English in Madrid

Source: Wikipedia (Pere prlpz)   Violent clashes over Catalan separatist leaders' prison terms Chaos at Barcelona airport as protesters react to sentencing over 2017 bid   for independence  The Catalan independence crisis erupted again on Monday as police and protesters clashed at Barcelona airport hours after the Spanish supreme court jailed nine Catalan separatist leaders over their roles in the failed bid for secession two years ago. Protesters took to the streets , with many gathering at Barcelona’s El Prat airport after the court acquitted the nine defendants of the charge of violent rebellion but convicted them variously of sedition, misuse of public funds and disobedience. By late afternoon , thousands of protesters had answered a call from the Tsunami Democràtic movement designed to bring the airport to a standstill . Thousands set off by car, train and metro. When police closed the station, even more made the three-and-a-half hour journey on foot. Seve

Source: John McArthur on Unsplash * PLANE WRONG Extinction Rebellion protester boards plane at London City Airport and stops it taking off as eco-warriors bid to cause travel chaos AN Extinction Rebellion protester managed to ground a flight from London City Airport today - to the fury of the passengers on board . The Aer Lingus flight to Dublin this morning was on the runway and about to take off when a smartly dressed man stood up and gave a lecture on climate change. Filming himself on his phone, the man said: "I don't wish to travel with you, but I don't wish to get off ". He went on : "I'm extremely sorry for the inconvenience". Furious passengers responded saying: "You're not sorry at all ". As their flight was held up , travellers pleaded with crew to remove the bespectacled man from the plane. Continuing to address those on board, the man said: "We have two generations of human civilisation

Source:  Pablo Varela on Unsplash What to do if you hate your boss "I actually loved my job but when you have a boss that hates what you do - or is just trying to undermine you - it really does kill your enthusiasm," says Craig (not his real name). At first , he liked his manager but that changed when he saw her shout at an assistant on the team. And things only went downhill from there. She would shout at him in the office and publicly undermine him at industry events. "At first it was the snide remarks ," he says. ' Soul destroying ' " Slowly and surely things started to change and the remarks became less snippy and more out-and-out aggressive, hostile and condescending." He says it became "soul destroying" going into work every day. "Your personal relationships suffer too," Craig adds. "When you work for a bad boss - someone who's just constantly belittling you - it lowers your self esteem

Source:  Mauricio Artieda on Unsplash Plastic-for-tickets: Free travel for recycling in Rome Under the scheme, passengers accrue credit for every plastic bottle they recycle which can be used to purchase metro tickets. Travellers in Rome are being offered free metro tickets in exchange for plastic bottles as part of a scheme to make the city more environmentally friendly .  The plastic-for-tickets venture, launched by the Italian capital's public transport company ATAC, is currently running at three stations. But transport chiefs have said because the public response to the initiative has been positive, the plan is to extend it across the whole metro network until July 2020. Under the scheme, passengers can deposit plastic bottles at stations in exchange for a €0.05 credit that can be spent to purchase online tickets. They need to download an app onto their mobile phones which registers the number of tickets they have earned on the basis of the number of bottl

Source: Wikipedia ( Menahem bar Abraham ibn Malik )   Spain gets 127,000 citizenship applications from Sephardi Jews A deadline for Jews living outside Spain to request Spanish nationality has expired with 127,000 applications, most of them from Latin America. Jews living in Mexico top the list , with about 20,000 requests, followed by Jews in Venezuela and Colombia. In 2015, Spain passed a law to atone for the medieval expulsion of Sephardi Jews from the country. In the 15th Century, Spain's Catholic monarchs, having defeated the Muslim Moors, forced Jews to convert or leave. Applicants have had to prove a family connection with medieval Spain - and in many cases, that proved difficult . In addition, they had to get their Sephardi origins certified by a solicitor in Spain.  Mass expulsion  Spanish Jews gave the Hebrew name "Sepharad" to the Iberian peninsula. So descendants of Jews from Spain and Portugal still describe themselves as Sephardi Jews