Languages: The door to the unknown

By Margarita María Gómez (FIGRI graduate, 2014)

Languages. This word means a whole world. For me, a language is a bridge to another country, a new culture and a new mindset. Learning languages has become a hobby for me so I don’t really have a single motivation as to why I study them. However, my main motivation when I started learning Korean was the Korean War (1950-1953), while learning Japanese was motivated by the different documentaries I watched on Canal Capital when I was 5 years old. Still, talking with foreigners and travelling have pushed me to study harder and has become the perfect motivation for learning. 

Externado University became the perfect environment for improving my knowledge in different languages.  Since I was exempt from taking English, I had many options to study a different language. So, I had the chance to study French (which is compulsory in my faculty), Japanese and Italian. My former exchange classmates were really kind by helping me with my French (which was awful!). Also, through the university I had the chance to do my internship in Korea, which was a once-in-a-lifetime experience for my language proficiency, and for my personal development. I cherish my memories of being a student at Externado.

When travelling, the difference between going to a country where they speak your language and going to a country where the language is completely unknown to you is quite big. For example, living in Korea and speaking Korean made my life easier, people were kinder to me and I was able to have new adventures that are not found when you’re just a tourist. But it doesn´t mean that you shouldn’t go to a country where you don’t speak the language. On the contrary! I would love to travel to places where I’m not great at the language, although I would try to get a basic understanding of their language beforehand. Travelling and backpacking mean all the effort you made while studying has a purpose, and you become more open-minded. As St. Augustine said “The world is a book, and those who do not travel read only one page.”  

I always thought that learning a language was not only about textbooks and conversational classes, but about living the language, absorbing the culture and understanding the mindset of native speakers. That was my main study method, along with textbooks of course! Speaking even if you are not sure if it’s correct, and reading things several times until you understand the message; those techniques are useful for getting your brain used to the language. In addition, technology has become a wonderful tool for learning new things! Using different websites and apps for languages has become an effective and fun way to test yourself and discover new cultures.  

La La Land: About the Soundtrack

By Juan Esteban Guzmán Tovar (1^st semester FIGRI student, level 4 English)

I went with my best friend to watch La La Land recently. The story was nice, however, the best thing was the music. During the whole movie, we could appreciate “live music”. I mean, they did not record the songs in a studio; they played the songs at the same moment that the scene was being recorded.

I’m pretty sure that you will hear that La La Land makes us remember cinema classics, and it’s true, due to the fact that the actors dance while they are singing.

Ryan Gosling stars in the movie, and he said that he had to take piano classes for 6 hours every day to play the piano songs in the movie.

It’s been a long time since we’ve had a movie with a soundtrack as good as La La Land. It definitely deserved the Oscar award; the music is excellent, and it’s the best soundtrack I’ve ever heard.

How to survive at Externado

By Angie Yuliett León León (3rd semester Public Accounting student, level 4 English)

Many of us know that the transition from high school to Externado isn't so easy. Adapting is never simple. And it becomes harder when you listen to all the stories and myths that surround this stage of your life. This is why this advice will be really useful for you.

1. You must know the place where you are going to study
This is the way you avoid being late. You won't embarrass yourself, and especially you won't fall for the typical “primiparadas” that first-time students at university can experience.

So… make sure you explore Externado and know how to get to your classes.

2. Have a good place to study and do your homework
If you create a clean and tidy environment conducive to study, without distractions, you can do your tasks while optimizing your time and allowing your mind to be clear and ready to learn.

So… try to have a clean desk with a comfortable chair and a lamp to read and do your homework. You will spend a lot of time in this place!

3. Manage your time
It is not a good idea to study all the time. You have to learn to divide your time between activities that you like and ones you have to do. Spend time with loved ones and study, but make sure you distribute time in the right way that allows you to do everything.

So… make a schedule. This will help you manage your time in the best way and remember not to leave all your obligations to the last minute.

4. Get support from teachers, tutors and administrators
They can be good allies on this path. If you have any problems, do not wait. They will help you to improve, but remember that they will only do it if you overcome your fear and ask them.

So… go to your faculty and ask about the tutoring and assistance available for what you need.

5. Participate in extracurricular activities offered by the university
Don't miss the opportunity to participate in the different activities offered by your university. They will give you unforgettable experiences that will make you grow as a person. This is in addition to meeting new people and spending your time on something that you like.

So… if you're good at a sport or you want to learn something new, or maybe do something you’ve been afraid to try, go to the Externado welfare office and you will find out about all the activities that you are missing.

These are some advice that will help you survive and enjoy your time at university. But don't forget that what you really have to do to survive and fulfill your goal is to study a programme that you really love.

HOT SPRINGS ARE AN OPTION!

By Laura Soacha (3^rd semester Social Communication student, level 4 English)

Within our daily routines all week, going out and taking a break with friends or family is an option. Very often though, the problem is that you do not know where to go. A new place that can produce a different feeling is the Napoles hot spring, which is a great option to get rid of stress.

Just an hour and a half from Bogotá on the road to Choachi, you will find this wonderful place which is surrounded by nature. Napoles offers three adult hot spring pools, a sauna, and a mud pit perfect for beauty treatments!

Hot spring pools offer many benefits for the body. The most recognized of these is reducing pain, in addition to stopping viruses, lowering blood pressure, helping blood circulation and oxidation, and dissolving and eliminating toxins. Leonidas, an assistant and hot springs lover, confirmed to us that for many people who go there with different kinds of pain, this pain largely disappears.

Schedule a date with the ones you love and take this little trip to rest and regain strength for a new week. I assure you that you will be surprised by the beautiful savannah that surrounds Bogotá and this rest will do a lot of good for your health and body.

A Day in Externado’s Cafeterias

By David Ramirez Ocampo (3^rd semester Public Accountancy student)

Rush hour at Externado University is from 1:00 pm to 2:00 pm. It is the time when you can eat delicious food and spend time with your friends. Yes, I am talking about lunch time.

Although this time is really important, there is something that does not allow us to enjoy it to the fullest: the crowds.

These crowds produce a lot of the problems that make our lunchtime less pleasurable. For example, people cannot walk quietly around the cafeteria and the stress levels are overflowing because there is so much noise that ruins your peace.

So, what is the solution to this problem?

Well, first we must know its causes. Externado’s cafeterias are very small and the students that have lunch there are very many, so the capacity of the cafeterias is insufficient to offer the kind of service we need. This is why we have the problem I mentioned.

For this reason, I propose that we build a bigger cafeteria in H building , which is almost finished.

This solution would help to decongest the cafeterias, would increase the profits of Seralun (the food services provider) and would increase the income of the university.

Everyone would win!

Never Give Up

By Ricardo Díaz (undergraduate English Through Multimedia student)

“So thank you for choosing our futures in your present”. As Elizabeth concluded, the crowd roars with a big round of applause after such a moving speech. She smiles and wipes the tears off her eyes as she steps down from the podium, reaches her table and sits down after hugging her mother.

Elizabeth is a 21 year old girl who had to deal with a traumatic event that changed her life forever: seeing how her family was slowly torn apart by an unjust and broken system. To confront such tragedy, she has taken it upon herself to stop such disgrace to befall others in her situation, the deportation of immigrants from The United States.

She was 13 years old when that fateful event happened. As Elizabeth was in her English class taking the SRI test, a runner came into her classroom saying that she was needed at the main office. It was weird to her since it was Wednesday morning and the only thing out of the ordinary that she had done was to arrive 40 minutes late to school that day.

“As I arrived to the main office, I saw my aunt standing there with a pale face. She looked at me sternly and said, “I do not know how to say this, but… your family has been taken by immigration and want to pick you up too.” As my aunt finished, I started crying uncontrollably while she hugged me. It was all so fast and hard to take in.”

ICE arrived and picked her up to take her and her family to Miami to be processed. “We were treated like criminals the whole time we were under custody. We were not allowed to go to the bathroom alone and were constantly watched by somebody. It was humiliating and horrible.”

At the end of the day Elizabeth’s family was released under two conditions: Every member of the family was forced to sign a document saying they had to eventually leave the country and one of the members had to stay with the immigration police to be deported immediately. “My father offered himself for our sake. That was the first member I saw being taken from me. I was heartbroken.” she said, as calmly as she could muster.

Elizabeth’s family lived in fear and constant hiding for years after that until the time arrived for another member of her family to be taken from her: it was her two older brothers who made the choice to leave. “They had both graduated already and with no opportunity to progress as people because of the document they signed years earlier, they did not see the point of lingering any longer. I was fortunate to be young enough during the signing of the papers that I was not forced to sign them.”

As only her mother and Elizabeth remained, feelings of sadness and depression began creeping in. “It was awful because I continued on with my life being known as a loner trying to get by when my whole life I had been associated with two other individuals who were always there for me.”

Although Elizabeth dealt with a rough teenage, she did not let these hard times get to her. As a matter of fact, she turned these into strengths. She eventually got a job and kept going from there where she made it possible to juggle 3 jobs while at the same time paving her way to college. “It was really hard to deal with all 4 things at once, but I did the best I could. Still, I felt that there was more I could do.”

During her college application process, Elizabeth met an individual who was part of a group called “Global Education”. “Due to my circumstances as an immigrant and everything I was doing I was offered a scholarship to reward my hard work. This person was also a member of a club called EQUAL, who gets involved in dealing with and making awareness of issues that plague our community on a daily basis.”

Among the many topics that EQUAL dealt with, there was the one about immigration. They delve into the subject from basic human rights being violated to immigrant families being torn apart because of a fragmented U.S. political system. “When I saw that this club was involved in this matter, something deep within me urged me to join. I knew I could not do anything for my family, but I could try to give a voice to those that are currently going through what I was going through and lend them a hand in some way.”

With this conviction fueling her, Elizabeth joined EQUAL and has been going around different states where a good portion of the population are immigrants to share her story in conferences set up by the club and let them know that they are not alone, they should not give up, that they matter and above all else that it is possible to triumph even if the world seems to be against you. “This journey has not been easy. However, knowing that there are others with a story similar to mine out there that could use a few words of encouragement and guidance to keep going is something I cannot deny them. If someone would have done the same for me, to inform me of what I can do and what I can become, my family would still be together today.”

Profile: Cormac Ross, The struggles of an Irishman in the wrong place and at the wrong time.

By Erin Ross (undergraduate English Through Multimedia student)

“If you ever get lost, walk towards the mountains” were the words my mum said to my dad when he arrived in Bogotá.

Irishman Cormac couldn’t have imagined in his wildest dreams that he’d end up living in Colombia when he met his future wife Adriana in Oxford. With little to no knowledge of the country, and after a couple of years into the relationship, he decided quite impulsively to pack his bags and go after Adriana, or Adie as he calls her.

Family members urged him not to come, quoting news headliners about the dangers he’d probably face. He didn’t care.

Back in Oxford he’d done the RSA Royal Society of Arts certificate in English Teaching as preparation for coming here. His plan had been to work in the British Council, but he didn’t have enough experience.

Thanks to Adie’s job in hotel management they ended up living on the Caribbean coast of Colombia. The Caribbean sounded so exotic to him, “the closest you can get to paradise”, he thought. But the grass looks greener from the other side, and once he got there his dream of paradise was shattered.

“The Caribbean” was actually Barranquilla, which was at that time a terrible excuse for a city. The sun was (and still is) the reason for the red on Cormac’s formerly pale and freckly face. You could definitely spot the only Irishman in town from miles away.

A year living in hell on earth, the recently married couple went through tough times. They were both working as English teachers, but sometimes they could only afford bananas. That’s all they had for breakfast lunch and dinner.

But there was one more thing: The language barrier. When he arrived in Colombia, Cormac didn’t speak a word of Spanish, but that didn’t seem to be a problem here in Colombia. He said “[…] in fact [not speaking Spanish] wasn’t as much of a hindrance as you’d imagine. Here there was a huge tolerance for not speaking Spanish, because Colombians in general seemed at the time, and even still today, almost honoured that a foreigner would come to their country. I always had that kind of feeling that they would make any allowance for a foreigner. They felt happy that a foreigner would come to their country. The lack of language was usually considered to be charming.”

Having no Spanish to get by, Cormac relied on Adie almost completely. He tells stories of how when he needed to argue with someone Adie would say whatever he said but in a toned down voice. It didn’t have the same effect, so that’s when he saw how necessary it was to learn the language. Whenever he took buses he’d take the one that headed towards the mountains, and asked someone to tell him when to get off.

Life for an Irishman in Colombia in the nineties wasn’t a walk in the park. He explains:

“It was lonely. There was no cable tv, there was no internet so not speaking Spanish you were very isolated. The only people I invited to my wedding I only invited because they spoke English”. “I remember speaking to Donald Bradley, a close family friend from Ireland, the morning of my wedding and I think I cried. To hear a voice in an accent that I had heard my whole life… it was very emotional”.

At that time there were very few foreigners in Colombia, and almost no knowledge of anything that wasn’t the US. “People would consider you to be gringo, American. There was no real appreciation of Ireland, no knowledge of Ireland. Even to these days in taxis, you say “Irlanda” and people understand “Holanda” and even “Islandia”, it was incredible how a taxi driver even knew “Islandia” existed.”

Everything changed the moment he started working in the British Council. His social life changed completely, he was finally amongst British and Irish people.

“Basically the British council is what established me in my profession as a teacher, then eventually gave me the confidence to start my own business.”

Nowadays he’s got his own teaching business, and even though he struggles to pronounce the double r, he gets by alright. He doesn’t need to know where the mountains are to get home anymore.