Little girl in the storm

This time, being the last English class and considering that there are a few weeks missing to finish the year, I would like to make an account of some of many events that have happened so far. I’m going to center on the academic aspect of the two semesters. First, I have to talk about the level of academic demand that our program imposed us in many aspects, for example, in the classes, the quantity and kind of subjects we went through in each period. Then, I will make a self-evaluation of my student performance, and at last, but not at least, I would like to talk about some unexpected situations, academic and personal, that were remarkable for me.

To start, concerning to the level of academic demand of this year, I could mention that it was really different form previous years maybe because it was not as difficult as I had thought it would be, which does not mean that it was easy at all. Comparing both semesters, the second one was more relaxed than the previous one. Anyway, there were a few extra requirements that made me go through so much stress maybe because it is my last year and we all want to success in all classes, or because of some assignments like finding a subject for our investigation workshop, etc. Besides, this year we had a change in our program that put a lot of pressure and extra working time because I had to pass eight classes each semester!!! It was really hard and I had (and still have) classes every single day from early in the morning until late in the afternoon. It was exhausting and in some occasions I did not had enough time and energy to carry out other university obligations. Concerning to my self-evaluation, I can proudly say that I did great... I have very good grades; in addition, I did better this year than the previous one, although I was not an example of constancy.

At last, to finish with this analysis of the year, I previously mentioned an area of unexpected situations that in one way or another affected my performance. As I said before this year was full of high demands that at some point affect you physically or emotionally and that finally affects our personal life. To explain this I have to say that this year my younger brother came to live with me because he is in college also, and sometimes he had to pay the consequences of my mood changes... nothing really serious. We went through many discussions because of unimportant situations combined with the fact that I had to play the role of bigger sister again, but in the end, he was the biggest support and company I had when I was in a bad day. Therefore, I can finish this post saying... yes, it was a good year.

Hello everybody!

Today, I’m writing about the situation of my faculty, specifically about the benefits that it offers us. First, I have to say that the situation is not really bad if we consider that ideally we all would expect a bit more. It has all the necessary elements to operate and, at the same time, it brings us the spaces we need for daily coexisting according to our needs. So, there are important aspects that have to be improved because they are a need for all students. For example, I consider necessary to improve the library especially for us, Social Scientists that need a very important amount of books either to read or to do our researches. Other problem is the lack of space, because as you know, everyone goes there to work and study, and sometimes the space is not big enough for all of us. At the same time, this space problem leads to another one, which is the lack of specific areas to study quietly.  Another aspect that can be improved is the computer room, I know that it was improved some time ago, but it's not enough for the enormous amount of students of the faculty. The rooms are always full of people and if we need to use a computer or just print in there, it's an impossible task. But not everything is that bad in the computer rooms, at least we have air conditioning that helps us to bear the summer time classes.

I consider that those are the main problems of our faculty, and in order to find solutions it's necessary first to create a priority list, so there would be a sort of guide to solve the more urgent problems. This could lead us to have a better standard of education; in addition, there are some problems that have to do with our daily student routine that can be solved easily like the disabled people accesses that ends to be a big limitation for those people that want to study here.

Today`s subject is music. First, I really love to listen music, that’s why I don’t have a specific favorite music style; I like different styles like rock, pop rock, pop, rap and danceable music. I also have many favourites singers and bands. I like Forty Foot Echo, De Saloon, Los Tres, Olivia Ruiz and Nach Scratch. I like some of them by their lyrics or by the sound and rhythm of their music. I’ve downloaded their albums and I have burned some discs. I also have stored them in my MP4, which is the most useful device I’ve, because I can listen my favourites songs anywhere I go like when I walk around or when I’m in the bus. Sometimes, I need to hear some music, especially when I’m a bit bored or when I feel a bit sad; in addition, everytime I listen a special song I feel that I’m in a different moment... it’s like if the music take us to special or memorable occasions that we want to remind forever. Sometimes, when I’m at home doing the chores or feeling a bit sad, I play danceable music in my laptop to cheer up myself. Music helps to make those boring activities to be more entertaining. I like to sing also, I don’t think that I‘m bad at... but I’m not a great singer. I sing when I’m alone in my bedroom, and even when my family is there... I don’t feel embarrased if they say that I am not really good at singing. Lately, I'm getting more comfortable when singing in public especially because my friends and I have visited a karaoke pub... it was a great experience, I remember we sang all night and enjoyed a lot the whole experience. Finally, I’ve to say that music is a very important aspect of my life because it truly expresses my moods and it can be helpful to change a boring or sad day into a total funny journey... in general, music is as much important as love in daily life, it turns to be a universal language of communication.

Hello everybody... today`s subject is cinema and films. Concerning to this theme, I have to say that I love going to the cinema; even though, I don’t go there very often because the tickets are really expensive. But remembering the last time I saw a film at the cinema, it was two months ago. Years ago, my cousins and I used to have movie days/nights. I remember we always rented some movies and then we watched them in any of our houses eating a lot of things, most of the time we prepared pizzas. But we all grew up and that sort of “tradition” we had became less frequent because each one of us had many other things to do. Nowadays, I do not rent or buy movies; in fact, I am use to lend them and sometimes I download them from the net.

There are many films that I like, but if I had to mention only one of them I would choose “A+Pollux” (2002), which is my favourite one. It’s a French romantic comedy, its director is Luc Pagès and the actors are Gad Elmaleh and Cècile De France. The story is about a man called Halvard Sanz, who is very immerse in the existencialistic principle that says "you always cross important people twice in your life”. This concept is part of the functioning rules of the world along to the law of the constant speed of light. Thus, Halvard believes that he is able to find Pollux again. Pollux is the love of his life but he could not tell her that. He realizes of this when she desappears without any clue and he feels really sad. Believe it or not, he had met her 15 minutes ago and he was suffering really bad.
Actually, I saw this film only once because I could not find a copy to rent it again; even though, it became my favourite film ever. I totally recommend this film because is a very loveable story that follows the French film tradition of having an open ending...

Hello everyone…this week I'm gonna talk about my favourite tv serial. Currently I'm not watching any specific tv serial in terms of being every week waiting for the upcoming episode because I'm not a tv fan. But when I have some free time, I watch them. I have watched many serials, most of them “gringas”, but lately I have been watching two spanish serials about different subjects and one of them became my fovaourite one. It's name is “Aquí no hay quien viva” and it is pure comedy. The story is about a small city building located in Madrid where live different people. Every episode has to do with some living problem within the neighbours of these six flats. First, there are two retired sisters and in front of them lives a gay couple. Then, there is a marriage with their two kids who by the way never listen to their parents; in front of them lives a retired old lady with her 40 years old son and her grand son. In the next floor there is a young couple that have recently moved to the building; in fact, the comedy starts by their arrival because they realise about the messy chaos among the neighbours, in front of this couple there are two young girlfriends that have not found a job. Nowadays, this serial has already finished but is still on screen every weekend at midday. I think that I would not get bored or tired of watching this show because is really funny and sometimes deals or shows any other liberal subject that in our country would never be considered to be shown on tv. Besides, I feel that the Spanish sense of humour is much similar to our reality than the American serials.

First, if we think about the differences between this new system and the older one it’s obvious that there have been some changes, very important changes actually. Some of the positive characteristics are:
• A very well organized order of time and bus stops (honestly it used to be a mess).
• Then, it provided access for all those people who could not use the older public system, specifically disabled people.

Second, comparing both systems again, my opinion have not changed that much. On one side, I travelled in the older system just for one year and I never had so many problems to move from one place to another because there were a lot of buses that i could use to move from my house to the University. But with Transantiago I had a lot of problems at the beginning because I didn’t have a specific bus that I could take to go straight to the University. Sometimes I had to wait almost 30 minutes in the bus stop!!! But now things have changed and everything has improved; in addition, I can take a bus that goes straight to the University and I do not waste my time in the bus stop, totally an advantage.

I think that most of use would like to find one day a job related to one of the areas of our study career. This is related to the fact of deciding what you wanna do for the rest of your life, I meen choosing the career that totally represents our desires for our future; at the same time, it's clear that we will have to consider "money" fact when we make this decision. In Anthropology, I see a dream job considering that you can travels abroad meeting differents cultures, ideals, experiences, etc., and at the same time, trying to introduce ourselves within these cultures in order become a new member of that native place. However, I would say that ideal is a kind of a utopian drem considering that finally it may become an eternal exotic journey. I think that everyone can dream of trabeling abroad; nevertheless, I feel that a job concerning to our career has to go beyond a trip around the world; I consider that we must make a contribution to society whether if we do it in our native country or in any other one. I believe that we have to help humankind to develop a bigger understanding of reality and, at the same time, contribute to decrease social inequalities. Maybe, I would not have the resources to find a solution o that problem, but at least I think I have a useful tool for that purpose, which is to value other's people perspectives. I mean to put myself in someone else's shoes in order to see life from their points of view creating a commitment with them. I must recognize that many occasions I have felt shocked by other people's pain, but it's not enough to stay immobile to that pain; in fact, it's necessary to make something to change that. However, in this last point remains the difficulty of this job, there are not too many people willing to recognize and get someone else's problems as owns, but if we do no do it, could we say that we have done any contribution to social sciences?