Christmas Song Actvity (Fariytale of New York)

If you did this in class with me, you might want to listen again and watch the video. If not, here's some good listening and reading practice:

First download the worksheet with most of the lyrics. There are 8 lines taken out. Read the lyrics and decide where you think the 8 lines should go. Click here for the worksheet.

Then listen to the song and check your answers.




If you want to know something about the song's background and the recent contoversy surrounding it, then have a look at this link to wikipedia.

Doing something in English over the Christmas holidays

If possible, try and do something in English over the holidays. You could do any exercises from the Inside Out workbook for the unit covered this term. If you want something less academic, them perhaps watch a film in English or read a book.

The British Council will be open again from Wednesday 2nd January so there's always the option of coming by to do some study or to borrow something.

Of course, there are also web resources you can make use of. If you haven't already done so, explore the BBC learning English web pages as well as the British Council Learn English site. Both are excellent. Quick links to these sites are on the left of the blog under 'useful websites'.

Finally, here's a word search for you to do. It's based on vocabulary from the first 4 units of the coursebook and is a good revision exercise. Just click here.

El Kasko

"El Kasko" is a nice place in El Casco Viejo of Bilbao (it's obvious if you see the name of the restaurant) in Santa Maria street. It's a quiet big place, there are a lot of tables inside and if the weather is good enough you have the chance of eating outside. The walls are decorated with modern pictures and everything is painted with lot of different colors. At lunch time it is usually full so it`s recommendable to book.

The first time I went there was four months ago: I had met with a friend of the school to have lunch and she told me that she was looking for eating in a Mexican restaurant. She had heard that "El Kasko" was a good one but, what a surprise when we arrived there and we saw that her information was completely wrong because it was not a Mexican place. However, we decided to go in and taste the menu.

It was a really good decission. We could choose between four first courses, four main courses and different desserts. I couldn`t avoid to look at everyones plates: everything looked fantastic! My mouth was watering!
For first dish I had ham rolls with salad: it's an original cold dish, perfect for summer that basically consists of cooked ham rolls with small pieces of potatoes, aubergine, lettuce, tomatoes and other kind of vegetables inside and everything dressed with a delicicious yogourt sauce. For main course I chose grilled turkey skewers with pepper and fry potatoes. The skewer had little pieces of green and red pepper between every two pieces of turkey. But, without any doubt, the best was the dessert: home made custard with Cointreau.

We didn't eat what we were supposed to eat, but we discovered a really nice place, where you can choose between original and classical food, enjoy a good atmosphere at a good price: 10 € menu with bread and drink. A recommendable place.

Comillas

Last Saturday my girl and I took our bags and went by car to Comillas to spend the day there.

Comillas is a little village in Cantabria, near Torrelavega, quiet far form Bilbao (two hours aprox. if you go by car). It is by the sea and has lots of 19th century's noblemen houses and momuments; the most important maybe is "The Quirk" (El Capricho), an old house decorated with sunflowers' tiles made by Gaudi, a famous Catalunyan architect. Appart from this outstanding building, Comillas is a very touristic place, with very good views and where you don't have to walk a lot to see different beautiful places.

Although it's beauty, Comillas is a small village where you can't do nothing appart from walking and seeing places, so maybe it becomes a little bit "boring" at the end of the day.

I would only recommend Comillas to people who like visiting beautiful villages with lots of momuments, but, if you haven't seen The Quirk yet and you have a chance... go and see it without any doubt.

URGITXIETA

It was a cold raining day when we found this place in Larrabasterra (near Sopelana) three years ago. All of us were starving and nobody knew anywhere to eat, but finally it appeared!

The restaurant is called 'Urgitxieta' and it is placed close the Larrabasterra Metro Station.

While we drink and eat some fantastic and original 'pintxos' we had the opportunity to meet the owners, a young couple from that village. Sergio who studied professional cooking was the Chef and Mireia the waitress. They told us that the restaurant was opened in 2004 and since then it has been a success!

After some time of waiting and talking with the friendly Chef, Mireia said us that we could enter to the dining-room. It wasn't very big with a cheerful decoration but it was full, there were a lot of families or friend groups globbing up.

All the dishes were tasty and original with a 'chic' presentation. At the end we went to give our congratulations to Sergio. Besides, the bill was unbelievable!! Just 8€ each one!!

I have come back in different seasons and days of the week since that day and always it's full of people. Nowadays, from monday to friday the menu is 9€ more or less but in weekends you have to choose between two menus; special or normal, the first one is about 24€ and the other one about 14€. I think that it's a cheap price for those fantastic dishes!!

POSTCARD FROM MADRID

Dear Fergus,

I write to you from Madrid. We have come to see the atmosphere of the city before Christmas. You know how much I like Madrid: the center with the magnificent buildings, the restaurants and all the facilities the city offers, such as the cinemas, the theatres and the musical plays, but this time I've really been fed up with the crowds. It was impossible to walk along the streets; they were clogged with people and the main roads were crowded with traffic. I thought that it would be a nice weekend and many people from Madrid would drive away but it seems that many tourists have planned to come and see the Christmas lights. I will tell that we wanted to have dinner at "las Bravas", a very homely bar near "Sol" which has the original "bravas potatoes" and it was impossible to reach there.

The city was very lively but I recommend you a more quiet visit after Christmas, definitely.

Best wishes,

Silvia