Portugal Day is officially known as “Day of Portugal, Camões and the Portugese Communities” and it is celebrated annually on 10th June. This day commemorates the death of national icon Luís Vaz de Camões on 10th June 1580. Camões wrote Os Lusíadas, an epic poem celebrating Portuguese history and achievements, mainly through the Portuguese explorations, […]
Let’s hear it for Sweden!
06/06/2013 by Leave a Comment
CLEW takes a closer look at national days around the world. How and why are they celebrated? And we throw in a recipe or two from that country for you to try. The first country is Sweden, by Lisa Fuchs. If you ever find yourself visiting Stockholm, the beautiful capital of Sweden, you absolutely must […]
Don’t sit under the spaghetti tree
01/04/2013 by Leave a Comment
The Museum of Hoaxes has made a top 100 list of April Fool’s Day hoaxes. This is the top 3, the rest you’ll find here. The Spaghetti Tree (1957) The respected BBC news show Panorama announced that thanks to a very mild winter and the virtual elimination of the dreaded spaghetti weevil, there was a […]
Day of Happiness
20/03/2013 by 2 Comments
Today is the first United Nations International Happiness Day. The 193 member countries have adopted a resolution to prioritize happiness, and they want your contribution. Today is a good day to start. The UN sees a global attitude change: “People are now recognising that ‘progress’ should be about increasing human happiness and wellbeing, not just […]
Bilingualism sharpens your brain
12/03/2013 by 1 Comment
Tiny Luxembourg can hardly be seen on a world map, yet illustrates perfectly the world today with more people speaking two or more languages than one. Expats arriving in Luxembourg quickly discover how well they can get by in English, French or German, and they marvel at how easily Luxembourgers switch between three or four languages […]
Bilingual babies
16/02/2013 by 4 Comments
Are you worried that your little one has too many languages to cope with? A recent study on bilingualism in babies might reassure you. Many of us have been asked questions about grammatical rules in our own language to which our immediate answer has been: “I don’t really know, it’s just the way it is…”
Young girl in a cyber world
05/02/2013 by 1 Comment
Sexting. Slut shaming. Familiar words? To many young girls they are, and the Woman’s Hour on BBC Radio 4 recently had a look at these words and their broader context. “Girls are in trouble” psychologist Steve Biddulph says on the show. Sexting: Send sexually explicit photographs or messages via mobile phone (source: Oxford Dictionaries). Slut […]
CLEW 