As Halloween is at the back of the corner, let's talk about the most popular Halloween symbol ever: THE JACK O'LANTERN
1.DO YOU REALLY KNOW WHERE THIS TRADITION COMES FROM??
It comes from an old celtic legend "Stingy Jack", Stingy Jack or Jack of the Lantern is a mythical character whose story started several centuries ago in Ireland , there lived a drunkard known as "Jack the Smith". Jack was
known as a deceiver, manipulator. On a fateful night, the devil overheard the tale of Jack's bad actions. Unconvinced (and envious) of the rumors, the devil went to
find out for himself whether the story was true or not.
Typical of Jack, he was drunk and wandering through the countryside at night and he found a body with a strange face, it was the Devil, Jack realised it was his end, so he begged the devil to let him drink beer before departing to hell, the Devil accepted and took Jack to the local pub and they drank together.
Jackdid not want to pay, so asked the devil to transform himself into a silver coin and the devil did so. Jack put the coin into his pocket where he also had a cricifix which prevented the devil from scaping.
The devil was forced to leave Jack's soul free for ten years in exchange of his freedom.
Ten years later they met again, as the devil prepared to take him to the underworld, Jack asked if he could have
one apple because he was hungry. Foolishly the devil once again agreed to
this request. As the devil climbed up the branches of a nearby apple tree, Jack
surrounded its base with crucifixes, so the devil could not go down from the tree.
As Jack did before, he demanded that his soul never be taken by the devil into
hell. The devil agreed and refused to take Jack's soul to hell.
Some years later Jack died, he was not allowed in heaven because he had been a bad person all his life long, and as the devil promised his soul could never be taken into hell.
From that day on until eternity's end, Jack is doomed to roam the world between
the planes of good and evil, with only an ember inside a hollowed turnip.
This story was brought to America by irish inmigrants who believed that ghosts and souls abandoned their tombs in order to visit the earth in Halloween, they used turnips in order to frighten ghosts. When they arrived to America they found that pumkins were common there and easier to use than turnips, so they substituted the turnips and began to use pumpkins as the symbol of the condemned soul of Jack who wanders until the end of timje the earth,.....
Here you have the tale of Stingy Jack on video:
2.THE ART OF PUMPKIN CARVING:
Carving a pumkin has become an art for so many people, watch the following videos and see what can you do with a pumkin!!!
Go to this link and you will see other incredible Jack o'lanterns creations :
On the second Monday of October Americans celebrate Columbus Day to remember Christopher Columbus voyage to America in 1492.
Columbus was born in Genoa in 1451, in his time it was believed that the world was flat, but Columbus believed it was round.
He moved to Portugal when he was 23, he wanted to go to India, China and Japan by sailing west. If the world was round it was possible.
But he needed money, ships and men, so he asked the kings of Portugal, France and England but he got no help.
Finally the king Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of "Spain" decided to help him.
They gave him three ships: the Santa María, the Niña (whose real name was Santa Clara) and the Pinta.
On the 3rd of August they left Spain.
They finally arrived to the island of San Salvador in the Bahamas on 12 October 1492.
Even though he discovered a new continent, Columbus died without being conscious of it, he made other 3 trips to America, and died poor and forgotten in Valladolid on May 1506.
CELEBRATING COLUMBUS DAY IN THE USA
The USA is usally know as the melting pot, due to its huge number of inmigrants coming from different countries around the world, amongst them the Italian people who celebrate the life and discoveries of Christopher Columbus since 1792.
Since then, Columbus Day is considered a national holiday in the US, and many Americans celebrate it with colourful parades.
Here you have some videos about New York's annual Columbus Day parade in the 5th Avenue:
TV , and particularly advertisments, have always been a good vehicle to promote new songs, this is the case of this song which is currently displayed on Spanish TV channels, this song mixes up Spanish and English, an interesting way of learning both languages!!
LYRICS
Voy a romper la ventana que nos separa
colarme bailando en tu casa.
Ojos azules marrones o verdes
vidas en bares de cielos celestes
somos millones y te sigo y me sumo
seamos ciudadanos de un lugar llamado mundo.
I will meet you in the city
what is there about the stars?
in the moonlight we’re all pretty cos’ it paints over the stars
We should put on the sun,
we are citizens of all you can see,
we’ve got nothing but time
you find everything you didn’t do (x2)
Standing right in front of you
Ciudadanos de este mundo.
Compañeros al andar.
Cada día una aventura,
caminamos al compás.
Hoy todo lo que pienso todo lo que hago todo lo que canto es tuyo
Hoy todo lo que dices todo lo que tocas todo lo que crees es suyo
Hoy solo damos sueños solo que sonrías solo que no frunzas el ceño.
Solo somos uno, somos ciudadanos de un lugar llamado mundo.
we should put on the sun
we are citizens of all you can see,
we’ve got nothing but time
you find everything you didn’t do
Standing right in front of you
THE
STORY OF THE SONG
SINGERS:
JAMIE CULLUM born in Essex (England) jazz and pop singer and pianist
NITA: Spanish
singer from the Spanish duet FUEL FANDANGO
FRANK T: Franklin
Tshimini Nsombolay,born in the Republic of Congo, is a rap
producer and a radio presenter, he lives in Spain since he was two years old.
CARLOS
SADNESS: singer and composer from Barcelona.
THE VIDEO IS A PART OF SAN MIGUEL'S BEER 2012 PROMOTION AND
WAS RECORDED IN LONDON AND BARCELONA WITH SINGERS FROM DIFFERNT COUNTRIES, IN THIS WAY IT TEACHES US THAT FRONTIERS DO NOT EXIST, "WE ARE CITIZENS DE UN LUGAR LLAMADO MUNDO"
IT WILL BE RELEASED SOON AS A COMERCIAL
SONG DUE TO ITS SUCCESS. LISTEN TO IT AND WATCH THE VIDEO ON TV!!
