Blog 16

                                            FROM MY KITCHEN TO YOUR TABLE
 

                                          
                     Organic Lentil Soup Recipe with Kale
                     
                     We will need:
                     
                      - 1 tbs. olive oil
                      - 3 cloves garlic, minced
                      - 1 small onion, minced
                      - 2 carrots, peeled, small dice
                      - 4 cups chicken broth
                      - 1 cup lentils
                      - 2 tbs tomato paste
                      - 3 cups kale
                      - 1 1/2 tbs balsamic vinegar

                                    
                     How to prepar:
     
                     1. Heat oil in a large heavy pot over medium-high heat.
                     2. Add onion and carrot and saute until softened.
                     3. Add garlic and stir until fragant ( about 20 seconds), being careful not to burn it.
                     4. Add chicken broth, scraping up any browned bits on the bottom of the pot..
                     5. Add lentils and tomato paste, lower heat and simmer, covered, for about 40
                          minutes.
                     6. Add kale and simmer ( about 5 minutes), uncovered, until kale and lentils are
                         tenders.
                     7. Add balsamic vinegar and season to taste with salt and pepper.

                                      
              To be honest I don't use to eat organic food, but since the professor asked for this project I was thinking and decided to do something that a friend recomended me because she loves it. It is so easy to do and take about 1 hour to get ready.This comes a tasty soup with a glass of red wine (Bonterra Organic Pinot Noir), also I should mention that that menu is perfect for a soggy chilly weather.I hope you try, you will love it.

Blog # 15


                                           " Playtime is Over"

                  In the article " Playtime is Over" by David Elkind the author is mention that for the last 20 years our children lost 8 hours of free time a week. The consequence of these changes is that kids have less time to talk and share their culture to one another, less time to socializing, as a result kids don't learn basic rules to deal each others, to respect the rights of others, also learning what could be cruel, kinf or fair. Today kids have to adapt to chilhood as it is. Children have their free time with their coaches and they have freedom of choice about what they want to do, also when children exercise they tend to get better scores on their report cards.Basically children should have their freetime back to be able to learn the culture of their friends, socializing to learn simple rules to respect the limits of others and they should learn how to have fun singing, dancing,exercising and playing old games.
               Leraning our friends culture is fundamental to agood relationship because when we know more details about our friends, for example, where he or she came from, their food,clothes and language it is easy to understand the way they act or talk. I remenber when I arrived in USA and started to making friends I tried to learn their culture before jugding the way they live or eat. I beleive the same happen with children sometimes, kids can be mean with others because they really understand the culture of their friends. One day my son came back from school and told me that he saw a boy in school wearing a small hat and he found that weird. I tried to explain that that boy is Jewish and on his religion he has to wear this hat bacause for him it means protection. After my simple explanation he said " Oh cool I didn't know that, tomorrow I will tell him that I know about his hat and if we can be friends", at that point I was sure about the importance for the kids to have more free time to share knowledge about everything in their lifes.
            Socializing is important for the children to learn how to respect the others, also learning basic rules for a healthy communication. I work in a school and I can see the kids socializing and how their behavior change each day. In my work place I have a student "A" and a boy with autism "B", "A" always used to argue with "B" and being mean with him. Many times " A" used to say that "B"  was slow and doesn't know how to do anything. Day by day "A" learned by socialinzing with "B" that he was different and "A" starting respecting him the way he was, also starting helping him with games.
          Exercising is fundamental for a better life, before when children had more p;aytime, they play soccer, voleyball, basketball,hide and seek and catch. All these activities enable them to be in better shape and having a healthy mind, as a result they get better result in their tests. Studies prove that kids that don't exercise and watch to much TV their brains has less capacity to think and developing good ideas.
        In conclusion, I truly beleive that schools should reevaluate the playtime recess because of paramount importance for the growth and development of our children, making them better adults and healthy families.
        

Blog #14
                                  
                                         " Myth: Bottled Water is safe than Tap Water"

               Many people say that they buy bottled water because it taste better , is safer and because they believe tap water is unhealthy. The Manufactory Demand are scaring, seducing and misleading us to believe that bottled water is better than tap water because for them it is convinient. The companies of bottled water are getting rich selling billions of bottled water a year, and most of those plastic containers are not recycled, as a result we have all those plastic in decomposition for decades that cause polluent in our natural tap water.
               In my country I used to drink only tap water actually in my country ( Brazil) not many people buy bottled water because our tap water is clean and taste good. After I move to NY my husband use to tell me that i shouldn't drink water from the tap because it contains chlorine to mantain the water clean. All these years trying to avoid tap water I figure out that is not a problem drinking tap water we just need filled a big container and wait about 20 min for the chlorine to go down then we can drink it.
             People could do many things that could really help to make the population go back to tap water. The government should invest in public infrastruture, prevent pollution, drinking fountains and that water bottled boycott. I personally stoped buying "Poland Spring" water to delivered in my house and I saved $ 35.00 a month. I beleive I am doing my part on the society but I can't force people to do the same.

Blog # 13
                                                     " Mom, Dad, buy the Broccoli"

                     In the article " Mom, Dad, Buy the Broccoli" by " The New York Times", the author is mention the importance of food industry stopping promote the comercial of food and drink with empty calories. Many companies already started cutting the advertisement of junk food like "McDonald's" and now their goal is to decrease that number in half of advertisement for younger children. Also the advertisement in elementary school and in public places to entertain children will not have comercial any more.
                     After all these companies started to limited the use of beloved cartoons or movie characters to promote junk food, the children have less access to all these information, as a result they don't ask the parents to buy them. The children food and beverages should have a decent and transparent guidelines helping them to choose a heathy food. Once the children are individualy informed about what to eat they become less obese and more assets.
                    I have two kids one in elementary and one in high school and in both schools they have these coca-cola and snack machines and for me these are a big issue because everyday they want money to buy this crap. Both of them know the importance of eatting healthy foods, but the temptation is there everyday in front of there eyes. After school when they get home i give them fruits to compensate the damage caused by chips and candys.
                    I particulary know many parents that buy broccoli and many others vegetables.In my life at like many others parents I cooked with healthy ingredients that helps them have good food habits.Today parents live in a battle against all these comercials about junk food and it is not easy to mantain our kids in good shape.
                    In conclusion, I believe if the Center for Science in the Public Interest put the effort for a real change of advertisements, we could easily see the difference. American children under twelve could change their habits and starting eating healthy, as a result they should have less sugar or fat in their body providing a good body condition to have a better behavior.

Blog # 12

Blog # 11                           

                                                               The Meatrix

                   In the movie Meatrix the author is showing a simbolic way to let us know that today the farms are way different as long ago. About 40 years ago when we visited a farm we used to see the owner of the farm treating their animal almost as pets.In contrast today family farms is a fantasy. The farmers are raising their animal like a factory, they make their animal reproduce and have many babys are possible. Animals grow in small places that caused them to take a over dose of antibiotics to resist germs, also animals produce massive amount of faeces that pollutes the water, as a result destroying communitties.

                                                             The Meatrix II
                      The farmers started artificial hormones to make the animals grow faster, get fat and produce more milk, as a result farmers didn't need to wait long to kill the animal saving money and time. When the babies are born they separeate them from their mother and they drink milk through tubes that make them drinking more milk  as neccessary to grow faster and fat.Some cows get sick and that disease call 'Mad cow desease", the cow that fail sick could be use to eat, as a result many people could eat the meat got very sick and die. Leo ( the pig) wonders if he is the one to save the world.


                                                           The Meatrix II and a half


                    Farmers kill and cut 4000 thousands cows in a single day, causing dangerous working conditions because the workers work so fast that they get injuries. The insane need for speed results in bad quality of the meat that contains some manure because parts of the intestine are between the meat. Moopheus with his passion for green pastures expose the problems with factorys and ask for the world to be involved then we could have family farms again.

Blog # 10                                                  
                                                 Tutor Visit

                    This visit was helpfull and worth because working 101 make easy to undertand our difficulties.I believe we should do this more frequently.

Blog # 9
                                                  Red Pill or Blue Pill: Is Ignorance Bliss?


              In the article " Red Pill or Blue Pill : Is ignorance Bliss " the author is showing the similarity between the movie "The Matrix" and "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland". Both of the protagonists are experiencing similar situations in life, also they are having the opportunity to get to know a new world from someone else's point of view. Neo the protagonist of the "The Matrix" and Alice the protagonist of "Alice's Adventure in Wonderland" got confused about the changes and both started questioning if this was real or was just their imagination. Both of these movies were based on the book "The Allegory of the Cave" by Socrates that mentions the liberation from the believes that we are used to.
            After they experience the new world it is hard to go back to the place they lived before and communicate to people that the world is a simple simulation of reality. When people live in their worlds for so long the change can be painful and also some people can refuse doing it.In the movie " The Matrix" the author uses a simbolic way to choose our change where the blue pill means that we continue in our regular lives and a red pill that means a complete change for a new world that nobody told us before. Likewise, in the movie "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland"the simbol for the change is a drink and a cake that a Caterpillar offers to her. The author shows in both movies the importance to take risks in life and grow as a person and open our minds to new things.
               Sometimes changes can cause a weird feeling because we can get lost trying to figure out who we really are. Also depending on the change we would need a complete reeducation of habits and concepts about life or even phisical skills like we see in the movie.In addition starting over in a new world is a big challenge because we have to go through some new situations that can make us question if we made the right choice.
                 I believe that everybody should take the red pill to have an opportunity to discover a new world. I am from Brasil and after 28 years living a convenient life with things that I knew for example: the language, places to go,culture, expressions, friends, family,how should I behave to be accepted and all these things that can bring us to a comfort zone I realize that I was tired. I had a nice job, my own apartment,  new car and all that make me starting questioning "that is it?" and i decided to come to New York and live with a friend of mine.
                I arrived in this country in 2001 and I didn't know how to say " how are you?" or " how much is that?", in other hand, I was so happy that I took the risk and I felt so proud of my self. Some days when I was still living in Brazil I use to think that moving to New York was impossible and a crazy decision. Later I realized that it could be nice to start over in a new place even with all the difficulties. Coming here I felt like a newborn, illiterate and ignorant, but I didn'tlet this be a barrier that could change my mind making me go back to Brazil. I had to literally reeducate myself and I can tell you that is not easy and sometimes can be frustranting.
               In Conclusion I truly believe that there is always a new world to discover and it is up to us to take the chance.Also based on the famous account given by Socrates and on both movies that I mention before and including my own experience, changes are never going to be for the worse because they can always add knowledge, it can be good or bad, but it can make you a better person.

      

Blog # 8

                                                   " The Matrix doesn't exists"

         The Matrix doesn't exists, this is just one more scifi movie that trys to make people think deeper about their lives and reevaluate some concepts. In the movie the autor uses the character of Morpheus as a God that knows all the truth about the world and has the knowledge and authority to show the people how the world really is and how we have being blind about it. In my opinion this is a intersting movie based on the theory of Socrates but is not truth at all and will never be. People are used to hear about all these rumors that the world is about to end, as a result people get scared. I remember whem i was a child that everybody used to say that in the year 2000 the world was ending and that never happened, so after that day all these rumors I try to ignore and starting to  believe that just God knows the truth.

Blog # 7

                                                          The Dangers of Reality TV

                 Reality TV as we know it began back in 1992 when MTV first broadcast the Real World to a desert island to make a alive competition and who survived won the price. Most of these competitions, the person who wans sometimes wasn't the one who has more capacity, but someone who conquer the audience with charisma and beauty that make the public to vote and making that person a winner. One of the problems to watch theses shows is that young fans get addicts. Besides that the shows send a wrong and dangerous messages, molding young fans minds, also reinforcing the ideas of life as a competition and education isn't importante in life. The owners and producer of these shows should have better means of reality show with a educational messagens.
                The addiction of young fans is forcing them to watch the show every day, also recording it. Further they discuss about it with friends and trying to decide who has the rigths to win the competition. Equally important is that the students or young fans are spending to much time on these shows and they should give these kind of attention to school and educational topics.I am a mother of two boys 15 and 9 years old and i can tell you by my own experience that my kids come back from school and they watcthed all this shows and i always argument with them that they should be much better if they expended that time reading a intersting book ou studing what they learned in school on that day, so i tell them to do their hw and they roush it to wacth the show, as a result, the hw get slope. It is kind of a sad situation because they are expending time on something that is not instructive.
               The reality shows are molding the young fans mind, also making them believe that school and education is not important to be successful in life.In contrast, they believe that beauty, popularity is the secret to find the success and being famous, as a result we are raising many stupid people that don't have a cultural base to be somebody in life. For instance, I am from Brazil and in my country we have a reality show called BBB ( Big Brother Brasil), the show works exactly like here in America, men and women competing each other inside a house that they can't go out and they have no comunication with the out side world and the girl or guy who wins the price also has to take pictures for Playboy Magazine .Can you believe it!!
                After watching many shows the young fans starting to see life as a competition, in addition some kids that belong in a team wants to be the best player in their own team. In fact, I know one friend of mine that has a son that plays in a soccer team, and he use to say to his playmates from the same team that he was better than them, as a result, the team started to repulse him and he was invited to leave the team because of his behavior.
                In conclusion, I truly believe that the producers of these shows should make a reavaluation about it and changing the topics and messages to be more instructional and educational.

Blog# 6

                                                " The Truman Show -- Self Determination"


                           Self  Determination is a theory of motivation, it supports our natural tendencies to behave in effective and healthy ways. In the movie 'The Truman Show", i believe the autor is trying to show people that when we have Self Determination we can reach our goals. In the movie truman ( Jim Carey) is a insurance salesman that discover that his entire life is actually a T.V. show, as a result, he got upset because he figure out that everybody new and just him didn't, so he decided to change his life and start over in another place, where he could be himself without nobody watching and judging him.
                          In the same way, many people fell trapped in situation in life that make them change their behaviors and trying to find the way out of it. Personally i already experience something similiar. Let me explain....Since I ws a child i use to be a independente girl and i always use to do things by my self, for example, fixing bicycles, build dolls house with paper boxes, help my mother raise my little brother and more.
                          Moreover when I was sixteen years old, I started on my first job at a National Bank as assistant administrative and after five years a bought my own apartment and started living by my self. Furthermore, five more years passed and I decided that was time to change my life and I decide to move to New York City and start a new chapter of my life, this decision make my intere family upset, and my father wasn't talking with me anymore.
                         On the other hand, I was determinated to change my life and I spoke with my boss at the bank and he accepted my decission and I left the the job. At the next day, I organized a meeting in my house to explain to my family my reasons that I was tired to do the same thing for ten years and I felt that I could do and be more than that and coming to New York City could be a big challenge, because here I could learn English, find a job and learn the american culture and that could be a nice experience in my life, also if it didn't results alrigth i would come back, but knowing that I tried.
                       Further, in january 2002 I arrived in New York City and it was a freezing morning for me because in Brazil the winter is about 50 F, so that was my first challenge, but i was determinated to stay and nothing could hold me back. Hours later I arrived in my friends house and that was a small place with no privacy, I had to sleep in a sofa and my clothes in my bag, I find this to be my second challenge because my parents house is so big with a large back yard, also I use to have a room just for myself, however, my friend helps me to find a job at a shoes store and there a learned Spanish and little English. Learning Spanish wasn't easy because there are different accents from many coutries and I had to pay attention when people talked and sometimes i felt discriminated, and i believe that was my third challenge, because learning a different language isn't easy at all.
                     In conclusion, the motivation that the Self Determination can bring to our lives is the key for the success, as a result, here I got married and I became a mother of two boys. I truly believe that have done the best choise deciding moving to New York City.

Blog # 5

                                        " I know the Truth, so don't bother me with facts"


                 In the article " I know the truth, so don't bother me with facts" by Jeffrey Kluger, the autor is explainning how easily people believe in rumors that they even know where it come from. I believe that people should learn more about facts, as a result people should avoid being labeled as dupes, also would be less exposed, in addition they would be never manipulated by the system.
                In fact, people should avoid being labeled as dupes, also should had more access to reading and get informed, so they would hardly believe in rumors.Moreover, whem we study and read books we can easily respond to rumors and explain to others the reasons why this is a rumors based on facts that they read before.In my work place (Queens), one person spread the rumors that the owner of the school was opening a new school in Broklyn and many people would be transferred, as a result of believing in this rumors, many people were fired, because they were talking about something that wasn't truth.
                Furthermore, people should be less exposed, also when we believe in rumors we get exposed to the changes that it would make in our lifes and opinions about facts.In addition, people get vulnerable about decisions to make about some project in life and hold plans for the future, all these because of a simple rumors.I personaly have a friend that postponed getting pregnant by rumors of an alleged promotion.
                Moreover, people would never be manipulated by the system, also we should never sticked on inflamatories quotes.Moreover, some of that may be simple ego, that we should learn how to delete from our brains.In Brasil long ago granmothers use to tell their daughters and granddaughters that they couln't wash their hair on the first day of menstruation or otherwise they could turn crazy people. Can you believe it?? Many young girls believe on this rumors for decades and even today in small towns still have people who pratice this habit.
                 In conclusion, rumors are a important topic to be discuss about, because it has the power to change future and people behavior. I wish that the investigation and studies of the brains continue, and the investigators continue looking deeper to figure out if we have some scientific solution for that then we could power down the situation.

Blog #4

                         " I know the truth, so don't bother me with facts"


       Claim: I believe that people should learn more about facts.
      
       Reason 1: People could avoid being labeled as dupes.

       Reason 2: People would less exposed.

       Reason 3:People would never be manipulated by the system.

       Thesis: I believe that people should learn more about facts, avoinding being labeled as dupes and less exposed, also they would never be manipulated by the system.

Blog 3

                                            " The Allegory of the Cave"
                                                           Sumary

                     In the article " The Allegory of the Cave" from the Book VII of The Republic by Plato, translated by Benjamin Jowett, Socrates is trying to teach and show that people see the world in many diferent ways.
                    When we born everything is a new beginning and we start to see  and learn things, and all those things make us as a person. Moreover, our parents at the beginning of our lifes are responsible for who we are and what we learn. Futhermore, when we reach a certain age (18 to 21), we supposed to leave our "caves" and live by ourselves and having the responsability to discorver a new world. In addition, we open our minds to a new world and we change as a person, and it is hard to go back to the same place that we use to live or being the same person that we use to. As a result, when people open the door for opportunities and to learn new things, people change and you can never go back because people may don't accept you the way you are now and even you nay not adapted to the old place that you use to live before.



                        In my opinion, the cave means our blind or confortable zone and at this point of my life i am not there any more. I am from Brazil and when i came here 10 years ago, i wans't feeling confortable at all, i didn't know anything, sometimes simples tasks was hard to solved because of the language barrier. In New York i got married, became a mother of two boys, learned English, found a job, and i change as a person. In addition, I would like to mention that in 2007 i went to Brazil to visit my family and all of them notice that i was dressing, talking and acting diferent, i was suprised to hear all these comments, because for me i was the same, but of course i couldn't be the same person after all these new things that a saw and learned. Moreover, the traffic in Brazil are not organized like in New York City and i got sad to realize that a never notice that before. Furthermore, when i made the comparison, my family got upset with me and that i was criticizing my on country. They really miss understood what a meant.As a result, a think that is hard to go back when we give ourselves the opportunities to learn new things in life and we never will see the world in the same way.

blog 2

                                 "I know the Truth , So Don't Bother Me with Facts"

                            According to the article “ I know the Truth , so Don’t Bother Me with Facts”, the author Jeffrey Kluger wants to show how Humans are easily deceived by rumors and lies. Also, researchers shows that people get stick on false beliefs and it is hard to make them to forgot it or change their minds. A recently study with 750 people who believe at least in one rumor, did these people expose the rumor and what would make them change their minds. As a result, the assistant professors of communication (Garret and Nisbet) came to a conclusion that it is easy to manipulate people’s beliefs and a fewer were willing to reverse their positions. Garret also shows, that some people refuse to change their minds even if they see documents that prove the opposite, people respond by sticking to their prejudices even more strongly. The Professors are still studying to find a better explanation for that behavior .

Blog 1

                                                                            Hype

                         Today most of the people feel visually and mentally squeezed by the pollutants, from the first moment that we wake up in the morning, until night when we go to sleep, there are marketing messages everywhere we go.The increase of advertising is growing so fast that people still don't realize the danger it can cause in our brain.
                         There is nowhere to run, any where your eyes look at, there are a comercial about something, for example, if your kids are wacthing T.V. they are attacked by commercials about new video games, candy's, brands of clothes, sodas, sneakers, places to travel, sites to visit that teach the kids how to play games online. This is to much for kids that sometimes even know the price of all this things.
                         Furthermore, i know one mother that bought a X-Box for her son to play with other kids alive, so she used her credicard number to pay the registration allowing her son to starting playing. Between each game appears commercials and her 9 years old son innocently bought a lots of thing using her credicard number that was in the system, cousing problems for his mother that had to call all the companies explaining the situation and canceling all purchases.
                         Moreover, it is worrisome how our childrem will grow up without knowing that it is possibly have fun without all this tecnology.
                        In school teachers give to the kids sites to search, that makes easy to complete a project or homework, but when these childrem visit the site, there are commercials from T.V. show that make the student losing the attention of they supposed to do.
                        In conclusion, i truly believe that the advertising company should make a reavaliation of the topic to reduce and limit to many commercials every where we go, it is really not neccessary.