Four teachers :s

I haven't had too many teachers at the same time in my life. I think this semester was crazy. The organization of the EAP 1 was terrible. The administration of this program offered us a high level course, but I don't think it is the same they promised us at the beginning. I don't understand why they asked us to buy books with subjects that we won't cover at all. If we have to cover the most important things, the books are suppossed to content that and I would have less weight in my bagpack. However, I think everything is important to learn, every detail, especially in english that is not our first language. I think we were a kind of experiment for them without taking care of our neccesities. How it could be possible to start somenthing without the main tools to work. Even though, Scott is an excellent teacher he didn't start with us at first. It would have been much better because we would have been able to finish everything, but now he is leaving and we don't have any hope to learn completly by the same way of teaching. I really feel such I wasted my time and my money except the time Scott was teaching us. I am sure that by the next month I will hear that they bring Michael Jackson to teach us English.

Life's Problems

I think problems are a neccesity in our life because we can learn a lot of things from them. We can prevent some of them by doing good things;however, there are some they cannot be avoid because they were created to make you a better person. Bad things that you did come to you again. In addition, the more difficult the problem is the more satisfaction you obtain at the end when it is over . For example, It is the same taking choices about something because we are get to used to take the easier way all the time, yet in my opinion when you fight for that you get better results because you put your efforts on it. The most difficult things in life are these ones you think you cannot do because you feel scared and you don't trust yourself. I think our mind is the most powerful thing that helps us, but at the same time destroy us. when we are able to face problems and solve them you will feel relieve and more mature, so that the next time it will be easier to handle a similar situation.

My Friends

I would like to talk about my friends because I think they are an important part of my life. I have met a lot of people in my life, but that is really strange because I am not a sociable person. I like to do things by myself, but at the same time I like to share my free time with others. People who are always there to help me and make me feel happy. My friends are that kind of special people who tries to cheer up and smile at me all the time. I have had friends since they started a conversation with me, otherwise I wouldn't have talked to them. I am really glad to have these friends because I have enjoyed a lot being with them any time. We have done many things together, especially with a friend that I met 12 years ago. I met her at school. At first we weren't good friends, actually she didn't like me, but now it is a diffrent story. I also met a japanese girl at the ESL program in Calgary and I really consider her a real friend. I have learned a lot of thing from her and about her culture. Mainly my friends are male, I prefer to have male friends because I haven't had problems with them in contrast to female friends. Female friends always are trying to gossip about personal things. I don't like to hear this things from anybody because it really bugs me. I have never expected to hear bad things from my male friends because it is not common they do it. I grew up with 5 boys maybe for this reason I am used to be with male more than female.

Communication issues

I think speaking in public is a really difficult job because everybody is looking at you so, every time before I have to speak in a presentation I get very nervous like many people in the world, but right away I start speaking I feel more comfortable. I like to see different faces while I am speaking; however, it is sometimes tricky because I lose my concentration on what I am doing. I need to work on my presentation several days before to expose it; otherwise I don't feel secure at the right moment. When I am in the opposite side and I just have to listen and looking at people who is speaking I think I always observe more than listen to them because the first impression come from my eyes. In spite of observing is more entertaining to me I like listening as well.

Rules in my home

I don't have a lot of rules at home. My friends can visit my house any time. It is not necessary call me before to go there because if I am not they can wait for me in the living room. Other people different from my friends I prefer they call me before since I don't know whether I feel in a mood to talk to them that day. I expect to receive phone calls on wise hours otherwise I don't take them except for an emergency.

The only places in my house that I consider private are my bedroom and bathroom. I don't like anybody stay there without authorization. I think is a cultural opinion to keep these places as private because in my culture the majority of people don’t like to share their personal stuff and we think these are our own spaces.

The Canadian culture has some different rules than us about welcoming people into their homes. For instance, they have to take off their shoes before to come in to their houses, but in my country it is not necessary. In addition, they receive a previous appointment to meet there; their visits are quite short in contrast to ours. It is common to say “help yourself” to someone who visits a Canadian home however; in my country it sounds not nice because we have to attend our guests in everything.

Canadians as same as us they like to receive phone calls in available hours for them because it is not comfortable to hang up the telephone at 3:00 in the morning for asking to go to our homes. Another similarity it is about to go through bedrooms and bathrooms without any authorization because it is very rude. Everybody is welcome in my home as long as they respect it.

Colors

In my opinion, the colors reflect people's emotions. The colors like blue, yellow and red are very remarkable and they make feel energetic, but at the same time make me headache because these colors are strong to see them. Instead, the colors black, white and green reflect tranquility to me. I prefer to wear clothes with the colors in the last category and using the colors blue, yellow and red for decorating or painting something. The blue color reminds me the sky. The yellow one means hope and the red passion. The black is a mistery or strength. The white is really nice because it gives me tranquility and the green color reminds me the American dollar.

My host mother thinks that the colors white and red are the best because they are on the Canada's flag; they mean the union between France and England when the cross took place. The color yellow is typical for the linseed that grows up in Canada and the blue one means ocean to her. The black color is night and the green is mountain.

I have learned that everyone has different culture; therefore, different thoughts about the meaning of something. Some opinions sound crazy when I don't think the same as other people but the most important is learning by new experiences and different reasons.

EAP

I really want to study English to communicate with other people around the world and to do a master degree at the U of C. I dreamed with being a lawyer since I was a child that is why I majored in law so, I would like to work as an international lawyer and I will need to communicate in English.

I like English as a second language, but it sometimes is difficult to learn because it has some words that they do not make sense to me, especially if I try to translate to my first language. I know it doesn't help me to learn English because I have to think in English. On the other hand, learning the present progressive always result to be easier than any other thing to learn it. Anyway I will keep learning it and trying to get better skills such as listening. I will push myself to watch more TV programs and to read books.

At first I signed up to study English in the ESL program and I made several friends there. I think the most difficult thing while you are studying in a college is making friends but I do not seem to have problems with it. On the contrary I made good friends in my last course and I used to do activities that I enjoy like going out with my friends, dancing, jogging and working out.