Wednesday, May 23, 2007

Journal: Wrong activities in wrong places.

I'm studying English in order to become a teacher. This is not my biggest dream, but this is the career that for many reasons I have chosen. But when looking at the actual situation of Eucation in mu country I realize that my career might be probably obstructed in the future.
The socio-economic situation of Argentina had led to a dramatic change in the role of teachers at schools. A teacher is primarly supposed to go to schools to teach; secondly back up to students as regarding external issues that are not related to learning is also understood within the profession. In addition teachers are supposed to follow the assignments chosen for his or her by the institution at which the professional works. And also, a teacher's task includes activities related to the educational field, such us teachers' thecnical perfection. And all this, is my intention for the future.
But nowadays, teachers have ended up performing the role of social assistants. Predominantly, in public schools. The poor economic situation of students is not left outside the classrooms. First of all the kids cannot afford for the clothe and for the material they need for classes, which is a big problem for teachers and schools, that in most of the cases have to pay for those things themselves. An even worse situation, is the fact that children are not fed well because of the pauper reality of their femilies. They faint in class, they cannot keep on with their tasks and homeworks, they fail in paying attention and show an important lack of concentration, and they also have serious problems of behaviour.
As a solution for the under-fed situation at which many students live, our governments have include at schools certain social programms such as the one called "Copa de Leche". Understanding these kind of programms as a way to cope with poverty, they are really correct. Hundred of kids have acces to food at schools, otherwise they have nothing to eat during day.
But when remembering which is the real purpose of schools, this programms highly interrupt the teachers'work. Because appart from teaching, they have to cook and prepare food, serve it to the students, and this is all done at times which are supposed to be spent on teaching and learning.
This unusual situations at schools, that reflect our actual reality, have made teachers to stop teaching in order to provide assistance to the children.

Monday, May 21, 2007

Journal: Women & Shoes

Shoes ocupy a particular place within women's culture. Not only are they one of the main pieces of clothe but they also form a staple part in women's life, and this is shown in the vast examples found in the history of human beings at which this objects have always been particularly related to the female side.
As it is well known, fantazy arises around the shoes world. And this feeling lies especially on crossing yourself with a unique opportunity that ocurrs few times in a woman's life:and that is just, finding a pair of shoes with an excellent design at half price!. This challenge is more likely to be satisfactory performed in outlets.
Besides the fact that there are lot of women who are really fans of shoes, every single lady has at least, little fond on this fashion elements. It's estimated that ordinary women in US have more or less 27 pairs of shoes inside her wardrobe. This includes trainers, sandals, boots, flippers, slippers and heel shoes. Some of the 27 pairs are said to be used by their owners only twice or three times per year. Sympathy that sometimes develops towards a particular pair of shoes, rather than another, changes in women as rapidly as the weather may change.
Fanatism is another issue extremelly related to shoes. Richard the III, was believed to be of this type. And for him, there were enough reasons in life to give up his reign for a pair of shoes. He was a really shoes lover (I heard this on TV once). Most famous people are address as shoes fans, many of whom have declared to have more than 100 pairs of them.
Comfortableness of shoes is paramount, especially when deciding on your next pair, among other issues such as design and price. The shoes must fit you, must make you feel comfortable and happy of haven chosen them. Regardless if they have been bought after looking at several options or if they were achieved by the impulse that love at first sight betwwen you and them caused, you should feel the certainty that those shoes were made for you.
It's amaizing what a woman can make in order to obtain a pair of shoes which caught her attention( for more imformation ask my best friend). For example, if the amount of money that a lady needs for them is what obstruct her path to reach those shoes, she will for sure mantain faithful to her goal and do what is necessary until finally succeding in buying that pair.
Women adore to look and to buy shoes, but what's more fullfiling is to wear a pair for the first time. And this overwhelming feeling can be doubled, if the new shoes are accompained with a bag or purse that perfectly matches!
Shoes are quite more than simply an outer covering for your feet. They are an element of art for designers, an object of desire for women and a form of seduction for men...and they give to women's figure a contribution to her steticism.

Saturday, May 19, 2007

Journal: About Video Games.

We cannot deny that, while Video Games are becoming a massive form of entertainment, discussions and arguments about them are ocurring worldwide. Generally, the debates around Video Games place specific attention on violence and the social impacts of gaming. But recently, there have been many studies and surveys which have widely succeded in addressing the anxiety of parents and societies about those topics.
It's true that gamers play for long times. And this has led to the idea that people may become isolated due to the less face to face interaction which Video Games are said to provoke. The long hours of exposure to video gaming and computers have made the issue go beyond, even, to what refers to health concerns. Principally because there have been importants attemps to show the negative impacts of video gaming on the body's health. Especially through physical and psychological problems of which gaming is said to be responsible for, such as stress.
Under the same focus, also behaviour is assumend to be affected by video gaming. What worries society most, as regarding this, is connected with the high content of violence that many games have and with the belief that exposuring people to these knd of images can make them develop violent or criminal attitudes afterwards.
Beside all this typical fuss, the fact that Video Games also have many favourable characteristics is undeniable. First of all, the reason why gaming has turned into a mass form of entertainment, is because it is safe. Parents can control the gaming of their children, providing that they play at home. Although the average age of gamers is said to be 30, children are on top of the discussion about Video Games. And it is precisely for them, that games offer lots of positive results.
For example, video gaming, helps to the development of mental and motors skills among other educational purposes that gaming serves, like being a perfect tool for learning a new language, such as English. They offer also an interesting approach to thecnology. And this is useful for the ones who find high-tech advances not very easy to follow.
While receiving all this positive effects, the gamer goes trough a set of virtual interactions with other gamers. And this shows the powerful "social" part of videogaming. Not only the player can interact with the characters inside the screen but also with the people behind them, which remembers children and gamers in general that they are paret of a larger community of beings that extends beyond the game itself.
Anyway, what is actually happening, is that video games have become the current topic of discussion. And its positive or negative points are going to be highlighted depending on who speaks. As it ocurres with all forms of art and entertainment. Meanwhile, the theme of these fields, will be predominantly Video Games, just until a new one arises and replaces it.

Journal: Hope of Change

Having read Ibsen's "A Doll House" I couldn't avoid a feeling growing in me towards Nora and towards the criticism made in the play to her society. A society that was on existance a long time ago but which resembles the one of our persent days.
What Nora expects for her life is not what society has planned for her, for women. She cannot fight. She cannot fight for love. Eventhough she did it , this is no supposed to happen. And in reward for her fight she obtains nothing but a marriage from which she finally runs away. Her husband is a witness of her departure. She leaves hopeless. But not everything is negative. Because by watching her leaving, by the realiztion of not having her anymore, the hope that is inexistent in the woman appears curiously, in the man. And this is a hope of change, a hope that makes me thought of the transformation of societies. Which hasn't yet reach to a final result. And what is more important, which results have been very few. Because chauvinism, disrispect, slavery and submission are concepts that unfourtunatelly haven't really disappeared of our ways of living.
Some hints of this issues are perceived in Ibsen's play. At least for me. Maybe, they are not clearly perceived because the voice of the author is present but not really to discuus those topics, but to criticize a society which within its vast hypocricy this issues are also found.
In my opinion, it is imposible not to relate Nora with the begining of a social transformation, and with the seeking for a more fair one. Especially, a more fair society for women, for whom the problem is not yet solved. But the hope, that the female character losses and which is present then in the man, has spread out. And it is still living in many of us. We still dream to see things arrenged in a different way. A way in which every being occupies the same place within society and has the same rights as everybody else has...eventhough no one knows how long this would take, it's just this thought the one which feeds this hope of change.

Sunday, May 13, 2007

Journal: The Old Lady and The Cats

Nearby my house lives an old woman, whose wrinkled face resembles the one of a witch and whose clothes are always tattered. Her place looks very grim and it seems really scary at nights. I take a look at it frecuently, because her house is short distance from mine. I think she is the only inhabitant of her place. Because I have always seen this woman alone. She doesn't even speak to the neighbours, what makes the mistery flows around her life.
The old lady goes out her house every single night, no matter how the weather could be outside. Her presence in street, is similar to a sort of strange habit of her, because the aim of it is feeding stray cats. The animals are acostumed to this, and for that reason they wait for her between 11 and 12 pm, all the nights. Some of the cats are as old and as dreadful as the woman. And some of them are just skinny kitties. Each of the cats have a special characteristic, but they are all marked by the same sad look, which origin is a mixture of loneliness and starvation.
After their supper, the old lady enters her house and the cats start to leave, and one by one, they all go away, until the front door is empty again. This scene that repeates every night is probably the only "social" interaction that this woman has with beings of any kind.
The old lady and the cats, look like if they were all a family. What would happen when this poor woman pass away? Surely, what is probable to ocurr is that this family would break up, and the cats would have to look for another way of survival. As the woman that feeds them has not died yet and so, the tragic probability has no ocurred for the moment, I understand their relationship as profitable for both sides. She provides food for the cats, and these animals serve in return, the need of company that the old lady has.

Journal: A lie I told.

Years ago, a friend of mine decided to move from her neighbouring house to an appartment sittuated in the city centre. Because she was going to have less space then to have a pet, she decided to give her boxer puppy to someone else who could continue taking care of the animal. I ofered myself for that task and my friend accepted happily, because she knew that I had always looked forward to have a dog like her's. The problem was that I didn't have enough space in my house for a pet too. So, as a solution, I thought of my boyfriend's place which has a huge background full of grass and plants. But, unlike him, his family had always rejected to have a dog. And that was the point at which, with the complicity of my boyfriend, I made up a lie:
We went to my friend's house and we took the little boxer with us after the owner gave the animal her long goodbyes. We carried it to my boyfriend's house where his family looked our arrival with surprise.'Is that boxer your's, Gabriela?' his mother asked. And I answer:'No.But isn't it lovely?'. Inmidiatly after, my boyfriend said:'We were just walking nearby the park and we saw it abandon, tided to a tree'. And then he added:'Who could have done such an evil thing?.We should keep it with us!'. All sort of negative responses arised and all who were present, except us, rejected the idea. We had an argumment then, which ended favourably towards us. And my boyfrien's family accepted the dog to stay, but with the condition that, its stay, should be a temporary one.
Time passed and the boxer puppy grew up and with it grew up also, the affinity of the family for the dog. Because of that the temporary stay became a permanent one. And now, if you dare to suggest some new home for the pet other than their house, they all cry: 'No, it must stay or it may suffer from separation anxiety!', and so on.
Our lie was never discovered. Nowadays, when we took our pet for a walk to the park at which we said we had found it, my boyfriend and I remember our innocent lie, and we laugh!.

Thursday, May 10, 2007

Journal: Positively Positive

I admire people who think positively. This sort of persons never seem to feel exhausted about the ups and down of their lives. Because, in fact, their lives do have those wave movements, as mine. By they are not affected by them, dramatically. For these peolple, there's always light at the end of the tunnel.
I really believed the optimistic people have much more chances to succed in life than those who make too much trouble of nothing. The reason for this, is simply; "positive" people emanate good vibrations and these vibrations tend to atract succes to people's life. This is the way in which optimistic people can become succesful rapidly, without too much effort.
On the other hand, people who are pesimist suffer a lot. And they need double effort in order to achieve their objectives in life. My qustion is: It's a matter of personality or it's about choosing a position in front of life? Seeking for an answer, I always try to keep my self close to positivism, but as regarding my personality, I'm not that sort of person. As for me, succes and positivism are closely related, I will like to "convert" then. I would like to take a positive attitude and established it as a way of life.
I believe that positivism is a path you may choose. And in my personal experience, this is a path that I would recomend, because I have seen the benefits of it, many times.
From little succes that nutures every day's life to the achievemnet of very difficult goals, beside effort, harwork and patience, the path you need to follow in order to obtain them, is widely connected to positivism. And in this same way, solution to problems can also arise easily. It's a matter of living life in a more relaxed and optimistic way.

Saturday, May 5, 2007

Journal: A television fraud

Some days ago, a friend of mine told me a story that astonished me a lot. We were in the middle of a conversation which was about very popular TV shows. Especially, about the prizes that those shows give to the people who take part in the talent competitions that they hold. We all agreed that those contests about dacing, singing and other abilities could be a fraud. But this story ended to convinced us that we were right on thinking that.
There was a girl from Tucuman who sang our traditional folclore. She started her career when she was just 5 or 6 years old. After gaining some re-known in our province, she tried to make public in the rest of the country. For that reason, she started to appear in many TV programms which are broadcasted in Buenos Aires. At that moment, one of the most popular TV shows of Argentina was giving a talent competition. The girl's dream encouraged her to enter in the competition. But what she obtained there was a lie, sustained in a sort of terrible pshycological pressure and an illegal attempt to bribe her parents.
Being aware of the fame that the girl had obtained until that moment, the TV channel offered the girl's parents what they called a "treat". They assured them that their daughter would win first prize. But the parents had to sign a contract that din't allow the girl to performed anywhere else appart from that channel and only when they called her, for at least two years. I was told many other details of the contract but let's go to the important part of this story: The girl had to enter the channel in the morning before the competition, with the other children who participated. She was going to see her parents again, at least, 18 hours after this entrance. She and the other contestants were going to be assisted by a baby-sitter, for they were all little children. And each of them would also have a sort of "tutor" whose task was to prepare them for the big moment. Do you imagine how? by telling the children the extact words they had to say and the exact attitudes they needed to have on stage. But this was not done with the idea of encouraging them to performe well, but with the idea of making the children to place themselves in advantage within the positions that the producers and parents had agreed on before. So, the competition itself was a fraud and noone really cared about the children and their talents.
In this way they all assured themselves that the fraud cannot be noticed by the audience. Because in fact, the child who was chosen to win in advantage, was told to perfrom in certain way (let's say that was told to perform well) and the "lossers" were taught techniques that would innevitably lead them to sencond positions.
The mother of the girl rejected to sign the contrat and the little girl, who is now an young teenager, left the channel with empty hands.
The important thing is that this story still continuous to go on. Not every parents think as the ones of this girl and they force their children to go into this sort of contests where they are treated like that. And just in order to win a prize or a little bit of fame.
This facts should de re-thought by parents, because this situations can leave marks on their children that may affect them for the rest of their lives.

Friday, May 4, 2007

Journal: My Horscope.

Unlike the Zodiac Horoscope, in which people's sign depends on the date of birth and it is related to the star's constellations, in the Chinnesse Horoscope, your sign will depend on the year of your birth and more than "a sign" people have an animal. This animal that stand for your sign, in my case, is the dog. But also, this animal is accompained with a nature element, which in my case is "the water". So I'm a water dog. Which for me is not just coincidence, for I feel like a dog and also like water.
As a dog, I'm loyal and human's best friend. I learn my lessons of life by cause-effect situations or let say, by a punishment and reward system, like the way in which dogs are domesticated. I bark, but I don't bite. I'm capable of fighting until death for my food, my territory and my offspring (in the case that I have it). And I will not hesistate to defend my owner against any danger. This one, I perceive it even being thousands of kilometres appart, because I have an acute sense of smell which never fails.
Although I have co-lived with human beings since the beginning of their existance, my wild instinct has not completely disappeared. It is just asleep. So, you shouldn´t wake it up, otherwise you will find the beast behind this beauty.
As regarding my element, remember that water connot be retained within your hands, because it drains. And so do I. To catch me, you will need an impermeable container. And to conserve me, it will need to be very well plugged up, 'cause I can also evaporate.
I can put out a fire, rotten the wood and oxidize a metal, but my abilities go beyond. Because I am the essence of life, I purify.
I can be cold, sometimes iced, and in other ocations, I can burn you until your bones. But also, I can pleasently warm you up.
I really have any doubt that a water dog, this combination, is exactly what I am.

Journal: The River

One of the main rivers in Tucumán is the "Lules". It starts its way in "La Quebrada de Lules" where its bed is nutured by several mountainside streams that provide to the river fresh natural water. The Lules runs many kilometres west-southeast, until it ends up flowing into the principal river of the province called "Salí". The Salí, crosses the whole territory of Tucumán going south until its final estuary in the magnificent dam "Rio Hondo" also known as "El Frontal".
The river Lules played an important role at the beginning of the Sugar Industry of Tucumán; which can be said to be one of the main industrial activities performed here. Many sugar mills were placed in the actual area of the city of Lules, through which the river passes by. The plantations were backed up with Hidroelectric energy that was generated in the Lules "Usina". The electricity generator of it, used the powerful and rapid caudal of water that the river Lules has in order to work.
The city of Lules grew up through the passing of time, becoming a "Municipio" which economy is supported by lots of factories that settled there. The development of many other industries among that area has led to the drammatic pollution of the river, which is no longer used for Hidroelectricity. The manufacturing of paper that "Papel del Tucumán" does, is one of the activities that contaminated tha riverbed most.
Anyway, the upper part of the river Lules, where the pollution has not afected the water, is chosen for leisure activities. That region, called "Anfama" is used for motocross and mountainbike competitions. And what is more important than the competitions, is that people who perform those sports use their motorbikes and bicicles to carry food, water and clothes to the local people of Anfama. The fact, is that those mediums of trasportation, among others, like horses, are the only way in which you can reach the upper parts of the river Lules.
Appart from Anfama and the city of Lules, the river runs also near a town called "Potrero de las Tablas". It is believed that this place will probably become on importat city due to the project of the construction of a dam there. This one will make the river to be use for Hidroelectric purposes again.
The main use of the river Lules nowadays has to do with the agroindustry, as its stream of water supplies the irrigation ditches that run acroos the vegetable fields of its banks.