My favorite movie

Well, my favorite movie ever is Clockwork orange, a movie directed by Stanley Kubrik, and starring by Malcolm McDowell (Alex DeLarge), Michael Tarn (Pete), James Marcus (George) and Warren Clarke Dim).

Basically, it is a movie about a teenager gang, where the leader is caught by police, and is subjected to an experiment, that is looking for a cure to violence and reoffends. During the movie, the leader and his gang commit a lot of crimes and acts of violence (they called it “ultraviolence”), and after Alex is subjected to this “therapy” the story turns, and even his “drugos” (that was how he called his friends in the gang) turn against him.

This movie talks about fictitious situations, locating the movie in a future Britain, but really the topics are happening nowadays, like teenage violence and drug abuse.

This movie is based on a book, which has the same name. It was written by Anthony Burgess. Personally, I like two of them, the movie and the book, but the interesting thing about the movie to me is the music, which is almost all of it classical music, changed with a Moog synthesizer. Also, I like the slang very much, called nadsat and the aesthetics, because it is very psychedelic, for example in colours, decorations, wardrobe, etc.

I like the whole movie, but if I had to choose one scene, I would decide for the one when Alex is at the Hospital, after he jumped off a second floor of a house, because he was part of a behavioral therapy, and he feels very sick when he listens the Ninth Symphony of Beethoven. So, he is locked in a room, and can’t bear the discomfort, and he jumped. Finally, he is carried to a hospital, and there the authorities realized that it wasn’t a good method, because it is really dangerous to the teenager. So, Alex is cured from this “therapy”, and the press and the politics take photographs with him, and all kind of stuff that hide the really meaning of this “therapy”, which goes against the free will.

Here in Santiago there are a lot of representative things of Chile, but I think that is important for a tourist to visit other places in the country, which are even more representative and beautiful.

Well, the first place I would suggest to visit is San Cristobal Hill, because from there you can see the entire city. Of course, if you are lucky and it is a clear day before rain. The hill is very nice, it is well taken care and there you can do many activities, like going to the zoo, climbing to the virgin on top by Funicular, a sort of elevator that takes you from bottom to top on the hill. Also you can walk by the hill, and enjoy the beautiful views of different gardens. Other thing that I’d suggest is to visit the center of the city. There are many historical places, and it is well known for being the most important part of the city, in relation to the civic activities. There is La Moneda, which is the Government house, and all the secretary of states, the Post Office building, the Cathedral, and a Museum of natural history. All these buildings are placed in Plaza de Armas, which is an important place in the city too. Plaza de Armas is a good place to do an historical tour. Finally, I would recommend a good place to know our food and drinks. La Piojera is a Chilean restaurant which is well known for being a popular place, in Spanish we said it is a “guachaca” place. There you can drink Terremoto, a drink made of a type of soft wine (pipeño) and ice cream. Besides the drink, you can eat typical food, like Cazuela, Empanadas and Pastel de choclo. Anyways, I think that wherever you go, you will find good sites, and nice people.

A Piece of News

Hello!

I´m going to talk about a piece of news that happened last week, but to me it is very important because it is still happening and today it is a very important topic. It was last Thursday, when a group of students of the Architecture and Town planning Faculty of Universidad de Chile decided to demonstrate against the university education, and they walked down Alameda, the most important Avenue in Santiago. This piece of news appears in the newspapers, on radio and on some TV channels, because of the violence of the police.

Well, the demonstration itself is not a big surprise, because the students are permanently expressing against the problems of education, and mainly the students of Universidad de Chile. Either the demonstrations in general, because people is taking part of the issues of the country, and they are getting out to the streets to express their dissatisfaction.

The problem is that, in this government in particular, the police action is getting stronger. In the Faculty, for example, the police used for first time a kind of weapon to break up the demonstration that wasn’t approved. It was a kind of paintball weapon that the police used to mark the students that were suspects of making disorder. This police action has many problems: first, it was not an approved procedure to dissolve demonstrations, because these paintballs could be very dangerous if it heats you on the eye, or another part without the appropriate protection. Second, it is against the right of people to demonstrate whenever they want. The fact of marking suspects is a big offense to the citizens and goes against our free speech. Finally, the action in FAU was excessive, and the police caused structure damages too.

To me the police action is very worrying, because every day is getting stronger, and I think that our free speech is decreasing. The kind of news that I would like to hear, could be about the citizen demonstration done in a pacific way, and supported by government, because the public opinion is very important to make the things in our country :).

A country I would like to visit

I would like to visit many countries really, especially to study for a year or two. However, today I’m going to write about Argentina, because I want to travel there very soon.
Argentina is well known for the meat. People say that there is the best grilled meat ever. Also, this country is known for the dance, called tango, which is a very theatrical couple dance. Personally, the most interesting thing is the chocolate, because people say that the chocolate is very tasty, especially in "alfajores".

Well, talking seriously, I think that Argentina is a good place to go, because it is an example to Chile in many ways, especially in education. In that country, the education is free in all levels, even the university. Is interesting to think, because Argentina is a poor country (in relation with Chile), and they have free education. It would be an interesting theme to study, and to tray to replicate here in Chile. Personally, I’ve heard that Psychology is a well known career there, and I would like to study there a semester or some like that.

If I go there in November, I would like to assist to a Congress of Human rights, organized by "las mujeres de Plaza de Mayo", an organization who cares about human rights. Also, I would like to visit my brother, who has been living there for two years. He went to Argentina, because that country cares about the culture and arts, at least more than Chile. So, he is studying "música y dirección orquestal".

Finally, if I decided to live for a long time there, I think that I would specialize in my career, because the people here in Chile are similar – because of the language, the culture, etc- and Argentina is a really good place to live.

First Term: Good and Bad points

As far as the academic life concerns, the first term of 2010 was very interesting, but exhausting. I think that one of the most important good points in this topic, is that I’m getting closer to my interests areas, because in first year I had a very general education in social sciences, and very superficial as far as Psychology. So, I am satisfied with my subjects, the reading material, and almost all my teachers. The subject I liked the most was “Teorías y sistemas Psicológicos”, where I learned the basis of modern thinking, and also of Psychology. On the other hand, there were some teachers who I didn’t like, principally because of their methodology. I have to say that they are experts in their areas, but perhaps they aren’t good at teaching.

Well, my academic life was very well in the first term, I passed all my subjects, and I practiced sports too: I did “acondicionamiento físico”. Basically, it was exercises at gym and running. I think that it was a good idea to take it like an obligation, because now that I don’t have to take more sport on obligatory basis, I don’t have (or don’t make myself) any time to do sports, and that is a bad point of this second term: I can’t do any physical activity, besides walking. As far as my personal life, I think that it is the big contra in the semester, because I haven’t learnt how to make compatible the university with my family, my friend, and my boyfriend yet. However, I think that in general, my first semester was very good :)

Second term, 2010.

my blogging experience

First of all, I would like to talk about the importance of learning English. I think it is a useful communication tool, especially because we are students, and we need to get updated knowledge, and the main investigations are from USA and other countries that publish their works in English, because it is a common language. Nowadays, learning English is almost a must. English isn’t a need just for we have to read documents, or papers, or articles in English, but we have to talk in a fluent way, in case we want to travel to another country to get specialized, or travel, or anything we want.

Talking about this blogging experience, I think it has been a very good way to improve my fluency, and learning some words and expression typical of English, so I don’t talk in a Spanish English anymore, or that I try, jajaja.

About the topics, I generally like them, and I think that they are a great help, because if they were really boring, I Think that I wouldn’t learn many things. The blog that I think was the most useful for me, was one about the earthquake, because I had to talk in past, a thing that have been always difficult to me. Also I have to admit that there were some topics very boring, like technology, or festivities. Nevertheless, they always were in agreement with the classes. I think that writing this blog have been a useful experience, because writing is an important thing about English, and learning in this way is much more fun for me that writing in a book, or things like that. In the other side, I think that writing this blog on internet makes us acting deceitful, because we can find all the word that we need on internet. But, I think that that could be a help too, because we can learn vocabulary, but not grammar. That thing we learn writing blogs and going to classes.

Finally, I would like to say that Blogging have been a good way for me to learn English, but I fell that in this year we could practices more about talking and pronunciation, but that I think that we would learn in the next level :).