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Kevin talks about a business experience that did not go so well and what he learned from it.
source: www.elllo.org
Todd: So Kevin, you were saying that you've been poor, broke, a couple of times. You talked about being in New York, and being broke. When else have you been broke?
Kevin: Wow. Well, after New York, the following year, when I came down from New York, I was determined to be my own boss. I had not been in control of
my life while I was in New York. It was all depending on other people to let me have a job. And when I lost the job, that really, that really hurt.
And so when I went home I decided that I was going to own my own business, and I opened my first business which was a Karate school, and I put a lot of money into it that I had worked for almost a year saving up and then, well I also had a smallinheritance
from my grandmother.
Todd: Oh okay.
Kevin: Yeah. But I ended up losing all of the money in the Karate school.
Todd: Now did you actually know Karate?
Kevin: Yes.
Todd: Oh you do?
Kevin: I do.
Todd: I did not know that about you.
Kevin: That would have been a strange business to start if I didn't know it. But yeah, yeah, I'd done it, I started when I was a kid. And, at the time, I was 20, I think 20, just about to turn 21 when I opened it. And I was ni-dan at the time, second degree black belt, and I had been teaching at my instructor's school for a while and he had encouraged me, you know, to go ahead and do it. But it was the wrong location, and the wrong town, the town was really poor. And I lost about $20,000 in 6 months.
Todd: That's a lot of money.
Kevin: That is a lot of money. Especially to a 21 year old who, you know...
Todd: Yeah, $20,000 when you're 21, you can live for like 3 years.
Kevin: Right, and not a year and half earlier I was flat busted
broke in New York, and then, you know, things picked up
, and that was the attitude that I had, and, you know, found myself broke again.
Todd: So that fact that you've been poor, but you were poor both times when you were very young, do you look back and are you glad that you had those experiences?
Kevin: Sure. Sure, I learned a lot. Those experiences were valuable. You can't buy that kind of experience, you know, I carry it around with me now. I listen to other people who have business ideas and, you know, one thing that I gained from it is I can tell if they are going into a business, if they're gonna try and start up a business and, you know, they haven't considered all the things that they really need to consider, I can see the pitfalls
that I fell in. And, you can try and suggest people to, you know, make other arrangements or to be more careful about this or that, but it doesn't always work out
This days a lot of people decide to study by themselves. How is it possible? There are useful websites and blogs, I recommend a list of them for Brazilians and foreign people.
Brazilians' sites and Blogs:
http://www.denilsodelima.blogspot.com
http://www.teclasap.com.br
http://www.englishexperts.com.br
http://www.ingvip.com
http://www.maganews.com.br
Of course there are many others which so far I don't remember.
Here is some website for foreign people, including Brazilians students can access.
http://www.bbc.co.uk
http://www.voanews.com
http://www.real-english.com
http://www.idiomquest.com (Phrasal Verbs)
http://www.sozoexchange.com
http://www.idiomsite.com
http://www.elllo.org
I hope this can be useful for you, and do not forget, no worries about mistakes and blocks, just practice English, no worries about your accent, students learners have to adapt any kind of them, but you have to choose a standard, even though remember, we're not Native learners. About fluence...It takes a long time, or not, depends basically on you, how much time you dedicate yourself to practice English. In conclusion, practice makes perfect, the more you do that, of course you learn...Never give up.
I would like to thanks for those visitors come from different accents, dialects, culture and nationalities who have been visited the English tips, as soon as I'm available I give some tips through skype, however do not forget if you want to help me to continue this I use a paypal account. Or simply everytime you visit this blog share and spreading it, telling for friends about Tour Guide (English tips' Blog). It's really hard to be volunteer, but doing small things we can do this world a better place to live. Thanks for everything and may you have a wonderful day, that's why I dedicate this posting to you. Your sincere friend forever...Carlos
This is SCIENCE IN THE NEWS in VOA Special English. I’m Steve Ember. And I’m Barbara Klein. This week, we will tell about six diseases of the liver. The diseases come from six different viruses. Doctors have one name for all of them: hepatitis.
1. The liver is in the upper right part of the stomach. This dark, red organ is big. It weighs more than one kilogram. And, it has a big job. The liver helps clean the blood and fight infection. It also helps break down food and store energy until the body needs it.
2. Hepatitis destroys liver cells. Some kinds of hepatitis are much more serious than others. Which kind a person has can only be known from tests for antibodies in the blood.
3. Antibodies are special proteins that the body's natural defenses againstdisease produce in answer to a threat. Identify the antibody and you identify the threat. Hepatitis A is usually spread through human waste in water or food. It is in the same group of viruses as those that cause the disease polio.
4. The hepatitis A virus causes high body temperature, pain and weakness. It causes problems with the stomach and intestines, making it difficult to eat or break down food. Also, the skin of a person with hepatitis may become yellow. This is a sign that the liver is not operating normally.
5. To help prevent the spread of hepatitis A, people should wash their hands after they use the restroom or change a baby's diaper. People should also wash their hands before they eat or prepare food. Hepatitis A can spread quickly to hundreds or thousands of people. But the virus is deadly in less than one percent of cases. Many people infected with the virus never evenget sick. But those who do usually recover within two months.
6. The World Health Organization says hepatitis A is oftenfound in Africa, Asia and Central and South America. People who have had hepatitis A cannot get it again. There is a vaccine to prevent hepatitis A. America's Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says the vaccine is the best way to protect against the disease.
7. The World Health Organization says as many as two billion people are infected with the hepatitis B virus. More than three hundred fifty million of those infected have lifelong infections. WHO officials say an estimated six hundred thousand people die each year as a result of hepatitis B.
8. The virus is in the same group as the herpes and smallpox viruses. Hepatitis B vaccines have been given since the nineteen eighties. The W-H-O says the vaccine is ninety-five percent effective in preventing the development of infection. Hepatitis B spreads when blood from an infected person enters the body of another person. An infected mother can infect her baby. The virus can also spread through sexual activity, and if people share injection devices.
9. Blood products from an infected person can spread hepatitis B. People also can get infected if they share personal-careproducts that might have blood on them. Some examples are toothbrushes andsharphair-cutting instruments.
10. Worldwide, most hepatitis B infections are found in children. Young children are the ones most likely to develop a chronic or lifelong infection. The risk of such an infection is small for children older than four years.
11. About ninety percent of babies infected with hepatitis B during the first year develop chronic infections. Such persons are at high risk of death from liver disease or liver cancer. The hepatitis B vaccine is considered to be the first medicine that can protect people against liver cancer.
12. Hepatitis C is even more dangerous. Like hepatitis B, it spreads when blood from an infected person enters someone who is not infected. The hepatitis C virus belongs to the same group of viruses as yellow fever and West Nile virus. Most people living with hepatitis C develop chronic infections, often without any signs. They are at high risk for liver disease and liver cancer.
13. The World Health Organization says about one hundred seventy million people are infected with hepatitis C. That is three percent of the population of the world! The WHO. also says that as many as four million more become infected each year. It warns that those infected may develop diseases of the liver, including liver cancer. The WHO says the highest rates of infection are in Africa, Asia, and Central and South America.
14. The hepatitis C virus was first observed in nineteen seventy-four. But it was not officially recognizedas a new kind of hepatitis until nineteen eighty-nine. Scientists have been working to develop a vaccine and other treatments.
I'm Susan Clark with the Special English program WORDS AND THEIR STORIES.
In the nineteen thirties, a song, "Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?," was very popular in the United States. It was the time of the big Depression. The song had meaning for many people who had lost their jobs.
A dime is a piece of money whose value is one-tenth of a dollar. Today, a dime does not buy much. But it was different in the nineteen thirties. A dime sometimes meant the difference between eating and starving.
The American economy today is much better. Yet, many workers are concerned about losing their jobs as companies re-organize.
Americans have special ways of talking about economic troubles. People in businesses may say they feel the pinch. Or they may say they are up against it. Or, if things are really bad, they may say they have to throw in the towel.
A pinch is painful pressure. To feel the pinch is to suffer painful pressure involving money.
The expression, feel the pinch, has been used since the sixteenth century. The famous English writer William Shakespeare wrote something very close to this in his great play "King Lear."
King Lear says he would accept necessity's sharp pinch. He means he would have to do without many of the things he always had.
Much later, the Times of London newspaper used the expression about bad economic times during the eighteen sixties. It said, "so much money having been spent ... All classes felt the pinch."
Worse than feeling the pinch is being up against it. The saying means to be in a lot of trouble.
Word expert James Rogers says the word "it" in the saying can mean any and all difficulties. He says the saying became popular in the United States and Canada in the late nineteenth century. Writer George Ade used it in a book called "Artie." He wrote, "I saw I was up against it."
Sometimes a business that is up against it will have to throw in the towel. This means to accept defeat or surrender.
Throwing in the towel may mean that a company will have to declare bankruptcy. The company will have to take legal steps to let people know it has no money to pay its debts.
Word expert Charles Funk says an eighteen seventy-four publication called the Slang Dictionary explains throwing in the towel. It says the words probably came from the sport of boxing, or prizefighting. The book says the saying began because a competitor's face was cleaned with a cloth towel or other material. When a boxer's towel was thrown, it meant he was admitting defeat.
Most businesses do not throw in the towel. They just re-organize so they can compete better.
(MUSIC)
This WORDS AND THEIR STORIES was written by Jeri Watson. I'm Susan Clark.
Or download MP3 (Right-click or option-click and save link)
BOB DOUGHTY: Welcome to THE MAKING OF A NATION – American history in VOA Special English.
After the end of World War One, President Woodrow Wilson sought national support for his idea of a League of Nations. He took his appeal directly to the American people in the summer of nineteen nineteen.
This week in our series, Tony Riggs and Frank Oliver continue the story of Wilson's campaign.
TONY RIGGS: The plan for the League of Nations was part of the peace treaty that ended World War One. By law, the United States Senate would have to vote on the treaty. President Wilson believed the Senate would have to approve it if the American people demanded it. So he went to the people for support.
For almost a month, Wilson traveled across America. He stopped in many places to speak about the need for the League of Nations. He said the league was the only hope for world peace. It was the only way to prevent another world war.
Wilson's health grew worse during the long journey across the country. He became increasingly weak and suffered from severe headaches. In Witchita, Kansas, he had a small stroke. A blood vessel burst inside his brain. He was forced to return to Washington.
FRANK OLIVER: For a few days, President Wilson's condition improved. Then, his wife found him lying unconscious on the floor of his bedroom in the White House. Wilson had lost all feeling in the left side of his body. He was near death.
The president's advisers kept his condition secret from almost everyone. They told reporters only that Wilson was suffering from a nervous breakdown.
For the next few days, the medical reports from the White House were always the same. They said Mister Wilson's condition had not changed.
People began to wonder. Were they being told the truth. Some people began to believe that the president was, in fact, dead. Vice President Thomas Marshall was worried. If the president died or could not govern, then he – Marshall -- would become president. But even Vice President Marshall could get no information from Wilson's doctors.
TONY RIGGS: After several weeks, the president seemed to get a little stronger. He was still very weak. He could not work, except to sign several bills. This simple act took most of his strength.
Wilson's wife Edith guarded her husband closely. She alone decided who could see him. She alone decided what information he could receive. All letters and messages to Woodrow Wilson were given first to Edith Wilson. She decided if they were important enough for him to see. Most, she decided, were not. She also prevented members of the cabinet and other government officials from communicating with him directly.
Mrs. Wilson's actions made many people suspect that she -- not her husband -- was governing the country. Some spoke of her as the nation's first woman president.
loc.gov
Woodrow Wilson and his wife, Edith
FRANK OLIVER: There was one issue Mrs. Wilson did discuss with her husband: the League of Nations.
The Senate was completing debate on the Treaty of Versailles. That was the World War One peace agreement that contained Wilson's plan for the league. It seemed clear the Senate would reject the treaty. Too many Senators feared the United States would lose some of its independence and freedom if it joined the league.
The leader of Wilson's political party in the Senate, Gilbert Hitchcock, headed the administration campaign to win support for the treaty. He received Mrs. Wilson's permission to visit her husband.
Hitchcock told the president the situation was hopeless. He said the Senate would not approve the treaty unless several changes were made to protect American independence. If the president accepted the changes, then the treaty might pass.
TONY RIGGS: Wilson refused. He would accept no compromise. He said the treaty must be approved as written.
Senator Hitchcock made one more attempt to get Wilson to reconsider. On the day the Senate planned to vote on the treaty, he went back to the White House. He told Mrs. Wilson that compromise offered the only hope for success.
Mrs. Wilson went into the president's room while Hitchcock waited. She asked her husband: "Will you not accept the changes and get this thing settled?" He answered: "I cannot. Better a thousand times to go down fighting than to surrender to dishonorable compromise."
FRANK OLIVER: The Senate voted. Hitchcock's fears proved correct. The treaty was defeated. The defeat ended Wilson's dream of American membership in the League of Nations.
Mrs. Wilson gave the news to her husband. He was silent for a long time. Then he said: "I must get well."
Woodrow Wilson was extremely sick. Yet he was not the kind of man who accepted opposition or defeat easily. From his sick bed, he wrote a letter to the other members of the Democratic Party. He urged them to continue debate on the League of Nations. He said a majority of Americans wanted the treaty approved.
Wilson probably was correct about this. Most Americans did approve of membership in the League of Nations. But they also wanted to be sure membership would not restrict American independence.
TONY RIGGS: The Senate Foreign Relations Committee agreed to re-open discussion on the treaty. It searched yet again for a compromise. It made new efforts to get Wilson to accept some changes.
But, as before, Wilson refused. He was a proud man. And he thought many of the Senators were evil men trying to destroy his plan for international peace.
Wilson's unwillingness to compromise helped kill the treaty once and for all. The Senate finally voted again, and the treaty was defeated by seven votes. The treaty was dead. The United States would never enter the League of Nations. And one of the most emotional and personal stories in the making of the American nation had ended.
FRANK OLIVER: The long battle over the Treaty of Versailles ended with political defeat for Woodrow Wilson. Yet history would prove him correct.
Wilson had warned time and again during the debate that a terrible war would result if the world did not come together to protect the peace. Twenty years later, war came. The First World War had been called 'the war to end all wars'. But it was not. And the Second World War would be far more destructive than the first.
TONY RIGGS: The debate over the Treaty of Versailles was the central issue in American politics during the end of Woodrow Wilson's administration. It also played a major part in the presidential election of nineteen twenty.
Wilson himself could not be a candidate again. He was much too sick. So the Democratic Party nominated a former governor of Ohio, James Cox. Cox shared Wilson's opinion that the United States should join the League of Nations. He campaigned actively for American membership.
The Republican Party chose Senator Warren Harding as its candidate for president. Harding campaigned by promising a return to what he called 'normal times'. He said it was time for America to stop arguing about international events and start thinking about itself again.
loc.gov
Woodrow Wilson and Warren Harding during Harding's inauguration
FRANK OLIVER: The two presidential candidates gave the American people a clear choice in the election of nineteen twenty.
On one side was Democrat James Cox. He represented the dream of Woodrow Wilson. In this dream, the world would be at peace. And America would be a world leader that would fight for the freedom and human rights of people everywhere.
On the other side was Republican Warren Harding. He represented an inward-looking America. It was an America that felt it had sacrificed enough for other people. Now it would deal with its own problems.
Warren Harding won the election.
TONY RIGGS: The results of the election shocked and hurt Woodrow Wilson. He could not understand why the people had turned from him and his dream of international unity and peace. But the fact was that America was entering a new period in its history. For a long time, it would turn its energy away from the world beyond its borders.
That will be our story next week.
(MUSIC)
BOB DOUGHTY: Our program was written by Frank Beardsley. The narrators were Tony Riggs and Frank Oliver.
You can find our series online with transcripts, MP3s, podcasts and images at voaspecialenglish.com. You can also follow us on Facebook and Twitter at VOA Learning English. Join us again next week for THE MAKING OF A NATION -- an American history series in VOA Special English.
From the right to left, Carlos (tour guide), Carlinhos from Parelhas, Yves, SEBRAE/Currais Novos and Professor Marcos from UFRN
Yves SEBRAE RN, and Carlinhos from Parelhas
Carlos' Tour Guide and Yves-SEBRAE
GEO SITE-ARARIPE Region of fossils
" The Araripe Geopark is located in Cariri, region of outstanding curiosities, inhabited for a cordial and cheerful people, with a rare culture of colours and flavors. Only in this area it's possible to see 59 official geo-sites showing that diversities and presenting a singular way, be it scientifically, pedagogic, Cultural values."
Fossil
" Statue of Padre Cicero the main Icon of Religious tourism located in Juazeiro do Norte, in Ceara State whose it attracts pilgrims come from different region of The Northeast of Brazil. Padre Cicero also predicted and anticipates ecological precepts teaching the local farmers how to survive and struggle on the dryness and how to keep the back country always green. initiative very disseminated nowadays and that could be considerate an important contribution for the environmental and Education awareness.
Padre Cicero said: " Do not turn down the Forest, even only one tree. Do not burn the farm even in the caatinga. Do a cistern on your house to keep the rain water. do not create the animals free, make enclosers and leave the pasture rest to remake it".
Padre Cicero is considered by Northeastern as a Saint that's why over 3 million people going to Juazeiro do Norte city in order to pay promise honored to the priest.
Cariri hosted the first Latin-American and Caribbean Geopark Conference
The last 17th runs 19th we were in Juazeiro do Norte, State of Ceara in order to take part on Geopark International conference. Yves of Sebrae Analyst and Executive Secretary of Serido Pole, Carlos Alberto Secretary of Culture and Tourism from Parelhas, Damiao Carlos Culture and Tourism Coordinator and Regional Guide and Professor Marcos of Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte State.
Members from different parts of the world, such as, France, Portugal, France, Greece, Norway and Ireland, beyond Caribbean and South America such as Nicaragua, Chile, Venezuela, Argentina, Uruguay and of Course Students and professors come from different part of Brazilian states.
Basically, Magareth who had represented the UNESCO and colleagues they are going to analyze about the Geopark from Araripe in Ceará State.
The event is over today, and we visited some geo-sites and museums in Nova Olinda and Santana do Cariri.
Absolutely, Geopark is going to provide a sustainable development of Tourism, but it depends on the local Governments compliments and the local population, otherwise it is not going to work.
The meeting brought together the local media, students and Journalism professors from the six towns that make up the Geopark Araripe. Communication discussed the benefits of the Geopark for the Region and media contributions to sustainable development.
We conclude the event through the Bench Marketing visiting several Geo Sites in Santana do Cariri and Nova Olinda, both towns located in Ceara State.
For more information visit http://www.geoparkararipe.org or geoparkararipe@urca.br
