A Summer to Remember

These summer vacations have given me quite a lot to talk and think about. My story of these summer holidays begins on June 6th. I left school prematurely, and after packing the few clothes and survival items we were allowed to take, Alejandra and I headed south to Madrid to begin our adventure of the Ruta Quetzal. We arrived at the first campsite in Madrid, and after a few goodbyes and a couple of hugs we left our "normal" lives and comodities for the next month and a half. We began to meet people and more people, and no matter how hard you tried to remember all their names, it was useless because the next instant you didn't remember who they were. After meeting swarms of people we finally met our groups for the next 6 weeks, which, apart from being colleagues, would serve as family and friends. Already this first day had been greatly intense, but what was lying ahead for us was the never imaginable.

Next morning, after an early waking up, the 300 of us, with 300 identical backpacks, 300 identical t-shirts and 300 pairs of identical boots, boarded the huge

caravan of 9 buses and 3 cars and headed for Madrid International airport to fly to 40ºC and 95% humidity, or what is the same, VERACRUZ, Mexico.

The next 40 days of my life would remain in my memory forever, crossing dense, tropical jungles, with soaking clothes, walking for 12 hours, visiting places I would never have inagined and feeling dirty, wet and tired the whole time. The Ruta Quetzal, apart from showing me incredible

places and making me live awesome experiences, served as a window to other people and cultures, a window to lives that are much

more complicated than ours and that I had never thought about before.

Summer didn't end there, however. After returning, I left for 7 more days to Tunis and enjoy a more relaxed and cofortable stay in

another country.

London Trip

Yesterday night we arrived from our London class-trip. We all returned exhausted but with a great feeling of having passed a great time. We did tons of things and visited numerous places apart from living a great experience in a musical. This is what we did during the trip:

Day 1 (Friday 7th).- Encounter at Bilbao airport 8:30A.M. The plane took off on time and we arrived at Stansted airport at 11 A.M. After passing eternal passport checks we finall

y boarded the bus which took us to Victoria Station, 2 minutes away from our hotel, the AIRWAYS HOTEL. After a quick sandwich lunch we got on the london tube and headed for Camdentown, where we had a couple of hours to shop and walk around. After Camdentown we had dinner and headed for the hotel, exhausted.

Day 2 (Saturday 8th).- After waking up at 7:30 A.M. and having breakfast at the hotel we headed for the "TUBE" to buckingham palace, where we saw the change of guard. However, the best part of the day was when we went to Piccadilly Circus to watch the musical "HAIR", a GREAT show in which we even went to the stage to dance! After the musical we had free time until 10:30 P.M. when we met at Piccadilly.

Day 3 (Sunday 8th).- After having breakfast at the hotel we left for Speakers' Corner, in High Park. We heard many people explaining their ideas, but surely there was one woman who topped them all. She was a crazy old woman who said we were all parasites and rats, and a

fter dying Hitler would judge us. After leaving this insane woman we went to the London Dungeon terror museum, which was good but a bit boring in some parts and later we had lunch. After filling our stomachs, we trotted to the London Bridge and London Tower.

Day 4 (Monday 9th).- Today we all left for the British Museum and discovered Egyptian tombs and Mexican Mayan people apart from aincient Greeks. At the evening we boarded the London Eye from which we had a great view of London and its main icons. Finally, as a great ending we went to Hard Rock Café to have

dinner, and ended our last full day in London.

Day 5 (Tuesday 10th).- This morning we woke up early and headed for the London Docks, where we entered a museum which showed us the history of these iconic storeplaces. We hurriedly left for Heathrow airport next, where our plane was delayed 2 hours due to the volcanic ash. END

26/4/10 What is my video about?

For our technology project, I am going to try and join our London trip with it. For my video, I'm going to record our trip, interviewing other people and tourists in London's streets. It's going to be a type of report to picture our trip as well as London's people and ambience. For this, as I said before, I'm going to carry my video-camera and later, I'm going to use Apple's iMovie to edit the video, adding music and adjusting it to the 3 minutes of time we have. I'm going to try and make it short, complete, with varied people and entertaining.

What are we doing in the last trimester?

During the last trimesters, we have been working on various things, including Open Source programs and online blogging. This trimester, we're moving on to different things, including typingweb, digital video editing and online posters.

1. Typingweb- On this online initernet page we are able to improve our typing skills with the objective of being able to type fast, accurately and without looking at the keyboard. There are several levels to pass, from beginner to advaced, and right now I'm beggining the intermediate level.

2. Digital video editing- Apart from typingweb, we're also going to begin editing videos, using either Movie Maker (windows) or IMovie(Mac). The video has to last 3 minutes, it has to be in either avi, mov, mp4 or flv formats and it has to be made with original footage.

3. Online Posters- Lastly, we are also going to work on making online posters, which can even hold sound and movie, apart from text, images and colorful backgrounds. We are using Glogster for this activity.

La JOVEN María Amelia

"Los que en realidad aman la vida son aquellos que están envejeciendo". Esta es una de las valiosas frases que nos dejó María Amelia, quien, a sus 95 años rejuveneció a través de la red. Todo empezó cuando su nieto, por su 95 cumpleaños le regaló a María un blog en Internet (amis95.blogspot.com). Entusiasmada con su regalo, se puso manos a la obra para ponerse al día en la informática y mediante su blog combatir la soledad y el aburrimiento y tener un motivo para vivir cada día. Ella ya se fué hace cuatro años, pero atrás dejó sus ganas e interés por conocer gente y cosas nuevas, y estas ganas sirvieron para que muchos otros ancianos siguieran sus pasos. Hoy, otros blogueros mayores ´como el "Viejo Pescador" están peleando por conseguir fundar un Premio Internacional para Blogueros Mayores.

Hoy, muchos otros ancianos se han abierto a la red, y juntos, hablando unos con otros, se acaban quitando años de encima. Este es su BLOG. En mi opinion, la idea de que ancianos puedan abrirse al muno mediante internet y así conocer a nueva gente es una oportunidad única. Es una oportunidad de dejar de lado la soledad en la que muchos ancianos viven y que así encuentren un motivo para levantarse cada mañana y sonreir. María Amelia nos enseñó que nunca es tarde para aprender, que nunca es tarde para rejuvenecer y que las arrugas del espíritu nos hacen mas viejos que las de la cara.

Other Open Source programs

GNU- GNU is another free source initiative developed by the Free Software Foundation (FSF). The idea that is behind GNU is to create free software that can be modified and redistributed freely. This project was started in 1983 by Richard Stallman at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Linux systems depend greatly on GNU programs.

information from webopedia

GNU WEBPAGE:

http://www.gnu.org/

LINUX- Linux is a general name given to Unix-like computer operating systems. It is the most used free- operating system, and as all open sourcer programs, it can be freely distributed and modified. Linux icludeas of the supporting software required such as utilities, the X Window System, the GNOME and the APACHE WEB SERVER. Commonly-used applications with Linux systems include Mozilla Firefox web-browser and Open Office application.
information from Wikipedia

LINUX WEBPAGE:

http://www.linux.org/

APACHE- Apache is a Web Server software which in 2009 became the first web server with more than 100 million users. It is characterized as an open source software and it is aviable for Unix, Mac, Windows, TPF and other systems. A great apache feature is Virtual Hosting. It allows one apache installation to serve for many different web pages. It is used for dynamic as well as for static web pages.

INFORMATION FROM WIKIPEDIA

APACHE WEBPAGE:

http://www.apache.org/

Gimp, Scribus and More...

GIMP:

Gimp is a free software graphics editor and it is used as an image retouching tool. It can resize, crop and edit photos, apart from converting photos into many

different formats. This program can also be used to ceate animated images in the GIF format. It is suitable for amateur and professional use and it is intended to print in inkjet printers. However, GIMP does still not allow CMYK separation and color management. As in Photoshop, GIMP also has options such as layers, masks, plug-ins and many more features.

Here is the GIMP webpage:

http://www.gimp.org/

SCRIBUS:

Scribus is another open-source program; it is a desktop publishing application which is well known for its wide range of features compared to other non-free programs such as Page-Maker. Among its varied features are scalable vector graphics, CMYK color and ICC color management. It is aviable for Linux, Mac and Windows.

This is SCRIBUS's web page:

http://www.scribus.net/

APPLE IPAD:

Apple has just released its new IPad, the best way to experience the web, email, photos and video. It is much like an ITouch, just that with a bigger screen and more vibrant color and sharp text. The new IPad also allows you tro read books and newspapers in the way they were designed; one page at a time. The photo design is also new and very intuitive, since they are displayed in a stack, and just with touching, the hole album opens. However the mos

t new and expected feature is the IBook App where you can purchase a book directly from ITunes Store and it is displayed in your "bookshelf". In general, the IPad is very similar to the ITouch, just that with a bigger screen and the IBook App.

IPad webpage

Google Wave

Google Wave is an online software application of Google which works as a personal communications tool. It is a web-based service program designed to be used for e-mail, instant messages and social networking. It includes translation into 40 different languages, spelling check and many other features. The key of Google Wave is that it is constantly refreshed, and therefore everything appears in real-t

ime.

Google Wave page

AUDACITY

Audacity is a free audio editor software from the OpenSource initiative aviable for Windows, Mac. Linux and BSD. Tracks can be mixed, digital effects added, and you can even change a track's pitch without changing its speed. However, audacity does not include equalizer controls and plug-ins are needed for some features.

Audacity Webpage