REVIEW: SPIRITED AWAY

In this post I wanted to do a little throwback and review one of my favourite movies when I was little (and still now): Spirited away. I remember having this movie in VHS and watching it often and some years ago, when I watched it again after years I really liked it and it remained me a lot to my childhood.

Spirited Away is an fantasy animated movie, but it isn't only for children, it is also a movie for adults. It was released in 2001 and it was directed by Hayao Miyazaki, a famous Japanese director.

I'm going make a brief explanation of the plot, to situate you in the movie. The main character is Chihiro, a girl who is moving with his parents. While they are going to their new house they get lost in a little village and their parents decide to eat in a little restaurant on the street. Because of the food they get transformed into pigs. From this point, Chihiro starts her magical trip to find the way to turn her parents into humans again. Almost the whole movie takes place in a bathouse in which the clients and the employees are magical creatures.

As you can see by the plot, it is little weird movie but I guess that is what caught my

attention when I was little. But besides its weirdness, it is a very complete movie. It is very marked by the Japanese culture and beliefs, which means that there are still a lot of things about this movie left for me to understand because I don't really know a lot about the Japanese culture, it is a story in which the hero is a little girl, it has a beautiful love story and it is a movie that shows you many values through a big variety of characters, each one of them with their own peculiarities.

In my opinion, it is a good movie for children, because it's about adventures and there are funny moments (although some things are so weird that I remember some things were a little bit scary for me when I was little), but it is also a good movie for adults, because there is a lot of symbolism behind it, and the whole movie works as a critique to the capitalist society from the 80s in Japan.

In conclusion, I really recommend this movie because it is entertaining, weird in a good way and if you go a little bit deeper, you'll find a movie full of values and symbolism. 

THE TRAILER:

TATTOOS

Nowadays it is more well-seen, but years ago there was a big controversy around the tattoos. People wearing big tattoos were often seen as problematic people and it was seen as something unsightly. This made some people not be able to get a job because they had visible tattoos or also piercings.

I personally like piercings and tattoos, as long as they aren't covering the whole body of the person. In my case I don't discard getting a tattoo or a piercing someday, but it will probably be a small one or a discreet one. I'm not really into the tattoo or piercing whole-covered bodies, for myself or for others, but I think it shouldn't be a problem for those who like it.

Having your body covered with tattoos shouldn't be an inconvenience for a person to get a job, because it doesn't define if he or she is hard working or not. It all goes to the common appearance problem. We all tend to judge the people by their appearance and I think it is kind of unavoidable, but in my opinion we should try to get over it and force ourselves to ignore our own prejudices.

People's looks (the style, tattoos, hairstyle, etc.) often reflect their personality, so we should say that it's something from the inside that goes outside gets shown to the world, but it's not all the inside that gets shown. It's just a little part and with that you can't determinate how a person is, their character or if he or she is a good or a bad person.

We should accept that people have different likes and different personalities and it doesn't affect their quality as a person. 

FORMAL LETTER

32 Esplais Street

17486 Castelló d'Empúries

20^th March 2016

Mr and Ms Perry

2548 North East Hood Street

97299 Portland, Oregon

Dear Mr and Ms Perry,

The reason why I am writing this letter is because I want to apply for the babysitter job you are interested in. I have seen your advertisement on the Internet and I think I am the person you are looking for. I am a sixteen-year-old Spanish student with a good level of English, but it can always be improved, and that is one of the reasons I would like to work as an au pair. I really like children and I am sure taking care of them would be at the same time fun and a way to learn and improve my English.

I think I match the babysitter profile you are looking for, because I am a tidy and responsible person, I am excited to work with children and I could teach them some Spanish as a new language, just like you request in your advertisement.

Find my CV attached to this letter.

Looking forward to hearing from you as soon as possible.

Sincerely,

Mar Oliva

CHOOSING OUR FUTURE

In this you-say I wanted to talk about something that I have been asked a lot for a while: my future. Last year, when I was in 4^th of ESO, we had to start deciding what do we wanted to do with our future. I didn't know it. I knew I wanted to study Batxillerat and to go to university, but I didn't know what I wanted to study. Now, that I'm doing 1^st of Batxillerat I still don't know it. I don't have to choose what I want to do right now, but it stresses me knowing that the moment of choosing is getting everytime closer.

I think that my problem is that I don't like making important decisions. I feel pressed and I'm never sure of my choice. I'm afraid of, for example, choosing a topic for my Treball de Recerca that isn't interesting enough, that I don't know how to develop, or that after some weeks working on it, becomes boring for me. I'm afraid of choosing a degree that happens to be something I don't like, something I'm not good at or something that is going to be unuseful.

I try to tell to myself that making a mistake is not actually a big deal, because I can always fix it and learn from it, but I feel the presure anyways.

I think that we are tied to decide what we want to do with our lifes too early, and not everyone has an idea of what to go for. Actually, when we finish 4^th of ESO we already have to start deciding: if you want to do Batxillerat, a Training Cycle, to work, etc. And then you have to decide which Batxillerat or Training Cycle you want to do. Focusing more on Batxillerat, because it is what I'm doing, I think that it is already a big choice choosing which

one you want to do. I know a lot of people that don't know what to study at university, and they like some degrees classify as science degrees and others as arts degrees, so it's a difficult choice for them to choose a Batxillerat. I don't really know if it would work, but maybe we should be able to choose the subjects we want regardless of if they are science or arts subjects, because then, at the end of batxillerat, it would be a little bit easier to choose a degree. Because someone who was doubting between a science and an arts one, for example, would have tried both type of subjects and maybe he or she would have a clearer mind than if he or she had only chosen scientific Batxillerat, for example.

I'm not actually a 100% sure it will work, because we also have to think about Selectivitat, the subjects that count more and all these things, but I think it would be a way to make the decision easier, at least for the people who have a lot of doubts. 

WHY ARE THE WARS STILL A THING?

The current situation of the Syrian refugees is worldwide known, and it is a shame that it still continues the war in Syria.

There are always wars in the world, and I pretty sure that it will always be like this, but when I think about it I find it quite shocking. Thinking closely about the wars, they're kind of stupid. Maybe one of the countries or sides is proclaimed the winner, but actually all countries lose. They lose money, lives and also a little of humanity. But there are still being wars.

I'm not going to go into the topic of why there are wars, but of why the countries decide to participate in them. The countries fight for their interessts, economic, territorial or of any kind, but I find the fact that they participate on them shocking, taking into account that they have lived other wars, and they know what it is like. Of course, the for people who decides to start or join a war it's practically sure that they're not going to suffer from any damage, or at least not directly. But they should consider the consequences of a war for the population, consequences that they actually know because pretty much all the countries have lived a war before, and then decide if they join the war or not. The people ruling a country probably weren't in charge when the last war that affected the country took place, but they should know what were the consequences anyways. They forget the mistakes of the past, and they make them again.

In the Syria case, there are European countries involved, countries that suffered the devastating consequences of the World War I and II. In this case, their countries are practically not being affected by their own bombing in Syria, but here is where a matter of humanity lies. Those countries went through important wars and they know how hard is it, and it's not only that they are not helping the Syrians, is that they are attacking them. They are causing the death of thousands of innocent people, while the responsabile ones of all this are safe and comfortable in their houses.

And what I find even more outrageous is that when all the peope who are suffering the consequences of the war (remembering that these countries are participating in making the situation like this), try to go into these countries to escape from the situation in there, th states are closing the borders or they are seeing them as a problem. Yes, they're a problem for Europe, because it's a lot of people at once, but we should remember that part of this problem is caused by Europe.

It's a very complicated world and these problems are very difficult to solve, but I think we should start by analyzing the things, because as it happens in this case, we are creating our own problems, and then we don't know how to solve them. And these problems are not only affecting to us, they are also ending with thousands of lifes. 

PHRASAL VERBS

Last summer I went to Ireland with some friends to learn and practise English. There we stayed with a family and we went to classes and also did different activities.
One Saturday, we were supposed to set off at nine in the morning, so we had to be in the school about fifteen minutes before. I had to get to the school by bus along with the friend who was in the same house as me and we had looked up the timetables some days before. The problem was that we hadn't thought it was Saturday and the timetables were different than during the week. And we found that out when it was too late. 

We sorted out the timetable the day before, so we got up thinking we were on time. Our host mother offered us a car ride to the bus stop, but we turned it down because we thought we had time to go walking. W got there and we waited for the bus, but it wasn't coming so we asked the bus timetables to a woman who was there. She told us the time the next bus was coming and we realized we were definitely going to be late. When it arrived we got on the bus, we sat down and we just wished the bus to speed up. Some stops later, my friend Paula and another one of our friends turned up. They were also late! They sat down next to us and we all switched our mobile phones on. We had plenty pf messages from our instructor saying that we were late and asking us where we were. The four of us tried to make up an excuse and we told him that the bus we were supposed to take hadn't shown up. What we didn't know was that the instructor, who normally went to the school by bike, that day had decided to take the same bus we were supposed to take, so he caught us in a lie.

EMPATHY

Some days ago a video starring some supporters of the Dutch team PSV went viral. This video was shot in Madrid, and they were throwing coins to homeless women, laughing at them and treating them like animals and they also forced them to do push-ups in exchange of money. After seeing the video I was outraged. And I was also surprised because it's difficult to believe there is people like this. I can't even imagine how could this idea go through their minds, and much less how could they do it.

In big cities is common to see homeless people in the streets, asking for money for food, and it is heartbreaking. I can understand if someone doesn't feel like giving them money, because they maybe are not in a good economic situation, maybe they think that people is lying and they are going to spend the money in alcohol, or other reasons. But there is a big step from not giving them money to humiliating them. It's disgusting the way they treated them, knowing the women needed the money, so using the situation to spend a good time laughing at them.

I think this world has an important shortage of empathy. The people who did this didn't clearly think about the situation those women are living and probably (or that's what I hope) if they had put themselves in their position they wouldn't have done that. It's normal everyone taking care of themselves, doing what's the best for them, because at the end it's our life and we have to try to be as happy as possible. But it doesn't mean we don't have to help other people, even if we have to sacrificate something we like. And there is a lot of people who don't do this. I don't mean I am always helping people and sacrifing for them, of course, but I think there is a lot of people that only think what's the best for them and they just do it, without thinking if that's going to cause negative consequences to someone.

And in my opinion, the lack of empathy is one of the things that causes more problems in society, and that's why I think it's important to teach little children the importance of it, to try to make the new generations more empathetic.

THE VIDEO:

DOWNLOADING FILMS

Nowadays the cinema prices are quite high and his makes people stop going to the cinema, but it doesn't they stop watching films. They find a way to watch them and the most popular way of doing it is watching the films through the Internet (downloading them or watching them online).

But is this a bad thing? It depends on the point of view you're watching it from. If you watch

it from the film costumers' point of view it is a fantastic thing: you are able to watch the films you want without the need to leave your house and the best, free. But if you watch it from the film producers' point of view this is such a bad thing: they spend millions of dollars in producing the movie and then their work isn't paid enough.

I may be a little incoherent, because I think that, at the end, downloading films or watching them online is not something good, but I have to recognize that I do it.

I think we should pay for the films we watch, but I don't do it because then you feel stupid. If you spend your money on them but then everyone in your surrounding is still able to watch those movies without paying you feel you're being stupid because you are paying for something others are enjoying for free.

I think the solution would be to control the Internet a lot more and to remove the posibility of watching movies for free and make the people pay for them, but with lower prices. If watching a film in the cinema costs you about 7€, watching it at home should cost you a maximum un 2€. This would be fair for the film producers because even though 2€ is not a great gaining of money for them, they would definitely earn a lot more than they are doing now and they would be paid for their work.

This would cause annoyance to a lot of people for sure, including myself, because anyone would like going from being able to watch movies for free to having to pay for it, but I think that it is the best option. We should all walk in the film producers' shoes and think about them not being paid for everyone who enjoys their work, and probably we would all be a little bit more in favour of paying for the films.

UNDERWATER MUSEUM

On the 1st of February, work on the Museo Atlántico (Atlantic Museum) started. The Museo Atlántico is going to be the first completely underwater museum in Europe and its location will be Lanzarote, one of the Canary Islands. The museum will be placed 12 meters underwater and people will be able to visit it doing scuba diving or going underwater with glass bottom boats.

It is going to be made of sculptures by Jason deCaires Taylor, a British artist who says that with these sculptures he wanted to reflect the actual situation of the world, with statues of people taking selfies to represent the importance of the technology nowadays, or with statues that represent the syrian refugees, to picture the actual situation and to tribute all those refugees who couldn't survive and whose bodies lay underwater. In general, Taylor says that the sculptures will attract animal and plant life and this is a way to represent the connexion between humans and nature.

Although there were some polemic about the location of the museum, the authorities of Lanzarote are happy with the project and claim it to be something historic, that will allow the island the ability to show the bottom of the sea to the world from a different view, and that will also make the island be a unique tourist destination. 

PERSONAL OPINION:

I find this project very original and cool, and I think it will be attractive for the tourists to visit an underwater museum. Also, I like the fact that Jason deCaires Taylor has decided to include thinks that are important and that are marking the society nowadays, because I think that in some years time, when the people visit the museum, the sculptures are going to look a little bit neglected because being underwater will have damaged them, and visiting old sculptures that represent the past will be kind of travelling to that time.

NEW WORDS:

· Funds: fons d'inversió

· Council: consell

· Strengthens: enforteix

LINK: http://www.thelocal.es/20160201/canary-islands-embark-on-europes-first-underwater-museum

THE VOID: A VIRTUAL REALITY

A TED (Technology, Entertainment and Design) conference has been recently held in Vancouver, and a project called The Void has been presented in the conference. This project is about virtual reality, and it offers the opportunity to transport yourself into a totally different reality. The creators The Void said that it wasn't only about seeing that different reality, but about being able to feel it. They guarantee that using The Void you can touch and feel the walls and even the heat from a fire.

To present this project, they brought a version of it to the TED conference, which allowed the players to try to solve different puzzles feeling as if they were in an ancient tomb.

A player who had the chance to try this, explains his experience and recognizes that The Void is different from other virtual realities he has tried. It feels different, it really feels like you are actually in another reality, mainly because you can touch and feel the things. Even though, he said that he was all the time aware that it wasn't real.

The creators of The Void said that the project still needs some more work, since during the conference time the sample booth had to be closed several times because of technical problems. And apart from the technical problems, they also say that it needs improving on the creation of new physical experiences, which is a new challenge for them. 

PERSONAL OPINION:

This article surprised me, because I didn't think this was possible. I had seen this in movies or on the TV, but I didn't really think it was possible to enter inside a virtual reality, and even less to be able to feel the walls or the heat from a fire. After reading this, it is still hard for me to believe it, and I think that it's probably not as I am picturing it, not that futuristic.

It is something that I would love to try, because I think it has to be a peculiar experience, different from anything that I have experienced, and it seems promising.

NEW WORDS:

· Mist: boirina

· Haptic: tecnologia del tacte

· Bespoke: fet a mida

LINK: http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-35583355

SPEAKING YOUR LANGUAGE ON THE INTERNET

Some days ago I was surfing on the Internet and, I can't remember if it was on Facebook or on Youtube, but I saw a comment that made me kind of upset. Well, it wasn't just a comment, actually some people were having an argument through the comments.

The first intervention was from a girl, comenting something about the video or the post. You could see that the girl was catalan because of her name and surnames, but she commented in Spanish because it was Spanish content. Then, there was a reply to that comment from a boy, asking the girl if she was catalan. The girl replied and said yes, and they started a conversation through the comments in Catalan.

Then, another guy replied to those comments calling them rude for speaking Catalan in a comment section in which everyone speaks Spanish. After this, some people joined the “conversation”, some of them in favour of that guy and some of them against him. The guy defended himself saying that it was a lack of respect to start speaking Catalan in the middle of a conversation in Spanish,- when actually a conversation in Spanish hadn't even started, because the catalan boy relplied to the first comment in Catalan, and the conversation started in Catalan- but anyways, what upset me the most weren't those things, it was a comment from a girl who joined the conversation which said something like this: “They think they are cool by speaking Catalan on the comments. But one thing is true: you are never going to see any comment in Basque or Galician. I also think this is a lack of respect, but hey, they are Catalan people. Don't ask for more.”

That comment made me angry because, firstly, I have sometimes seen comments in Basque or Galician in Spanish-speaking sites, and it doesn't bother me at all. But apart from that, the worst thing, is the way the girl talked about us, the Catalan people, as people who are rude or impolite by definition. And well, I don't think I need to give reasons against that, because I think it is too obvious that it isn't true. There is people impolite all around the world, even if they speak Catalan, Spanish or Russian. And the same happens with polite people.

All this comments thing made me remember about one time that me and a friend, were called impolite by a random guy, just because we talked with each other in Catalan on a Facebook's comment section.

About this, I think some people are just so grumpy about this kind of things. I mean, you're on the Internet where people from all around the world and who speak a ton of different languages is connected; there something called freedom of expression, which we all have; and the people who are talking in another language are not even talking to you. So just let it go. Let them talk with who they want to talk using the language they want to use.

I could accept if that people felt upset if someone talked to them in a language they don't understand, but if it doesn't concern you, why should you be that grumpy and take some of your time writing a comment to call them rude? As the saying says, “Some men just want to see the world burn”. And actually, in my opinion, the roles are backwards, the rude ones are them by insulting for no reason someone who is just having a conversation using his or her language. 

MUSIC'S IMPACT IN OUR WORLD'S VIEW

Joydeep Bhattacharya and Job Lindsen, two professors from the department of phsychology in the University of London, carried out a series of experiments that relate the music with the way people sees the world.

Specifically, they performed three different experiments:

In the first on, they showed a grey square to a group of twenty adults for one second, and right after they made them listen to a nine to seventeen seconds track. After this, they asked them to evaluate the music on a scale from "very unpleasant" to "very stimulating". Straightawat, thet showed them another grey square (which was actually the same as the first one), and the people who had rated the music as "very stimulating" described the square as if it was brighter than the people who rated it as "very unpleasant". 

The second experiment, performed with a new group of twenty people, was the same but with the difference that they didn't ask the participants to evaluate the music before the second square showing. The results were the same: the participants that had listened to the track the researchers had judged as happy described the square as brighter than the ones who listened to sad music.

The last experiment consisted of twenty adults again, who had to learn a grey scale of colours. After they had learned it, they were played music of different styles and afterwards the researchers showed them a grey square and they judged it to be brighter as it actually was on the original scale.

With these three experiments, the researches got to the conclusion that music changes our way of seeing the world and it makes us see the things in a more positive way, that's why music could be used, and it is actually used in some occasions, as a therapy for those who suffer from different kinds of depression.

PERSONAL OPINION:

I have found these experiments very curious and they are a good way to demonstrate the power of music and the impact it has on our brain. As it has been shown with the experiments, I think music in general helps people being more positive, but if it is happy music this effect increases greatly. And I think that this is awesome, because it's a simple way to cheer yourself up and to get motivated, that's why I think listening to music in the morning is a good way to start the day better, with more energy and positivity.

NEW WORDS:

· Excerpt: fragment

· Bias: preferència

· Attire: vestimenta

LINK: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/science/science-news/12150973/Happy-music-really-can-make-the-world-seem-a-brighter-place-research-suggests.html

DESCRIPTION OF A PERSON

Her name is Paula, she's sixteen years old and she is studying 1st batxillerat. She is one of my closest friends.

Talking about her appearance, she isn't too short or too tall and she has a slim body, with a feminine figure. About her head and face, she's got quite long, straight and brown hair. Her eyes are big and light brown, mixed with green. She's got long eyelashes. Her nose and mouth are average size and her skin is quite tanned.

Focusing on her personality, she is very outgoing and she's not a calm person at all. She loves meeting new people and being active doing different activities and practising sports. She is very friendly and she cares about orther people. Paula is hard working and very good at her studies.

She is one of my best friends because I know I can always rely on her, and even though we have been together since we were three years old and we spend pretty much the whole day together, we don't get tired of each other. 

A LETTER TO SANTA

Dear Santa...

Talking about material things, I don't really know what to ask for and the same thing happen with more "abstract" things.

Of course, I would like the world to be much better: wars ending, all the people having a place to live and enough food. But I think this very difficult and almost impossible.

I don't want to be negative, but it is impossible to live in a perfect world, without problems and in which everyone is happy, although we could try to get the closest we can to this. 

Therefore this is what I'm going to ask for: to get the most perfect version of our world.

As I said before, we're definitely not going to build up a utopian world, but what I am asking for is a world with the less possible problems, in which people are as happy as possible and in which people enjoy little things in life. At the end of the day I consider these are the reasons why we are glad. 

KINDS OF LOVE

Love is one of the most intenses feelings in the world, but not all loves are the same kind. Here there are some of the different types of love:

- PURE LOVE: This is a kind of love which isn't about giving and taking, it's about sharing. The two parts of the relationship love eachother with the same intensity, and they don't expect anything from the other. Is a natural, gracious and freeing love.

- PLATONIC LOVE: This one is the love in a non-sexual way, the love which you feel for the mind and soul of the other, a spiritual love.

- ROMANTIC LOVE: Is the love you feel for a person and that makes you can't stop thinking about her/him. When you feel a romatic love for someone, you feel a physical attraction and you focus a lot of your energy on that person.

- UNREQUITED LOVE: This is a kind of love which is one-sided, what means that involves a person who is crazy in love with another one, but knows that he or she will never love him or her. This love often causes depressions and sadness, because of the unreturned feelings.

- UNRETURNED LOVE: This one is pretty much the same as the Unrequited love, is a feeling which is not returned and only one part of the couple feels it.

- BITTER LOVE: Is a love which gives you a bittersweet feeling: a good feeling and happines, but at the same time it gives you pain.

MY WORLD

I didn’t know what to talk about in this post, so I finally decided to talk about something that I already wanted to share some months ago.

I like to watch videos on Youtube and I follow several youtubers, like Connor Franta. He’s an American guy who about two months ago released a video coming out, saying that he was gay.

In the video he told that for years he had been thinking that maybe he was gay, but he always tried to avoid thinking about that, because he was afraid of being different. After watching the video, I read some of the comments and some of the tweets that other youtubers tweeted him, and everybody was saying that they were so proud of him. That made me think that, although the society has progressed a lot, it still has to progress a lot more.

Years ago, when someone was gay it wasn’t even accepted and the people would have never sent him this kind of messages saying that they are proud of him, and nowadays we have reached a point in which the majority of the people accept when someone is gay, but it’s still not a completely normal thing for the society.

If you like boys or if you like girls it’s part of you, just as if you like arts or if you like sciences. You can’t choose what you like, you just like it and I don’t think we should be ashamed of our tastes. And, although is society’s fault and I put myself into the group of people who does this, I don’t think we should be proud of someone who comes out, because at the end it’s just expressing one of your tastes. When someone says that he/she is heterosexual, nobody says anything, but when someone says that he/she is homosexual is such a big deal, and it shouldn’t be that way, it should be the same for everyone.

In Connor Franta’s case, we shouldn’t be proud of him for being gay or for coming out, we should be proud of him for, after years avoiding a thought which he was afraid of, finally accepting who he is and becoming happy with himself. We should be proud of him for finally being able to sit in front of a camera and tell the world something that, as he says, he had been afraid to tell even to his own reflection in the mirror for years.

That’s why I think the society will have really progressed when we reach a point in which the people don’t need to upload videos saying they are homosexuals and they don’t need to go through all this fears for being different, because everyone should be able to be who they are, without anyone impeding that.

CONNOR'S VIDEO:

LOVE SONG

GRENADE by Bruno Mars

This song is about unreturned love. The man in the song is in love with a woman who doesn't love him. Even though he knows she is only going to cause him problems, that she doesn't love him and she's just playing with his feelings, he can't stop his love for her. He says that he would do anything for her, such as jumping in front of a train or catching a grenade, basically he would give his live for her.

I have chosen this song because it's easy to feel identified with it. I think everyone has liked or fallen in love with someone who doesn't like them back, and in my opinion the song describes the feeling very good (exagerating a little bit, of course), because although you know the best is forget him/her you just can't and you would still do anything for him/her, even knowing that he/she doesn't love you. 

In the song there aren't many slang words or common expressions in the informal language, the only thing I can find is 'Cause to say Because, which is very common in songs and spoken language as well, ya to say you, and finally 'til, meaning until.

MY WORLD

PAPER TOWNS

Hello! In this post I’m going to talk and do a little review of a book that I have recently read. This book is Paper Towns, by John Green.  First, I’m going to tell you a little bit about the plot.

SYNOPSIS

Quentin has been always in love with his neighbour, Margo, the most popular girl in the high school and who always seems to live the craziest adventures. One night, Margo enters in Quentin’s room through the window and asks him to drive her to get to different places to do some mysterious stuff. After spending a night full of adventures together, the next morning Margo disappears and Quentin finds some clues that seem to be left for him by Margo. Following the clues, he will try to find her, while he starts realizing that she is so different from the person he thought she was.

PERSONAL OPINION

I was excited to read this book, not only because of the book itself but also because it’s the first book that I have read in English. Of course, I have read some English books at school, but I had never read a book in English by my own.  I was excited about it but I was also a little scared, because I didn’t know if it was going to be a too difficult book to start reading in English and if I would understand well enough the book. But now that I have read it I’m happy because I understood pretty much everything and it was a good experience that I will repeat for sure.  

When I read the plot I immediately liked it, because I love the stories about mysteries and people missing, and even more if there are clues and enigmas that lead to them. 

Actually, I imagined the book a little bit different than it was, maybe with more mystery, but after reading it I realize that even though the main issue about the book is Margo’s disappearance, the author also wanted to add parts in which the friends and friendship are important, and some of this parts have become some of my favourite parts of the book, because of the touch of humour that John Green gives to them.

As the book it’s not very long (305 pages), the author doesn’t really go into detail about the characters, and in my case, I didn’t really get the chance to grow fond of any of them.

The main character is Quentin, an ordinary boy who seems to be lucky about being part of Margo crazy plans. He’s a good main character, but I think that he sometimes gets too obsessed about finding Margo, which makes him kind of forget about his life and his friends. That makes Ben, one of his best friends, get tired of him talking the whole day about Margo.

If I had to choose a favourite character I would probably choose Radar, the other Quentin’s best friend, because I liked his personality and I think he’s really good friend, who tries to help Quentin to find Margo, but also knows that Margo is not the whole world, and that she’s maybe  just playing one of her games.

The book is divided in three parts: the first one is the night that Margo and Quentin spend together; the second one, which is the longest, is the whole part about Quentin finding the clues and trying to find the sense of this clues and to find Margo; and the last one is when Quentin finally realizes what the clues mean and, along with some friends, they start a trip against the clock to find her.

Although the second part is the one with more mystery, because of the clues, is my least favourite, because it’s the longest and in some parts is a bit repetitive. And, even though I really like the first and the last part, if I have to choose I would choose the last one, because it’s the funniest and the one in which you connect the most with the characters.

So, my conclusion is that if you want to read an entertaining story that will make you laugh and have a good time, Paper Towns is a good choice.  

LOVE MOVIE

LOVE ACTUALLY 

Love actually is a romantic comedy that was relased on 2003 and was directed by Richard Curtis. 
This movie contains several little love stories happening on Christmas and involving different characters, which at the and are all kind of connected.

As there are different stories, not all the stories have the same kind of love.

Those are the different stories:

The wedding story

The main characters  are Juliet, Mark and Peter. Juliet and Peter get married but after that, Mark, Peter's best friend who's also in love with Juliet, tells her that he loves her. It's an unrequited love, because Juliet is already married to Peter, his friend.

The medium-aged couple story

Harry and Karen are a happy married couple with two kids, but one day, Karen discovers that Harry cheated on her with a girl who works with him. After she discovers it, Harry realizes the big mistake he has made, and they finally stay together. The love in this story is the one named Pragma, love which endures. This love is common in married couples, love which endures in sickness and in health. Karen decides to forgive Harry because she loves him, and she doesn't want to ruin all the years of marriage. 

The new father and the first love story

Daniel loses his wife, Joanna, because of an illness and he has to take care of Sam, Joanna's son. During the movie, their relationship gets everytime better and they get more confident with each other, growing a paterno-filial love relationship. Besides, Sam starts liking a girl in his class, which is a first love or childhood love.

The inter-status relationship story

The love story between David, the recently new Prime Minister and Natalie, his assistant. As they work together and he's the Prime Minister and she's just a simple assistant, their love is an imposible love.

The international story

Jaime, a writer, decides to spend some time in France, to disconnect of everything, because his wife has cheated on him. There, he meets Aurélia, the Portuguese housekeeper of the house he's staying in, and although they speak different languages and can't understand each other, they fall in love. This is romantic love or also known as Eros love, which starts first with attraction, as the characters don't understand each other, and then in can turn to other kinds of love based in more things than just attraction, as it happens in the movie. 

The American adventure story

Colin, after not having any success in relationships, decides to go to America and try to find love there. Although his friend Tony says to him that it's not a good idea, he travels to America anyways and there he meets Harriet. Their love is mostly passional or Ludus love, based on the attraction and on wanting to have fun. 

The fraternal love story

The story of Sarah, a girl who has been in love for years with Karl, a man who works with her. She finally gets a date with him, but they are interrupted all the time by Sarah's brother phone calls. Michael, the brother, suffers a mental illness and Sarah, even though Karl asks her to not pick up the phone, answers everytime, because she worries about him. At the begining, there is platonic love, because she has been in love with Karl for years, but then it turns to be a fraternal love story, because Sarah wants to make sure that her brother is fine, even though it makes Karl angry and decides to end with the date. 

The rocker story

This one is about Billy Mack, a rockstar, and his manager and friend Joe. The love in this story is friends love, because we can see how Billy, on Christmas Day, instead of going to a party with famous people, stays with Joe, who's kind of depressed and supports him.

                                           The love and sex story

John and Judy meet in the shooting of a sex scene for a movie, in which they work as extras. In front of the camera, they are both comfortable and outgoing, because it's their job, but when the camera is off they are very shy. Their love story has Storage love, because they get to know each other and they end up dating because they share likes and dislikes, and their personalities seem to fit.