English in Madrid

Source: You Tube (BBC News) Key Words: spiderman Mailian Paris Paris balcony boy family thank Mali 'Spiderman' Mamoudou Gassama The family of a small boy dramatically rescued after dangl ing from a balcony in Paris, France have expressed their thanks to the Malian man who saved him. "He's truly a hero," the boy's grandmother said of migrant Mamoudou Gassama, who scaled four floors to pluck the child from danger. The four-year-old's father, who had left him in their flat and gone shopp ing , faces charges of failing to look after his child, reports say. Mr Gassama will be given citizenship . French President Emmanuel Macron personally thanked him, gave him a medal for courage and said he would also be offered a role in the fire service. More details have begun to emerge of the circumstances surrounding the incident. Why was the boy on the balcony? The boy left Réunion, where his mother and grandmother live, about three week...

Source: Helena Lopes en Unsplash Give millennials £10,000 each to tackle generation gap, says think tank Resolution Foundation proposes ‘citizen’s inheritance ’ to help redistribute wealth to young Every person in Britain should receive £10,000 when they turn 25 to help fix the “broken” inter-generational contract between millennials and baby boomers , an influential think tank has proposed following a two-year study. The payment, described as a “citizen’s inheritance”, is intended to redistribute wealth at a time when young people need it most to find housing, return to education or start a business. It is also intended to reduce resentment towards baby boomers (born 1946-65) who have typically done better out of the housing market and pensions than any subsequent generation. The idea has emerged from the Resolution Foundation’s inter-generational commission, which has been working on the issue for two years and has now published its final report. The panel was ch...

Source: Wikimedia (Ed Yourdon)   Phrasal Verbs with run : run around : to be very busy doing a lot of things e.g .I'm exhausted. I've been running around all day. run away : to leave a place suddenly and secretly e.g. Some teenagers run away from home when they are unhappy. run sth by sb : to tell sth to sb e,g, Can you run that by me again ? I'm not sure that I have fully understood. run into sb : to meet sb by chance e.g. I ran into my boss on the High Street at the weekend. run into sth : to experience something unexpectedly e.g. The company ran into problems and had to rethink their strategy. run out (of sth) : to finish, use or sell all of sth so that there is none left e.g. I ran out of time . I still had five or so questions to answer. run over - to hit and drive over sb or sth in a vehicle e.g. She was run over by a car, which then sped off. Running History: My first race was the 14km around Ciudad Universitaria in March 2015. I finished...

Source:  Mathilde Langevin on Unsplash Former Spanish presidency favourite resigns after CCTV captures her shoplifting face cream  Cristina Cifuentes had recently faced controversy over allegedly fake Master's degree   The career of one of Spain’s most high-profile conservative politicians was in tatters Wednesday thanks to an alleged seven-year-old shoplifting case involving two 20 euro pots of anti-aging cream. Madrid regional president Cristina Cifuentes, a leading light of Spain’s ruling centre right Partido Popular [PP] party, had once been tipped as a successor to Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy.  But instead , Ms Cifuentes resigned after a three-minute video was published online of her emptying her handbag of items and handing them to a security guard in a grimy supermarket backroom. The video, published by the OK Diario online site, shows Ms Cifuentes - at the time when she was deputy for the Madrid regional assembly - apparent...

Source: Wikipedia (Zerohund) Cheesed off : Spain's manchego makers vow to fight EU name ruling EU says Mexican producers can use manchego name to describe their cheaper, cow’s milk cheese Makers and lovers of manchego, Spain’s famous sheep’s milk cheese, have vowed to fight an EU decision allowing Mexican producers to carry on us ing the same name to describe their cheaper, cow’s milk cheese. A battle over ownership of the name had delayed a major trade deal between the EU and Mexico for months, but agreement was finally reached over the weekend in a deal that will allow 99% of goods to be traded between Mexico and the EU on a tariff-free basis. However the agreement on manchego cheese, while giving the Spanish variant some extra protections against copy-cats when sold in Mexico, will allow both types of cheese to share the same name and sit on the same shelves in that country. The European commissioner for agriculture, Phil Hogan, insisted careful packagi...

Source:  Hamza Madrid on Unsplash Why are Spaniards the only people in Europe obsessed with window blinds ?  Spain enjoys plenty of hours of sun, but yet apartments and houses are often completely shut off to natural light. Why is this? “It’s like Spaniards are afraid of light,” says Caroline Jurgens, a 42-year-old Dutch woman who has been living in Spain since 2005 . One of the first things that surprised Jurgens when she arrived from Amsterdam to Spain was the number of homes with the shutters down.  “They pull them down all year long, even in winter even though it’s not so hot. The Dutch do the opposite: we need light all the time,” she says. While the use of shutters in Europe is only anecdotal, here in Spain they are part of popular culture – and almost always kept down. And it’s not just because Spain receives more hours of light – between 2,500 and 3,000 hours in an average year, compared to the 1,600 in countries such as the United Kingdom or Holland...

Source:  Kenneth Vellinga on Unsplash London murder rate overtakes New York for first time ever after spate of fatal stabbings and shootings London's murder rate has overtaken New York City's for the first time ever, according to a new report. February marked the first month the UK capital saw more murders than New York, with 15 dead (nine aged 30 or younger). According to the report in the Sunday Times, London also suffered 22 fatal stabbings and shootings in March, higher than the 21 in the Big Apple. Both cities have similarly sized populations of around 8.5m people. New York City's murder rate has decreased by around 87 per cent since the 1990s. Meanwhile , London's has grown by nearly 40 per cent in just three years, not including deaths caused by terrorist attacks. On Saturday a murder probe was launched after a 36-year-old woman was killed in what is believed to be the 30th incident of fatal knife crime in the capital this year. The deat...

Source:  Marloes Hilckmann on Unsplash Waiter fired for being too rude says he was 'just being French' A waiter fired for being "aggressive, rude and disrespectful" has insisted there was nothing wrong with his manner - he was just being “French”. Deserved or not, France’s reputation for producing surly waiters who eye customers with suspicion, indeed disdain , is known the world over and has stood the test of time . Now one waiter has taken that reputation to another level by appearing to claim that a grumpy “garçon” is a cherished French national trait , not a sign of unprofessional conduct. Guillaume Rey, who worked at a Vancouver restaurant on Canada's Pacific coast, filed a complaint with British Columbia's Human Rights Tribunal against his former employer, saying he is the victim of "discrimination against my culture". The restaurant, operated by Cara Operations, accused Mr Rey of breach ing its code of conduct...

Source: Wikipedia (Andrew Dunn)   The Portuguese gave us fried fish, the Belgians invented chips but 150 years ago an East End boy united them to create The World's Greatest Double Act  They're a British institution as well as a national money-spinner , but how much do we really know about fish and chips? For most of us, the classic combination of battered fish and chipped potatoes deep-fried in beef fat or vegetable oil is as English as the cup of tea that washes it down . But just as tea originates in India or China, fish and chips is partly Portuguese and partly Belgian.  The British can take credit for uniting these two Continental imports and creating a coupling that is loved the world over . Today, Britain's 10,500 fish and chip shops have an annual turnover in excess of £650million. This multi-million-pound industry, which currently accounts for a quarter of the white fish and more than ten per cent of the potatoes we eat, grew from humble beg...

Source:  Julia Joppien on Unsplash German cities to trial free public transport to cut pollution   Plan to be tested in five cities in effort to meet EU air pollution targets and avoid big fines   “Car nation” Germany has surprised neighbours with a radical proposal to reduce road traffic by mak ing public transport free, as Berlin scrambles to meet EU air pollution targets and avoid big fines . The move comes just over two years after Volkswagen’s devastating “dieselgate” emissions cheating scandal unleashed a wave of anger at the auto industry, a keystone of German prosperity. “We are considering public transport free of charge in order to reduce the number of private cars,” three ministers including the environment minister, Barbara Hendricks, wrote to EU environment commissioner Karmenu Vella in the letter seen by AFP Tuesday. “Effectively fighting air pollution without any further unnecessary delays is of the highest priority for Germany,” ...