Blue Balls Fall from the Sky!

Blue balls rained down from the sky in a small hailstorm over the county of Dorset on Thurday afternoon.The balls are jelly-like but not sticky.The person who found the blue balls in his garden is keeping them in his fridge and said he was mystified as to what they could be.Atmospheric pollution caught up in the clouds?

click here for more information on this story

British Food all the rage in Paris!

British food,including the legendary fry-up breakfast,is all the current rage in Paris at local eateries:Rose ,Le Bel Cafe,Marcel;even popular with weekend visitors from London!

Hugo and The Artist both up for best picture Oscar

 

The 3D film 'Hugo' and the film 'The Artist' are both in the running for best picture and best director award in the forthcoming Oscars.'Hugo'has nominations of 11 awards whilst 'The Artist' has 10.

click here for further information on the Oscars

  

Year of the Dragon!

Happy Chinese New Year everybody!

click http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-16675356 for a short video!

click http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/in-pictures-16670305 for some great pictures of the celebrations!

Wish I was in Bangkok to celebrate the New Year New! Nothing happening here!
In London the celebrations take place next Sunday beginning with a big parade in Chinatown and culminating with a big fireworks display in Trafalgar Square!
click http://www.visitlondon.com/events/detail/4733685-chinese-new-year-in-london for more info

Teaching English Radio goes live on RCTI Tunis!

Today the British Council Teaching series of English Radio programme reached many new listeners in Tunisa as the first programme was broadcasted on the 'The English Programme 'on the Tunisian radio station RCTI. Apart from the well-known presenter Hayet Toukabri there was a studio audience,which included local Tunisian teacher/trainers and teacher trainer,Kiros Langston and Project Manager,Christina Phelps from British Council Tunis.As the studio audience was gearing themselves up for the discussion,the song 'The Greatest Love of All ' was played 'the children are our future.. teach them well ' George Benson sang.

The theme of discussion on the English programme was 'lesson planning' which produced many thought provoking comments:
 'you fail to plan,you plan to fail', 'without planning you're heading nowhere'.Later I found out that Olfa,a teacher at British Council Tunis said she'd listened to the programme finding lots of useful advice and ideas,so the programme was even useful for experienced teachers as well as newly qualified ones.

Even,my taxi driver,even though he only speaks a few English words,had listened to the programme.

On the programme there was a call-in quiz with lots of exciting prizes to be won;although many of the callers weren't teachers,one of  the callers was a manager of a patisserie,who listens to the English programme every day,came up with the correct answer.The last caller to answer the final quiz question was a new listener and had decided to tune in after seeing the advert for the show.
Surprisingly none of the callers were able to name the countries that were mentioned in the programme.

Tune in for the next programme of the Teaching English Radio and more chances to win some great prizes on  Friday the 17th February!

Auditions

Went to Sindbad Studio,just 5 minutes from the British Council,to do an audition for a film for the Discovery Channel.An American accent was needed but I don't think I could ever really do accents but the audition was fun to do.

Empty Beaches in Tunisia

Empty beaches,empty hotels!
What should Tunisia do to bring back the tourists?

click http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/fast_track/9677417.stm
for a recent report on the situation in Tunisia.

Tunisia Revolution :anniversary 14th January

Anniversary of the Tunisia Revolution;14th January has been declared a national holiday but not for the service workers,such as hotel/cafe/restaurant workers or taxi drivers.
There were celebrations in the centre of Tunis with many hundreds of people filling Avenue Bourguiba.

Upstairs at Mille Feuilles bookshop in La Marsa there is an exhibition of photographs taken in January 2011;capturing some key images of that momentous time.This evening,to celebrate the anniversary,many of the photographerswere at the exhibition to sign copies of the book ' Degage! ',which contain numerous iconic images,mostly in black and white with some of them highlighting one part of the image in red.

Yesterday,a cruise ship,the Costa Concordia ran aground off the West Coast of Italy;forty people are still believed to be missing.

Wind swept Tunis

It's been quite blustery in Tunis but probrably not as much in England where storms have battered many places.

New Year's Eve

New Year's Eve,spectacular fireworks display at the London Eye.
Tony celebrated it with Lucia and their friends from the tennis club;they went to the Duje of Cambridge pub.
At the London Eye met a family who had driven from Hertfordshire to see the fireworks.
Quite a few Chinese tourists but while chatting to them they didn't know about the activist Wei Wei or the recent stikes in Shenshen,in the south of China;the news in China must be censored a lot.
On the way to Vauxhall,to get the bus home;it seemed it was too crowded to get into Waterloo train station,an Indian man had been attacked by a young black guy.The Indian man had desperately held onto his attacker but seemed to have aggravated his injuries as blood was streaming down his face.Two policemen soon came along;one of them on a motorbike.
At Vauxhall bus station
an elderly couple who'd tried unsuccesfully to see the fireworks from the Strand but were stuck in the enclosed area and unable to leave told me they had also seen
an Indian man attacked.
http://m.youtube.com/index?desktop_uri=%2F&gl=GB#/watch?v=Xy_9bx6U8_0