Talking point: Superstitions

Today's talking point is superstitions. Before getting together with the members of your conversation group, go over the questions below, so that ideas flow more easily when you hold the discussion sessions and you can work out vocabulary problems beforehand.

Look at the pictures. What do these situations suggest to you?

Do you follow any special rituals when:
• you are about to take an exam? 
• you are travelling by train or car? 
• you are playing or watching a sport?
• you are choosing an important number (e.g. a lottery number)?
• someone wishes you good luck or mentions something unlucky?

Do you regard yourself as lucky or unlucky? For example, do you often win competitions or are you accident prone?
Some people say you 'make your own luck'. Others say you are 'born lucky’. What do you think?

Some experts say that luck does exist and ‘our attitude to life is the key'. How far do you agree? Think of your own experience.
What advice would you give to someone who complains that they ‘never have any luck’?

Have you ever consulted a fortune teller, palmist, etc.?
Do you read your horoscope regularly?
Have you got a lucky number?
Are you bothered by the number 13?
Have you ever thrown a coin into a wishing well?
Have you ever made a decision after tossing a coin?
Is there any particular day of the week which is lucky or unlucky for you?
Is there any particular piece of clothing which is lucky or unlucky for you?
Have you ever changed your plans because of a dream?
Have you got any kind of talisman or lucky object/charm?
Do you know any jinxes?
Do you know funny superstitions from around the world?

To gain further insight into the topic, you can read this BBC article on superstitions in sports.

Speakout Advanced: Inspiration

This is the last but one episode of our Speakout series, the video podcasts from Pearson Longman. Today's topic is inspiration, which deals with the role of creativity and art in our lives.

Passers-by are asked the questions below:

Do you do anything creative in your life?
Is there anything or anyone that really inspires you?
In what ways do the arts influence your life?



Now it's over to you. Answer the questions above about yourself. Try and use some of the expressions you heard on the video.

You can read the transcript here.

Cambridge illegal parking, cheaper for shoppers

Shoppers in Cambridge city centre are finding it cheaper to park illegally and pay a fine rather than use an official car park.

Self-study activity:
Watch this BBC news item by clicking on the picture below or on the BBC link and answer the questions below about it.

The activity is suitable for intermediate 1 and intermediate 2 students.

1 How much is the fine if you are caught parking illegally on the street?
2 How much does parking cost at the Grand Arcade multi-storey car park?
3 Who decides the prices?
4 Who do shop owners want to park in the car park?
5 How many parking spaces are there available?
6 How does the first woman interviewed usually get around in Cambridge? Why?

To check your answers, you can read the transcript below.

For a motorist, a heart-sinking moment, a parking ticket on your windscreen. But if you come to shop here in Cambridge and park in this multi-storey on a Saturday, paying a fine could be the cheaper option.
Get caught overstaying in a meter and the fine is £25 if you pay it soon enough. Nine to five at the Grand Arcade though is £26 and then they’ll charge an extra pound for every hour after that.
The city council set the parking prices here. They are high on purpose, they say.
The main driver, for the very high all day charge is we don’t want them to be parked all days, so if the car park is filled up with tourists and commuters then there will be spaces denied to shoppers, and the retailers don’t want that.
Just over 950 spaces here generate more than £9 million, the profits helping to pay other council’s services. But shoppers today were unimpressed.
I try to bike into Cambridge as much as possible because I live in the city purely on the basis because car parking is so expensive, …and that’s actually probably what I think they want me to do. But the reality is that when you have two children and that can be rather more problematic than they might appreciate.
Park outside and get a parking ticket? It’s ridiculous.
I think it’s a lot of money. I’m just visiting Cambridge today, and we’ve only been here a few hours. We’ve enjoyed the day but it’s a lot of money.
If the prices rise even further here, some motorists may even opt for a fine on the streets outside instead.

Doping to win

"Can't tell your peptides from your steroids? Not sure how EPO improves stamina?" Catalyst, a programme from ABC, Australia's public broadcaster, investigates the substances at the forefront of the sports doping controversy and asks whether we are all potential candidates for life enhancing drugs in an eighteen-minute documentary.



You can read the transcript here.
You can download the programme here.

H/T to The Prop Room.

Expat blogs on Spain

In late June this year, Barry O'Leary, the man behind Teaching English in a Foreign Land, made a selection of the best expat blogs about Spain.

It's funny to see how foreigners view your country and your customs. Only for this reason, Barry's list is worth checking out, especially if you are a Spanish learner of English. An added bonus of dropping by any of the blogs on the list is that Spaniards will find the English counterpart for a number of Spanish expressions and words that have a difficult translation into English.

The comments on the blogs below are Barry's, and I have added only a few of the blogs he suggests. Drop by Barry's blog for a full list and for keeping abreast of the latest news of Barry's life in Spain and his round-the-world trips.

Spain Expat is a website and covers loads of topics. Have a look for a great forum, business, finance, language, legal, lifestyle, moving, working, and technology. An amazing resource and a great way to get in touch with other expats.

The Spain Scoop is well worth a visit for expat information on Madrid, Seville, Bilbao, Santiago and the Balearic islands. The Spain Scoop is written by several expat experts and they cover issues such as travel, food, museums, transport, festivals and entertainment.

Spanish Sabores has a mountain of information about Spain, travel, recipes, teaching English, and expat stories.

Sunshine and Siestas is a cool blog about life through the eyes of a Chicago girl, Cat, who lives in Seville. She covers issues on travel, food, teaching, and she has some great photos.

Piccavey is a useful blog. Written by an expat living in Granada who covers issues on travel, tapas, Andalucia, flamenco, and life as an expat.

Christine in Spain is a great blog about expat life, the Basque Country, food, and world travel.

BCN blog is all about Barcelona. A great blog full of posts about sport, music, festivals, food and drink, exhibitions, hotels and business.

New York's City Bike Share

New York's bike-share programme seems to be encountering some difficulties, as this New York Times video demonstrates.

Self-study activity:
Watch the video and say whether the statements below are true or false.

The activity is suitable for Intermediate 2 students.



1 Everybody is happy with the bike-share programme.
2 The programme has been running for two years now.
3 A user (Ivan Baker) says that he's having problems 40% or 50% he tries to get a bike.
4 Some of the problems seems to have to do with vandalism.
5 The instructions to borrow a bike are clear.
6 New Yorkers make more than 170,000 bike trips annually.
7 New Yorkers have a reputation for being patient.


It could be better if it works then I’d be on the bike now but…
Yeah, it doesn’t seem to work, maybe we have to find another station.
It’s been a rough road so far for New York City’s ambitious bike-share programme.
We’ve basically imported Europe’s most boring idea.
The programme started two weeks ago with the installation of 6,000 shiny blue bikes across more than 300 stations in New York City. But on Wednesday, a multi-bike trip from Brooklyn into mid-town Manhattan, with several stops at stations along the way, revealed some of the problems that have bedevilled riders and led to a flurry of complaints about a system some say was not ready for prime time.
It’s been my experience 40%, 50% some times on bad days don’t report that the bike has been returned or I can’t get a bike out. And it’s just not taking my card, before I had no problem at all, and I’ve been using it all around in Brooklyn, and yeah it looks like I’ll have to go to another station.
Just across the Brooklyn Bridge at City Hall. One of the city’s bike fixers was busy resetting the entire rack. Although almost every bike was fine someone had pushed every button signaling the need for repair.
I don’t know who is malicious. It could’ve been.
Soon after the station’s first customer arrived.
We are from Sweden, we arrived last Saturday and we’re going to be here for a week. We think like taking a bike for a tourist is really nice.
But things didn’t go as hoped.
Yeah, [it] doesn’t seem to work, maybe we have to find another station.
Just up the street at Hudson and Reed bike-share, users were greeted with the blank screen. The entire station, it seemed, was without power. The bike-share I-phone app directed users to the same station, suggesting everything was just fine. Of course, despite these problems, the systems seem to work fine for many.
It’s a…but it was flawless… I loved it.
It’s been acceptable for me. I haven’t had any problems with bad kiosks or those sort of things so far.
Others just found it confusing.
Did it give me the code for the bike that I was supposed to get, or did it me give the code that I have to enter somewhere, or do I dip my card.
So far the City says more than 170,000 trips have been taken with annual memberships surpassing 36,000
I look at this as a big quality of life enhancer, yeah.
The biggest problem encountered on this day was at Grand Central Station. One of the system’s largest which was entirely shut down.
I’ve had two trips already where I was charged 45 hours because I thought it had taken and then someone took it out, and took it around for two days. They cleared the charge but it’s crazy, all these stations are down.
The bike-share programme is clearly going through growing pains and city officials, who would not go on camera said in an email statement that this was an adjustment period. New Yorkers, for the most part, seem enthusiastic, and while not always the most patient people in the world, seem willing for now to give the programme a chance.
I don’t want to think like this is a terrible programme. It’s the best thing I think has happened to the city and I’ve been living here for thirty years.
This is Erik Olsen reporting for The New York Times.

Key:
1F 2F 3T 4T 5F 6F 7F

Family share

This video was created by Family Share to honour fathers on Father's Day this year. The celebration is long past, but it's a nice video to watch.

Self-study activity:
Watch the video and complete the blanks in the transcript with the missing words.

The activity is suitable for Básico 2 and Intermediate 1 students.




Ever (1) ... in the moment your balloon came back.
Or why you like to (2) ... with your hands?
Or why your friends always came and played at your house?
Ever (3) ... how vacations are made?
Why the night monsters never came back?
Or why you and the (4) ... always had the same name.
Ever appreciate how happy your dad could be when he (5) ... into the house.
How goofiness can ease the tension.
Or the non-stop battle he fights between (6) ... his family and (6) ... his family.
Because this Father’s Day if you really look around you just might.
You might appreciate where your (7) ... came from.
Might (3) ... on the dreams of those before
You might (1) ... that being the bad (8) ... is sometimes a very hard job.
You may even discover the ultimate (9) ... in his eyes, then you’ve learned for yourself.

Key:
1 notice 2 work 3 wonder 4 princess 5 walked 6 supporting  7 passions 8 guy 9 pride