Happy halloween!!!

Tanzania independence day

Normally in our country we celebrate independence by doing some activities such as drama competitions, singing, some games like football, fashion competitions, running competitions some specches from the leaders from different group, of people. We do these at the pared? ground, included students of primary school, secondary school, college, and goverment groups. Some people from each group presents fun skills like hand craft skill,s domestic skills, hand made skills, and advertisements. People make temporary shops and sell their things or goods and make money to establish their small industries.

In Reunion Island we celebrate each year 'grandmother kal'.There are many stories and assumptions about this legendary figure and grandmother Kal is often referred to as a witch wandering at night to make people get lost. In fact she is said to have been a slave during the age of slavery in Reunion Island and one day the master killed her grandson .She fled and drowned in a chasm which is actually located in my town. From that day on her soul wanders at night looking for children. Indeed her body has never been found. Presumably, she was eaten by a shark. Therefore she has never found her resting place because people have never given her a proper burial as her body has never been found. So in retaliation for the loss of her grandson she wanders at night on a broom dressed in a long, dark dress and tries to attract people into the forest especially children to make them get lost. When she attracts people she utters a stange sound 'tout tout' similar to the sound made by a kind of bird. I heard many stories of people getting lost and it's quite unnerving. I know a man who related this story to me:when he was a child while he was walking throug the forest he saw a little light and this light seemed to attract him so he followed it. He also heard the sound of a strange bird but didn't pay much attention to it. He kept on following the light but couldn't reach it. When he woke up in the morning he realized that he was lost. He found himself in a ravine and was desperate because he knew that nobody would be able to find him. When his family noticed his disappearance they prayed for him for nine days and at the end of the nine days they found him by chance. He told me that the prayers saved him. Many parents refer to grandmother Kal to frighten their children and prevent them from wandering late at night. Also people say that we should never imitate the sound that she makes otherwise she will appear in the shape of a duck. Today on November 31st people dress up as grandmother Kal and go to the beach, especially near the chasm where she is believed to have drowned.

The "Escalade" Festival

This celebration, which takes place every 12th December, commemorates the attempt of the invasion by the French in 1602.


At that time, Geneva had proclaimed its independence from its sovereign, the Duke of Savoy, and had become a republic. But the Duke, who did not recognise that fact, decided to send an army to attack Geneva to make it submit again under his command. For that attack, the Duke chose the longest and darkest night in the year: the 12th of December which is the Winter solstice. And so did they...

As Geneva was protected by high defensive walls all around, the army of Savoyards had to build some high steps to be able to get into the city. So, they put them on the defensive walls and started scaling up (= climbing up); that's why we call this event l'Escalade in French!


According to a legend, a woman, la Mere Royaume (mother Royaume), heard a noise outside and got up to see what was going on. She looked through the window and saw the army of Savoyards coming into the city. As a reaction, she seized a cauldron of hot vegetable soup and poured it through the window on the attackers..the alert was given! All the inhabitants of Geneva woke up, put some clothes on and fought against the Savoyards.

In the morning, the few Savoyards who had survived the fight were caught and were made prisonners or just hanged in the public place..The inhabitants of Geneva had won the battle and proved to the Duke of Savoy that they were and would remain really independent from that day on..

Nowadays, we celebrate this historical event by wearing fancy dress (to remember the fact that our ancestors just had to put some scraps of clothes on to fight), walking in some parades, singing traditional songs that commemorate the victory of Geneva's people and...we also eat some hot vegetable soup!!

In addition, as we are in Switzerland (= the country of chocolate!), we eat for dessert chocolate cauldrons with marzipan vegetables which have to be broken up by the eldest member and the youngest member of the familiy or group saying at the same time: "Ainsi perir les ennemis de la Republique!" (= And so died the ennemies of the Republic!).


Here you have some kind of chocolate cauldrons filled with marzipan vegetables...so delicious!!

Setubun

Setubun is one of the famous festivals in Japan. It takes place on 3 February. Setubun means 'the border of the seasons (Winter and Spring). And it is said also to be a girl's festival and suitable for driving out evil, and wishing for good fortune in the coming Spring.

On the evening of Setubun, Oni-uchi (devil-extermination) and Mame-maki (bean-scattering) ceremonies are held. People throw soybeans towards demons in the house saying "Oni wa soto. Huku wa uchi! (Out with the devil! In with good fortune!)" in order to drive out any bad spirits. One person, usually the father, disguises himself as a demon in the house. After this ceremony, you eat the same numbers of soybeans as your age. So it means if you are 90, you have to eat 90 soybeans. And if you eat one more soybeans than your age, it would be good for your health for this year.

Another custom of Setubun is eating an uncut sushi roll facing towards this year's 'lucky direction'. This direction depends on the zodiac sign of the year. For example, south-south-east or east-north-east. The important thing is you can't speak until you finish eating them. You eat them wishing for your luck.

Carnival

Carnival is a festive season that takes place right before Lent. The main events are in February and March. And these events are for example, a public celebration or a parade. For this occasion, people often dress up.
Carnival is associated with Roman Catholic and eastern Orthodox Christians. We all know the world's largest carnival celebration which is in Brazil. However many countries have large, popular celebrations like the Carnival of Venice and German celebrations. Carnival ends on the day before Ash Wednesday, which is the beginning of Lent.

History

Lent meant that for 40 days, no parties, no food and no meat were allowed. This 40 day prohibition commemorated the Passion of Jesus. Therefore, people started to celebrate before fasting because it was the last opportunity for eating and partying.
For a long time, the Carnival in Venice was the most famous. From Italy, carnival traditions spread to Spain and Portugal and France. From France, it spread to Germany and New Orleans and from Spain and Portugal it spread to Latin America. Many other areas have developed their own traditions.

Etymology

There are a lot of theories regarding the origin of the word "carnival". One of them is that it comes from the Italian "carne levare" (to remove meat) since meat was prohibited during Lent.


In Switzerland, the festival starts on the Thursday before Ash Wednesday and the Tuesday before is called "Mardi Gras" (Fat Tuesday) because it marks the end of the seven days before Ash Wednesday. Many carnivals occur on this Tuesday.
Nowadays, Carnival is for young teenagers one more occasion to party and because the tradition allows people to put on fancy dress so it is even more funny!

Nit de l'Albà

The Nit de l’Albà or Alborada is a celebration that takes place on the night of 13th August in Elche in Spain. Hundreds of fireworks light up the sky in this magical night. The celebration origins date back to the Middle Ages when families offered a rocket for each of their children to the Virgin of La Asuncion, who is Elche's patron saint. Today the tradition has turned into an organised firework display where hundreds of fireworks and rockets are fired from different points of the city, especially from roofs where the inhabitants of Elche also join in spontaneously with their own fireworks. The colourful storm of rockets and fireworks begins at 22:30 p.m. and continues until a few minutes before midnight. At that moment, all the fireworks cease and the city lights are turned off. The people of Elche remain silent while they listen to Gloria, the most significant fragment of the Mystery Play, which is a lyrical medieval drama declared by the World Heritage and UNESCO. At midnight, the darkness of the city is almost completeley lit up for a few seconds by a huge white starburst which is known, because of its shape, as the Virgin's palm tree, and which is released from Santa Maria's Basilica. Once this magical moment has passed, the city lights are turned on and people can see an image of the Virgin in fireworks on the Basilica's tower while they listen and join in singing Aromas Ilicitanos, which is the town anthem. The celebration ends with people eating watermelon on their roofs.

Eid al-Fitr celebration

During the month of Ramadan, Muslims observe a strict fast and participate in pious activities such as charitable giving and peace-making. It is a time of intense spiritual renewal for those who observe it. At the end of Ramadan, Muslims throughout the world observe a joyous three-day celebration called Eid al-Fitr (the Festival of Fast-Breaking).

Before the day of Eid, during the last few days of Ramadan, each Muslim family gives a determined amount as a donation to the poor people. This donation is of actual money, food (rice, barley, dates) to ensure that the needy can have a holiday meal and participate in the celebration.

Generally Eid al-Fitr is celebrated by having a special meal with home-baked sweets and wearing a new special dress.

On the day of Eid, Muslims gather early in the morning in outdoor locations or mosques to perform the Eid prayer. This consists of a sermon followed by a short congregational prayer.
After the Eid prayer, Muslims usually scatter to visit various family and friends, give them gifts (especially to children), and make phone calls to distant relatives to give well-wishes for the holiday. These activities traditionally continue for three days. In most Muslim countries, the entire 3-day period is an official government/school holiday.

However, the Eid-Al-Fitr is equivalent on scale to Christmas. It is the most wonderful event for all of us.

'Daeboreum' - Korean full Moon festival

Daeboreum (it means 'Great full Moon) is a Korean traditional holiday that celebrates the first full Moon of the new year in the Korean lunar calendar. Because of the lunar calender the date changes every year, but usually it is in Feburary. Traditionally, Korean people have considered Daeboreum as an important day because it is the day of the first Moon of the year rising that means a new start of the year.

There are a lot of traditons on this day. First of all, people eat different kinds of nuts such as chestnuts, walnuts and pine nuts, etc. By cracking a nut, people believe that they can guard themseleves aginst bad luck for a year. In the countryside, people go up to the mountain and try to see the first rise of Moon. Also, they play a game called 'gueybulnori' the night before Daeboreum which is burning dry grass and straw while children spin the can full of fire.

It is said that if someone slept at the night, his eyebrow would turn to grey. Usually, adult plays a trick on children by putting flour on their eyebrows. For breakfast on Daeboreum, people usually eat five-'grain' rice which include rice, barley, millet, Indian millet and red bean.

In Vitro Fertilization

I was reading BMJ (British Medical Journal) a few days ago and suddenly I noticed an article regarding a case which was dismissed in the European Court last month.

The case was regarding a woman who had IVF a few years ago before splitting up from her partner. Two years after that she was diagnosed with ovarian cancer and therefore surgeons decided to remove her ovaries.

Now she asked the clinic to implant fertilized eggs in her but her request was declined as she was unable to provide her ex partner's consent. As result, she took the case to the High Court and the case was dismissed.

At this time, there are lots of arguments and ethical issues surrounding the topic. I am going to brieflyintroduce some of them.

First of all, the human being has the right to be generated, not produced, to come to life not by an artificial process but of a human act in the full sense of the term: the union between a man and a woman.

Secondly, who should decide about IVF? Doctors? The Church or Politicians?
Also, should we consider the fertilized eggs as an object or a person? And which type of rules should apply to it?

Thirdly, how long should the clinics keep the fertilized eggs? Should they keep them for a long time or should they dispose of them shortly after they are taken?

Finally, can they be donated to couples who are experiencing difficulty having children including homosexual couples?

If they can be donated who are the real parents ? And can these children inherit from these parents?

Interesting arguments. Have a look at your original copy as I have deleted some articles and prepositions.

many neighbours come and visit them very often.Among Emma's acquaintances there are Mr.Knightley, the older brother of Emma's sister's husband, Mr.Elton, Miss and Mrs Bates, Jane Faifax who is Mrs Bates' orphaned grand daugter.However even though Emma is surrounded by nice people, she feels that something is missing in her life.She is beginning to suffer from intellectual solitude.When Miss Taylor used to live in her house, she had someone with whom she could talk to, a companion for conversation but now that Miss Taylor was married, she had nobody with whom to spend hours talking and although she liked her father very much he couldn't be a companion to her .Soon she hears that a girl, Harriet Smith aged seventeen is coming to her house with Mrs Godddarg.The latter has a school and Mrs Smith is in her school.Emma is delighted and cannot wait to meet Harriet.Emma is a very fanciful and temperamental girl .This is actually her own fault and no sooner has she met Harriet than she starts making plans for the young lady.Harriet happens to be a docile girl and she is very grateful to Emma's taking an interest in her . So she considers Emma like a model and listens carefully to everything that she says.Emma talks Harriet into forgetting about a certain Me.Martin, a young man who likes

Danielle Steel

This story is about Allegra Steinberg who wanted to go into law, and she had thought she might want to be an actress. This wouldn’t surprise any one in her family, but it wouldn’t necessarily have pleased them. Her mother, Blaire Scoott, had written and produced one of the most successful shows on television for nine years. It was a comedy, well peppered with serious moments,and some occasional real life drama. Her father, Simon Steinberg, was a major movie producer and had made some of Hollywood’s most important movies. He had won three academy awards over the years.
More importantly, he was that rarest of commodities in Hollywood, a nice man, a gentleman, a truly decent human being. They worked hard and had a real family, who they devoted a lot of their time to.
Allegra had a seventeen year old sister who was a senior in high school and a model and also had one brother, Scott, a junior at Stanford, who seemed to have escaped show business entirely. He was premed?, and all he wanted in life was to be a doctor.
Scott had seen enough of show business in his twenty years, and he even thought Allegra was crazy to be an entertainment lawyer. Allegra smiled to her self, thinking of him and listening to the last of brawn’s? song.
Unlike Brown, who was in his late thirties and had been around the music business for twenty years, seemed to be constantly beset by problems, used to call Allegra just to talk about problems she was having on the set, or sometimes just for comfort.
Allegra loved practicing law and particularly enjoyed the field of entertainment.

The boy in the striped pyjamas

The boy in the striped pyjamas is a book written by John Boyne about a nine-year-old child called Bruno who lives in Germany during the time of the Nazis. Bruno is the son of a general who works for Hitler (although Hitler is called in the book The Fury; his name is not mentioned). One day, Bruno arrives home from school and sees his mother, his annoying sister Gretel and the cleaning lady packing their stuff; so he asks them why and they tell him that they are moving to Auschwitz. When the family arrive at their new home, Bruno looks through the window and he sees on the other side of the fence, not really far away from his house, hundreds of people wearing striped pyjamas, so one afternoon he decides to explore and find out the reason why all those people are there (he cannot imagine that those people are Jews and that place, called "Out-With" is a concentration camp!). He meets Shmuel, a boy in striped pyjamas who is the same age as him and they become close friends. Every afternoon Bruno goes to see and talk to Shmuel who tells him that although they are just kids they should not be friends because they are very different. One day, Bruno has to have his head shaved because of lice, but it does not matter to him because he thinks that now he looks much more like his friend Shmuel, but Bruno's mother cannot stand the situation in Auschwitz anymore so she talks to Bruno's father and they decide that the best thing to do is for Bruno, Gretel and their mum go back to Germany. Bruno is not very enthusiastic about the idea because it means that he has to say goodbye to his friend Shmuel, but they have a plan for Bruno's last day in "Out-With": Bruno is going to see the other side of the fence and help his friend to look for his father, who had disappeared few days ago. He puts striped pyjamas on, but once they are in, Bruno starts feeling that he wants to come home, they are caught in a march with many men and they are locked in a gas chamber...

Bruno's family look for him desperately without any result until one day, Bruno's father sees his son's clothes and realizes what had happened.

Black Beauty

By Anna Sewell


I found in my library a very interesting book that was about horses, how they feel and love. How they show their emotion and how they refuse to be treated in a bad way.
The author was writing the book from the perspective of the horse, the hero of the book.


In 29 chapters, the horse talks about his life and what it was like. Starting from the beginning when he was a colt with his mother in their first home, going through his life until he became an old horse. He describes homes that he has lived in and owners, grooms, and stables.


However, while you reading through the chapters you will forget that you are reading about an animal, it seems that you’re reading about a human life.


(( “When I look back, my first memories are of a large rolling meadow with a small pond. Green, shady trees leaned over the pond, and water lilies grew in the deep end.
As a colt, I was too young to eat grass so I lived on my mother’s milk, in the daytime I ran at her side and at night I slept beside her. During the warm weather we used to stand by the pond in the shade of the trees. In the winter we went to warm shed near an apple orchard.))


This is how the black horse describes the beginning of his life and how his first home was nice with a warm-hearted Mother and a living owner.


One day his Mother came to him and said: “I hope you will grow up gentle and good and never learn bad ways. Do your work well, lift up your feet when you trot, and never bite or kick, even when you are just playing?”


And he never forgot his Mother's advice. A the time when he enjoyed his home and good food, his master talked to him as if he were his child and he spoke in a very warm voice: what a handsome horse you are, I will call you ” BLACK BEAUTY”. And since this time everyone knew who Black Beauty was.


During his life ,Black Beauty was sold to different owners and he heard a lot about bad behaviour because if bad treatment...? and he could not believe it until he was treated by a very bad owner and in the end he was a broken-down horse and felling? to would have been merciful to shoot.

A sad story! Be careful with the word 'how'. Also, check your spelling.

"NO TIME FOR GOODBYE" by Linwood Barclay

The book "No Time For Goodbye" is story about one woman who lost her whole family. The event happened 25 years ago. One day, Cynthia, a 14-year-old girl, lied to their parents and went out with a boy at night. However, her parents found her, so she had to come back to home. That night, Cynthia had a huge fight with her father, and she even said something that shouldn't have said to her father.
In the morning, she woke up, however, the house was silent. There was no sound of her parents getting ready for work, or Tod, her brother, for school. Weird. At first, she thought that everyone had already left early in the morning. However, they never come back again to her. Her parents and brother had left her and just disappeared mysteriously. Were her family murdered or abducted? If they were alive why had they abandoned her?
Now, Cynthia had her own family; a nice husband Terry and an 8-year-old daughter Grace. She was happy, but still obsessed with this unsolved question about her missing family. She decided to appear on a television programme called 'Deadline' which shows unsolved events that really happened, hoping someone would show up who can give her a clue about her family.

The heroine is Emma Woodhouse.She is twenty years old and motherless. She lives with her father in a village called Hartfield.As her mother died when she was very young, she has a vague memory of her and as a consequence hasn't suffered from her absence. Moreover,the latter has been replaced by a loving governess , Miss Taylor who has come to be more of a friend than a governess for Emma.Indeed, to a certain extent Miss Taylor played the role of a mother for Emma and between the two there's a lot of love and affection .Financially,she is wealthy, has a beautiful house, in brief nothing is lacking,she has had a happy childhood and a sweet life in Hartfield.When the story begins, Miss Taylor had just married a neighbour, Mr. Weston. On the one hand, Emma and her father miss her a lot, but on the other hand Emma is happy because marriage allows Miss Taylor to have a house on her own and a good condition.In addition, Miss Taylor does not live far from her house so it won't be a problem at all for them to visit each other as often as they want.Finding herself alone with her father, Emma endeavours to entertain him as best as she can .Also, as her father is very respected in Hartfield and as everybody thinks the world of him

"Broken" by Shy Keenan

The book "Broken" is about the life of Shy Keenan. She was born in 1963 and actually her real name is Karen. We learn later in the book that her stepfather decided to call her Shy because he used to say that she was a shy little girl. When she turned 4, her mother, Jennifer, remarried Stanley who became Karen's stepfather. Her new stepfather systematically raped her from that young age and sold her to other paedophiles. Once, she almost got killed by a group of abusers. She was forced to give men oral sex and was beaten up if she didn't do so. She had to do it to be able to eat, drink, sleep and have clothes. Her little sister also suffered from abuse and Karen used to protect her by taking her place when Stanley asked something to her dear little sister. Karen tried to tell her mother what has been happening to her, but Jennifer would just ignore it and beat her up for being naughty, dirty and bad. She would never talk to her and show any sign of affection unless she needed her to be kind to social workers or to lie or to act as if she was a little girl with special needs. This way, Jennifer could get money from the government. Once, Karen just burst out and told the social worker what she had been forced to do all this time but Stanley immediately invented a story saying that she was the one who tried to seduce him and that she made sexual advances towards him. The social worker believed him! When, at the age of 11, she had already suffered two miscarriages and an STD, the doctors didn't even question her parents. Nobody ever believed Shy, until in 2000 she took part in a Newsnight TV programme and secretely recorded Stanley admitting the abuse. This book describes her childhood and teenage years and in the end her stepfather is finally brought to justice which has been her battle since then. She now compaigns for justice for victims of childhood sexual abuse. I, at first, hesitated a lot about reading this book because I knew it was going to be shocking and hard to read. However, I thought that child abuse is a reality that we have to face and be able to talk about. I think it's good to write such books to open the eyes of the world even though it must have been really really difficult for Shy to live those moments again when writing the book. She is a wonderful woman who describes herself not as a victim, neither as a survivor, but as someone who tries to work things out. This book is even more heart-breaking because when describing things, Shy uses terms that are very childlike and we, readers, see the events with her way of thinking as a child. For instance, she refers to the abuse as "The horrible" and her life is basically made of up of this and of the expectation of it. This story is sad, revolting and we constantly wish Shy would say something. We want to tell her: "Shy, tell them what Stanley has done to you, say that you are not crazy, tell those or those people because they are the ones you can trust!" But as Stanley psychologically manipulated her, she just couldn't. It is shocking that this has been going on for so long without public knowledge or even worse, with so many people looking the other way. Imagine you are hated and beaten by the two people who are supposed to look after you and to protect you...

"After the Wall" by Jana Hensel

In her book, After the Wall, Jana Hensel speaks about the night in which the Berlin Wall fell and how much it has changed her lifestyle...At that time, little Jana - who was only thirteen years old- couldn't exactly realize what was going on and what consequences this great historical event would bring for her future. She couldn't even imagine what that symbolic act would represent for her and her peers: it would not only mean the reunification of Germany after a long time of splitting up into EAST and WEST, it would also mean a strong fight against her past memories, habits and identity. After the Wall fell, Jana saw some things were changing around her. GDR (German Democratic Republic) where she had been growing up and which had been in the shadow of Communism for so long was now catching up with developing industries and following the WEST's way of living to convert itself to a free-market economy. She began to read pop magazines, wear trendy clothes and behave as her WEST friends did, letting her habits, her lifestyle and even her accent of an EAST german girl behind her. But although Jana wanted to succeed and be integrated in this WESTern world which was so different from hers, she couldn't avoid feeling awkward when people just looked at her as she was just German. She sometimes wanted to express herself and told everyone that life in EAST Germany wasn't so bad, that her childhood was really happy and full of good memories. But she knew that whatever she said, she and her EAST peers would always be considered as "the sons and daughters of history's losers". Nowadays, despite her efforts in the past to forget her roots, she tries throughout her book to retrace her childhood memories and to remember all these little details that define how she lived, where she's from, and finally who she is.

'The Notebook'

This is the story about one man called Noah and a woman called Allie.

Miracles
Noah is sitting by a window in a nursing home.
He walks to her room and reads the same story to her everyday as a matter of routine.
Everytime he goes there and sits for just a second and stares at her, but she doesn't return the look. She doesn't understand who she is. He begins to read the notebook aloud in the hope that the miracle that has come to dominate his life will once again prevail.

Ghosts
It's back in early October in 1946, and Noah, a thirty-one-year-old, is sitting on the porch at home enjoying seeing the beautiful trees in North Carolina turn their autumnal colours. He bought his house right after the war ended. The house was built in 1772 and one of the oldest and largest homes in New Bern, North Carolina. He lives with his hound dog and
He looked at the book 'Leaves of Grass' by Walt Whitman which he'd carried with him throughout the war. It reminds him of New Bern and he was glad he'd come back here. Though he'd been amay for fourteen years, this was home and he knew a lot of people here. His best friend these days was Gus, a seventy-year-old black man. He'd come to regard Gus as family especially after his father died last year.
He had been in love only once with a girl fourteen years ago. And it had changed him forever. He felt his mind drifting back to a warm evening like this forteen years ago.
It was just after graduation 1932, the opening night of the Neuse River Festival. He arrived alone and found Fin and Sarah those who he'd grown up with talking to a girl he'd never seen before. It was Aliie. She came to New Bern to spend the summer with her family. She seemed good and perfect for him and also she was from a good and wealthy family.
Soon after they got to know each other and became inseparable.

ADDITION written by Toni Jordan

Grace who is the one of main characters counts everything: how many letters in her name, how many steps she takes from her home to the café and so on. She likes “regularity” and to be balanced in her daily life, she counts and finds the regularities in everyday life. Her daily life is regular, not only as things she does every day but also the time when she does it. For example, she wakes at 5:55 and exactly 5 minutes later, she gets up. Even more, she eats the same things every day at the same hour each day. However, one thing which she enjoys is the difference of numbers in each day and the number of poppy seeds on the orange cake which she orders every day at the café where she goes everyday at the same hour. She eats the orange cake with the same number of bites, which is the same number with the poppy seeds on the top of the orange cake.
She met a guy whose name is Seamus in the café. Spending time with him, her life has changed little by little by not count everything . But it is very difficult for her to accept this change because she has been counting for a long time, and this makes it difficult for Grace and Seamus to stay together even though they love each other.
This is a story of how she is going to manage to accept the changes through love. There are some difficulties for them. However she is going to find out how to deal with them and what are the most important things for her.

Welcome to your blog!!

You will be writing a summary of your chosen book (in English!) on the blog on Friday morning!