I have been a member of italki for ten months Hello everybody. As the title of this entry states, I joined italki on August 29, 2016. I'm sorry but I have to change the topic. As I was writing this notebook entry my grandmother interrupted to tell me that last night at 11 PM something happened to her. She was sleeping soundly and all of a sudden was awoken by a sharp pain in her leg. She screamed but I couldn't hear her calls for help. As with most people her age, she’s never exercised regularly. In fact, she has to take blood thinning medications so that her heart can have the strength to pump blood throughout the circulatory system. My brother is a gynecologist and ten years ago he said my grandmother's life expectancy was only five years. Well, I guess the factor that has prolonged my grandmother’s life is her blood thinning medicine. One and a half years ago, she had to take a routine exam. Her doctor told her to suspend her heart medicine prior to the exam. However, she misunderstood her doctor's request and she completely stopped taking her heart medicine. As a result her health declined steeply and I had to take her to the hospital for emergency treatment. She took her medicine again and her health greatly improved. She stayed at the hospital for two days and finally got released. I don't know how loud she screamed for help but what really scares me is being unable to hear her calls for help. I instructed her to call my name in case of an emergency. Our rooms are connected through a small ventilation window so I should be able to listen to her with ease. I'll talk about my English learning experience in my next entry.

MODERN REFLECTIONS I was thinking on what to write about today. First, I saw my mother reading an Agatha Christie's book that I had printed yesterday. After seeing this, I started debating on the effect technology has on our daily lives. I remember that twenty years ago I had to go to the library and spend around two hours to get my mother an Agatha Christie's book (by the way, A.C is my mother's favorite writer); moreover, twenty years ago when I was in Elementary School, it was very hard to find anyone to correct an essay written in English. Fortunately, the world has changed, and today I can buy and download all of Agatha's Christies e-books in less than ten minutes; what’s more, you (probably an American reader) can correct this writing in less than an hour. But do we live in an advanced, wonderful society? Five hundred years ago, slavery was rampant throughout the world, Europeans were debating whether Africans and their descendants had a soul and therefore had the right to go to heaven. However, if I hypothetically travel five hundred years to the past and ask a British historian about his opinions on the living conditions of his society compared to those of the ancient civilizations; he'll proudly tell me about the current state of the art in medicine and the development of firearms that have allowed the British to dominate the world and protect it (the world) from whichever culture is declared savage and barbaric by that time standards. To be continued…

Old radio shows on WGN radio I listen to WGN radio every day. In case you don't know, WGN is the most popular radio station in Chicago. People on the radio tend to speak really fast and sometimes I don't understand every word that they say. On the other hand, I feel really satisfied when I understand everything that they say. On Saturdays and Sundays they air a show called WGN Radio Theatre with Carl Amari and Lisa Wolf. This "Radio theatre" presents various old radio shows. My favorite radio show is Gunsmoke; this drama is regarded as one of the best of its kind. The old western atmosphere and the quality of the voice actors among other characteristics, is what makes this radio show so interesting and entertaining to listen to. To summarize it all, listening to old radio shows is a way to recreate the experience an American listener could have had back in the 1950s.

I know 12000 English words (or do I?) Last night, I took three tests that measure (or try to measure) the taker's English vocabulary. I'm pretty good with passive English. According to two of these tests, I know about twelve thousand English words. However, what surprised me the most was the precision of the results. Precision is defined as the reproducibility of the outcome of a given experiment. In this case, as reported by the website Test your vocab (testyourvocab.com), my vocabulary size is estimated to be 12 000 words; additionally, the website Vocabulary Size (vocabularysize.com) gave a similar estimate of 12700 words. That's only a 6% difference between the tests. Some studies say that the vocabulary of a normal twelve-year-old kid is around 12000 words. I believe the above statement since "twelve thousand" matches twelve years (obviously that is just a curious coincidence). I agree with the results only to a certain degree. As a learner of English as a second language, I recognize that we have two sets of vocabulary. One is passive and the other active. What these tests measured was my passive vocabulary; in other words, they showed me a particular word and I was supposed to say whether I knew the meaning of the word or not. On the other hand, active vocabulary comes from within me, and I have to use it automatically either verbally or in writing. I don't know the size of my active vocabulary but I think is near three thousand words. Exercises like writing on a virtual notebook (like the one I'm writing on right now) help increase my active vocabulary. I have an advantage, all I have to do is use words I already know the meaning of but I don't frequently use and therefore are passive vocabulary. If I keep doing that my active vocabulary will increase to the point where I become proficient in English.

America and sports During the past six months I've been studying English. I've realized that one way to understand American culture was through sports. Therefore, I've made the decision to immerse myself into the American sports culture; after doing this for a couple of months I've come to the conclusion that Americans have way too many sports. This year started with the Super Bowl, then it was Stanley Cup's turn and now we are in the Basketball Season. I guess I'll have to get used to this. For most countries in Latin America, football is their main sport. Of course, we practice other sports, but the main point here is that the other sports hardly have full media coverage and if they do it's after football is discussed, analyzed, etc. I know this is a cultural thing and as I've said before I'm confident I'll get used to it.

writing exercise from my grammar book This is an exercise from my grammar book. I just want to practice some English patterns/structures. The only way to learn from a grammar book is by practicing the different patterns/structures that are taught in it. I have already run the race many times. I have been in Bucaramanga since March, 2015. I lived in Bogotá for ten years. According to my grammar book the latter implies that I don't live in Bogotá now and I still live in Bucaramanga. I’ve never been to any native English speaking country. I took the TOEFL exam on March 3, 2017. I scored 106 out of 120. This might seem good but I feel my writing skills need more development. That’s why I’m here on italki. I’ll try to write a notebook entry every other day. I currently have earned 700 italki points. I really need to stop beginning each damn sentence with “I”

English writing practice v - Describing a picture The attached picture shows the main park of Giron. Girón is a municipality of the Santander Department in northeastern Colombia. One of my favorite things about the center of Girón is those old cobblestone streets. Walking on old cobblestone streets is like a trip to the past. This city was built under Spanish rule almost four centuries ago. Today, despite having undergone minor modifications, Girón still conserves a colonial atmosphere. The colonial atmosphere, the numerous hotels, the warm weather and the town's cathedral is what attracts so many tourists during the whole year. One disadvantage of living in a tourist town is that sometimes our little town gets overcrowded with tourists and minor traffic jams occur. I guess we are victims of our own success. As a final note on this subject, I am very happy to see many tourists visiting our small town because that's good for the economy and many local residents live from tourism. Some clouds are visible in the sky and also by the direction of the shadows it's reasonable to infer that the picture was taken in the morning. There's a pole at the center of the image and a security camera is mounted on top of the pole. The cameras are connected to the main police station. A couple of trees are behind the pole. People use these trees for shade from the sun. Behind the trees an old cathedral is barely visible. The Mayor's office is on the left. It is forbidden to park in front of the Mayor's office. In the image you can see a white tourism van parked in front of the Mayor's office. Unfortunately many tourists are unaware of local traffic rules and drivers frequently get ticket.

English writing practice IV - Describing a picture I just came back from the mountain. The weather was cool. Overall, I felt good and my race pace was good. However, I did have some difficulties in the middle of the race. When running you have to be aware of your body and use common sense to address any problems that could arise during the race . Muscle cramps occur when you push your body too far. When I was in the middle of the race I had this feeling that I was about to get cramps. In the last part of the competition I decided to reduce my pace as a preventive measure. Running requires a lot of effort, it is more intense than jogging. Besides, running is more beneficial to the Respiratory and Circulatory System than jogging or walking. Additionally, it is worth mentioning that I did a mental exercise while I was running. I described (or should I say, tried to describe) what I was seeing using English. This writing used some of the ideas of the aforementioned mental exercise. Today I will travel to Barrancabermeja and perhaps I will be out on the town tonight. The attached picture shows the main park of Giron (Colombia). I will describe this picture in my next notebook entry.