Tenth Task

Many stories and just one pen

Last week we were working on some stories of our authorship. The idea was to turn some words’ meaning into another (E.g. tomorrow replaces fireworks; knight replaces sun, etc.) then we had to take five of those, at least, for our story. Finally, we shared every single tale or anecdote.

These were the words and their replacement.

Toothbrush = knife; pencil = coffeemaker; Husband/Wife = box; window = umbrella; going on vacations = scratching the nose; take the Metro = diving; a kiss = monster; telephone = night; smiling = house; looking = zoo; thunder = Ravioli Plate; tongue = shaking.

The ones I picked up were:

Husband/Wife = box; window = umbrella; pencil = coffeemaker; tongue = shaking; looking = zoo; telephone = night.

So, the following text was my product and I hope you enjoy it as I did:

Echoes from a sudden death

-         “Oh my Lord, I’m heartily sorry for having offended thee!” - She said after falling in tears.

After all, it was not her fault. She had just seen how her box had jumped through the umbrella and, without zoo at his back, from the eleventh flour of the building. He just had proceed and there was nothing in this world she could not do for him…He simply passed away.

Some years ago, she met and dated him - her future fiancé, and then, box; she acquainted him by her beloved best friend, Amelie.

-         “Antonio was everything from me!” – She cried out.

Although the current situation was not running good at all, she was still in love with him – she even took the coffeemaker and wrote down an apologizing deep letter for him.

-         “Oh my Lord. Oh my lord. How he dared; how he proceeded!” -, She kept calling out.

Thereupon, she felt something had bitten her shaking and then carried on toward her doomed soul. Ex post facto, she couldn’t keep standing up and felt down such a faint. Next, the telephone covered the whole room in shadows and, afterward, she could not see how the gloom filled her corpse and letting her aside in the Oblivion.

The End

After reading this tale, let’s take advantage of this activity to create anything, as you want, with these words:

Lord = knight; marvelous = whatsoever; dear = rotten; afraid of = lovely; importance = relentless.

Keep rolling!

 

 

Ninth Task

 Interesting stories only can be told throughout nonsense thoughts

“The art of writing is the art of  discovering what you believe." Gustave Flaubert

This week we got the chance of creating stories by passing our notebooks around. Howbeit nothing at the end had not sense, we ended up laughing at loud because of that “exquisite corpses”.

In order to improve our writing skill, Professor Jean Paul wanted us to create, at first, a single question using two “at-board-written-adjectives” and two nouns as well. Then we had to spin our notebooks around to let everybody write down a “viable” answer on it; each one with cohesion and coherence. Finally, we received our notebook with many thoughts, incomplete ideas, nonsense outlooks that replied everyone's question; nevertheless, we fixed, after all, those fragments to create a well-structured text and next share it by a poster (this last part was done in groups).

So, this is my product and I hope you like it:                                   

Where the dreadful snake is going to be whether the dog's tree is by the way or the hammer gets away?

Maybe it passed by the dog's tree... but, wait, hold on a second. What if the dog got lost while it was on path toward its tree? If I'm right, the dreadful snake could not see it or, from another viewpoint, the hammer never got away but It did act as an obstacle and did hide the dog's tree - at least the tree - from the dreadful snake's sight; or being just an ordinary obstacle for snake's get away due to hammer's endeavor was just murder the dreadful snake; therefore the hammer acted as a barrier for the dreadful snake's way. Why would something act like that? Well, I guess - I have seen it already - the hammers are usually possessed by demons from Purpleland and they, the demons, always kill whatsoever into the woods. Thereby I just don't want to know anything to do with that... and also because I have not could find the dreadful snake. Why? Uhm, it will bring me down if I explain it. Alright. Now I am so sad. Everything is because I am ugly - yes, I know -, but I strongly know that even ugly people as me can find someone pretty alike to live with. Wait! I remembered something meanwhile... oh, damn it, I will cry! That fucking hammer cheated on me. It used to think that everything inside of me supposed to be beauty and, as you know, it is truly better being ugly but honest... Oh, you'll never gonna realize how many nights I have spent alone because of that hammer. I still remember how everything was and how it, the hammer, nailed my heart. What a shame! It was simply horrible... For instance, just being asked uncountable times "What is a noun?" Oh, my lord!

Well, I end up - as usual - do not wanting to remind everything of as I do it forevermore...The dreadful snake can go fuck! I bit the dust, buddy. I hate it as well as that fucking hammer. I don't know what I did ask for. All that shit can go to the hell... fucking question.

Thanks for reading!

“Science fiction is any idea that occurs in the head and doesn't exist yet, but soon will, and will change everything for everybody, and nothing will ever be the same again. As soon as you have an idea that changes some small part of the world you are writing science fiction. It is always the art of the possible, never the impossible”. Ray Bradbury

Eighth Task

Does Colombia very well?

On July 11th of 2014, Juan Manuel Santos, President of Colombia, in company of Minister of Education, Maria Fernanda Ocampo, introduced the program named “COLOMBIA very well” to the nation. In order to improve students and professional English level, the government is endeavoring to invest in them, the people, over 1.3 billions of pesos along 10 years (2015 – 2025) with the aim of giving English as a communicative tool for opportunities and, by the way, to take out “Ley de Biligüismo” by this new program.

English, for instance, has been taken as a lead speech not only here, Colombia, but for other countries as well. This has meant a lot of languages begin to pass away because many people is just focus on learning English as a communicative instrument to spread ideas, thoughts, so on and so forth. Thus: Does Colombia very well? I do not think so. Besides the importance of those speeches and how every single policy from government has to reply the contexts and global trends, this policies ought to take into account the other languages that are spoken in the country and how to take them as rich knowledge resource. In fact, to create awareness of how this world is full of languages and ,most of all, this country, Colombia, has richness in relation with tongues and dialects, which are worthy to share to one another.

Now, dear reader, I do not want to leave some questions so, instead of that, I am going to leave a video from TED – Talks that has to do with a global issue. Hope you like it and please let me know your ideas or thoughts by a single comment.

 

Seventh Task

SECOND WRITTEN:

The importance of getting involved in grammar

 

Grammar is the backbone of any language and, not having it, any single thing you know could be flux, in a sort of jelly without much consistency. It also provides you with the necessary structure to set or organize and put your ideas, thoughts or “whatsoever” across. It is the “railway” by which any message is transported and then delivered to another. If it were not exist, you wouldn’t be able to convey your ideas because there’s not a way to pass them on. It means, whether you are second language users or not, going in deep really matter.

Now, in regards  the way it is taught, well, there are a lot of things that, might be, are going to turn many people around. Being instructed in grammar in our nowadays is a tough task due to education just has been focused on two main scenarios: the grammar as everything and context as main means. The first one is related to language’s formal structure and some lacks in contextualization of meanings; the other is just the “communicative” approach and how the context is the main means of expressing. So it has meant many people just get involved in the use of one these and fail at the other.  Finally, the results are a mass of misunderstandings and people falling in filatures that has to do with any language learning process.  In fact, there should be a balance in structure, context and language acquisition in order to cause a great and joyful experience in grammar practicing.  

Sixth Task

Idioms

This week we were getting involved into the world of idioms. As many of you may know, these are very common in other languages due to every culture's needs. It means each one is allowed to express its own wisdom by suitable statements. Now, here I let some English idioms and few explanations: 

Hit the road: this common idiom has two meanings. The first one is to begin or  to start traveling in an automobile or another road vehicle (if she’s going to make it by dawn, she’d better hit the road); the second one is to go away (hit the road and do not come back anymore, man!). Its equivalents in Spanish could be (in our paisa slang): “abrirse, largarse, pisarse; empezar.”

Tie one’s on: it means to drink alcohol excessively until the point of getting drunk (Mary tied her on after the party). The equivalent can be: “estar copetudo/copetón”.

Bite the Dust: this is a very common uphemism and has two meanings, as well: to die (my wife finally bit the dust after two endless days); to quit or fail from something (Eliot has bitten the dust because he thought it was enough). In Spanish may be like: “tirar la toalla; colgar los guayos”.

For a song: you shout for a song when something was cheaper or almost for free (we got it for a song). Its equivalent could be: “por nada; no valió nada; regalado”.

Have a Cow: it means to overreact or get angry because of something (he always has a cow when everybody speaks aloud). In our paisa slang can be: “estar/ponerse como un tití; estar/ponerse como una fiera; ser PA-TI-CO”.