The amateurs (a small essay) Many people today mean by word 'amateur' something that has been done on the not professional level. Apparently this word became the opposite of the 'quality'. It's curious to know that actually the origin of the word 'amateur' rises from the latin word meaning 'to love'. The history and the present show us many examples of the amateurs who reached a significant success in the business. They were driven by love of the subject or the field they worked in. The morden example of how the amateurs become a multi-millionaires are those who we called 'nerds', people who are really love technology and computing . They would be doing their work even they never be paid for that. This is the main difference between them and those who just want to take advantage of the burst of the Internet and make quick money. Other example of the success amateurs are workers in the organic food sector. They started with running a small home-made production and raised till almost the global market without betraying the principles of their work. So is it real to gain one's living or even reach a big success doing what you really passionate about? I think we have enough proves to try it at least.

Difference between English and Spanish phonological systems The fact that English and Spanish language use the Roman alphabet makes many learners believe that the same symbol used in two languages transmit an identical sound. Although there are some similar phonemes, these two phonological systems have lots of differences. First difficulty which find Spanish learners of English is that the written and spoken language are very different things. There is a lack of correspondence between spelling and pronunciation, while in Spanish the pronunciation of words is directly represented by their written form. The number of sounds of these two languages is also different. There are 12 vowels in English and just 5 ones in Spanish. In last one there is no front-back opposition, no central vowels. It means that for native Spanish speakers the phoneme /ɑː/, /æ/ and /ʌ/ are perceived as Spanish /a/. The number of consonants is also different: 24 consonant phonemes in English and 20 ones in Spanish. Moreover, consonant sequences which are very common in English, for Spanish speakers present some complexity as the only consonant sequences which occur in their language are initial stop (/p/,/t/,/k/,/b/,/d/ and /g/) or /f/+/r/ or /l/. Apart from the fact that English phonological system has more vowels, their length is important: still - steal, will - wheel, sin - seen. This words are minimal pairs with the differnce in one sound: /i/ - /i:/. In Spanish there is no distinction between long and short vowels, so there is a tendency to pronounce all these words identifically. Another very important point which makes the speech in any language sound natural is a rhythm. English is a stress-timed language. It means that some words in the sentence are emphasized by extra effort: one of the syllables of the word are stressed. Stress syllables forms rhythm units. Other syllables in the sentence are unstressed. They are very short and are said very quickly, so they don’t influent to the length of the unit, in that way every unit has approximately the same length. Spanish is a syllable-timed language, where each syllable has approximately the same length. Weak syllables influence to the length of the sentence the same way as the stress ones. For this reason Spanish learners of English tend to transfer their native rhythm to English. Special attention should be given to learning of this issue, as well as to pronounce in the right way unstressed syllables, which don’t occur in Spanish.

About phonetic and pronunciation During the process of the second language/foreign language acquisition learners encounter different types of problems. Between them, one of the most challenging issue is a pronunciation. It could cause more or less difficulty depending on the student’s native language and the target one, as every language has their own set of sounds which could be similar to the ones of another language’s set or completely different. For being successful in any foreign language learners should pay enough attention to the correct pronunciation. It not only makes the speech sound more natural, but also helps to avoid misunderstanding in cases when the meaning of word could be changed because of inaccurate pronunciation. English pronunciation seems difficult for many foreign learners. Spanish learners are not an exception and they have a serie of specific problems due to the different characteristics of the phonological systems of this two languages.

Language exchange Hello! I would like to do a language exchange: I need to improve my English level and I could teach you Russian or Spanish instead.

¡Escucha mejor música en directo! ¡Hola a todos! Estoy preparando la parte de escritura para el examen. Tuve que escribir un comentario a un foro sobre musica para animar a los usuarios del foro a escuchar el programa. Muchas gracias de antemano por corrigirme. ¡Escucha mejor música en directo! Ya sé que voy a hacer el próximo sábado de 17:00 a 19:00: voy a escuchar “Un Lugar Llamado Mundo”. Esto es un programa presentada por Javier Limón – una figura muy conocida en el mundo de música y no sólo en ello (o no sólo allí). En este programa cada vez tienen nuevos invitados del mundo de cine, música o deporte, y nosotros los oyentes podemos elegir el tema de su entrevista, mientras disfruta la mejor música del mundo en directo. Es el un modo ideal para estar al corriente de todas las novedades musicales nacionales e internacionales. El locutor es una estrella de la música flamenco y Jazz Latino. Es el profesional en su área, el músico, compositor, productor y, además, una persona con una vista de la vida muy interesante y positiva. Si quieres escuchar más de mejor música y saber más de la vida y de las preferencias musicales de las personas más interesantes, bienvenido a Un Lugar Llamado Mundo.

Encierro Hola! Estoy preparando la parte de escritura para DELE. Aquí voy a publicar mis textos y espero vuestra ayuda, chicos! ¡¡Muchas gracias!! He añadido la hója con la tarea para que sea claro sobre que he escrito. Encierro Cada año las fiestas populares de distintos países atraen una gran cantidad de la gente. Esas fiestas son siempre espectaculares, pero en el mismo tiempo podrían ser muy peligrosos. Ayer asistí al estreno de un documental sobre una famosa fiesta española, que se llama encierro de Pamplona. En esta película enseñan qué pasa en esta fiesta, qué motiva a gente correr con los toros por las calles estrechas de Pamplona y qué consecuencias causa esta diversión peligrosa. Las escenas violentas impresionaron mucho al público que asistió en el cine. Creo que a unas personas les da cuenta por la primera vez cómo es esta fiesta en realidad y qué es el otro lado de ella. Me resultó importante realizar y enseñar a la gente los documentales sobre los eventos violentos como esto. Pero, a distinción del punto de visto del director del documental no veo ninguna belleza en esta fiesta. En contrario, me la parece una locura, muy violente en respeto tanto a la gente, como a los animales. Aunque estimo las tradiciones de cada país, no asistiría este acontecimiento.