Halloween I thought that Halloween was an American celebration but I was completely wrong , it has its roots on the Christian and Gaelic tradition . There are different theories about it, but seems the most logical it is a Christian tradition influenced by Celtic harvest festivals with possible pagan roots, particularly the Gaelic festival Samhain. What a big mistake from myself, I was born in Galicia, a region in the northwest of Spain, we have an important influence of Celtic and Gaelic culture, like we are in the shore of Northwest Peninsula , we were invade by many people from the North of Europa, as Celts, Vikings, and we still have some traditions from these cultures. I´m not interesting in traditions in addition, I don´t like , I think that in many occasions on behalf of traditions we do a big aberration, but now when I wanted to write about Halloween, I discover interesting stories about the festival of Samhain, and how in many town in Galicia recovered the old tradition. In Spain we celebrated All Hallows Eve, but now Halloween is introducing , little by little, especially in the young people , essential why it is more fun and interesting, and it´ll be imposed in three or five years, is life, ones traditions be imposed on others, it happens nothing The tradition in our country was attending church services, lighting candles , visit the graves of the dead and carry flowers to them, it is the day to remember our dead, at night we meet with our family and eat roast chestnuts and sweet potato , above all the fantastic mini pastries make of almond, sweet potato, potato and pine nuts. Now I hope you can understand why we can´t compete in the global world with the tradition of American Halloween of dress up, go the parties, walk by streets dress up like witch, ghost, etc , . Only one part of our tradition is better, the food, and of course, we joined Halloween with Spanish food, great.

Friends, cinema dinner and glass of wine In some countries, scpecially latin countries, like a Italy, Spain and also Françe we comunicate ours feelins around the food and wine. The family,is esential in Spain and Italy, is the rock that it settles the society, it survived all changes and the transformation from the last century to actually. The family when the members meet always meet around the table with the best food,wine and some others drinks. We speak, argue, discuss passionate,in general with love. We do the same way with the friends, we usually meet for dinner, lunch and after a dinner we can go to disco or for drink I have a friend that every Wednesday organise a meeting in her house to see a film around a glass of wine and popcorn, when the film finished we share a different dishes that everybody carried in and discuss, argue , laugh around the film and the many other questions that the film transport A good virtue of our culture!

The rain I think the humans are prepared biological to adapt at different temperatures and atmosphere condition , but we need a short time to adapt. If you put a someone from Cuba in any Scandinavian country in winter , autumn or spring probably would have hard problems to organize the daily live. I remember perfectly when I arrived to London to spend one year to live there, I had been many times before, but it is different, It was very hard , I had to make a big effort to adapt essential the climate and also to the food, two things opposite London to Barcelona. But I was adapting little by little, I bought clothes as if I was living in a ski resort, I never left home without the umbrella , and the most importantly , one terrible day that it rained strong all day and it was very cold at the end of May, I decided to change my mind, not to think about the weather, walk down the street just the necessary and make social life in the home, pub, library, theatre, indoors. And I began to enjoy London life..., for the food , the next note Best regards Celia

Autumn In my country,Spain, we are in the middle of Autumn, I thought that I liked it, but I don´t really like it, I prefer the Spring . In Autumn we come from Sumer that it is hot, relax, bright, the season of the senses, and the autumn is the season the transition for the winter, a season that I don´t like, rather I hate it . You begin to be umpleasent with the temperatura, specially if you are working in the computer or reading, suddenly you don´t know and you are freezed, like me 20 minutes ago, that I must to turn on the heating, we have 18º ... is strange And you have to go getting clothes in different times of the day, now I´m going to have a drink with friends and I must take time to decide that I must wear. But he worse it is that at the end of October although it is Autumn the winter wil be yet, for the first of November is always the beginning of the cold. Best regards Celia

Why is difficult to chat about politic and religion? Why the politic and religion are a personal belives as strong that it is quite embarasing sometimes to discuss or simply speak about it ? In my country, Spain, and in my city, Barcelona, we didin´t have this problem on the last 35 years, since that we have democracy, we could speak about every thing, sometimes with strong and passionate feelings, but the blood didin´t arrive to the river. We had a unique exception at the Vasc Country where operated one politic gang terrorist, there it was absolutely impossible to speak about politic and nacionalisme vasc nationalism with freedom. But now we have the same problem in cosmopolitan and international Barcelona, the local people we are completed diveded between independent and not independent.If we have a dinner or lunch, very frecuent, the host or some other person warn you, if you can or not speak about it, if the majority are pro independent or are again independent. Horrible, and not healthy for our society!

Crazy summer I live in Barcelona, a Mediterranean city, we usually have humidity high temperatures, but not too much.However this summer was completely unpredictable, and we are saying, what is happening... the change climate is here, I don´t know We had a big wave heat since the last week of Juny until the first week of August, the people were totally desperate and many of them don´t know to do with that high hot, on the shops all the sytems of air condition were finished and every one was really exhausted. And then,suddenly, at first of August, the summer finished , we began to have 24º -27º, and this it isn´t the temperatures for summer in Barcelona . It was rainning, the sky was cloudy very often, strong storm,, at the end, not pleasent for people like me who love hot summer, the usually temperatures in Barcelona. What a pity, we lost the summer and the goods sounds of it, we must to accept! Regards Celia

To stay August in Barcelona People from Barcelona always leave the city in August , in general for vacation, but also who are retired or don't work they too leave the city, essentially to run away to the hot. And like every body leave the city and only stay the people must work, this situation make you feel sometimes anxious, and push you to make plans to leave althoug you don't really wish to go away or sometimes you go to visit your family that live in the country who didn't you have any wishes to see. I decided long time ago that leave my city when I really wanted and forget if was August or not, but for different reasons , in general I make my vacation in August, and this year that I'm here , I became aware that I only stayed 3 times in Agust in Barcelona. And I also relaized despite the crisis the people feel pressed to leave the city, especially this weekend ,15th August, the "ferragosto" Italian, many neighbourhoods are nearly dessert, a lot of shops are closed even that never close and always open the Sunday. Yesterday a friend invited us a fantastic dinner, she is a wonderful and sophisticated chef, she trust some shops over her house were open to buy especial ice for cocktail, and we had to grind the ice ourself , by the way, it was so funny ! Out of the tourist world , the life in Barcelona in August is like a dessert, everybody is escaping from it Regards Celia

Jellyfish on the beach The summer is my favourite season, I love high temperatures, live with the windows open, go to the beach very early on the morning , everything is opens, we meet with friends at the bar terraces to socialize and refresh, especilly on the night. The Mediterranean love enjoy the summer although some days the temperatures are very high and the heat is really unbearable, but in general we love the summer mainly if you have beach, and in Barcelona we have a fantastic beach, but sometimes, principally in August the are jellyfish, like this morning.. The jellyfish attack your foot like it was a big hit and then the effect of the sting is very painful, it is very unpleasant to go to the beach. The people try to go way from this pecualiar animals of the sea, this morning when the people realized of them, they hunted by the tools that the children had for play, very funny. I have to say that I was stinged by one ten years ago in Malta, and it was very painful and bad Kind regards Celia

Why the food is such important for some cultures I live in Barcelona , and for us the food, cuisine, is one of most importants things in our lifes. Many things happen around the meals, on table, special the lunch and dinner, it is curious but the less important is the breakfast, depend the person, some only have pure coffee at the first hour of the morning and later could have a little sandwich, croissant..,etc the opposite of the rest of the world. But the lunch is very important, if you work in gerneral you have an hour for lunch and you have the lunch with your colleagues or some friend in a popular bar with "menu" that you can choose two dishies: start and main, dessert or coffee , water or a glass of wine The dinner you have at house or for occasions at the resturant or bar with family, friends, in general very late on the night, around 9 pm to 10 pm. But the really important it is at the weekend, when you share the meals with family and friends, it is the moment to socialize and to show your big family all your love, for example, parents, grandparents, uncle, aunt... We comunicate our feelings around the table, it is one of the ways to give and share fondness