10 BIZARRE NEW YEAR'S TRADITIONS FROM ALL OVER THE WORLD

 Hi everyone here we are, another year has gone and a new one is coming. Very soon it will be 2020 and we’ll be living in a new decade. Let’s discover more about strange New Year’s Day traditions from all over the world.

MIND- BLOWING FACTS ABOUT THE STAR WARS SAGA

                                       

Hello everybody! The last Star Wars movie, The Rise of Skywalker,  is finally out at cinemas and in honour of its release I decided to list a few facts about one the most popular sagas in the world. Enjoy the reading!

SPIDERMAN, WITH GREAT POWER COMES GREAT RESPONSIBILITY.

Hi guys! Welcome back to our blog! How are you? I hope everything is going well. I know, this is a very difficult period for us…everyday there's a test and we can't wait for it to end. But  we'll start our Christmas holidays very soon!

Guess what? Yesterday while I was helping my mum tidying up our attic, I found my old console games, and I noticed that they were almost all about Spiderman! So, I'm here today to talk about my childhood hero, aka Peter Parker!

ENGINES FOR THE FUTURE

One of the most important problems in the world is air pollution. Industrial  production, transports and many human activities essential to welfare and survival pollute our planet. So we need to find new ways to produce things and to travel.

In this article I’m focusing on the automotive industry and what it’s been invented to reduce emissions.

THE 5 MOST BIZARRE CHRISTMAS TRADITIONS IN THE WORLD

Christmas is almost here, dear friends of Let's Blog! Are you ready to celebrate with us? Here our first article in the festive mood. I hope you'll like it! 

ADELE, MY FAVOURITE SINGER

Today I want to tell you about one of my favourite singers, Adele. I love her for her amazing voice and her ability to turn her intimate experiences into songs.

JAMES HARDEN, YOU'VE GOT TO FIND WAYS TO BE BETTER

As a superfan of basketball, this month my post is about one of my favourite basketball players. Ready to discover more about him?

STORY WRITING - RAVENOUS

Hello guys! This month  I’d like to share with you a story I’ve had some fun writing. Let me know what you think!

Yuri

I’ve always wondered if there’s a God, if there’s someone out there who watches us, who guards us. Even now, I haven’t found an answer yet. The universe is huge, enormous, full of different planets and populations, too big for a human-being with a limited mind like me to comprehend. Yeah. Far too big. But if there’s something that I can comprehend is that my people, my species, we, are different. Different from each other. Or, at least, from the majority of them.

POSE: ART AS ACTIVISM

Hi guys I’m back! Today I wanna talk to you about my top 3 characters from my favorite tv series! Its title is “Pose”

Have you ever heard about it?

THE ARGONAUTS AND THE GOLDEN FLEECE

This month I'd like to share with all of you one of the myths and legends I'm fascinated by, especially because it is connected to one of the constellations, Carina, and its origin. Are you ready for an incredible adventure?

ANXIETY

Have you ever had a panic attack?

Breathing very deeply and quick, like there’s not enough air to breathe; the focus narrows; you’re feeling a tingling in your body; you’re sweating.

This is what someone with a panic attack feels like. The panic attack is a form of the most common mental illness: anxiety. 

OLIVIA MEARS

WHO IS OLIVIA MEARS?

Olivia Mears is an American woman who at the age of 26 decided to turn her passion into a real job. She creates dreamy dresses, beautiful clothes, reproduces characters that are not often seen and even invents them. Thanks to her inventiveness she has become viral on the web.

I'M FOND OF VOLLEYBALL

                  

I love volleyball, it’s my favourite sport and the one I’ve been practicing since I was a child. Did you know that volleyball was invented by William Morgan, an American gym teacher, in 1895? It is a team sport. There are six players, and every player has a position:

• Outside Hitter (also called wing spiker, left side)
• Opposite Hitter (attacker)
• Setter
• Middle Blocker (center, middle Hitter)
• Libero
• Defensive Specialist
  

5 OF THE SCARIEST AUDIO RECORDINGS. BRACE YOURSELVES!

 

WHAT IS AN AUDIO RECORDING?

An audio recording is an electrical, digital or mechanical process that allows the acquisition of sound waves, such as the human voice, singing, or sound effects.

In this article I want to talk about 5 of the scariest audio recordings. 5 audio recordings of radio interference, interceptions from space and calls from 51 area ex-employees. They are among the most disturbing and mysterious audio recordings ever captured after the invention of the first phonograph in 1876. So turn off the lights and turn up the volume.

JOKER AND MARY SHELLEY’S CREATURE: THE GENESIS OF A MONSTER

“For my whole life, I didn't know if I even really existed. But I do, and people are starting to notice.”

                                                                              - Arthur Fleck (Joker), from the movie Joker, 2019

MARIA HAS SOMETHING TO SAY ABOUT SIMON SINEK'S VIDEO ON MILLENNIALS

Who are the Millennials?

Millennials are people who were born from 1984 on, so I am a millennial and since I’m a part of them I’m going to refer to millennials using we.

So basically we are accused of being narcissistic, unfocused, self-interested, tough to manage, lazy and entitled. The last one means that we claim something without even working to get it.

All those adjectives describes only a part of us because we aren’t all equal. Maybe the majority of millennials recognize themselves in those definitions but it’s wrong to say that we are all like that, it’s not good to generalize.

TEENS & DRUGS

Hi guys! Welcome back to our blog. How are you? I'm Giacomo, and today I would like to write about an important issue, especially for us teenager.

We're in a very, very strange phase of our life, and it's impossible to not get in touch with new things: sometimes, for a variety of reasons, we happen to get in touch with a new world, but it's a very dangerous one: drugs. 

QUEEN ELIZABETH II SAID STOP TO REAL FUR

The Queen has recently decided to move on with the times and to stop buying clothes made of real fur replacing them with ones made only of fake fur.

CYBERBULLYING AND INTERNET SAFETY

Cyberbullying is an unfortunate widespread phenomenon among teens. It’s a new form of bullying: bullying online, especially on social media.

The bullies hide behind a fake username so they feel invincible and the insult the weakest using strong and impolite words.

I KNOW A FEW THINGS ABOUT DION

HAVE YOU SEEN RAISING DION ?

Can you imagine being a child with powers who can save lives without even moving? Would you want to defend people, or would you think only about yourself? What would the people you love do to  protect you?

ANIME (アニメ)

Hi guys! Welcome back to our blog! Today I’d like  to talk about anime as I am a real fan of everything Japanese. But what are anime? Are they just cartoons for children?

THE SEVEN WONDERS OF THE WORLD

The world is full of amazing places, cities and also old building that are very important tourist attraction but seven of  them  are considered the most beautiful in the world. In 2000 a Suisse society called “New Open World Corporation” organized an online survey to choose the most beautiful seven places in the world. About 90 million of people parteciped in the competition. The list of  wonders isn’t approved by UNESCO but the competition was successful and in 2004 NOWC got results and in 2007 the list was completed.

What are the seven world wonders?

EXSTRINSIC VS INTRINSIC GOALS

There are people who work hard to archieve something they've always wanted to get, thinking about the goal itself and so being focused just on the prize they would get in the end. Those goals are called extrinsic, and they're usually connected with narcisism, individualism and also depression. People having those goals are often people with denied choices or people under pressure who are trying to escape from their condition.

DREAMS

 

                                        

“We are such stuff as dreams are made on”

(The Tempest by  William Shakespeare)

Humans have always seen dreams as mystical or as some kind of window into our deeper selves. They’ve reportedly inspired great literature like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, scientific breakthroughs like the arrangement of the periodic table of elements, hits like the Rolling Stones’ “( I can’t get no) satisfaction” and art like Salvador Dalì’s  painting “Dream caused by the flight of a bee around a pomegranate a second before waking”.

FIVE REASONS WHY THOR IS THE STRONGEST AVENGER

Thor Odinson is one of the most important members and one of the founders of the Earth's mightest heroes team, the Avengers.

He is the prince of Asgard, the most powerful of the nine realms, he's the God of Thunder and one of the strongest characters of the Marvel Universe.

Here are the five reasons why he if  the strongest of his team.

TEEN HEROES: MALALA YOUSAFZAI

Hi everyone, welcome back to our blog! I'm Giorgia R. and today I would like to talk about Malala Yousafzai, a female education activist who stood up to the Talibans, survived an assassination attempt and became the youngest  person ever to win a Nobel Peace Prize.

But What about her life? What did she do to make a change in the world?

Malala was born in the Swat  region of Pakistan, where she grew up. Her  parents were determined to give her every opportunity a son would have, starting with an  EDUCATION.  But then, in 2007, Swat Valley, one of Pakistan’s most beautiful regions, was taken over by the Talibans. Life under the Talibans was difficult and women were discouraged from getting an education.  Malala’s father, an educator who ran a number of private schools for girls, attempted to educate girls under the radar.  Later the Talibans officially banned girls from going to school. In  2009 Malala started  blogging for the BBC under a pen-name, chronicling her life under  the Taliban  regime.  The  New York Times made a short documentary about  her and  she publicy campaigned  for girls  to go to school. But this put  Malala in the limelight sparking the Talibans to target her.  In 2012 she was shot in the head and shoulder.

MARVEL’S THE AVENGERS

Who are the Avengers?

The Avengers are superheroes belonging to the Marvel universe. They are a team of extraordinary individuals, with superpowers and special characteristics. Their purpose is to protect global stability from inner or extraterrestrial threats. Though primarily affiliated with the United States of America, they work  with the peaceful interests of the whole world rather than a specific country or organization. 

WHY I LIKE PROG METAL MORE THAN OTHER KINDS OF MUSIC

Hi everyone, my name’s Francesco C. and I’m fond of prog metal. So I’d like to tell you the reasons why I like this kind of music  and why you should start listening to it.

  

Prog metal and prog metal famous bands

  

 Prog metal (short for progressive metal ) is a metal subgenre  born at the end of the ‘80s. This genre  includes songs and albums very different from other subgenres of metal rock. Bands which can’t be classified in any other subgenre of metal are progressive bands, but anyway they have some similar features:

- The extreme complexity of the songs,  which makes the members of those groups being very good. They’ve been studying their musical instrument for a long of time

- Songs generally can last from 4 minutes to more than 30 minutes, which is more than the average.

- Prog is influenced by lots of other kinds of music, such as jazz, classical and other subgenres of metal.    Songs are usually in odd-time signature

INTERSTELLAR: MANKIND'S NEXT STEP WILL BE OUR GREATEST

“Mankind was born on Earth. It was never meant to die here.”

The movie

Interstellar is a 2014 American science fiction film written and direct by Christopher Nolan. It stars Matthew McConaughey as Joseph Cooper, Anne Hathaway as Amelia Brand, Jessica Chastain as Murphy Cooper, Bill Irwin as TARS (voice and puppetry) and CASE (puppetry), Ellen Burstyn as old Murphy and Michael Caine as Professor Brand.

Interstellar has some of the most beautiful images of  the space. The space is vast and the depiction of a wormhole accomplishes amazement especially to science fiction space. The black hole is even more amazing and it is a recurrent image throughout the movie. It’s in these lingering shots of a tiny spacecraft floating through the galaxy that we can recognize the influence of Kubrick’s space Odyssey. 

Interstellar include complex but fascinating theories referring to Physics,  thanks to a scientific consultant,  Kip Thorne, who also wrote a book where he explains all the Physics in the film (The Science of Interstellar).

TOP 10 NATURE’S BEAUTIES

Hello everyone! Nothing can amaze and astonish us as much as the extraordinary beauty of Nature. Do you agree with me? Have a look at these places and let me know in your comments. 

Charamel’ s falls

In the Pacific Oceans, there is a wonderful optical illusion. In the Mauritius Islands, it seems that the abyss crumbles and creates these incoparable underwater falls.

TRICK OR TREAT? HAPPY HALLOWEEN, EVERYONE!

Next post on Monday, 4th November. Till then, have a terrific time! 

IS IT POSSIBLE TO LIVE NEAR A BLACK HOLE?

If you have seen the renowned film "Interstellar", you probably remember the  protagonists leaving the earth in search for an inhabitable planet near a super massive black hole, but you must know there’s a major mistake in all that.  

 A  research directed by NASA astrophysicist, Jeremy Schnittman,  explains it. In his work Schinttman analyses the probability to find an inhabitable planet at  the right distance from the black hole, in the livable area , heated by the accretion disk . Would you like to know what the mistake in the movie is? You can’t live near a black hole because of the light. What does that mean? The light  I refer to is the light that comes from the surrounding stars . To understand it,  we have to imagine the  gravitational , and in general physical  effects caused by this massive object. First of all the different passing of time. According to Einstein's  relativity , when you are close to an object with a huge mass, the time flows faster . Few hours near the black hole are many years in interstellar space. The second one is the reason why you are reading this article ....  charged particles accelerated by the gravity.

THE LEGEND OF PERCIVAL

Arthur Hacker, Percival with the Grail Cup

Every country, every nation has its own legends and ancient tales and the UK, of course, it’s not an exception.  The Matter of Britain is their legendary epic.

The legend of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table is not only a worldwide known tale, but also an important part of English literary  heritage. I’d like to talk about one of the most prominent characters of the legend, Sir Percival, in a sort of short story. But, before we start, it’s important to note that there isn’t a single version of the story of Percival. There are lots of them  and they are also contrasting, so, to create a story as coherent and enjoyable as possible, I will use as a basis the story narrated in Perceval, the Story of the Grail, by Chrétienne de Troyes, adding to it, at the same time, some elements from other stories, mainly Parzival by Wolfram von Eschenbach and Le Morte d'Arthur by Sir Thomas Malory.

And now, let’s start.

THE DARK SIDE OF FOOTBALL

Every sport has its legends, icons and a dark side that people don’t know. Kobe Bryant and Michael Jordan are famous basket players, Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic are tennis legends. Soccer has its own icons too,  like Cristiano Ronaldo or Leo Messi, but all of these sports have a hidden side that are not as popular as their bright side. We think that the life of a football player is easy: stellar salaries, Ferraris, big houses and expensive holidays and many of us think that they are heroes or aliens.

SABATON: THE LAST STAND OF METAL ROCK

Hello everybody I’m Francesco and today I will tell you about one of my favourite albums in the metal music world: “The last stand” by  Swedish band  Sabaton.

This album is about famous last stands in history; a last stand is for definition a battle where a small defensive force holds apposition against a much more powerful attacking force.

There are ten songs in this album, and I would like to talk about each one of them.

The first one is “Sparta”; it’s about the battle at the Hot Gates (“Thermopylae” in English and “Thermopylon” in ancient Greek). In this last stand there were about 5, 000 Greek hoplites led by king Leonidas of Sparta and his 300 Spartans against 500,000 Persians of Xerxes I. It took place in August 480 b.C. and lasted three days. The Greeks fought bravely but a traitor called Ephialtes showed to the Persians a way back to defenders. A lot of Greeks retreated covered by Leonidas and his 300 men, who fought until they were killed by the Persian horde.

TEEN HEROES - JAZZ JENNINGS

Hi guys, we all know that to be free and happy we have to be ourselves but for someone it’s not always that easy! Because for somebody being him/herself can mean to go against society.

This is the case of Jazz Jennings a young transsexual woman.

I’m going to use only female pronouns even when telling you about when she was a biologiacal man because in my opinion you can be whatever you feel even if it doesn’t match the gender you were born!!!

She was born on the 6th of October 2000 in south Florida and when she was about five years old she already knew she was a girl and not a boy so she told  her family that she was a transgender girl and luckily they always supported her. We all know that families do not always accept and support that kind of things but fortunately she was born in a family with open-minded opinions and that’s very rare for a Florida family, because that’s a state known to be a conservative one.

MY TOP 5 FAVOURITE ED SHEERAN SONGS

5. GIVE ME LOVE

This song dates back to six years ago and is about necessary love,  which one cannot live without. In the lyrics Ed tells us that love has no limits and that it’s one of the few things that makes us complete. He makes us aware of the fact that love is a beautiful thing that can save us. In the video there’s a disappointed and wounded girl who turns into an angel of love, who with her arrows hits people and makes them fall in love. Love can save us but sometimes it can also hurts us.

I LOVE MANGA!

Useless to say I’m fond of Manga, that’s why I decided to start writing my first post for Let’s Blog! about them. Is there anybody there with the same passion for Japanese manga? I hope you’ll get in touch in the comment section, then.

LIONEL MESSI: BELIEVE IN YOURSELF, NO MATTER WHAT

Hi guys! Welcome back to our blog! How are you? I'm fine, I'm ready for this new year and, to be honest, I missed all of this. I can't wait to create new contents for our blog during all this year, and to support all of my  blog mates. We are a team, guys, aren't we? For this new October’s post, I decided to talk about one of the best footballers ever: last year I wrote about Cristiano Ronaldo, but today I would like to talk about “la Pulga"(his nickname, how Spanish people usually call him during matches), Lionel Messi!

INSATIABLE- SHOULD YOUR APPEARANCE INFLUENCE ALL YOUR LIFE?

What counts the most?  Your appearance or who you really are? Just 7 words: “don’t judge a book by its cover”.

Just a few days ago Netflix released the second season of Insatiable.

Insatiable is a tv series, starring Debby Rayan as main protagonist. It is about Patty (Debby) that is overweight and for this reason she has just one friend while all the others bully her and call her ‘Fatty Patty’. 

7 THINGS YOU DIDN’T KNOW ABOUT THE MOON LANDING

This year it’s 50 years since Neil Armstrong, during the mission Apollo 11, became the first man to walk on the moon. In honor of the 50^th anniversary I decided to list a few pieces of information you might not know about one of the biggest achievement of Mankind.

    1.    Nasa had no idea how to go to the moon

When the president of the USA, John Fitzgerald Kennedy, announced to the world that America would send the first man to the moon by the end of the 60s, Nasa, the American space administration, had no idea how to send a man to the moon. It was something that had never happened before so they weren’t ready at all. Moreover, the training of the astronauts hadn’t started yet and the American engineers didn’t even have the right rocket. After the moon landing an engineer that worked on the mission Apollo 11 proudly said: ”We did the impossible”.

TEEN HEROES - AMIKA GEORGE

Teens…what an interesting species we are! We go from having thousands of “friends” on social medias to break down on why we don’t have many actual friends in real life; from being completely apathetic to cry on puppies’ videos on twitter; from laying down in bed for hours staring at the roof thinking about all the responsibilities we avoided during the day to actually doing something to change the world.

Amika George is an incredible example of what teens are capable of.

SUMMER MAKES PERFECT!

Summer can be the perfect occasion to improve your English! You have more free time and you can use some of it to practise and  improve your English.

These are our plans to improve our English this summer.

"During this summer I'd like to improve my English, but I can't travel abroad, so I'll do it some other way. For example, I'm going to read articles and posts online and to watch videos in English. I'd also like to read books in English. I've never done it but I want to try. "  (Jaco)

BEST FRIENDS OR RIVALS?

Do you remember the Coachella festival? It was at the end of April and during that period many things happened. Among them, a row between two friends who are also two very popular make-up gurus. Was their quarrel real or staged? Read on and make up your mind. 

James Charles and Tati, a friend of his, had a terrible row during the Festival. James Charles is a popular 19-year-old make – up guru in the world, with more than 16 million YouTube followers. Tati is also a make-up guru, she runs a vitamin factory, hair vitamin for hair.

She decided to have a row with James for many reasons, as she explained in a 42- minute video posted on her YouTube channel. The main one is that James has never wanted to sponsor her hair vitamin and during the Coachella he sponsored other hair vitamins. So she felt disappointed and betrayed by her friend.

NASRIN SOTOUDEH: IMPRISONED FOR DEFENDING HUMAN RIGHTS

Imagine still living in a world where defending human lives puts your life at risk. We are still living in that world.

Today I’m going to tell you the story of Nasrin Sotoudeh.

IF I WERE FAMOUS, I'D BE ...

Hello everyone! Here we are again. Today we’d like to talk about something we’ve all dreamt about at least once in our lives: becoming a famous footballer, model, dancer, a VIP. 
Differently from what the majority of people think, to be famous may not always be as easy as it seems. Let’s find out more about what being famous really means.