Pronunciation Diary 2

My second blog post about pronunciation is more specific than my first one because I already knew what my mistakes were. When I read my pronunciation feedback I was not surprised to find out that my unvoiced “th” was not perfect yet because I had never given it special attention. So I checked the pronunciation page to find videos or texts about the “th”. I was lucky to find enough information online and also asked my peer Natascha for help because she is very good when it comes to pronunciation. From Rachel's English I knew what I should do but I was not sure if I did it right. So I asked Natascha if my threes sounded any better now. She was very nice and always told me when it sounded right and when I still had to change something. So when I knew how it basically works, I practiced on my own whenever nobody could hear me, like for example on my way home or in the shower. ;) I know that my “th” is not perfect yet and it still does not feel completely natural. I always have to think about it and when I do not pay attention I tend to just ignore it and pronounce the unvoiced “th” like “f”. However, I will try to be more aware of the unvoiced “th” whenever I speak and hope that I will sometime be able to do it like a native speaker.

Studying Vocabulary

In this blog I will explain how I study my vocabulary and what works for me and what does not. As we had to study the Porter words this semester, I will focus on how I studied those. To begin with, I do the exercises in the Porter book. Even though some of the exercises are very doable, there always are many words that I do not know or do not know well enough. These words I write on the Vocabulary sheet included in the book. When I am done with that I check all the words on my Vocabulary sheet online to get a quick overview what they all mean. Then I start studying the vocabulary list on “vocabulary.com”. I have really come to like this website during the course of this semester. I does not only include very useful definitions and example sentences but you can also listen to the pronunciation of the words, which is very useful for PC2. For pronunciation the listening and spelling question part is especially great. On this level you have to read through the definition of the word but without the word and you should guess what is meant by the definition. If you do not know what it is, you can listen to the word and then spell it. This level is very helpful for me because I can easily check if I would have pronounced the word the same way. While studying the vocabulary list I write down all the words that are especially hard for me.

When I am done studying the list because I have mastered it I read through my “difficult words” again and check if I know how to define, explain and use them now. Then I study the ones that I still do not know again. This basically is how I study my vocabulary. For the last PC, this precess worked very well. I hope it will work for this one as well.

Pecha Kucha Experience

The Pecha Kucha project proved to be very interesting and fun in the end. At first I was not so sure about my topic but the more I got into it, the more interesting it seemed and the more motivated I got. Working with my partner, Natascha, was great as usual and I think we both enjoyed it. Starting the research and coming up with a good structure was pretty hard in the beginning. We were not sure what to include in our presentation and getting information out of Hendrik was very hard but that was probably the case because we asked the wrong questions. ;) However, after that one session in class when Frank talked to us and proposed that we could do our presentation in a more lively way, everything turned out fine. We really enjoyed making up dialogues and had very much fun imagining how the audience would react. Practicing and recording out Pecha Kucha took us longer than we expected because the Welsh words were very difficult to pronounce and we made mistakes or started to laugh again and again. In the end we managed and came up with a quite good recording, at least in my opinion. Then for our big day we did not have to practice much because we had gone through it so often when trying to record it but I was a bit nervous because our presentation was so different from all the other ones. But everything turned our fine and I actually had fun presenting our Pecha Kucha.

Pronunciation Diary 1

To start my pronunciation practice, I tried to do Rachel's exercises. I picked a Youtube video I liked and took a sequence out of that. I start at 2:00 in this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eobsfjFOqNk

With this half sentence I tried to do the Ben Franklin method and wrote down everything I could hear. I am not sure if my notes are clear for everyone but they make sense to me.

 

When I was done with that, I tried to repeat the piece of language myself and then recorded myself doing that. I think that the speaker, Jona Weinhofen, has a very nice English, even though is is hard to imitate.

I then tried to upload my recording to soundcloud and put the link here but unfortunately something did not work. I hope I will figure out how it works soon.

Culture Days!

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So here goes my post about our presentations today and yesterday. Yesterday started very nice. It was cool and quiet in the room “Rosegger” and I didn't even want to leave because the temperature was so much nicer than outside.

1. The first presentation I watched was Kathie Bölsche's. Her topic was American High Schools. It was very nice that she could give us some first-hand insight in American high schools as she went to one for nine months when she was in America. I also liked that she included the Austrian and German stereotypes about America's education system. This way we were forced to rethink our opinions and really think about what she said.
2. After that it was Manuela's turn and she talked about Reality TV, in particular Big Brother and Jersey Shore. I really liked her presentation even though I don't watch reality TV at all. I don't even have a TV at home. Maybe that was the reason why I liked the presentation so much. It is something I am normally not confronted with and it was great fun to get a glimpse at these strange people doing stupid things on TV. The one thing that sticked to my head the most was that it is easy and cheap to produce and that there will probably be more and more of them in the future.

Today the temperature was not that great and there were many people which sure didn't make the air any better. Well, luckily I survived the heat so I can now post about what I saw. ;)

3. Harald talked about Scientology and I was very impressed by how well done his presentation was. What I liked the most was that he talked about the background mostly. I have never heard of the person behind it all (L. Ron Hubbard) and that it all started with a book. I always thought it was just a way to make money. So I was very fascinated when I found out that Scientology has something to do with overcoming problems and finding individual truths. Another fact that impressed me was that Scientology is accepted as a religious organization in Austria.
4. After that Tiana talked about Racial Segregation. She explained racial segregation through two movies named The Secret Life of Bees and The Help. I haven't seen either of these movies but she summarized the stories very briefly so is wasn't a problem. I was very shocked by the scene out of The Secret Life of Bees she showed us but I think that it is a very good movie. In case of The Help I must agree with the critics that it is a bit strange to use a white girl to change the world. If it is a movie about racism they could have made the hero of the story African.
5. Then it was time for tornadoes. Anna told us a very exciting story about how she wanted to find out how people living in the tornado alley thought. The tornado alley is an area in the Unites States where tornadoes are most frequent and the State of Oklahoma lies in the middle of it. Even though this is the case there are may people who love living there and would never move. In the State of Oklahoma the problem is made even worse by the fact that the soil mostly consists of clay and therefore underground shelters are very difficult to construct. She came to the conclusion that these people just love Oklahoma, the Unites States and each other. They have a very strong sense of community and help each other.
6. Painted America was Natascha's topic and she chose to present it through two paintings. The first one was Grant Wood's American Gothic. He got the idea for the painting on a trip on which he saw a dibble house or American Gothic House. He wanted people he admired to live in there so he painted his sister and his dentist in front of the house. Then Natascha showed us that this painting is used in the series “Desperate Housewives”. The second painting actually is a series of four paintings. They were painted by Norman Rockwell and represent the four freedoms: Freedom of speech, worship, from fear and want. Two of these were later included in the bill of rights and represent typical American values.
7. The last of my USA-presentations was about Deaf Art in the U.S. And was presented by Sonja. As I study Austrian Sign Language this was a must in my schedule. Due to the lack of chairs I didn't have that good sight on the prezi but I still heard nearly everything she said. Logically, Deaf Art deals with the topic of oralism. Oralism forced deaf people to practice oral language instead of sign language.

So let's move to the Irish presentations I watched.

8. The first Irish presentation I watched also was about sign language. Lisa spoke about the history of Irish Sign Language. There was Old-ISL which was the sign language spoken earlier in Ireland. The Milan Congress was a very dramatic event in the history of Irish Sign Language because it forbade sign language and forced the deaf children to use oral language only. The best way of communication would be “Total Communication” which uses both, sign language and oral language.
9. Next was a presentation about The Children of Lir. I didn't know what the legend but she explained that it is about a king and his four children. The mother dies while giving birth to the last child and soon there is a stepmother. At first everything is fine but soon the stepmother is jealous of the fathers love for the children and transforms them into swans. The children have to remain in the swan bodies until they hear the bells of a new god ringing. The king finds out and transforms her into a monster. This legend represents the English rule in Ireland and the Christianity.
10. The last presentation today was about Kilmainham Gaol which was very interesting because I went to the presentation by chance and then found out that I have been in Kilmainham Gaol on a school trip to Dublin. It was very nice to have my memories freshened up a bit.

So these ten presentations are the ones I watched. For my KGP I would like to be tested on:

• American High Schools
• Deaf Art
• Scientology
• Painted America
• Racial Segregation as depicted in two movies

Animal Rights Activistes charged again

The lawsuit against Austrian animal rights activists continues. 13 men and women were accused of being part of a criminal organization in 2010. Everybody knows what animal rights activists do: They organize demonstrations, go on demonstrations, do research about different locations were animals are kept and probably don't eat meat or animal products. Well, I do all these things. Still I have never committed any crime and neither have these 13 men and women. The main charge was “foundation of a criminal organization” based on clause 278a. This clause is meant for actual criminal organizations which deal with drugs and weapons and really dangerous stuff. This clause has never been used against citizens' groups and it was never meant to be used that way. The lawsuit took more than one year and the lives of these 13 animal rights activists were practically ruined. After not being allowed to work, paying the legal expenses and spending a lot of time in imprisonment on remand they were often separated from their families and all deep in dept. However, in 2011 they won the lawsuit and all 13 were acquitted of having committed any crimes. The whole lawsuit was absolutely ridiculous and an unbounded cheek. It didn't end there, however. Some days ago there was a new shock: The judgment didn't stay in force. 5 of these 13 Austrians were charged once again. Even if the accusation of being in a criminal organization was dismissed, they are now accused of threatening the company “Kleider Bauer” and committing damage of property. The supposed threat against “Kleider Bauer” comes from an e-mail in which a legal campaign against fur farming was announced. What is illegal about that? The case of damaging property stems from one broken window. That's it. There is nothing else. Isn't this completely ludicrous? This whole lawsuit never should have existed. Everyone thinks Austria is such a fair and wonderful country but in this case you see the other side of the coin.

Here you can watch a very interesting movie about it all:

http://tvthek.orf.at/programs/6088093-Der-Prozess

Enter Shikari

Another band that probably no one likes but me is Enter Shikari, one of the most fascinating bands I know. I could even say that they are something like my favorite band, which I do not really have because I listen to so many bands. They are a Bristish post-hardcore band and were formed in 2003. I did not know them back then but that was when I was 10 years old so I think that is understandable. ;)

Wikipedia says they are a post-hardcore band but I am not really sure about that. Enter Shikari is a very creative band. For me they sometimes sound like a straight metalcore band or hardcore band, then again they use all this electonic stuff so that a song sounds like dubstep. They even released one album called “Tribalism“ which consisted mainly of remixes of their former songs.

That I listen to a remix-album is rare enough, that I like it is an even rarer case.

What I find even more awesome than their music are their lyrics. Most of them are written by the singer, guitarist, pianist, celesta-player and electronics guy, Rou Reynolds. He must be a very fascinating person to talk to. His approach on society, environment issues, politics and many other things is very critical and refreshing. Some of their songs are just touching and give me hope.

The fist song of theirs I heard was “Sorry, you're not a winner” and I instantly liked it. It still took me quite a time to listen to their other stuff. Since 2009 I really listen to Enter Shikari and attend their concerts as often as possible! In 2012 the new album “A Flash Flood Of Colour” was released and I absolutely love it! The last song of the album is a very calm and thoughtful song. I dare to say that it maybe is my favorite song. If you listen to it, pay attention to the lyrics, these are the best part of the song in my opinion! :)

Here is the link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VmNjpfJqdkw

Nightwish – Singer number 3

Tarja Turunen

I know, most of you won't like or know the metal band Nightwish but I do and their story is quite interesting. Even if you don't like symphonic metal. Nightwish was formed 1996 in Finland. They started with a wongwriter and keyboarder (Tuomas), a guitarist (Emppu) and a female singer (Tarja). Originally, Tuomas wanted to write acoustic music but soon he realized that Tarja's operatic voice was too strong for that type of music. So he decided to include heavy metal elements and that is how Jukka (drums) and Sami (bass) joined the band. They were quite successful but in 2001 they had a very hard time. They had internal difficulties and Tuomas thought he would have to break up the band. It was Tony Kakko (singer and songwriter of Sonata Arctica) who made Tuomas realize that he could not simply do that. After a long talk between the two of them everything got better. Sami left and Marco played the bass instead. In 2004 the 5th album “Once” lead to unknown success. After this album, however, they had a terrible crisis. The male band members didn't get along with Tarja anymore and threw her out of the band through publishing an open letter to her and all the fans. Needless to say, Tarja was pretty shocked and angry about that and herself released an open letter as answer. She said that the way of breaking the news to her was needlessly cruel. Well, life goes on. Tarja started a solo project and Nightwish started looking for a new singer.

Anette Olzon

They came up with Anette Olzon, the ex-singer of the Swedish band Alyson Avenue. This was a very brave step. Anette didn't have any real metal or opera background. She was more of a pop singer and due to that had difficulties with songs written for Tarja's opera voice. She did a great job, however, and in 2007 one of my favorite albums of all times called “Dark Passion Play” was released. Anette gave the music a new touch and many fans really liked that. Of course there were haters, there always are. In 2011 they released their second album featuring Anette. It is called “Imaginaerum” and just as awesome as Dark Passion Play. In 2012, however, the problems started again. Nightwish announced their parting with Anette as their paths would no longer match. Later Anette also announced that she was pregnant with her third child. Maybe that was the reason for the break-up.

Floor Jansen

As the band was just on the Imaginaerum World Tour they needed a replacement. They ended up with Floor Jansen, the Dutch ex-singer of “After Forever”. As Floor has studied Musical Theater and one year of opera it is easier for her to reach Tarja's heights. You can definitely hear that she has more experience with metal but I can't say that I really like it. I loved Anette's light, friendly voice while Floor sounds too “wannabe tough” for me. I am sure that she is a great singer and lengths better than Anette. Still, I am not very enthusiastic. Yesterday I found some videos in which Tarja, Anette and Floor are compared. Hear for yourself!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mIC21R_3Fcs

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7NzvYhqs46I

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Al54eMCoxUw

Move in rain - again

This weekend the fifth vegan summer festival called “move” took place. I had never been there because I had never been in Graz when it took place. This year, however, I was there and it was great. It all goes down in “Stadtpark” on the “Passamtswiese”. Of course I wasn't there just for fun, I had to work but it was great anyways. The main idea of the festival is lots and lots of awesome vegan food. Everybody tries to eat as much food as possible, relaxes for some time and then gets something new to eat. That's not everything of course. There are live bands, workshops, a bouncy castle and lots of information desks. The move festival also has a tradition. Bad weather. This year it was the same. On Friday it just rained. On Saturday, however, it hailed. Very nice. Still, it didn't really matter for me because I was under the food tent anyway. There even were some people dancing in the rain and the band continued playing. When the rain finally decreased there was a huge lake on the lawn and most booths were gone because the water was everywhere. It was nice anyway, I had some great food and met lots of people. I still hope that the tradition will be broken next year. ;)

Save some rivers

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That's what it looks like now.

Some of you may know that I am active in the citizens' group “Rettet die Mur”. It is about preventing the hydroelectric power stations that “Energie Steiermark” wants to built in and around Graz. Most of you will probably think: “Wow, she's an idiot. Hydroelectric power is the best thing for our environment and she just wants to prohibit everything.” Well, Hydroelectric power is not good for our environment and I don't want to prohibit everything at all. It is just that these power plants in Graz would produce CO² and methane, would be very expensive compared to how much energy they produce and would destroy the habitat of dozens of animals and plants. In addition Graz would be a construction area for about 3 years and all the trees that give shade and fresh air in the middle of the city would be gone. Not that attractive for me.

Anyway, I didn't really want to write about the Mur but about the Sulm. There is a similar project going an at the river called “Schwarze Sulm” in a town called “Schwanberg”. A guy with too much money wants to built a hydroelectric power plant in the middle of a “Natura 2000” sanctuary. This should be forbidden but he somehow managed to get a yes for the project. Now he starts to built even though not all land owners of the land he needs agree. So the reaction of the townspeople was to start a protest. They set up a camp to prevent him from moving on. Yesterday I was there and it unbelievably beautiful. The river it crystal clear and freezing cold and everything else is a fresh green. This unique landscape really deserves being protected. I f you want to help you can come to the demonstration on Wednesday and go there any time. They are always happy to see helpful people. :)

More info here:

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https://www.facebook.com/RettetdieSchwarzeSulm?ref=ts&fref=ts

http://www.kleinezeitung.at/steiermark/3310876/jetzt-fahren-sulm-bagger.story

Falling...falling...falling

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That's the bridge...

On Sunday I did one of the craziest things in my life so far. I jumped off a 96 meters high bridge.

If you now think that I am crazy: I am not. I just went bungee jumping. It wasn't my idea, however. On my last birthday I got it as a present and last Sunday, nearly one year after that I finally dared to to do it. My voucher was for the famous and very high bridge “Jauntalbrücke” so I went there with my sister and a friend of mine. It

That's the view from up there...

is Europe's highest railroad bridge with its 96 meters. Under the bridge the river “Drau” flows. The scenery there is beautiful, the green-blue water and forest everywhere! The scenery, however, was not enough to calm me down. When I got there, there were 4 people jumping before me. With every person jumping off the platform I got more nervous. I don't suffer from vertigo and I knew that nothing bad at all would happen. Still, the thought of having to jump was horrible. When it was my turn one of the trainers told me what to do and said I should take it easy. Haha. That's not that easy when you are standing on the edge of such an abyss. ;) With the instructions, however, it was not so bad because I could concentrate on what I had to do. So when the final word of the countdown (Jump!) was there I just jumped and tried to do what the guy told me to. At first I thought I have to throw up because of that horrible dropping feeling I got in my stomach. It felt like going down with an elevator but about a hundred times worse. After that it was just amazing! It was so much fun, I had to giggle all the time while spinning through the air. When my spinning got less, the guy in the rubber dinghy on the river grabbed my hand and pulled me in the boat and asked me if I was alright. I was very alright. :D After hiking all the 96 meters back up again to my friends I got a certificate that I am a woman for every case. ;) I can absolutely recommend bungee jumping to you, I would definitely do it again if it wasn't so expensive.

New Addiction

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I think we all know the problem of sitting in front of the computer, having to study and doing nothing for university at all. The distractions I use most often are stupid computer games and youtube videos. I play computer games when I am supposed to study even if in general I don't like playing computer games at all. I always think it is a waste of time. Obviously not when I should study. ;) Still, youtube is even worse. I open it because I want to listen to a specific song while studying and I never close it again. My latest youtube addiction are Dan and Phil. I don't know if you know them or not. They are two British guys who basically make youtube videos. They started in 2009 and are still going. They don't even do crazy stuff or especially amusing things, they just talk. They talk about things they like or don't like, about embarrassing things that happened to them or they play truth or dare. They got quite famous via youtube and now have their own radio show on BBC radio one. One thing I use as an excuse for spending so much time watching them is that they also do some videos on different English accents. For example, they did one video called “How To Speak Northern” in which a friend of theirs from Northern England tests Dan on Northern vocabulary. They also did one video where they tried to do an American accent. The other excuse I use is that watching English videos counts as listening practice. ;) I don't know why but I just can't stop watching their stuff. If you also want to waste some of your time I give you the links to their channels here:

Dan: http://www.youtube.com/user/danisnotonfire

Phil: http://www.youtube.com/user/AmazingPhil

Ice Cream!!!!

I love ice cream. Who doesn't? ;) As I am vegan I can not eat any kind of ice cream but since this spring my choice of shops in Graz is very big. I always thought that every ship offers some vegan type of ice cream. I was so wrong. About one week ago I fried to buy vegan ice cream at Temmel and the sales girl told me that they put milk in EVERY type of ice cream!!! I was incredibly shocked and will gladly never visit Temmel again. Some vegan friends of mine always told me that at least lemon ice cream is vegan everywhere. They were wrong obviously. Well anyway, I have lots of other ice cream shops I can go to. There is a great shop in “Sackstraße” which offers some great tropical vegan ice cream. My favorite place for ice cream, however, is “Sporgasse”. There are three shops I really like. The first one is Amorino which is a bit expensive but their banana ice cream is just delicious! The second one is Sax. They have some great vegan fruit ice creams and they even offer soy chocolate! :) Last but not least is the Eisgreissler! This one is very new but very, very awesome! Eisgreissler sells organic ice cream with mostly local ingredients. My two sisters both work there and they offer vegan chocolate, coffee, strawberry, raspberry, mango, pear, apricot and some other great stuff that I unfortunately forgot. ;) I f I was you I would totally check it out!

Great design, isn't it?

Lord of the Rings

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I guess everyone of you knows the famous movie “The Lord of the Rings”. As we all know it already I am not going to write about the story of the film or book but about the film crew. There were many knows actors involved in the movie, for example Elijah Wood, Viggo Mortensen, Liv Tyler, Sean Bean, Ian McKellen, Orlando Bloom and Cate Blanchett. As the filming was very intense and sometimes in very remote places, the actors got to know and like each other very well and formed a little family. I watched some videos lately which showed how emotional the end of the filming was for them. I also found out that Viggo Mortensen as Aragorn got very attached to his horse “Brego” and bought it afterwards because it was his best friend. He sometimes even slept in the stables . He did even more: He brought a member of the stunt crew a horse because she could not afford it but enough of horses now. That the fellowship actors got very attached to each other is very visible in this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yd8jfzN5OkI

It is a fake interview in which Dominic Monaghan (Merry) poses as a German interviewer and asks Elijah Wood (Frodo) all kinds of stupid questions. In my opinion it is one of the funniest things ever! :D

If you want to find out some more about Viggo:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RvakFEr98qk

Oh and by the way, there are some pictures which combine Lord of the Rings and Game of Thrones. I find them all incredibly funny: :D

I guess that made clear how much I like Game of Thrones, too. ;)

Kill your meat yourself!

Would you eat that?

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Margi Clark said: "I think if you want to eat more meat you should kill it yourself and eat it raw." I totally agree with her. People say it is natural for us to eat animals. They say that we have always eaten animals, that we were great hunters and that we only got a such a huge brain because of the protein in meat. That is all very well but it does not matter now. We were not only hunters but also gatherers which brought us protein from nuts and plants. We surely are no hunters now, most of us can't even walk noiselessly in a forest or kill anything with our bare hands. I, for my part, would not be able to kill a deer, pig, dog or any other mammal. Do you think you would stand a chance against a grown cow? I really doubt it. If someone tells me that they would go into the forest and bring out a dead animal, that is alright. However, I really doubt that anybody would really do that, even our laws forbid it. The other question is: Who would eat a raw dead animal? I wouldn't.

How cowardly is that?

Let me introduce myself...

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My name is Alexandra but most friends call me Xandi. I live and study in Graz as most of you know. My second language is Austrian sign language, which I like very much. In general I am a quite cheerful person with a fondness for nature, veganism, activism and very much food. ;) Another thing I enjoy very much is music. I love listening to music, going to concerts and festivals and singing along with my favorite vocalists.