Wednesday, December 31, 2008

THE TERRORIST ATTACK OF INDIA
First of all , some weeks ago in India, many hotels, railwaystation, airport,... were attacked by Al-aeda terrorists perfecty organiced. The terrorist shoot to many civil potulation killed.
The terrorist destination were luxury hotels no one person in particular, many killers but no politician or important people of goberment, because in these moment Esperanza Aguirre was there with some spanish businesswoman/man on catatastrofic situation, but nobody of them was casualty. Afterwards of shot-out the authorities cleared the zone of danger went towards airport and Spanish embasy.

Secondly this terrorist attack will affect consecuenly to country tourism, where more of a hundred persons Killed ; on the other hand the imagines were very impact for me but many days ago these hotels (were happened this) has opened again to publicin general with hight security measures. This done, surely won´t affect to Indias´s tourism , because the population going to forget all happened it so this way , the tourists will return to India for going to spend their money althought the India population going to die hungry.
Finally only I say that the life of persons is more important that this.

Sunday, December 28, 2008

Recipes

Hi!

Can you cook? Maybe you are not a famous chef, however I think everyone knows how to cook something, so tell us an easy recipe, please. Something easy but not telegraphic. Something like this, for example:
Yorkshire pudding.


Serves 4-6


300ml (½ pint) Milk 110g (4 oz) Plain Flour 1 Egg Oil, Lard or Dripping


Place the flour in a bowl, then make a well in the centre and break in the egg. Mix in half the milk using a wooden spoon, work the mixture until smooth then add the remaining milk. Beat or whisk until fully combined and the surface is covered with tiny bubbles.


Allow to rest for 15 to 30 minutes, whisk again before use. Pre-heat oven to 220°C.

Place a teaspoon of fat into 12 individual deep bun tins or a single large tin and place in the oven until the fat is very hot. Pour the batter into the tins and bake for 10 to 15 minutes for individual puddings (or 30 to 35 minutes if using a large tin) or until risen and golden brown.

Though not vegetarian this has been added because they are tasty when baked if filled with a savoury filling.

Como on, try it! Try some Spanish recipes, for example, or whatever you want.

See you

Saturday, December 20, 2008

ACCESSIBLE TOURISM 3

Once anyone decides building a new construction, first of all he has to get a valid building permit which has to be supervised by the Municipal Technical Services in order to be approved. This is the most difficult part of the whole process, because you will experience the unsuitable town-planning legislation, being affected by three different laws with different development. Referring to accessibility, in one side, there is a general National legislation about construction and another specific one, recent to be in force, named Building Technical Code (CTE); in the other side, there is a profuse regional legislation due to competences assumed by the Autonomous Governments in each Spanish region. Furthermore, each particular city or village has its own particular laws that can be applies. All this laws’ mix-up becomes in an endless pilgrimage window to window trying to conciliate many resolutions that sometimes offer different duties for the same matter. As a result of this “law-shake”, one person who decides to create a new touristic resource is never sure at all about the accessibility he offers in his facilities. After all this approval process, there is another question to be considered: the way construction companies carry out their job and respect the original project. Very often, a good design can be ruined by a bad execution.

Friday, December 19, 2008

I think about the tourist ways that suppose a high business for all tourism industry in general. This money is very atractive for: tour operator, hotels,... but everybody have took into acount, the most important are natural resources.I´m strongly against of this because the goberment must son many things against enviromental impact now.
I can explain to this way isn´t being correct in Galician tourist places especialy in Natural and National Parks. This definitions although say the same but isn´t true, this fact is being dangerous because the forest es being theatened for visitor daily. The solution will be more control in daily visit by goberment authorities. Both definitions (natural and national park) have diferent legal connotations, the one is more permisive than the other one only a change in a point by law should be good in this context.
In the future We going to change for this places look care everybody.

Monday, December 15, 2008

ACCESSIBLE TOURISM 2

First of all, it’s important to distinguish every disability and learn the way to name each one correctly. We can’t refer to people with disabilities like “disabled person”, because they are not disabled, they have a disability. That’s why the correct term is “person with disability” or “person with a challenge” (visual challenge, hearing challenge, mobility challenge or reduced mobility …). This is a subtle difference, but it’s important to start to change the way people think about disability.
Knowing that every kind of disability has its own specific characteristics in order to get full accessibility, there are however some common actions which can ensure a high level of accessibility for the highest percentage of this community. There is no doubt that the main difficulties are those related to architectural barriers and signposting both indoor and outdoor, however it’s relatively easy to adapt the way of building in order to allow an universal access which become in an improvement for everybody. Against many people think about, money is not the main problem. To build an accessible environment is not much expensive than not to do it. Many times is just a matter of willingness.

Thursday, December 11, 2008

PROFESSIONAL OR NOT

Nowadays tourism has to face many problems, like economical crisis, fuel prices, air fares, weather conditions, social riots and more. The most part of those events are not under control of the tourism worker. However, there is a question that bothers to people more than any other one: employees who don’t work in a professional way. This appears to be a minor problem compared to others, but if you think that the only contact you’ll have with the company which provides you any service is through this inefficient employee, the matter become more important. You can see this kind of workers everywhere in tourism places and their behavior is really harmful for tourism industry. I’ve noticed this kind of people is found often in small family companies, like rural or snow houses and hotels. In some of these lodges, it’s usual they change your reservations depending on their needs, without any respect to the books they’ve made before. It happens sometimes that you book for two nights, you have the booking confirmed, and after the confirmation, you receive a call, trying to force you to book for one o two more extra nights without previous notice, and without any other reason than “because I’m the manager and if you don’t like it, I don’t care, that’s just the way it is”. Of course they have the right to establish the minimum amount of nights they want to book, but always in advance, not after the booking is confirmed. Worst of all, there is no effective way to complain about those abuses but to look for another place and don’t play the game with this kind of business men.

Saturday, December 6, 2008

ACCESSIBLE TOURISM. I

Past week, I participated in a course about Accessible Tourism, sponsored by Turgalicia and taught by Predif, an organization with no profit motive in mind, dedicated to promote the quality of life to people with disability. To a person like me, who didn’t know the problems that people with any disability have to face every day, was a way to become aware about the difficulties they find daily in their life. We did a simple test: I tried to walk around a square garden with a black mask, and even with a person by my side guiding me, it was incredibly difficult and the feeling of insecurity was brutal. That’s why I think it’s necessary to throw away all the prejudices and get conscience about how accessibility is the best solution for all of us. Even if you don’t agree with this statement, just think: at any time in your life you can be injured in an accident, you can be sick, you will walk pushing a baby-trolley and, that’s for sure, you’ll grow old. In every one of these situations, you are temporarily a person with disability, and you will appreciate accessible buildings, sidewalks, doors, stairs, parking places, toilets, transports, etc… Furthermore all this measures are directly related and conditioning tourism.Accessibility involves many different sides, in many levels. There is a legal framework, there are different needs depending on the kind of disability, sometimes hard to conciliate, and finally, there are individuals, each one of them with its own special needs. I think this is an important remark. A person with disability is not a kind of person, is an individual, and as an individual must be considered.

Wednesday, December 3, 2008

Hello to everyone

Hello!

I'm Ana Isabel Vázquez, your English teacher in UNED Pontevedra and I've created this blog for you to practise your English writing.

I know writing in English is not so easy for you, however the best way to practise is writing and wrinting in English as much as you can.

This blog is part of a research of how blogs can help you to improve your English writing, so in this blog we are not going to give you any feedback about your posts or comments, that is, we are not going to comment your English or the way you write. The aim here is that you improve just writing and writing and looking at your posts and your mates' post, as a porfolio. This will give you an idea of your own mistakes and you'll improve anyway.

I hope you try it on.

See you soon.

Bye.

Ana