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“We read to know we're not alone.”   William Nicholson,  Shadowlands “Until I feared I would lose it, I never loved to read. One does not love breathing.”    Harper Lee,  To Kill a Mockingbird “Let us read, and let us dance; these two amusements will never do any harm to the world.”    Voltaire Promoting talks, Reading circles, creative workshops enhances our minds and our self expression to a level that allows our dreams to reach a much more happier place. Schools should commit some of the syllabus work to that matter, so that self fulfilment should take place and embrace students and staff into a common ground of well being. Having this in mind, Language department has prepared a week full of enriching activities for a wide audience. Today, in the morning,  we had a workshop of storytelling using Animaker. In the afternoon, fans of manga and anime, Japanese cartoons, talked about their common passion, describing the plot, character building and ...

    I believe that Portuguese society is on a good path. You can see enough electric cars and bicycles through the streets of Lisbon. Many people this year have been using public transport, specially now with the rising of fuel prices.  In my city for example, all the streets already have the 3 crates instead of a general one. In the Algarve for example most restaurants sell drinks in glass bottles instead of cans or plastic bottles. But even so, I think Portugal still has to evolve a lot in terms of sustainability. I'm a person who tries to keep a balance. At home, I've already installed LEDs (on tape) so you can spend less power. Many of the times I end up leaving the lights on by forgetfulness but my mother is the opposite of me and always turns off everything be it lights or appliances.  On my computer, I downloaded the performance so that it consumes less power. When I bathe for example, the water does not heat up soon, it takes about 1 minute. So you don't wast...

  We started to promote afternoon talks in our library regarding reading habits, cultural interests, to engage students, teachers and other staff in positive aspects of our lives. Reading is not the primary issue but along the way someone share a text, present a good moment reading or discussing a good movie that led them to the book behind the screen. This coming week we will do our 3rd and 4th talks. One is dedicated to manga, the Japanese cartoons, and the other to books that they want to read.  It has been quite interesting to promote these moments. We never know beforehand who will turn up, but the joy in their eyes, the feeling go wholeness has been a really interesting discovery and perception. This might seem strange, but our students are over 16 years and ours is a vocational school. Usually, they say they don't like reading. I hope we are about to change it. Cristina Basílio

  It's interesting to think that we want something we don't know, we all want to be happy, but what for some is happiness for others may not be.  Happiness has phases, the first is when we are children and we have no worries and everything is always fine and then we have the phase where we grow up and realize that everything is different.  In order to be happy we need to know how to build happiness and everything starts with liking ourselves, we have to be able to understand that not everyone will want our happiness.  In my opinion happiness is a feeling that we all seek in the day to day, even on less good days we try to find happiness, something good, because if we do not go after our happiness ourselves who will?  We must always be surrounded by people with a positive energy who want to see us well, so that we can also share happiness with someone. Each person can have a meaning to the word/feeling happiness and are not always meanings alike, it all also depe...

In the early 20th century,  women did not have as many rights as women today. In the old years, the women who worked were in the minority. Still my grandmother, mother of 5, did not work stayed at home to do daily tasks. Also in the minority groups there were women who were dependent and with higher education study.  Today it is no longer so, most women are already independent. Even so, there are still countries where men have a higher salary than women in the same profession which in my opinion makes no sense at all.  My mother, for example, is an example of an independent modern woman. She came from Ukraine alone and today she's in the job market, working as a nurse, being able to support me and her.  Nowadays women can also enlist in the army, which in the past did not happen in anyone's head.  In conclusion, the modern woman compared to the woman of the early twentieth century has changed a lot. Miguel Costa

  Why is music important for us? Music, a combination of rhythm, harmony and melody, in a manner pleasing to the ear, which may or may not contain lyrics. It is very important for our lives, there are people who cannot live without music, they listen to it from the time they wake up to the time they go to bed. But why is music so important to us? It is so present in our daily lives, something that is part of us, but almost certainly most people have never stopped to think about it. In this way, music is important for many things, some of which can be explained by researchers, where they say that music develops the human mind, it provides us with a pleasant state of well-being, penetrating directly into our nerve centres. We can also say that music has a healing power, it is linked to our memories and remembrances. The effect of the same song can be different to each person, as this depends on your relationship with that song or the interpretation you may have of the lyrics. There a...

  The best trip of my life   Italy, a country I had never thought of visiting specially at the age of 16. I honestly don't even know where to start, and I know I won't be able to tell you even half of what happened but I'll do my best. Well, maybe it makes sense to start with the day I arrived. I woke up very early to catch the plane with my colleagues and arrived in Italy at 10:30 am. Then we took a train to Cardona where we met with the teachers and some Italian families. My host family was very friendly and picked me up at the station. I loved them because even though I had a lot of difficulties expressing myself in English but they always tried to facilitate communication. They made my week much easier I assure you. On the second day, we went to school around 8 am. The school teachers welcomed us and in the morning we did an activity about cultures. It was a lot of fun. It helped me get to know the other students who were participating in the project. In the afternoon w...

My thoughts about isolation during the pandemics   “All you can see from my window...”, or would it be more “what can you not see from my window?” For me, it makes more sense "what you don't see" in the face of the world pandemic situation, many things are no longer seen in the world. And when I refer to the world, the city where I also live, better known as Lisbon, capital of Portugal. Lisbon is an European city with a big name when it comes to tourism, as we can find tourists at any time of the year, but due to the situation we live in, it's really sad to no longer see the typical Lisbon city and its big and small movement. Can't be seen, can't be heard and can't be smelled. When I refer to these stimuli, I conclude that Lisbon is a city that does not take a vacation, probably this year 2020 had to do so. Not by choice, but by obligation, with this, it brought as many good things as very bad things. - Let's start with the bad ones. Lisbon seems like ...

  Being an influencer Nowadays, it is noticeable that the number of important celebrities is increasing, which means people tend to choose jobs where they have a huge influence on others. At the same time, they are doing something that brings them joy.   For starters, I think it is very important to do something you enjoy, and the best way to know if someone likes what they do for a living is to look for the ones that would rather earn less money than not be as happy as they currently are.   Second of all, some people only become famous for the glory and because they enjoy their job but that does not mean they are not good at it, it means that they do not choose it for the same reason a musician chooses his because a musician bases his decision on enjoyment and happiness in contrary to some of the others.     In addition to that, I believe the best part of being famous is to be seen as a hero or role model, which makes us feel like we did a good service to ...

  What would you be willing to do for freedom?  “Not pleasure, not glory, not power: freedom only freedom” Fernando Pessoa. Freedom, a word with constancy to describe the world, people and our society. The month of April carries  with it a reflective part on the issue of freedom, how are we in relation to it today? Do you know what  freedom is? “Condition of one who is free. It is a concept that takes on a great variety of meanings among  the different authors who have dealt with the subject”. Freedom can be seen in many ways, being physically or mentally. Freedom of expression is everything we  absorb from information and create our own opinion from it, we are free to think, idealize and believe in  everything that adds to our interest. While there is a point in favor of freedom to believe and create our  own opinions, aren’t we just adopting others’ point of view? And putting them as our freedom? Lately,  people share the same opinion on th...

Books “Don’t juge a book by their cover” “I loved her so much that I, instead of giving her flowers,  I gave her books, because flowers last for a few days,  a good book lasts for a life.” Albert Einstein     There are several books;  They are everywhere, anywhere, somewhere…Where there's life there are books. Whether in a library, a bookshop, on a shelf waiting to be read, or even with no right to a shelf or a bookmark, for some reason. There are books with strong covers, soft ones, without a cover (or almost without one), there are others that are still to be unwrapped, but all of them have a story. Books that are still being created, that are old classics already widely read and recognised. There are books that nobody likes but everybody reads and knows, there are others with a wonderful story but nobody knows or wants to read. There are books that readers only get to know the story because they recognise the author, because they like the cover or becaus...