About my experience learning English

I think that learning English here in the University has been a great experience; it has made me practice it, improve it and learn new vocabulary. So I totally recommend it. But a few years back (when I was just beginning my career) I just wanted to exempt of going to English classes, because I did not want to lose my time learning English. Now I think differently, I want to keep practicing my English, so that way, I will not forget it.

My knowledge of the language I owed to my mom, she taught me when I was younger, so that was fundamental, and she always encouraged me to developed my hearing skills, so I listened song in English and paid attention to the dialogues of the English-talked movies. When I was in School a few years after I got English classes; the class was one for all the students, so teachers taught just the basics. I never had to write a paper or an essay in English, I just had to talk, and that made me have a weak point in this language: the writing so it was a little disappointing.

But when I got to college things changed, I had to take different classes according of my English level, I took the diagnosis test and I got into the III group, and because it is mandatory to take English classes I took them. Last term I took Miss Yulia Kitaeva’s class and it was great, she made the “learning English experience” fun. She always corrected our English and encourage us to learn more on our own. This term I’m taking Juan Luzzi’s class and it has turned out just fine, I have improved my writing skills and learned new vocabulary.

Because of this reasons I strongly recommend taking English classes in College, it makes you not forget what you have learned over the years, because makes you practice it. It also makes you learn new vocabulary and the best of all, it’s free. If you do not want to get your English knowledge rusty, you need to practice it, and taking the classes according your English level is a great way to do it.

Curico, Sweet Curico

My hometown’s name is Curico, it’s located in the north of the seventh region. My parents are from Santiago and before I was born they moved to Curico because my dad had a great job offer there.

I was born in Santiago (my parents wanted to show me to my grandparents, and they all live there) so I just born there and afterwards I went to Curico and lived there for almost 19 years. Then I wanted to go to college, and all the Universities that are located near Curico don’t have Sociology on their careers. So I had to come here, to Santiago and study the career that I wanted in the University that I wanted. Now I live with all my siblings (they also came here to study, because the careers they wanted weren’t in Curico they study Literature and Design).

I have been living in Santiago 4 years now and it has shown me that there is no place like home. Whenever I can, I go to Curico to see my parents and to visit my friends and walked all over the city. It is a beautiful city, now has a face that you couldn’t recognize because of the earthquake, all the historical places went down, or has to go down because they are dangerous.

The face of the city has been wrecked, but the warmth of the people stayed the same, a few of the citizens are organizing themselves so they can have a voice when the reconstruction takes place, some organizations want to maintain the colonial style of Curico, want to repair the historical places and don’t want to take them down. I’m a part of those people, because I think that the magic of Curico is exactly that, the history and the memory that is contained in the buildings and houses all over the city.

The Environment

I’m pretty away from green. I don’t have any practice that you could call “environment-friendly”. It is not really my subject, I think. But of course I try to do my part, by not throwing away my garbage on the streets, but I think that’s nothing, that’s not a real change because of two reasons: Firstly it is such a small action that do not change the wider reality (as the sociologist-to-be that I am, I don’t believe that individual actions are that important) and secondly I think that you don’t help the environment by throwing the stuff you don’t need in the garbage, you help it by recycling your garbage. And that’s the subject I prefer.

I personally don’t recycle much. I don’t know where to put my garbage in, and I don’t make the effort to know where to put it. The only things that I recycle are batteries, that’s because when I was in school, one time someone older than me gave a class about the environment and show to me and my class videos and pictures of the damages that causes one battery to the animals and to the location. But that’s the only thing that I do.

I would love to use a bike instead of public transportation, but I have bad luck with bikes, every bike that I had was stolen from me. It is just sad because it would keep me in better shape and it would be less harming to the environment, the problem is that some studies have said that people that transports their selves in bikes, across cities as polluted as Santiago put in danger their health because of the contamination.

About tree-huggers I think they are insane, because we all need wood for something, to light up fires, to build furniture, houses, and other things. I don’t believe that nature has feelings, and assume that it has I think is insane. It’s like vegetarians, I just don’t get it, I love meat and I could never give it in.

Books :)

I loved literature! Yes I said it in past tense, because of one thing: studying sociology has taken from me the interest on literature books. Now when I go to a bookstore I just focalized on the sociological books, not the poetry, historical or literature books. But in summertime this tendency changes, I read other kind of books depending of my interests in that time. For example last summer I read Latin American authors from the twentieth century (like Gabriel García Marquez, Julio Cortázar, Jorge Luis Borges, Maria Luisa Bombal and Juan Rulfo). And the summer before that I read classical authors as Shakespeare, Chéjov, Tolstoi and Dostoievski. But that’s the only time of the year that I read literature books.

My mom tried to incentive my reading habits when I was a child, she used to take me and my brothers to the public library to look for a book to read. Since that time the books have had a special place in my life.

My favorite book from all times is “the perfume”. An art piece written by Patrick Süskind. I remember that I didn’t want to finish the book, I wanted to read it forever, but obviously that didn’t happened and I finished it and I got obsessed with the story, I started to smell things different, just like the principal character.

The Last book I read was ‘the kiss of the spiderwoman’ from Puig, it took me forever to finish it because the book got lost during the summer, I started to read it in December and in February I found it and finished it. The story is about two prisoners that share a cell together and tell each other stories, that way the time goes faster and they don’t lose their minds. Extremely recommended!

I think this summer I will meet Roberto Bolaño, I have received great comments about his books.

The Zesh Rehman Foundation

The article I’m going to tell you about consists in a foundation created by a famous football player named Zesh Rehman, he is the captain of Bradford City in England. He is 26 years old and is the only Asian man to play in all four divisions of the English game, including the Premier League.

His childhood was hard; the beginning of his football life wasn’t easy either. Because of the social limits that are imposed over the Asian boys that make nearly impossible to be a professional football player in Britain. Regardless of the hard obstacles he became the first and only Asian man that plays in the football league of Britain, all this because of his hard work and perseveration.

Now he's offering help to youngsters from similar backgrounds who might want to follow in his footholds by the creation of the ‘Zesh Rehman Foundation’. The aims of this foundation are in one hand: support the kids that have Asian heritage and in the other hand: wants to encourage football as a "pathway to community cohesion" between kids from different cultures. A sociological initiative that helps to overcome the fragmentation and discrimination of the Britain society.

You can read the whole article in :

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2010/oct/13/zesh-rehman-football-asian-community

Pulp Fiction

My favorite movie is Pulp Fiction, a Quentin Tarantino’s film released in 1995. It has everything that I love in a movie: action, blood, mob, witty dialogues, and great actors. The greatness about this movie is its complexity, you never know what is going to happen and from one moment to another everything gets upside down.

The Plot is hard to describe ‘cause of the complexity and the nonlinear storyline of the film. But it’s about a lot of stories coming together in bizarre situations. It has to do with a mob, leaded by Marcellus Wallace a well respected African-American.

You can also enjoy the performance of John Travolta, Samuel L. Jackson, Tim Roth, Bruce Willis, Uma Thurman, Harvey Keitel and Quentin Tarantino. All of them great actors (at least in this film). I have seen this movie like ten times (I’m not kidding, I just love it) and I know that I’m going to see again soon. I even have an original copy in my house; it was a Christmas gift from my parents.

I love going to the cinema, but it’s too expensive. When I go it’s just because I had a coupon or someone invites me. The last time I went to the cinema, was a few months back, I saw “Inception” a film directed by Christopher Nolan (Memento & the Dark Knight) and performed by Leonardo Di Caprio. I strongly recommend seeing it, better in the cinema ‘cause it has great effects that you can enjoy in the big screen.

Places to visit!

I don’t know Santiago very well, I know some historical places and museums, but just a few. Obviously I have an excuse: I was raise in Curico, my hometown, it’s located in the north of Maule’s Region (is the seventh if you didn’t know) however I was born in Santiago, but my family just came here to show me to my grandparents (they have lived their entire lives here). And I know very well Curico, sometimes I get lost but it’s because I get lost easily.

I’m ashamed, I have been living in Santiago for four years now, and I don’t know this place. However some foreign friends have come here to visit and I have shown them some places that I personally love and that I think every tourist should see: First of all green places (like squares) I think that the forest park it’s a beautiful place, the streets around that and the art museums near that park, makes it a great place to visit. For example the Beauty Arts Palace (from his architecture and his art) it’s a fantastic and cheap. This is my favorite green place.

An architecture place that anyone can’t miss is the Sacramentinos’s Church, it’s located in San Diego street. It is just lovely, everytime I see it it amaze me the beauty of this Church.

An important museum that a tourist should visit is the Precolumbian Art Museum, it shows all the handmade thing made by the natives before Columbus came to America. It’s located near the Town Square.

A street you should visit is Yungay street, it’s representative of the ancient part of the city, the houses in that street have more than 300 years and right now is restoring the cultural side of the city. Last but not least is the government palace, a gigantic building build as a republican icon.

Music is essential

Music is essential. Just like that.
For example, have you ever watched a movie in mute? It’s horrible, I know it firsthand because I have to travel almost every week to Curico (my hometown) and inside the bus there is always a movie been played, and there aren’t headphones available so you have to watch it without any sound, but you can read the subtitles (so you can understand what it is happening). Music makes every emotion, sensation and situation more intense. Like when I’m happy I just want to hear “cumbia” or hard rock and when I’m sad I just want to hear grunge or blues.

The band that I’m listening now and that I’m obsessed about is Alice in Chains, a band originally formed in the late 80’s in Seattle. I heard this band when I was fifteen years old and I just loved it, we met up again a couple of months ago, because they got a new album out, It’s called “Black gives way to blue” and I just can’t stop hearing it.

I used to play the piano, in fact I was in a band and I played the keyboards, it was a metal band called “Elodia” and my friends were in that band so it was a lot of fun, but unfortunately it’s over, but we have great memories of those days.

I don’t know if Music is really essential, I mean I don’t know if we (as a society) couldn’t live without it, but what I know is that is essential for me.

Bolivia

Bolivia is the country I would like to visit. In fact my boyfriend and I are making plans to go there somewhere in the future. What I think is amazing about Bolivia, and what makes it my first choice, is that I want to see firsthand what it is happening in Bolivia, I want to see how works a native government, I want to compare it with our “republican regime” and I want to know how the common people feels about their president and his government.

I know from friends that have gone there that it is a beautiful country, that it has a lot of contrast, for example 80 percent of the population is native and Evo Morales is the first native president that this country has. Another important fact that interests me is that you don’t need to have a lot of money to have a great time in Bolivia, comparing it with the value of thing here in Chile, Bolivia is definitely cheaper than Chile.

But what interest me the most is that although we are neighboring countries, we are so much different, our cultures are very dissimilar and we have conflicts regarding the geographic delimitations. That makes it a place where I want to be.

All work and no play makes Javi a dull girl

Last term was very difficult for me, because of two reasons:

The first reason is that I had to take a lot of classes because last year I didn’t approve all the courses I took (mostly because I did a lot of activities that were “extra-curricular”, like be part of social organizations from the University, so the time I dedicated to study my “curricular” classes decreased) but last term I approved all the courses I took so that was very comforting (that’s an upside, but only in the end of the term, because during the term I was like a zombie).

The second reason it has to do with my family and one thing you should know about me: I’m from Curico, a city located on the north of Maule’s region, so that means that I have to travel on the weekends if I want to see my family. Last term was hard because my mom got pretty sick and because of my extra classes I couldn’t travel as much as I wanted to take care of her. Now she’s better and I see her frequently, but it was really sad at that time.

When I look back and think about last term I’m pretty glad it’s over. I learned a lot but I’m really glad it’s over.

WELCOME!

Hi, I’m Javi, a 22 year-old student from Chile. This is my fourth year studying sociology in the University of Chile and my first year as an English student, so this blog is my first homework.

I don’t have much experience with the language, but all the knowledge that I have I owed to my mom, she’s an English-French-Spanish translator and she taught me when I was very little how to speak and understand English, however I have serious problems writing in English, so I hope that this class can help me in that area.