segunda-feira, 31 de outubro de 2011

My Second Reflection


1989, April
Dear Diary:
                     Everything happened fifteen years ago...Those were the worst moments that I went through in my life. I just want to change my life and go back to Ireland. One day I was down the street and found the keys of a prostitute’s house and of course, I was tempted and entered to look around. There, I stole some of the money that she had in her bedroom and I came back home after buying some extravagances. When I thought that my life was at its height it became a living hell, because some IRA soldier put a f****** bomb in a pub that killed five people and injured some more. The police officers arrested me and I was so angry!
     They tied me to a chair and started to beat me, they pushed my hair, pushed my ears to make me confess the crime and I just thought: “What going on?”, “This world is crazy” and I was very furious and irritated with them. But the worst thing was when they threatened my father to death. When the stupid officer said that, I just started to scream and I wanted to kill him with my bare hands. After this mess I signed the damn confession and the f******  guys got what they wanted.
     The day of the first trial arrived and as expected I was considered guilty...the jail was waiting for me. In the jail I met some people, among them, one guy that was a little freak Rastafarian but cool and gave me a drug that made me forget all of this shit for a while. But, the worst part was when my father died, I was wield, angry, felt alone, without support, I was mad and knowing that the f******    government screwed my life, what made me even angrier.
     But thank God there was a lawyer who helped me and when I arrived to the second trial she managed to prove my innocence and we were all considered not guilty. At that moment my soul swelled with happiness and freedom but there was still one thing to do: fight for my father’s innocence and restore the truth.
     When I’ll achieve this goal I’ll be the happiest man in the world, proud to be free in the name of my father.  

segunda-feira, 24 de outubro de 2011

I.R.A. background notes


The Irish Republican Army (IRA) (In Irish: Óglaigh na hÉireann) was an Irish republican revolutionary military organization. It was descended from the Irish Volunteers, an organization established on 25 November 1913 that staged the Easter Rising in April 1916.
In 1919, the Irish Republic that had been proclaimed during the Easter Rising was formally established by an elected assembly, and the Irish Volunteers were recognized by Dáil Éireann (That means: Parliament) as its legitimate army. Thereafter, the IRA waged a guerrilla campaign against British rule in Ireland in the 1919–1921 Irish War of Independence.

Sinn Féin is a left wing, Irish republican political party in Ireland. Originating in the Sinn Féin organization founded in 1905 by Arthur Griffith, it took its current form in 1970 after a split within the party. Sinn Féin is led by Gerry Adams. The party has historically been associated with the Provisional IRA.

Gerry Adams (In Irish: Gearóid Mac Ádhaimh) was born 6 October 1948 in Belfast, Northern Ireland, he is an Irish republican politician. He is the president of Sinn Féin, the second largest political party in Northern Ireland and the largest nationalist party. From the late 1980s onwards, Adams was an important figure in the Northern Ireland peace process, initially following contact by the then Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) leader John Hume and subsequently with the Irish and British governments and then other parties.
In 2005, the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) indicated that its armed campaign was over and that it is now exclusively committed to democratic politics.

The Wolfe Tones- You'll Never Beat the Irish

In the name of the father - Official trailer

segunda-feira, 10 de outubro de 2011

My first reflection

In our days English is the most important language spoken all over the world.
In the beginning of the history, English was unknown, the more important languages were Latin, modern Romance, languages Germanics, Greek and Celtic languages.
The English history begins when West German people from Jutland, southern Denmark and northwestern Germany, start coming to what is today known as British territory. They brought their culture and their language that influenced those who already lived there.
To me English is good because we need it to communicate with other people around the world. In our days, learning English is as important as writing or reading our own language. It became a very useful tool not only for us as students but also to meet other cultures and connect to the global world.
If students, can speak, write and understand English very well they are able to open their horizons. It’s easier to be successful at work or business with this language because it can be the passport to “fly” to other places in the planet. In our days it’s hard to find an educated person who isn’t able to use the English language.
To understand English is urgent since it’s the most widespread language in the world.

Reflection - The importance of English in today’s world

Nowadays English is growing to become the language that everybody speaks in the world. Not long ago, the language that ruled the world was French, but all of that changed at the end of the Second World War with the treaty of Versailles being written in both French and English by will of U.S. president Wilson. Since then the evolution of music, science, space exploration, economics, the internet, politics, solidified English as the language to learn.
English is spoken everywhere and is the official language of 55 countries and co-official of many more, being the one more spread around the world with more than 500 million of speakers, so if we want to find a job outside our country it becomes easier if we speak English.
Some people say that English shouldn’t be thought in schools outside English countries, because with the growth of English, their native language can well be at risk of disappearing, being overthrown by English and in a few years nobody will remember what language was spoken in that country.
English is being learnt and spoken by more and more people every day, so if we know how to speak it, we can communicate with almost everybody in the world, that’s why it’s certainly the language to learn.

segunda-feira, 3 de outubro de 2011

My first reflection

English is a language that influences most people around the world but in the old days nobody spoke English because French was the predominant language. In the beginning English was influenced by Angles, Saxons and Jutes and was called Old English and after the British colonization of many parts of the world English was influenced by other language like Spanish (mosquito), Latin (curriculum) and Chinese (ketchup).
In my opinion English is easy to learn if we are motivated and nowadays with the evolution of technology in areas like science, music, movies it is very important to speak and understand English. It’s also crucial to be successful in the world today. For example, when students are in university they can find training opportunities in other countries or if they want to change their lives and improve their living conditions, they will probably need to go to another country to work because they will find better opportunities. If people don’t know the universal language (English) it is a passport to success in the future.
Nowadays multiculturalism is everywhere and it deals with cultural exchanges. In my point of view it is good because it gives people the opportunity to learn a lot of things about other people, things we have never contacted with or ever imagined. One of the things that I have learned is that a language, like English, do not put other cultures at risk, I guess it enriches our country and even more important it enriches ourselves.