Cinco de Mayo

I spent Saturday hanging with some of my friends in manchester.  One of them was darker complected, but I knew he'd lived here most of his life.  I remembered him saying his parents were out celebrating Cinco de Mayo.  It took me a few moments until I realized that his family must have been of Mexican descent.

I remembered from Spanish class that Cinco de Mayo was a popular holiday and stood for "fifth of May."  The date is remembered as May fifth of 1862 when Mexico was victorious during the Battle of Puebla.  The French lost the Franco-Mexican War to Mexicans with little skill and lack of weapons.  They fought with all they had and won the battle.
Today the holiday isn't nearly as popular in Mexico as it was a long time ago.  Over time it has turned more into an American event.  Some restaurants market the day to bring in customers.  It promotes their business with their supposably authentic Mexican food.
The day is also often confused with Mexico's Independence day.  That was marked on September sixteenth of 1810.  In Mexico there are military parades, but it is still not a federal holiday.  Mariachi music, however, is very popular.  Where ever you are on the next Cinco de Mayo means its time to party.

Spanish In Xbox

The other day I was playing Xbox and I was playing MW3.  My friends decided to switch to game chat so I went with.  While I was in game chat I could hear someone speaking in Spanish.  I believe he said he was going to win in Spanish that match and I thought it was weird how I understood him so easily and he thought he was gonna win and I beat him.

T.V.

I woke up last Saturday morning and got breakfast like I usually do. I walked out into the living room and to my surprise my little ten year old brother was watching a weird show on T.V. called 'Perro y Gato' I just had to laugh because then mason says "I really have no idea what they are saying but dang it sounds sooo cool!" I then got to feel very smart because since it was a spanish cartoon they talked slow enough and used little enough words that I could catch a few sentences here and there. But if he asked me what a sentence was and  didn't quite understand it I would just make something up that sounded believable  Its crazy how much Spanish you can pick up in a short time. I may not be very fluent but hearing it I am getting good at picking up the meanings of words.
~Sabela

Penelope Cruz

For my spanish blog I decided to do it over Penelope Cruz. Penelope Cruz was born in Madrid. Her mother was a hairdresser and her father was a retailer. As a child she was born to be an actress, she used to re-enact commercials to her family. Then she got older and decided she like to try to do dance. She studied ballet and other major dances for fifteen years. At age 15 she entered in a talent agency and blew all the other girls away, and landed her a job starting in spanish  TV shows, and movies. These small roles led her to larger roles in movies like "debut" Then she started in a oscar-winning movie called, "The Age of Beauty." I believe she is very successful and has had a good life. I do believe she will keep moving forward and keep doing what she does best. She is now married and has beautiful children and is living a good life.

Mariano Rivera grew up in Puerto Caimito, Panama. This wasn't the ideal spot for a future baseball star 
to grow up as equipment was sparse. He was forced to play with sticks for bats and hallowed out milk cartons for gloves. His love and dedication for the game however earned him a chance in the minor leagues. It wouldn't be long, still in his rookie season, that he would play in the major league. Shortly after he would move from being a starter to being a closer. He would define the prototype of this postion for years. His calmness allowed him to succeed in pressure moments and often set the mood for the whole team. For many years you knew if the Yankees were up and Mariano was in the game it was as good as won and the rest was just a formality. His domince feed itself as his reputation grew teams would fear him and avoid being down in the late game at all costs. To me, Mariano was one of the most exciting players to watch and in many cases cheer against. When he was in the game it was a good game up to that point and you know with his reputation even a base hit seems great and if you could manage to win it was unbelievable. Sadly, it appears his career may be over due to recently tearing his ACL. He'll be missed by many including me.




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Martelli, A.J. "Mariano Rivera A Bio of the Greatest Closer in Baseball."Bleacher Report. March 24, 2009. Web. May 4, 2012.

Experience

A few days ago I was watching TV with my parents. After the show we were flipping through the stations. My mom stopped on one of the stations, and we didn't know the name of the show but it dealt with doctors. The guy was talking to a woman he thought was attractive, but she was mad at him. As she was walking away from him he yelled you are "muy bonita" and I instantly knew what he was saying. My mom asked what it meant and I told her he said you are very pretty. It was kind of cool to understand it and be able to tell your family what is being said by someone in Spanish especially since they don't know the language.

Dancing With The Stars is, in my opinion, an amazing show. This season, a man named William Levy is partnered with Cheryl Burke. William has made it through week seven in season 14. He is from Havana, Cuba. Leaving Cuba early on, William was living in Miami, Florida, by age fifteen and learning how to speak English. He appeared in Telemundo's Los Teens, a series about Hispanic teenagers growing up in the United States. Before Los Teens, he appeared in a music video and two reality shows. This kicked off his careers towards acting and modeling. William was a model, traveling outside of the U.S., and then moved to Los Angeles to take acting lessons and  start auditions. He did Spanish soap operas and a very famous novela called "Pasion". This gave him incredible recognition and really threw him into the acting world. He then traveled to do more of this work. William did acting in Ecuador and Mexico. In Mexico, he took acting jobs and traveled Mexican cities. He has become well known around Mexico, South America, and the United States. Dancing With The Stars is just the latest thing from this Latino's life.


"William Levy." William Levy. N.p., n.d. Web. 4 May 2012. 


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