 1984, it became an Olympic Sport in Atlanta games.  It started as a sport just for women, but nowadays men can also practice it, though, it is not very popular, and it’s not accepted as Olympic sport.

The prominent exponents are Ukrainian, Russian, and Bulgarian young woman. They have won almost every Olympic Games. But Spanish and Italian girls have won and have very good gymnastic too.

My favorite is Anna Bessonova. She’s an Ukrainian Olympic medalist. Although she won bronze medal in all around individual in Athens and Beijing, I think the most beautiful routines were performed by her, with perfect movements and no mistakes with the implements. She retired in 2010, so she didn’t participate in London Olympics.

I like this sport because it shows an awesome synchronicity among music, gymnastics and artistic interpretation. I started practicing it when I was 7 years old at school, but when I moved to other school when I was 15, I quit practicing it. That’s a thing I still regret. But at least I can watch it at the Olympic Games, I guess.

Anna Bessonova at Beijing 

Groupal Routines

Summary from a career-related article

The article I chose was titled "Anger of wartime sex slaves haunts Japan and South Korea" and it was written by Justin McCurry on October 18, 2012.

This text called my attention because I think that war victims never receive a direct satisfaction after all the horrors they live. Usually the countries make postwar peace treaties that are may be an economical solution for the nations, but the people doesn’t get anything but traumas and pain they will never forget. It is connected with my future career because I’ve always been worried about women and their (our) legal protection. I think even in XXI century we are discriminated in many ways, so the abuses to woman during the war and sexual exploitation are topics I’m interested.

The abuses started in 1943, When the Japanese forces invaded South Korea. A lot of women were sent to China and were forced to have sex with the soldiers. Along with being sex slaves, they were beated.  But, afraid of ostracism in their own countries, Asian women kept silence and didn’t talk about it until 1991, several years after the abuses.  Kim Hak-soon, a South Korean, was the first one that dared to reveal the truth. After her, more women could start talking. They are still waiting for an official apology or compensation from Japan.

South Korea is still asking for compensation. They argument that there is legal responsibility that hasn’t been settled, and those war crimes were crime against humanity. But Japan refuses to pay compensations directly, because they say all claims were settled by postwar peace treaties. One of their leader even claimed that there was no evidence of the sexual slavery. In 1997, Yohei Kono, then the chief cabinet secretary, acknowledged that the Japanese military had forced Asian women into sexual slavery. He apologized for all the physical and psychological pain and damage caused to the woman.

But that apologizes are no well received and women are still waiting for an official apology and compensation directly from the Japanese government.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/oct/18/forced-prostitution-wartime-japan-korea

My Best Holidays

Hi everyone... I think it’s my study trip were my best holidays. It was in 2008, and we went to Brazil, precisely Porto Seguro and Salvador de Bahía. It was the best trip because I could travel with my best school friends and do a lot of funny things the week we were there.

At day, we went to the beach, which was in front of our hotel, walk along the sea, take sunbath and meet historical places. The people there said that Porto Seguro was the first place Portuguese arrived in XVI century, and it was full of old buildings and constructions. Now, they are National Monuments.

At night, we had parties, and they were pretty cool because all the music was Axé and there was a buffet of fruits, where you could eat watermelon, pineapple, melon and a lot of other delicious fruit. We also went to a water park, with slides and a giant swimming pool with artificial waves. I and a friend tried to reach the place where the waves started, but we (really) nearly drown. At the moment it was terrifying, but when we could leave the pool we laugh a lot.

We also visited Salvador de Bahía. I think is the most beautiful city I’ve ever visited. I especially liked a church that was all gold inside, the beaches with warm water and the old architecture.

The view from the historical city

The swimming pool in the hotel

 Me and a friend in the water park

The waterpark slides :D

Me and my classmates in Salvador de Bahia

San Francisco Church, Salvador de Bahía