Final Reflection

I have a mix of feeling in this moment, I am happy because the semester is over and I finally get to have vacations, but I’m also sad because this course is over.

I really appreciate this class; I learned too many things from it, even though it was not a normal English class, which focuses mainly on reading, grammar and listening skills.  

Through the course I noticed my English has improved, I think it was a good choice to take it because it had been a long time I was not able to practice it as I was studying French. All the activities we maid in class maid us use all our skills and improve ourselves.

The course taught me to be confident and to be determined, sometimes I thought it was almost impossible to do some task, like editing videos, but I had to make all my effort and do it, it showed me that if we work hard for something we can do almost anything.  It also helped me to change my mind on some topics like for example tattoo I used hate them but know I am more tolerant towards them.  One of my favorite activities was the pictures we have to show to other representing a feeling I think everyone got to show to the class a private part of their selves, and express what they feel.

The most challenging thing for me in this course was have to go up front and speaking in front of everyone, but I think it was a good thing I had to do that even if a did not like it, because the only way to defeat that fear is to fight it through practice.

Finally, I really want to thank Jill and Niahm for all the great things they taught us, for all the time and love they gave to the entire course, they are the kind of people who earns a place in everybody’s heart.

HAPPINESS

“People are just as happy as they make up their minds to be.” 
― Abraham Lincoln

 this picture was taken on a friends birthday, we went to eat to wingz and while we were waiting we started playing pictionary, i was really sick and i felt very bad but as soon as they started playing i could not stop laughing and i totally forgot i was sick. it was really fun even the people who were sitting on the table next to ours were laughing of all the silly things we said.

 i think sweets means happiness for many people, most of the enjoy eating candies or desserts. in my case i don't like candies but you can not imagine how much i love strawberry cheesecake, it is my favorite dessert, for my birthday i usually ask for cheesecake and when i taste it i feel the most happy.

this holidays i gave my little cousin a new pet, it was almost 3 months when i gave it to her. she had been asking her mom for a dog for a long time, so when she saw the dog she could not believe it, she was really happy. she loves that dog he is like her brother, they play all the time.

this picture represents the importance of family for me, my dad since i was little has had to travel frequently, this picture i took when my dad came back of a one month travel, i was really happy to see him again, i love him so much, i think he is the best dad!

and last but not least is this picture of my tv, i took it last sunday. i was really happy because i could spend a whole sunday doing nothing but resting and watching movies after a few months having to study all day. i felt so happy knowing i had nothing to do that day but to rest

the wonderland of tattoo

by Beatriz Quintero, Andrea Lozano and Laura Gonzalez

MIDDTERM

This course has improved my English skill in the sense that I get to practice what I have learned, and also, through all the activities made in class, I have been able to improve my vocabulary, writing and oral skills.

In relation to my development as a person I think it has helped a lot, activities like the one we made the first week of class in which we talked about ourselves allowed me to know myself better. The course has made me overcome some activities I do not like to do like drawing, but I have become a fun thing to do, I started enjoying doing it in class.

What I most like about the course is that is not a typical English class; we get to practice our English through different educational activities. I also like that I have learned about topics we usually do not get the opportunity to learn about in regular classes, before I did not know anything about graffiti and my knowledge about music was almost nothing. The course has even let me see things in a different way for example in relation to graffiti, I used to think that graffiti was vandalism but after learning about it, I consider it now as art.

What I have found the most challenging is meeting all the deadlines of the work we have to do, sometimes we have to many tasks for the course and for other courses so it makes it difficult to meet always all the deadlines. I have also found challenging some tasks we are meant to do, like the video, it was really hard to edit it, or the photo of the graffiti with us in it, this was not difficult but it took time to find the graffiti and go to the place to take the picture. Even though the course has been challenging and there is lots of works I have learn to organize my time in order to fulfill all the requirements of the course.

“ Real Graffiti is Illegal”

 Graffiti is the art of drawing or writing over a wall or public space, the original idea of graffiti is to bomb the system, artist do graffiti in a form of protest against what is going on in society. However, I think that even though it becomes illegal or showcased on an art gallery, does not mean it will not be graffiti anymore. In my opinion graffiti refers more to the style of painting, than to the fact that its objective is to question the system. People draw graffiti everywhere, in walls, subways, buildings, etc. so why it would not be graffiti painting over a canvas, if the idea of graffiti is painting everywhere possible, and besides if the graffiti is being shown on a gallery is because it is consider art, and art gives people the possibility to express all sorts of ideas even if they are against the system.

Graffiti, which is drawn in authorized zones, is not illegal; this does not mean it is not graffiti anymore. Society has misjudged graffiti, this is a form of art, but it may bother some people because it uses public spaces, maybe if it was drawn in special places, destined only for this, people would admire this kind of art and would stop judging it.

Graffiti Description

I took a picture of a graffiti located in street 91 with Carrera 16^th; it is a very big graffiti. It starts on the door of a shop and it goes all the way over the wall of the shop and ends right were the shop ends. The graffiti is a huge face with a small arm pointing towards a sentence the artist wrote, which says: “we are painted on the wall”.

On the face, there are two white eyes with black pupils, the eyebrows are also black and thick, the nose starts from the middle of the eye and as it hoes down to the tip of the nose it gets bigger, under the nose there is an enormous mouth, with red lips, showing teeth that are white but very disorganized. The mouth is open as if it was shouting and you can see the back of the mouth painted in red and black. To the right you can see the arm, compared to the face it is much smaller, the arm starts right next to the mouth and ends next to the sentence. The sentence is painted in black letters, it is written in capital letters which you can read clearly, the back of the letters is yellow which highlights the text.

In relation to the theme I think it is a social protest. They are expressing that they are not being heard or seen; someone else is ignoring them. The face is showing anger and the bigger part of it is the mouth, which is the part of your body that best lets express yourself and by which you can make someone listen to you. This graffiti might be trying to show their support for graffiti, and to the liberty of using walls or public spaces to express themselves.

When you see the graffiti you get the feeling of being angry, being against something, you feel the need to protest and support what the graffiti is fighting for. 

Remembering english skill classes!!

last week i was walking through the "zona T" and i saw a lot of people so i went to see what was going on, when i got closer i saw a wall that said: BEFORE I DIE...
i immediately remeberd our class activity i wanted to write on it but i got bored of waiting my turn so i left.

4th WEEK CHALLENGE UPDATE ;)

This is my fourth week of my challenge, it has been really hard, when i chose this challenge i thought it was going to be easier but it was not, i forgot all week to take a picture every day, the week i did better was one in which i forgot only to take 1 picture but it was impossible to remember, during the time of my challenge, to take every day a picture specially on those days in which i was busy. here are the most significant pictures of this week i hope you like them!  

This is chess he is my moms’ dog, he is very spoiled he is the King of the house and he knows it, whenever he does something wrong no one will punish him so he doesn’t care being bad behaved and when you tell him that what he did is wrong he will bark at you and get angry. This picture was take at a mall he was happy ridding in the shopping car and everyone who saw him would come close and pet him.

This weekend my sisters friend came from Barranquilla to visit her, on Sunday we went to Alpina’s cabin, traffic was terrible I thought we weren’t going to arrive, but it was worth it the cabin is really nice and he had really good deserts the only thing is that was really cold weather wasn’t nice.

This picture was on Saturday, we went to Andres carne de res with a few friends, party was great, we went there because we invited some friends who were visiting Colombia they live in the united states so that day I got to practice my English because they didn’t speak any Spanish.

This picture was on Wednesday when we were living the university, I was with two of my best friends we were on our way to one of their house to study and I told them to take a picture for my challenge and they started taking lots of pictures we took almost 20 pictures of us in the car.

This picture was on Friday, my mom asked me to take my little cousins to “Mundo Aventura”. It was the first time I went there by my self I got lost for almost 2 hours. When I finally arrived we had a great afternoon my cousins were really happy. I thought it was going to be difficult to take care of them but they were really well behaved.

"COLOMBIANADAS"

On February 25^th I was reading a magazine and I found an article, which I think, describes us Colombians very well. The article is called “manual to distinguish a Colombian abroad” written by Maria Jimena Duzan (revista semana online).

The author begins by saying that Colombians are the only ones that, when they want to buy something, say “Me Regala” which means to get the product for free. According to Maria Jimena Duzan, if you go to Spain for example and ask the waiter: “Me Regala…” he will probably answer that you have to pay for it.

Another fact is that Colombians usually clap when the plane lands; this is the best way, according to the author, to know if there are any Colombians on the plane. This might be because Colombians love to clap; they do it even when it is not necessary.

I know many of you who have family or friends abroad have suffered from the famous “Encargo”. Colombians do not have any problem to ask you to take them whatever whim they have, and they are usually things which are difficult to carry like Obleas with Arequipe, Bocadillo, Coffee Delight or sometimes even bigger things like decorative items for their house.

Finally, something I think should not be this way, is that when Colombians travel abroad they do everything they do not do inside Colombia, they do not throw trash in the streets, they respect the lights, in general they are well behaved and obey the other country’s; laws and traditions. So I do not understand why it is possible to do all of this outside Colombia instead of doing it within Colombia and taking care of our country.

You have probably noticed how Colombians tend to name everything in English, that is why you can find someone called Usnavy or Onedollar and restaurants with a terrible misspelled English name. This may be because many Colombians wish to be North Americans or from any other place but Colombia; basically in Colombia there is a lack of patriotism.

To conclude, we Colombians are full of weird and funny features; if you stop and take time to think about it, you will notice how special we are.