Snow White

Blancanieves  es uno de los cuentos más populares de los hermanos Grimm. A lo largo de los años  ha sido modificado y traducido a muchos idiomas  pero esta es  la versión en inglés del argumento del  original Alemán. 

A queen gives birth (dar a luz) to a baby girl, but dies soon after. The king takes a new wife who is beautiful but very proud.(orgullosa) The new Queen possesses a magic mirror,(espejo) which she often asks: “Mirror, mirror on the wall, who’s the fairest ( más hermosa) of them all?” The mirror always replies, “You are.” However,(sin embargo) one day when she asks her mirror who is the most beautiful, it responds, “Queen, you’re the fairest where you are, but Snow White is more beautiful by far”.(con mucho)

The Queen is extremely jealous, (celosa) and orders a huntsman ( cazador) to take Snow White into the woods and kill her. She tells the huntsman to return with Snow White’s lungs ( pulmón) and liver (hígado) as proof (como prueba ) he has killed her. The huntsman takes Snow White into the forest but in the end cannot take her life. He releases Snow White, and brings the queen the lungs and liver of a wild boar.(jabalí)

Snow White discovers a small cottage in the forest where seven dwarfs (enanos) live, and she decides to rest there. Meanwhile,(mientras tanto  ) the Queen asks her mirror once again,“Who’s the fairest of them all?” She is horrified when the mirror tells her that Snow White is still the fairest, which means she is still alive!

The jealous Queen discovers where Snow White is staying and visits the cottage in disguise,(disfrazada) hoping to kill her. First, disguised as a peddler,(vendedor ambulante) the Queen ties Snow White up (ata) until she faints (desmaya) and the Queen thinks she is dead. Snow White, however, is revived by the dwarfs when they loosen (aflojan) the laces. Next the Queen, dressed as a different old woman, combs (peina) her hair with a poisoned  comb ( peine envenenado ) . Snow White again collapses, and again the dwarves save her. Finally the Queen, dressed as a countrywoman, offers a poisoned apple to Snow White. She does not want to eat it at first, so the Queen cuts the apple in half.(por la mitad ) She eats the white part, which has no poison in it, and gives the poisoned red part to Snow White. She eats the apple and immediately falls into a deep,(profundo) magical sleep. When the dwarfs find her, they cannot revive her, so they place her in a glass coffin,(ataúd) thinking that she has died. 

Time passes, and a prince travelling through the forest sees Snow White in her coffin. He is enchanted by her beauty and instantly falls in love with her. He asks the dwarfs insistently for the coffin. The prince and his men carry the coffin away, but as they are walking one of them falls and the piece of poisoned apple comes out of Snow White’s mouth, waking her up. The prince then tells her he loves her and soon they get married. 

The jealous Queen, believing that Snow White is dead, again asks her mirror who is the fairest in the land. Again she is shocked when the mirror replies: “You, my queen, are fair, it is true. But the young queen is a thousand times fairer than you!”

The Queen goes to the royal wedding (boda real) and discovers that the new queen is her stepdaughter (hijastra). As punishment (castigo) for her crimes, she is then forced to step into (ponerse) a pair of red-hot shoes and dance until she dies!

Things to say when you are thirsty or hungry.

About being thirsty:

I’m sponged!(1) Can I have a glass of water?

I’m dying of thirst!(2)

I’m gasping for a drink!

I’m parched!(3)

 

 

About being hungry:

I could eat a horse!(4)

I’m nothing but skin and bone!(5)

I’m starving!

I’m famished!

                     

 

Comments

(1) Sponge significa esponja. To be sponged en slang de EEUU quiere decir tener mucha sed.

(2) Literalmente esta frase quiere decir estoy muriendo de sed.

(3) Parched significa muy seco, la frase to be parched quiere decir estar muerto de sed.

(4) Horse significa caballo. Así que la frase quiere decir que uno tiene tanta hambre que podía comer un caballo.

(5) Skin – piel, bone – hueso. La frase literalmente quiere decir que soy solo piel y hueso, sin nada de carne, y se usa como la frase en español enclenque.

Independence Day

El Día de la Independencia de los Estados Unidos ( también conocida  como "the Fourth of July" ) es el día de fiesta nacional que se celebra el 4 de julio en los Estados Unidos. Esta festividad  marca el día de la firma de la Declaración de Independencia en 1776 proclamando su separación de Gran Bretaña. Veamos algo  de historia.

In addition to the British, the French also wanted colonies in the Americas. They started to settle in Canada and a series of wars were waged  (hicieron la guerra ) between them. In the end the British won, but at the cost of the United States. The French wars were very expensive and the British government decided to tax their American colonists to pay for them. 

"The Boston Tea Party "

The colonists didn’t like this, especially since they had no representation in the British parliament, and so they protested. A popular slogan was “No taxation without representation!” In December 1773 they attacked a ship carrying tea and threw all the tea into Boston Harbour, an incident called the Boston Tea Party. Tension grew and the colonists declared their independence from Britain on July 4th 1776. The war lasted (duró)  until 1783 when the British were finally defeated and America was free. 

"13 Colonies American Flag "

America was now a country made up of  (constituido por)  13 colonies. In 1787, representatives from these states met and wrote a constitution for the new nation. They didn’t want a monarchy so they asked George Washington, the commander of the American army in the war against Britain, to be President. They decided to have a Congress like the British parliament, but the Senate had two elected representatives from each state and no Lords! The old colonies kept (conservaron)  a lot of their powers as individual states. The nation’s new capital was called Washington and the White House was built for the President and Capitol Hill for the Congress. 

Tanabata the "star festival"

Tanabata, also known as the "star festival", usually takes place on the 7th day of the 7th month of the year, this year will be then on the 7th July. According to (según) a Chinese legend, the two stars Altair and Vega, which are usually separated from each other by the Milky Way (Vía Láctea), are able to (ser capaz de) meet.  As the legend goes, when Orihime, a tireless but lonely seamstress (costurera), was introduced by her father to Hikoboshi, a cow-herder (vaquera)  they fell so deeply in love that each began neglecting (abandonar)  their work. For this they were punished when Tentei created a mighty river, the Amanogawa (天の川) – the Milky Way – permanently separating the two lovers.

       

Tanabata is still celebrated on August 7th in some regions of Japan, though it is celebrated on July 7th in other regions. One of the most popular Tanabata customs (tradiciones) is to write your wishes on a piece of paper, and hang (colgar) that piece of paper on a special bamboo tree, in the hope that the wishes will come true.

    

Colourful Tanabata festivals are celebrated across Japan in early July and August. Among the biggest and most famous ones are the Tanabata Festivals of Sendai in August and Hiratsuka near Tokyo in July. So remember to write some fun wishes. If you wish for your English to improve, remember that you will still have to study hard.