lunes, 31 de octubre de 2011

Halloween horror story contest. Group 4B.

Hello, boys and girls!




It has been a very hard decision because there have been only two entries from this class. I will announce the winner after posting both of them. I hope you like them! I will copy them just as they come, with only minor corrections for understanding. You are free to add or correct anything in your comments, but please be respecful to your classmates.




THE HALLOWEEN THRILLER by Yolanda Gavilán Romero.




At Halloween night when it was raining there were two friends in a doorway waiting for it to stop raining. They were listening to strange noises, they looked around them but they could not see anything because it was very dark, because there were not any lights.



The door started to open and it was like if somebody was there but they could not see anything. Ali, one of the girls, was sitting down and she could feel like if somebody was next to her, she started to scream because she was very frightened.



Yolanda started to scream too but she could feel nothing. Ali asked her to help them, she screamed very loud but nobody listened to her, she went back to help her friend but Ali was not there. Yolanda, frightened, started to cry, she started to scream her friend's name, every time she said her name, she listened to very strange noises, she went up and down the corridor to see if...



..she could find her, but she could not and she did not stop crying, she started to think she was mad, because she could not see anything, somebody was telling her name and she went out to the street because she was frightened, but nobody was there and she could not find Alicia there, so she went back in, when she went back Alicia was sitting down, she sat next to her and Alicia bit her.



Yolanda died because she was poisoned and Alicia's body was not found.



Where will it be?



PS: Be careful in the doorways in Halloween!










THE BLESSED SOULS by Laura Serrano Romero.



This story reports the supernatural phenomena that a fifteen year old girl feels, a few days before the birthday of her best friend.



The first strange evet was when she left school and she saw her friend Mary, but she was accompanied by two tall and robust men dressed in black, and they were insinuating with gestures to stay away. Lucy went home quickly thinking about these two men who were escorting her friend and did not let her talk with ther friend.



The next day when she saw Mary, she was impatient to ask her about the two men.



-Hey, Mary!



-Hi, Lucy! What happens?



-Yestarday I wanted to talk with you but the two men who were with you intimidated me.



-The men? What men? Yesterday I was alone. You have the wrong person.



But Lucy was totally sure that she saw her friend with two strangers. But she decided to forget it.



When she arrived home after school, she went to greet her mom but she saw a old woman dressed in black, sitting in her sofa, so she greeted her, thiking that she would be a friend of her mother's.



-Hello, Mom!



-Hi, darling, how whas been the day?



-Very good. Who is in the living room?



-There isn't anybody home.



-Of course there is! I have greeted her.



So she went back running to the living room and she saw that the woman who she greeted was not there. Very frightened, she went running to the street to look for her, but there was not anybody.



Lucy started to get frightened too much and she thought that she could be tired, so she went to her room and began to do her homework.



At night, while she was sitting in her bed reading a book, she got frightened when she heard the television turning on suddenly and she stayed watching it, but the screen was only grey with a very strange sound.



The next morning, after she had been all night without sleep thinking in the strange things that were happening, she decided to look for information on the internet about supernatural phenomena.



In a website she found comments that people made to a man who knew about strange appartitions and paranormal things, and Lucy decided to make him a comment telling what had happened and asking for indications about what she should do.



Two days later she saw that the man had answered her comment and said:






Hello, Lucy,



I think that you have seen the so-called blessed souls, and they are spirits of the dead people who are in the mortal world because thay have a mission to do and they can't rest in peace.



They are always dressed in black and only some people can see them, so I think that you are one of them, but be calm, because they are practically inoffensive and they just want to communicate with you, but they can't speak, they just can do gestures or actions, so what happened to you with the television could be to call your attention.



Next time, you should communicate with them and ask them if you can help and how, but be careful, because the blessed souls get angry if you do not fulfill your promises or if you ignore them when they need you.



They can do things that make you repent for all your life, so be careful and good luck!



Thank you for your comment and we will wait for news.






Lucy got traumatised when she finished reading it and she got frightened to think that she had seen dead people and furthermore when she thought that they want her for something and she should see them again and also communicate with them. She did not understand why they had chosen her and what is that they want to tell her.




The days passed slowly and without innovations, so she began to forget the blessed souls.




The next weekend would be her best friend's birthday and they were going to do a surprise party, so she had met her friend Mary to buy the preparations and the gifts.




They met in the afternoon to go to the shopping centre of the town and Lucy was useful to ask Mary about the two men.




-Mary. Has any of your relatives died recently?




-Yes. Why?




-Because yesterday I heard your mother talking about it.




-Well, yes, two weeks ago my two oldest cousins died.




-Oh, wow! How?




-My cousin John, the oldest, had been bought a new car and they went to the town centre that night to celebrate it, but when they went back they didn't see a traffic sign and they were in the wrong road and they got into one in the opposite direction.




-Oh, my god! I am sorry, indeed. Did hou have a big relationship with your cousins?




-Yes, really, because I have always been the smallest and they had me very protected.




-Oh, all right! Sorry for medding in your personal life.




-No, really, don't worry.




After this conversation Lucy started extracting conclusions and she thought that the men who were with Mary might be her two dead cousins, but what will they want to protect her from?




-Well, where do we begin?




-I think that we should begin with the preparations. I thought that the best option is to celebrate it in my father's business premises and we are going to make a crazy party!




-OK, so we are going to buy the drinks and the tobacco. And, what are we going to give her?




-I don't know, now we are going to look for something in the shops.




When Lucy arrived home, her mother was waiting for her with some bad news.




-What happens, Mom?




-Do you remember your great-grandmother Valentina?




Then Lucy remembered and she realised that the woman who she saw in her living room was her great-grandmother, whom she had met in a family meal.




The funeral was the following day and they should travel three hours to get to it.




In the funeral there were not may people and a woman was talking about her great-grandmother's life, and she should have been a very strange woman. then Lucy thought she had seen her great-grandmother in the door and went out to look for her. She found her some rooms beyond and she was waiting for her, so Lucy decided to go and talk with her. When she arrived, her great-grandmother smiled to her, and then she started to hear a voice in her mind saying Be careful with what you do, and don't get angry with the souls, they will make you pay for your disobedience! And she disappeared. Lucy did not understand why she was disobeying the souls, and decided to go back to the funeral.




Sofía was about to arrive and everything was ready. When she arrived, the party started and everybody started drinking, dancing and smoking, but then a horrible thing happened. Everybody was being sick and fainting, but nobody knew why. Suddenly Lucy saw Mary's cousins behind her, they were looking at Lucy with angered faces while Mary did not stop being sick and she started to vanish, and Lucy asked What happens?, and then she realised that everybody had drunk vodka except for her, who had drunk something that a strange boy dressed in black gave to her. This was the last thing that Lucy could think about.




When she woke up, she was running to the lounge looking for her mother and she watched on the television a piece of news that said that last weekend in her same village, young people were poisoned in a party and one of them expired without knowing why. Then she looked for her mother, and she was sitting in her favourite armchair with a photo of her between her hands. Then she understood everything. She was punished by the souls for having disobeyed the only thing that they asked her, to protect Mary. Now Lucy is a blessed soul and she looks for someone who could see her, and warn him of the consequences.




The End.










And the winner is...


...


...


...


...


... Yolanda Gavilán Romero!




Congratulations! You will receive your prize in the first English lesson after the exam.

Halloween horror story contest. Groups 3A and 3B

Hello, boys and girls!




Due to the laziness you have shown in NOT handing in any horror stories, I will keep the prize to myself. The only entry I had is a translation of a well-known tale by the American writer Edgar Allan Poe done by group 3A student Victor Lauret Arco.




And as it is not an original story, it cannot be accepted.




Have a terrible Halloween!

sábado, 29 de octubre de 2011

Halloween Quiz: Questions.

Hello, boys and girls!

Here you have the questions for the Halloween Quiz. Remember that the answers are in the handout I gave you called "Halloween traditions". Read the questions well and search carefully for the answers.

Good luck!

QUESTIONS

1.- Where does the name "Halloween" come from?

2.- Which ingredient did the traditional Halloween food NOT contain?

3.- What is a "soul cake"? Why are they NOT eaten nowadays?

4.- How old is the festival of Halloween? When and how did it start?

5.- What is the original name for Halloween? How is it related to apples?

6.- How did the Christian church change the celebrations in the ninth century?

7.- What special food is eaten in Halloween nowadays?

8.- Where does the custom of "Trick or treating" come from?

9.- How has Halloween changed in the USA? Who took it there?

10.- Why did the Celts consider it "a time for mischief"?

I hope you all get them right!

Watch your backs!

Juan Carlos "The Ripper" Laguna.

martes, 25 de octubre de 2011

Halloween Horror Story Contest

Just a reminder that the deadline for the horror story contest is Thursday 27 and Friday 28 of October.
Good luck!
Remember that the three best stories in each class will be published here!
Watch your back!

jueves, 20 de octubre de 2011

Welcome to my nightmare!

Good morning, good afternoon and good evening!

This is the first post of what I hope will be a list of many, many others which will help you, me and everyone learn English through practice.

It is a way of interaction between teacher Juan Carlos Laguna and his students started in the school year 2011-12.

That's all, folks!