FRIENDLIEST COUNTRIES

Here's a map that shows the countries where it's easier to make friends and the countries where it isn't. The best are the greenest, the worst the reddest. Spain's amoung the first and the UK among the latter.

+ info:

The best and worst countries in the world for making friends

Posted 2 months ago by Louis Doré in news

THE PERIODIC TABLE OF ELEMENTS

A post devoted to science, more specifcally to chemistry: the periodic table of elements. Above you have an example of a common periodic table with the symbols and abbreviations of all the known elements. But below you have the link to one that includes pictures apart from the usual info (atomic number, chemical symbol, chemical name, weight...). Click and see...

The Periodic Table of Elements, in Pictures & Words.

FALSE ENGLISH

HOW DO YOU SAY THESE THINGS IN ENGLISH?
IT'S NOT THE WAY YOU THINK IT IS. IT'S NOT THE ENGLISH WORD WE USE IN SPANISH...

It's not 'zapping'. (1)

It's not 'parking' (2)

It's not 'footing' (3)

Obviously, they don't say 'puenting' (4)

It's not 'playback' (5)

It's not 'lifting' (6)

It's not 'autostop' (7)

It's not a 'ticket' (8)

It's not a ·smoking"

Do you know the equivalents in English of all these words?

1- 'Channel surfing'

2- 'Car park'

3- 'Jogging'

4- 'Bungee jumping'

5- 'Lip sync'

6- 'Facelift'

7- 'Hitchhiking'
8- 'Receipt'
9- 'Dinner jacket'/'Tuxedo'

THE QUEEN DATA

Brought to you by Anglotopia.net – British Travel & Culture Blog

IF YOU CAN SAY EVERY WORD IN THIS POEM, YOU SPEAK BETTER ENGLISH THAN 90% OF THE NATIVE ENGLISH SPEAKERS

If you can pronounce this complete poem well, it's said that you speak better than 90% of the British population. The poem is called "THE CHAOS", written by Gerald Nolst Trenité in 1922 and shows the irregularity of English spelling and pronunciation. Have a try, below there's a video where you can listen to it being read if you need help.

Dearest creature in creation,
Study English pronunciation.
I will teach you in my verse
Sounds like corpse, corps, horse, and worse.
I will keep you, Suzy, busy,
Make your head with heat grow dizzy.
Tear in eye, your dress will tear.
So shall I! Oh hear my prayer.
Just compare heart, beard, and heard,
Dies and diet, lord and word,
Sword and sward, retain and Britain.
(Mind the latter, how it’s written.)
Now I surely will not plague you
With such words as plaque and ague.
But be careful how you speak:
Say break and steak, but bleak and streak;
Cloven, oven, how and low,
Script, receipt, show, poem, and toe.
Hear me say, devoid of trickery,
Daughter, laughter, and Terpsichore,
Typhoid, measles, topsails, aisles,
Exiles, similes, and reviles;
Scholar, vicar, and cigar,
Solar, mica, war and far;
One, anemone, Balmoral,
Kitchen, lichen, laundry, laurel;
Gertrude, German, wind and mind,
Scene, Melpomene, mankind.
Billet does not rhyme with ballet,
Bouquet, wallet, mallet, chalet.
Blood and flood are not like food,
Nor is mould like should and would.
Viscous, viscount, load and broad,
Toward, to forward, to reward.
And your pronunciation’s OK
When you correctly say croquet,
Rounded, wounded, grieve and sieve,
Friend and fiend, alive and live.
Ivy, privy, famous; clamour
And enamour rhyme with hammer.
River, rival, tomb, bomb, comb,
Doll and roll and some and home.
Stranger does not rhyme with anger,
Neither does devour with clangour.
Souls but foul, haunt but aunt,
Font, front, wont, want, grand, and grant,
Shoes, goes, does. Now first say finger,
And then singer, ginger, linger,
Real, zeal, mauve, gauze, gouge and gauge,
Marriage, foliage, mirage, and age.
Query does not rhyme with very,
Nor does fury sound like bury.
Dost, lost, post and doth, cloth, loth.
Job, nob, bosom, transom, oath.
Though the differences seem little,
We say actual but victual.
Refer does not rhyme with deafer.
Fe0ffer does, and zephyr, heifer.
Mint, pint, senate and sedate;
Dull, bull, and George ate late.
Scenic, Arabic, Pacific,
Science, conscience, scientific.
Liberty, library, heave and heaven,
Rachel, ache, moustache, eleven.
We say hallowed, but allowed,
People, leopard, towed, but vowed.
Mark the differences, moreover,
Between mover, cover, clover;
Leeches, breeches, wise, precise,
Chalice, but police and lice;
Camel, constable, unstable,
Principle, disciple, label.
Petal, panel, and canal,
Wait, surprise, plait, promise, pal.
Worm and storm, chaise, chaos, chair,
Senator, spectator, mayor.
Tour, but our and succour, four.
Gas, alas, and Arkansas.
Sea, idea, Korea, area,
Psalm, Maria, but malaria.
Youth, south, southern, cleanse and clean.
Doctrine, turpentine, marine.
Compare alien with Italian,
Dandelion and battalion.
Sally with ally, yea, ye,
Eye, I, ay, aye, whey, and key.
Say aver, but ever, fever,
Neither, leisure, skein, deceiver.
Heron, granary, canary.
Crevice and device and aerie.
Face, but preface, not efface.
Phlegm, phlegmatic, ass, glass, bass.
Large, but target, gin, give, verging,
Ought, out, joust and scour, scourging.
Ear, but earn and wear and tear
Do not rhyme with here but ere.
Seven is right, but so is even,
Hyphen, roughen, nephew Stephen,
Monkey, donkey, Turk and jerk,
Ask, grasp, wasp, and cork and work.
Pronunciation (think of Psyche!)
Is a paling stout and spikey?
Won’t it make you lose your wits,
Writing groats and saying grits?
It’s a dark abyss or tunnel:
Strewn with stones, stowed, solace, gunwale,
Islington and Isle of Wight,
Housewife, verdict and indict.
Finally, which rhymes with enough,
Though, through, plough, or dough, or cough?
Hiccough has the sound of cup.
My advice is to give up!!!

Video "THE CHAOS":

29 FACTS ABOUT THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE

Click on the link below to check 29 facts about the English language.

ENGLISH FACTS.

29th FEBRUARY: THE LEAP DAY OF A LEAP YEAR

2016 is a leap year, because February has an extra day, which is today: the 29th of February, leap day. Leap day is an extra day inserted into the calendar to keep it synchronised with the astronomical and seasonal year and it occurs every 4 years.

+ info: @ Wikipedia: LEAP DAY & LEAP YEAR.

A GUIDE TO BRITISH CULTURE BY STEPHEN FRY

British actor Stephen Fry  stars in a three minute video explaining the essence of British culture to visitors arriving to the UK via London's Heathrow airport. The film shot inside a pub features the actor talking about British cultural features and mentions important British attractions. You can watch it here with subtitles. The video was released last Thursday on Heathrow's free Wi-Fi page.

Video:

CURRENCY SYMBOLS: DOLLAR, POUNDS & YENS

Do you know the origin of the names and symbols of the different currency, here's a video that explains the origin of American dollar, British pound and Japanese yen.

THE HISTORY OF LONDON: THE BIGGEST & THE SMALLEST CITY IN THE UK.

[From Bristoleños.com]

As if it was the Vatican City and Rome, London (UK capital city) has a borough called the 'City', but it isn't a borough, it has a special distinction that sets back a long time ago. Below you can watch a video which clearly explains the main differences between them, but here's a summary of the most important ones:

- More than 8 million people live in Greater London (the grey area of the map above), the capital of England and the UK.

- About 11.000 people live in the City of London (the red area of the map above). It has a totally independent organization from the rest of the country.

- Both cities have different councils, lord majors, police and even laws and collect their own taxes.

- The City of London sometimes acts like Wales, Northern Ireland, Scotland or England, the other countries that make up the UK.

- The organization that rules the City is older than England's.

- The City was founded by the Romans, called Londinium. They built a wall and the city grew within it. After William I, the Conqueror, had united England, he couldn't defeat the City, so he offered the Londoners some privileges that have lasted since 1705 until now.

- Later, William I founded another capital, Westminster, to diminish power from the City. This city grew so much to become Greater London.

- Not all London and England's laws are directly applied on the City. 

- Another curiosity is the tradition that the Queen of England can't enter the City without asking for permission to the Major of London.

Video:

3rd CuriosiPics PHOTOGRAPH COMPETITION

Cambridge University Press España has launched the 3rd edition of the Photography Competition for Secondary Students and Teachers. The issue of the competition is curiosity.

You don't have to be a great photographer. Creativity will be rewarded. They are looking for photos that represent what curiosity means for you, or what somehow causes it. Each photo must come together with a description/explanation of it in English (between 10 words minimum up to a maximum of 50).

Registration is free. To participate the only thing you need is a camera, a mobile or anything you can take a photo with. You must be a student of ESO or an ESO English or English CLIL teacher. 

If any doubts, you'll find some advice to help you on their website below. Each contestant can take part with up to 5 photos maximum. Don't forget to check on the legal basis, too. You can follow them on Twitter or Facebook, where they'll be giving possible ideas and references on photos and curiosity.

The period to submit photos goes from 17th November 2015 to 16th May 2016. The award veredict will be on the week of June 2nd 2016.

- PRIZES FOR STUDENTS & TEACHERS:

Prizes from the jury:

1st- A trip to London with 2 friends!

2nd- An iPhone 6.

3rd- A reflex photo camera.

4th- iPad.

5th- A GoPro action camera.

Prizes from the public:

-  5 Smartbox adventure packs for two people.

+ INFO @ CuriosiPics website.

21st OCTOBER 2015: "BACK TO THE FUTURE" DAY

For many people, October 21st 2015 might be an insignificant date. However if you've seen the film "BACK TO THE FUTURE II", you'll know the day is here. Yes, the date when Doc and Marty McFly got into the DeLorean car converted into a time machine and travelled into the future. 

No doubt, the film starring Michael J. Fox and Christopher Lloyd has been a hit and has created a great number of fans interested in seeing which things have become true in real life and which not.

"Where are we? When are we?" Driving along a motorway in the sky and Doc shows McFly the time calendar in the DeLorean. "We're in the XXIst century, in Hill Valley, California. It's 4:29 of Wednesday 21st October 2015" "We're in the future!". That's how the second part of "BACK TO THE FURURE" (1989) starts. A film that has become an icon in pop culture and a marketing success selling related memorabilia.

The future is here: this Wednesday is the day. By chance. Because in 1985 when the first film was premiered, no sequel had been planned. But the great success of this first film became a trilogy. With the second film they travelled to the future and Zemeckis, the film-director,  fantasized about how the world would be like in 2015.

Videocalls, digital binoculars, multiple TV channels, online shopping, digital fingerprints to open doors, flying cars and roller skates, total climate control, neon bars on road sides, biofuel... Many of Zemeckis inventions in fiction have become or will soon be true.

Others stay as simple crazy ideas or wild dreams...

“BACK TO THE FUTURE” 2015	TRUE & WRONG PREDICTIONS
TRUE PREDICTIONS	WRONG PREDICTIONS
VIDEOCALLS (SKYPE)	“JAWS-19” FILM
NIKE AIR MAG TRAINERS	FLYING ROLLER SKATES
BIOMETRIC SECURITY  (Fingerprints, iris recognition...)	AUTOMATIC DRONE CONTROLLED LEASHES FOR WALKING DOGS
INTELLIGENT GLASSES (Google glass)	FLYING CARS
PEPSI “PERFECT”	AUTODRYING JACKETS

More about this celebration below:

- OCTOBER, 21, 2015 - BACK TO THE FUTURE DAY @ FACEBOOK

- october212015.com

Video trailer of the film:




Video what's right and what's wrong about 2015 predictions:

ABBREVIATIONS, ACRONYMS & INITIALISMS

As you can see above, it's not the same an abbreviation (Dr. = doctor or Ave. = avenue)

than an initialism:

or an acronym:

Watch the video a similar explanation:

Links:

- 50 of the most useful English abbreviations and acronyms

- English abbreviations, initialisms & acronyms.

SYMBOLS: # AND @

 

Two very common symbols of the technological age. Here's a video that explains the origin of the hashtag (#) and the at (@) symbols.

Video:

DIFFERENT LANGUAGES & ACCENTS IN THE BRITISH ISLES

As we saw in the previous post yesterday, Britain has different languages and accents, as an example, the longest name of for a village in Welsh. 
Today we're presenting the map that shows the geographical distribution of the different languages/dialects (____) and accents (_ _ _) spoken throughout the British Isles. Another interesting curiosity.

LLANFAIRPWLLGWYNGYLLGOGERYCHWYMDROBWILLLLANTYSILIOGOGOGOCH

While we wait to start off the new school year, let's begin with a funny curiosity. The title of this post is nothing strange... It's not exactly English, but Welsh. It's the village with the longest name in Britain and in the whole world with 51 letters (considering ch and ll as digraphs in Welsh, so single letters). You can see in the photos above, the name and where the village is on the map.

which means: Parish [church] of [St.] Mary (Llanfair) [in] Hollow (pwll) of the White Hazel [township] (gwyn gyll) near (go ger) the rapid whirlpool (y chwyrn drobwll) [and] the parish [church] of [St.] Tysilio (Llantysilio) with a red cave ([a]g ogo[f] goch).

but if you want to hear it being pronounced, here's a video of a weatherman on British TV saying the name correctly live on the weather forecast.

Video:

By the way you can also check on the weather vocabulary once again.

HOW LONDON TUBE EXPANDED: THE TUBE MAP TIMELINE

Just in case any of you have the oppotunity of visiting London this summer, here's a map you will have to be acquainted to, if you go: the London Tube's Map. But here's also a video which shows the history and the expansion of London's Tube network from 1863 (152 years ago). Watch and listen the whole story:

Video:

IF 'GAME OF THRONE'S' "WESTEROS WERE EUROPE

Are you fan of "Game of Thrones"? The Huffington Post have worked out the equivalent of Westeros map of the Seven Kingdoms with its real European equivalents.

- North Of The Wall = Greenland

- The North = Scotland

- The Iron Islands = Norway

- The Vale = Switzerland

- The Riverlands = Germany

- The Westerlands = England

- King's Landing = London

- The Stormlands = Wales

- The Reach = France

- Dorne = Spain

For more detailed information link here.

BRITISH ROYAL FAMILY TREE

The Royal British Family is an important part of British culture and tradition. With a new baby girl just born into the family yesterday, here's the British Royal Family Tree to see who's who in this family. By the way, the new member is called Princess Charlotte Elizabeth Diana. She's fourth in line to the thrown.

Video of the news:
.

THE WORLD'S MOST USED 'EMOJIS'

 (6th Cultural Week-14: Writing in the 21st century)

Emoticons, 'emojis' or smileys are certainly the new way of communicating of the digital era. Emoticons have come a long way since the days of :-) and they are already 32 years old. 
Link:The emoticon celebrates its 30th birthday (Sept'12)

Thanks to "emojis" (from Japanese = "picture character") we can express complex emotions and ideas in a simple way when textmessaging,whatsapping or tweeting.

There are different rankings showing the most used emoticons throughout the world.

On this post we can see some ranking results, above and on the left. 

The latter was a survey carried out in 2014 by Matthew Rothenberg on Twitter in real time. The survey was made counting tweets in many languages from Arabic to Chinese, English... and the resulting TOP 100 is the one on the left. Hearts top the list by far and love is also prominent.

If we are to answer the previous question, these are the results from 2014:
- These are the leading countries of each emoticon family:
babies - Latin America
cats - Brazil
female themed icons - the UK
violence - Canada
holidays - Australia
parties/'fiestas' - Spain
sadness - USA Hispanics
hearts - France
happy faces - Turkey
romanticism - Russia
flowers - Arab countries
hand signs - Malaysia
- The French use the heart icon, in any of its versions, four times more than average. Russians use romantic icons (kisses, love-letters, kissing couples) three times more than average.
- USA is the worldwide leader in the use of the chicken thigh, the aubergine (this use considered obscene), the birthday cake and the money bag.
- French & Vietnamese are the ones who seldom use smileys related to homosexuality, such as the rainbow or same-sex couples holding hands.
- The smiling poo is mostly used in the USA, the UK and Brazil. It's considered a funny emoji, but Russians don't seem to like it much.

More and more people have fun using emoticons to write the names of songs, films, sentences, short stories.

Here are some funny ones we've found:
- Can you decode this message?

(Scroll to the end of the post for the translation*)

- A summary of "Les Miserables"

*Translation: "Writing in longhand takes too much time and space, so in the future this newspaper will be written entirely in emoticons and sent directly to your mobile phone."