More slang

Second deadly quake hits northern Italy

Northern Italy has been hit by another deadly earthquake - the area's second in nine days.

At least 16 people have been killed and about 350 injured by Tuesday's 5.8 magnitude tremor.
Rescue workers are searching for survivors in the rubble. A 65-year-old woman has been pulled out alive, after 12 hours trapped in her kitchen.
There are now 14,000 people who've been left homeless by the two quakes.
This quake was strong enough to be felt across Italy - as far away as places like Venice, Milan and Pisa.
People ran out of buildings and into the streets, and reports say that some roads were blocked by residents trying to flee the area.
The last earthquake on 20 May killed seven people.
Loads of churches and other historic buildings have been destroyed.
The Italian Prime Minister has promised to do everything possible to try and get life back to normal.
(CBBC Newsround)

Remote Control Inventor Dies Aged 96

The inventor of the television remote control has passed away at the age of 96. The Associated Press news agency reported that Eugene J. Polley died of natural causes on Sunday. His creation is one of today's most commonly used and ubiquitous devices. Mr Polley worked as an engineer for a company called Zenith, now part of Korea's LG Electronics. He introduced his gun-shaped remote control, called the Flash-Matic, in 1955. It was one of 18 patents he owned. The Flash-Matic used light to turn the TV on and off, adjust the volume and change channels. His invention was followed up five years later by fellow Zenith engineer Robert Adler, who used ultrasound instead of light. Today's remote controls use infrared light.
Polley worked for Zenith for 47 years and held some top technology posts. In 1997, the USA's National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences honoured him by awarding him with an Emmy Award for 'Pioneering Development of Wireless Remote Controls for Consumer Television.' Polley's invention is something we all take for granted nowadays. Generations of people have grown up not knowing that before remote controls, people actually had to leave the sofa and push a button or turn a dial to change their TV settings. Today we use remotes for everything from adjusting the brightness of lights to changing songs on our iPods to opening the garage door from 30 metres. Life would be quite different without this handy gadget. (Breaking News English)

Blaze at Qatar shopping centre kills 19

A fire at a shopping centre in the Qatari capital Doha has killed at least 19 people, local officials have said.
The interior ministry said 13 of the victims at the Villaggio centre were children. Four of them were Spanish nationals and one child was French.
The cause of the fire - believed to have started in the centre's nursery - is being investigated.
The Villaggio mall is one of the most popular shopping and recreational complexes in the small Gulf state.
The centre - which opened in 2006 - has a cinema, a hotel and a Venice-styled theme park.

'Trapped inside'
The blaze started at about 11:00 local time (08:00 GMT) on Monday, Qatari Interior Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Nasser al-Thani said.
It is believed to have started at the centre's Gympanzee nursery, and firefighters reportedly had to break through the roof to get to trapped children when a staircase collapsed.
But the firefighters were too late to save seven young girls and six boys who died with four of their teachers, reports say.
Four of the children who died were Spanish, foreign ministry officials in Madrid said, without giving further details.
In Paris, the minister in charge of French expatriates, Yamina Benguigui, said that a three-year-old French child died in the blaze.
Two civil defence officials - believed to be firefighters - were also among the victims, the interior ministry said.
All the victims died of asphyxiation, reports say. (BBC)

Slang

Golden Gate 75th Anniversary

The Golden Gate Bridge - 1937

It was a structural victory born of massive human effort and grand design. A suspension bridge of this length (1.7 miles) had not been tackled previously.
There is no accurate number of how many people actually worked on the bridge, although we know that eleven died . . . fewer than expected, considering the hazards of the job.

A few construction and design statistics:

• May 28, 1937: Bridge opens to traffic
• Pedestrian day was May 27, 1937 when 200,000 people crossed the bridge on foot or skates.
• Total length of bridge: 1.7 miles (2732 meters)
• Width of bridge: 90 feet (27 meters)
• Width of sidewalk: 10 feet (3 meters)
• Clearance above mean high water: 220 feet (67 meters)
• Height of tower above water: 746 feet (227 meters)
• Total length of wire used in main cables: 80,000 miles (129,000 km)

(About.com San Francisco)   

Simple egg fried rice

What is the Eurovision Song Contest?

Hundreds of millions of people tune in every year for a live extravaganza of multi-cultural entertainment called the Eurovision Song Contest.

Eurovision what?

The Eurovision Song Contest is probably better known for its colourful costumes and dodgy dancing than its music!
Every year countries from all over Europe send a song and performers to fight it out for Eurovision glory.
It's hosted by the country that won the year before.

When did it start?

Eurovision started in 1956 when just 14 countries took part. In 2008, there were a record 43 countries.
The contest was created by the European Broadcasting Union - an organisation of national broadcasters in and around Europe.
The idea originally came from an Italian song contest and it was also a chance to test out early live TV technology.

How does it work?

There are two semi-finals and a final. The top 10 countries from each of the semi-finals go through to the final.
They join the nations that are automatically qualified - last year's winner, along with the 'Big Five' (UK, France, Germany, Spain and Italy), the nations that give the most money to the contest.

How's the winner decided?

A combination of viewer phone votes and the opinions of an expert 'jury' are used to score the countries.
Each country that takes part can give points to 10 other countries - 1 to 8 points and then 10 and 12 for their top two countries.
All the points are totted up as we go along to decide the winner. Sometimes countries end up scoring nothing and getting the dreaded "nul points", as the UK did in 2003. (CBBC Newsround)

Solar plane

Solar plane completes trip from Switzerland to Morocco.

A plane powered just by the sun's rays has flown from Switzerland to Morocco.

It's the first time a plane has been able to fly across continents without using any fuel.
The flying machine's wings are covered in solar panels which turn the sun's rays into electricity to power the plane's propellers.
The plane's engineers are hoping that by 2014 they'll be able to use it to fly all the way around the world. (CBBC Newsround)

Prince Charles weather forecast sweeps the globe

The prince turned his hand to weather presenting along with his wife, the Duchess of Cornwall, at the BBC headquarters in Glasgow.
Video of the weather forecast has been viewed hundreds of thousands of times.
The story also features in newspapers, bulletins and on news websites from Europe to South America and has trended worldwide on social media.
Prince Charles delivered a specially-written script which included references to royal residences in Scotland.
In confident style, he said: "The best of the bright and dry weather will of course be in the northern isles and the far north of the mainland. So, a little hazy sunshine for the Castle of Mey in Caithness.
"But a cold day everywhere with temperatures of just 8C and a brisk northerly wind. Thank God it isn't a bank holiday." (BBC News)

At the supermarket 2

At the supermarket 1

Greeting

Howard Carter

Born in 1874, Howard Carter first went to Egypt as a young artist hired to sketch artifacts. He went on to become an important archeologist, and the lead excavator of the tomb of King Tutankhamun.

Howard Carter was born May 9, 1874, in Kensington, London. His father Samuel Carter was a successful artist. Howard was a sickly child, and was sent to live with his aunts in Norfolk. He had private home schooling, and had an artistic streak from an early age. When his father painted a portrait of a well-known Egyptologist, the young Howard's interest was sparked.
The British had occupied Egypt in the late 19th centry. This period saw an increased European interest in Egyptology, the study of ancient Egypt. Many prominent British scientists and archeologists were active in excavating ancient sites.

Through his father's connections, Howard Carter found a job working for an archeologist who needed an artist to draw his findings. Howard headed to Egypt in 1891, at the age of 17, where he was to work on the Egypt Exploration Fund's excavation of the Middle Kingdom tombs at Beni Hassan.

In 1907, Carter was hired by wealthy English aristocrat Lord Carnarvon, who was fascinated by Egyptology. With Carnarvon's backing, Carter led the excavation of Egyptian nobles' tombs. In 1914, Carnarvon received a license to dig at KV62, the site where it was believed the tomb of King Tutankhamun rest. Carnarvon gave the job to Howard Carter. Carter hired a crew of workers to help find the tomb, which was believed to be at a site in the Valley of the Kings designated KV62.

After a few weeks of digging, a boy who worked as a water fetcher on the excavation started to dig in the sand with a stick. He found a stone step, and called Carter over. Carter's crew found a flight of steps that led down to a sealed door, and a secret chamber. On November 6, 1922, Carter and Lord Carnarvon entered the tomb, where they found an immense collection of gold and treasures. On February 16, 1923, Carter opened the innermost chamber and found the sarcophagus of King Tut.

The discovery made a huge impact. King Tut's tomb was by far the most intact of all the tombs that were excavated, and artifacts were well-preserved, including the sarcophagus and Tut's mummy. (bio.True Story)

Hand washing in hospitals halves superbug infections

A campaign that was launched in hospitals encouraging people to wash their hands has helped halve the number of "superbug" infections.
Superbugs are germs that antibiotic drugs can't destroy, so if people get ill, they can't be treated.
In hospitals, the bugs can spread easily from patient to patient.
During the government's "Clean Your Hands" campaign, the amount of soap and hand gel being used in hospitals tripled.
The campaign has now finished but it's hoped hospitals will carry on the hand washing practices highlighted.(CBBC Newsround)

Being Bilingual Boosts Brainpower

A study by the USA's Northwestern University provides biological evidence that people who are bilingual have a more powerful brain. Drs Viorica Marian and Nina Kraus investigated how bilingualism affects the brain. They found that studying another language "fine-tunes" people's attention span and enhances their memory. In particular they discovered that when language learners attempt to understand speech in another language, it activates and energises the brainstem – an ancient part of the brain. Professor Kraus stated: "Bilingualism serves as enrichment for the brain and has real consequences when it comes to…attention and working memory."
Professor Marian explained why studying and learning another language was so beneficial for the brain. She said: "People do crossword puzzles and other activities to keep their minds sharp, but the advantages we've discovered in dual language speakers come automatically simply from knowing and using two languages." She added: "It seems that the benefits of bilingualism are particularly powerful and broad, and include attention, inhibition and encoding of sound." She said bilinguals were better listeners because they are "natural jugglers" of sound. She said: "The bilingual juggles linguistic input and, it appears, automatically pays greater attention to relevant versus irrelevant sounds." (Breaking News English)

Edvard Munch's iconic artwork The Scream sold for $120m

Norwegian expressionist Edvard Munch's The Scream has become the most expensive artwork sold at auction, after it fetched $119.9m (£74m).
The 1895 pastel was bought by an anonymous buyer at Sotheby's in New York. Bidding lasted 12 minutes.
The work is one of four in a series by the Norwegian expressionist artist and was the only one still privately owned.
Proceeds of the sale are to go towards founding a new museum, hotel and art centre in Norway.
Seven bidders were competing for the work, which had a starting price of $40m. The crowd broke into applause, following the sale on Wednesday.

The sale price includes the buyer's premium.

The previous record for an artwork sold at auction was for Picasso's Nude, Green Leaves, and Bust, which sold for $106.5m in 2010.
According to Forbes, The Scream is the eighth most expensive painting sold at a private or public auction, when prices are adjusted for inflation. (BBC News)

La Rioja

La Rioja is both a province and an autonomous region located in the North of Spain. It is situated between Castilla La Mancha to the south, Castilla León to the west, Aragón to the east and Navarra and the Pais Vasco to the north. The capital of La Rioja is Logroño.
It is a very fertile part of Spain and has an abundant supply of water due to the 7 major rivers that flow through it: the Oja, the Najerilla, the Iregua, the Leza, the Jubera, the Cidacos and the Alhama all of which end up in the Ebro, which also flows through this province. La Rioja is also known as the province with 7 valleys (although in reality there are more).
La Rioja is a small province but it is very rich in natural resources - it is one of Spain's most famous wine producing areas as well as having an interesting landscape. It has an important historical heritage and there are endless possibilites for visitors.
You can do all kinds of sports in La Rioja. There are ski slopes in the mountains: Valdezcaray, the Cebollera mountain range, in the Obarenses and the Cantabria and Demanda mountain ranges. Climbing, hiking, bungee jumping, paragliding and canoeing (in the Najerilla, Oja, Tirón, Iregua, Leza and Cidacos rivers) are all popular sports here. You can also go on a trip in a hot air balloon. You can go horse riding (in Navarrete), hunting or fishing or play golf.
La Rioja's main economy is wine production and its related industries (wine distribution, rural tourism...). There are also other important industries such as its textile and shoe industry as well as agriculture. Logroño the capital of La Rioja is its commercial centre.
It is well connected by air (the nearest airport is La Rioja-Agoncillo, on the N-232 road to Zaragoza, Tel: 941 277 400) by rail and also by road. The A-1 motorway which passes Burgos connects it to Madrid which is almost 388 kms away, Bilbao is 137 kms away on the AP-46 motorway (with pay tolls), Barcelona is on the AP-48 motorway (with pay tolls) 478 kms away and you reach Zaragoza which is 176 kms away on the same road. There is a good coach service too which connects La Rioja to the rest of the country. (Euroresidentes)

English Tense

Madrid revolts against French rule

During the Peninsular War, a popular uprising against the French occupation of Spain begins in Madrid, culminating in a fierce battle fought out in the Puerta del Sol, Madrid's central square. The Spanish rebels were defeated, and during the night the French army under Grand Duke Joachim Murat shot hundreds of citizens along the Prado promenade in reprisal. The gruesome events of the day were depicted by Spanish artist Francisco de Goya in two well-known prints. (History.com)

The year I was born

What happened the year you were born in?

If you want to know, click:

http://whathappenedinmybirthyear.com/