FAMOUS PHOTOGRAPHER

MY WORLD

EUROVISION 2015

Last night the 60th edition of the Eurovision festival, with the motto Building Bridges was held in Vienna, Austria. The festival started with several performances, one of them by Conchita Wurst, last year's winner. Then the important performances, the ones who aimed for the prize, started.

The night drew on with the performances of 25 European countries, an Asian one (Israel, like every year), and for the first time ever with Australia, as a special guest. Before the festival, the favourites this year were Sweden, Italy, Estonia, Australia and Russia. 

On the other hand, Spain that brought Edurne with the song Amanecer to the festival was expected to be in the top 10, or at least close to it. 

During the festival, Belgium became one of the favourites while Russia, mainly for political reasons, recieved several catcalls.

After all the artists had sung and all the performances had been reviewed twice, the voting started. Forty countries voted, and they gave 1 to 7 points to seven different countries and then they gave 8 points to one country, 10 to another and finally 12 to the one they considered the best performance.

In my opinion, it was like all the years. Every year there are two or three favourites, which recieve points from almost all the countries, but then the countries always vote for the countries next to them. So the votes always happen to be given for political or geographic reasons. 

The winner, with 365 points, was finally Sweden, just like three years ago, with the song Heroes by Mans Zelmerlöw. Russia with the song A Million Voices by Polina Gagarina finished in the second place, and after it there was Italy, with Grande amore by Il volo. 

The other ones who were favourites before the festival ended up all in the top 10: Australia in the 5th place, with Tonight Again by Guy Sebastian and Estonia, with the song Goodbye to Yesterday by Elina Born and Stig Rästa ended up in the 7th place. 

The ones that complete the top 10 were Belgium (4th place), Latvia (6th place), Norway, Israel and Serbia (8th, 9th and 10th place).

The four last ones were Austria, the host, and Germany, with 0 points; France with 4 points, doubling their last year results; and the United Kingdom, with 5 points. 

Spain ended up worst than expected, it entered in the top ten, but starting from the bottom. Edurne ended up in the 21st position, just the same position she performed. She didn't perform perfectly, without a mistake, but in my opinion she deserved better results, as the song was fine and she also danced. 

I liked some of the songs which ended up in the top 10, just like Australia or Belgium, and I liked the winner song, Heroes, although before the festival, several people said it was too similar to the song Lovers on the sun, by David Guetta. And it isn't the only thing for which they were accused of plagiarism. A lot of people said that the lights show of the background was copied from a lights show called The Alchemy of Light. 

And well, these are the main things about the Eurovision festival of 2015. Next year it will be held in Sweden and let's see who represents Spain and how he or she does it.

THE WINNER SONG:

MY WORLD

DIGITAL BOOKS vs PAPER BOOKS
Nowadays, the number of people who read books in a digital way has increased a lot. I think that the main reasons of that are: the paper books are expensive and is easy for the people to get cheaper or even free books using digital devices.

I think most of the people prefer the paper books, but there is a lot of people that read more digital books to save money.

In my case I have only read an entire book in a digital way once, and I have to say that I prefer a hundred times paper books.

Here are some of the pros and cons of both of them:

ADVANTADGES OF PAPER BOOKS:

- You actually feel it like a book: you can turn the pages, feel the texture...

- It's a good thing to disconnect from all the digital screens, that can hurt your sight.

- You own the actual book, not only a digital version of it, so this means that you can place it on a shelf, lend it to someone, give it to someone...  whatever you want. 

- You can read whenever you want because you don't have to worry about the battery.

DISADVANTADGES OF PAPER BOOKS:

- Nowadays paper books are quite expensive.

- They are heavier and take up more space than ebooks.

- Sometimes you have to wait a lot for a book being translated and published into your language. 

- Paper books can be sold out and that is something that won't happen with digital books. 

ADVANTADGES OF EBOOKS:

- You can have a lot of books in just one digital device and you can carry the ebook wherever you want and it doesn't weight too much, considering the amount of books that you can have there. 

- Although you first have to buy the ebook, once you have it, the books in digital version are cheaper than in paper. 

- When a book is published you can have a translated version of it faster than if you want a paper book.

- There are dictionaries incorporated in the ebook, so you can search for a word instantly.

DISADVANTADGES OF EBOOKS:

- They have a battery, so you have to worry if the battery is full charged or not. If it isn't, the ebook can just ''die'' while you are reading, so you'll have to stop. 

- Not all the books have a digital version. 

- It's not good for your sight to be a lot of time in front of a screen, but if really like to read and you like to spend a lot of time reading, with digital books you don't have any other option than being in front of a screen. 

- They aren't like paper books: you can't turn the pages, they don't have any smell, the author can't sign you the digital book, etc.

DESCRIBING A PHOTO

This photo was taken by Ernie Vater in the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore, in Wisconsin and it was published by the National Geographic.

In the photo you can see a completely frozen landscape and if you look close in the upper part, on the left, you can see some rocks, which makes me suppose that on the left there is a kind of cave which is frozen. 

In the foreground you can see a small pile of snow, that is surrounded by a ground made of ice, and this is in the lower part of the photo. Behind it, on the right, there is another pile of snow, this one bigger than the first one. On the left there's ice hanging from the ceiling of the cave, and this covers the whole cave. There is a hole which lets us see part of the sky and, especially the sun. The sun is shining so bright, and the rays of sun are shining through this hole. 

The cave covers the left part of the background, but on the upper part of the photo, on the right side, you can see it. In the background you can see a large portion of land covered by snow and a man walking on this snow. You can also see the sky, which is very clear and mostly blue, although in the lower part of it there's some kind of pale orange. 

I have chosen this photo mainly because of the colours. This is a white landscape, because of all the snow and ice, but the rays of sun shining make the white colour of the snow turn into other colours, just as yellow in the right part of the cave, or red in the left part of it. 

In the background, the snow is blue, because of the reflection of the sky. 

This photo makes me feel calm, because there's not a lot of movement, only the man in the background. And actually, the photographer said: ''Part of the beauty of this place is the silence of it.'', so I guess in this place you could only hear the sound of nature.

Also, what I like and I think it's curious about this photo is that, although it is a winter landscape in which everything is covered by snow, it doesn't make you feel the cold feeling that it should give you, because the sun and its rays make you feel warm. 

LOVE STORY

BLOOPERS:

TOURISTS INTERVIEWS

Last Thursday we spent the day in Barcelona, in a trip organitzated by the English, Spanish and French department. The task we had to do for English was to interview tourists that we found in the street. 
Here there are two interviews that me and my friends did:

INTERVIEW 1: to two girls

MAR:  Where are you from?
GIRLS: Belgium
MAR:  Ok, is the first time that you are here in Spain?
GIRLS: Yes, yes. Well, me the second time. 
MAR: And how did you come here, by plane, ship...?
GIRLS: Plane, plane. 
MAR: How long are you going to stay here?
GIRLS: We leave tomorrow. We stayed three days here.
MAR: Are you travelling with family or friends?
GIRLS: Friends, yeah. 
MAR:  What have you visited up to now?
GIRLS: The Parc Güell and... the Stadium
MAR:  Yes, Camp Nou
GIRLS: Yeah, yeah
PAULA V.: What do you liked the most in Barcelona?
GIRLS: Shopping
PAULA V.: Is there anything that you didn't like?
GIRLS: Emm... the people in the shops are not that friendly
PAULA V.: Do you know any words in Catalan or Spanish?
GIRLS: Yeah, ''hola'', and ''buenos días'' and '' buenas noches''
PAULA V.: And, do you think Barcelona is expensive?
GIRLS: No, not much.
PAULA V.: Okay, thank you!

INTERVIEW 2: to a girl

PAULA C.:  Could we ask you some questions, please?
GIRL: Yes, tell me. 
NEREA:  Where are you from?
GIRL: I'm from Peru. 
NEREA: Is it the first time that you are in Spain?
GIRL: No, I've been... I grew up here but I was born in Peru.
NEREA: How did you come here? By plane, ship or train?
GIRL: Oh, plane.
NEREA: Why are you in Barcelona?
GIRL: For my parents.
NEREA:  How long are you going to stay here?
GIRL: I lived here for all my life, so.. I'm not.. I don't want to come back to Peru, so I will be here for a long time. 
PAULA C.:  Are you travelling with family or friends?
GIRL: For family, for family.
PAULA C.: What have you visited up to now?
GIRL: Sorry?
PAULA C.: What have you visited up to now?
GIRL: Emm... no.. I'm not..
PAULA C.: Yes, yeah, okay.. so... what do you like the most in Barcelona?
GIRLS: Emm.. the most.. I think it's the party but.. haha but motions.
PAULA C.: Is there anything you don't like?
GIRL: The weather, all the time changes. I think is in all countries.
PAULA C.: Yeah.. Well, thank you!


We did another interview to a group of guys, but unfortunately the podcast wasn't recorded properly, so we don't have the interview here. 

ITALY 2015

Two weeks ago we went on a trip to Italy. We were all really excited about this trip and the truth is that it was fantastic and we spent a great time there. 

Today's task is about choosing the best photo and the best moment of the trip, but in both cases I can't choose only one, because there are too many good photos and moments! Also, a lot of the photos I have may not be the best photos in an artistic view but I like them because for me they are connected to good moments that we spent there. So I'm not going to choose one photo and one moment, I'm going to choose several photos that make me think about good moments there. 

These two photos were taken on the top of the dome, in Florence. 

To get to the top we had to climb so many stairs, and we also had to stop in some moments to wait for the people to go down.  

But when we got to the top, we could see the whole city of Florence and the views were incredible, so it was definitely worth it. 

In Florence, one of the best moments was when we visited the Ponte Vecchio, in the free time we had in the city. We stopped beside the river, we sat on the railing and we spent a lot of time there taking photos and talking. While we were sitting there, it started to get dark, so everytime the sun was a little bit lower, the river and it's views changed because of the light and the colors of the sky that were reflected on the water. We stayed there until it was dark and the lights in the street had already turned on. 

The last photos were taken on the boat, on our way back home. We spent the last night there, and as we could do whatever we wanted the whole night, when the party finished, some of us decided to stay awake to watch the sunrise. Although we were tired, and actually the sunrise at the end wasn't as good as, at least me, thought it was going to be, it loved that moment, when we where on the deck of the boat, at night, just waiting for the sun to rise.