Amazon Shake Spring 2014
1 Dear Readers,
This long awaited 3rd issue is finally here. It is the last one this year so we really hope that you enjoy our articles and that the wait will be worth it. We focus mostly on spring themes and everything connected to it, meaning there is absolutely no lack of articles and columns regrarding sports, recreational activities that could take a place outside , things contributing to our health, many travel opinions as well as the latest and current cultural events section. On the topic of our school, we have opinions about the ski trip, the Think Big School event and of course that marvellous Spirit Week full of creativity, fun, good moods and a great atmosphere. This time of year has been known to be kind of hard for all of us, everybody has to deal with his/her own problems and school can be a bit overwhleming. Students from the senior year have the hardest as they are now facing the obsticle called Maturita. In my opinion, it doesn´t have to be an obsticle, it can be more like a life trial that has to be overcame. It can make you a stronger individual in the end as it tests your limits and abilities to the max. On the other hand, it´s spring and we all are about having a good time, keeping our friends close and simply enjoying ourselves whenever it´s possible, that´s what I´m trying to say. So keep calm and don't overeact regardless of what you are actually dealing with because everything is possible to manage if you don´t stress yourselves out too much, laugh and simply keep a healthly lifestyle!
Your Amazon Shake Staff
2 Cultural Events
International Women’s Day: A Bit of History
Everybody knows March 8th is the International Women’s Day (IWD). But who truly knows how we began celebrating this day of women? Where did it start and why exactly? Let me try to tell you the story…
Imagine the 1900’s, a time of great expansion, world industrialization and movement of radical ideologies, but also a very hard time for women. Women were discirimated against as they couldn’t do „a man's job“, they couldn’t take part in politics meaning they couldn’t vote. Who would like that, right? Women wanted equality and change in their lives, so in 1908 15,000 women marched through the city of New York in protest demanding shorter working hours, better salaries and voting rights. According to this event, a year later, the first National Women’s Day was announced on February 28th across the US. National Women’s Day was celebrated by women every year till 1913. During 1910-1911 the idea of celebrating IWD was proposed on International Conference of Working Women in Copenhagen. Women wanted to have just one day in a year to be celebrated as their day – to press for their demands. In 1913 Russia started celebrating IWD as well as Austria, Denmark and Germany and the date was also moved to the March 8th.
Since then, IWD is being celebrated all over the world to coordinate international efforts for womens' rights and participation in political, economic and social processes.
But what does it mean for us as students? In my experience, IWD is not as popular a holiday in Czech Republic as it is in other countries. However, there still are people – men – who buy flowers and little presents for their beloved women – wifes, mothers, daughters, maybe even friends. I think this day should be more widely spread, but what’s more, a woman should be feeling needed and equal every day in her life!
Olga Moiseeva
3 Cultural Events
The 2014 Winter Olympic Games in Sochi
When the 2014 Winter Olympic Games in Sochi were about to start there was a lot of controversy surrounding it. People were complaining about the lack of pillows or bad food in the hotels. Some people even prefered eating McDonald’s to what the hotels and restaurants offered. Then there was the ban of homosexual athletes, which I think was the main reason why everybody paid so much attention to the Olympics.
The opening ceremony was held on the 7th February 2014 and everything was amazing and genuine. Well, at least we all thought it was. When the Olympics were over people found out that a lot of things were censored. For example, nobody outside Russia knew about t.A.T.u.‘s performance, which was another weird thing because they are a pseudo-lesbian group and it left a lot of people confused.
But generally there were no big problems and everybody seemed satisfied except for those little misunderstandings that happened. The athmosphere during the games was amazing, the opening and closing ceremonies were stunning and the athletes proved that there was a reason why they attended the Olympics.
Mariam Gamdjianová Cultural Events
My Opinion on Syria
As you all have probably noticed, the situation in Syria these past 3 years has been terrible and it doesn’t seem to be getting better. Some of you may have gone to see a documentary about it and may have formed your own opinions. I felt like this was a good opportunity for me, as a girl who’s dad and his family are from and still living in Syria, to speak up and tell you how we feel about this situation.
Now, I don’t want you to think I’m speaking for all of us, this is only my opinion and my feelings and I’m not going to take any sides or speak about politics because I really just want to talk about things I know about. If there’s one thing I really know about it’s the fact that I couldn’t be more heartbroken and sad whenever I think about all the people in Syria.
I visited Syria a few times when I was younger, I got to explore the beauty of this country and I got to meet all these amazing people that make country even more beautiful. Everyone’s kind, welcoming, optimistic, generous, humble and so strong. It’s really upsetting to think that those innocent people have to go through what they do and I wish I had the power to change it all. I currently am in touch with only one member of all my family in Syria. He’s studying at college to become a doctor. I couldn’t be more proud and worried about him at the same time. There were few times when I would ask him how he was and he would reply with 'good' and follow that statement with a terrible, frightening information which was that there was a bomb at his school again and he’s fortunately alright.
I honestly cannot imagine living in such fear and without any idea what’s next. Syrians are so unbelievably strong and brave to be able to live like that without breaking down every second of their days because that’s something I, and surely most of people used to the comfort and safety of the Czech Republic would do.
4 I mean, can you imagine going to school every day knowing you could be shot or blown up with your whole school and everyone in there anytime without any warning? Can you imagine going to school and missing one of your classmates because they got killed? Can you imagine being a parent of those kids living in terrible fear every day because you just never know what might be happening at their school or what might happen to them on their way to school and back?
I almost feel selfish anytime I talk to my cousin and he’s being so optimistic and humble. I know that he has to be and that being sad or angry wouldn’t change anything or possibly would only make everything worse. I’m here, I’m safe, I have everything they’re not even dreaming of and I get angry and I get sad and I get upset and I get emotional and I cry and I scream and I can’t deal with life being so unfair to all of them, even though he’s the one who has the right to do that. I just can’t help it, I will never understand why such things are happening, I don’t even want to understand, I don’t care about anything, I don’t care about what caused all this, I just want it to stop! I want to be able to fall asleep without worrying about whether they’re alive or not, I want to think about my wonderful, loving Syrian family and smile, not cry. I would give up everything to make it stop and I know you can never really relate or understand such things and if you can just know that I’m really, really sorry and hope everything gets better, but I feel like people always talk about weapons, politics, money, they are always showing horrible videos of people dying, of children losing everything including their families and it’s starting to be overwhelming.
We get used to seeing such stuff and we don’t think about it much because it’s so common for us. It’s not like these videos were made to look more brutal than the actual situation really is and it’s not like people shouldn’t be talking about politics, because I know they should and I know it’s all happening because of politics but I feel like if you read this and realize I’m one of you, that I’m your age, I live in the same country, I go to the same school and I have just as much trouble deciding what to wear every day as you do, you can understand so many more things than from these videos and articles written by complete strangers using words you’ve never heard.
That’s also one of the reasons I decided to write this. I don’t expect you to suddenly become grateful for everything you have or start caring about others, I know that this little silly thing I wrote won’t make you care if you don’t already. What I really want is you to understand that these are real people just like you and me. Yes, I do realize how stupid that sounds but take a second to think about how hard it is to understand that when all you know is from reading articles full of facts written without putting any emotions into it and seeing videos that only show the worst things possible and make everything seem hopeless. The people struggling there are only just humans, who fall in love, fight, get sad, get happy, get silly and weird, who have a passion for singing, drawing, reading or writing, who have dreams and hate waking up early. They only thing different about them is that they happen to be in a very unpleasant situation right now. Let’s keep them in our thoughts and prayers, cross our fingers and hope for life to be good to them again, because that’s really all that is left for us to do.
Thank you so much for caring about what I have to say about this and for reading it all, I hope I made you feel emotions and I hope I didn’t waste your time.
Anna Issova
5 School Events
Spirit Week at Amazon!
It´s being commonly known that our school is often willing to organize such a special events such as the one called the Sipirit week at Amazon. This idea develops pretty well our creative and fantasy skills plus it´s more then fun, because we don´t have too many opportunities to see our classmates and teachers dressed with crazy socks and even crazier hairstyle. This whole thing was transformated into a competion where the the winning team was awarded by a pizza party with the American department and as I heard the price was definitely worth it ! And when ti put which costume on was scheduled, each Day of the week had a different topic to break the borders of bashfulness of the Amazon students. People were asked to show up dressed like their future job, crazy socks and hair day, all in black, celebrities ect. Well each year and especially each class found this event hilarious but not everybody followed the instructions, there were simply less and more enthusiastic people as always. Then finally was up to Ms. Tope to decide who sacrified themselves the most, so that it turned out that the winner was the class SO2C, congratulations guys, you have surpassed yourselves!
Valentina Lazzari
School Events
Syria and Cuba Documentary Films
#Chicagogirl and Viva Cuba libre: Rap is war
People are such bizzare beings with absolutely unteachable character. The human race had so many opportunities to learn from their mistakes that went down in history such as the antisemithistic deeds, wrong ideologies and perverse dictatorships and they are still applying some of these in the particular places. To avoid this kind of behavior, the folks must be admonitioned as much as possible and that is probably one of the crucial reasons why we, the sophomore year, went to the Lucerna movie theater to see the two movies called the #Chicagogirl and the Viva Cuba libre: Rap is war.
Both of these films were so different but at the same time so similar! The main idea was basically identical: The dictatorial regime penetrates the peoples' peace and faith. We have been introduced to the world's two craziest and cruelest regimes so far. These movies were extremely explicit and sometimes even way too much. However, let´s focus on the Cuba one first.
6 Viva Cuba Libre: Rap is War is telling us about the current situation in Cuba, everything is being presented from a random Cuban woman´s point of view that her sons were arrested because of political reasons. These two guys were listening to the most famous group called Los Aldeanos and praising them and waving with the Cuban flag simply motivating people to go on strike and change things! There were several scenes where this completely desperete mother longing to see her sons again was critisizing the regiem and encouraging people to never give up and to go against the gouvernment! People are just falling all over themselves to survive under such conditions! At the end of the movie, the usher presented to us another rap band that was here in the Czech Republic, we all had an magnificant opportunity to ask them how the situartion is in real life, how did they got to be here and simply what is it like to really face it.
Another part of the festival, Jeden Svět, was devoted to the movie named the #Chicagogirl telling us about 19 year old girl Alaa Basatneh, a freshman of a university in Chicago. She looks like a completely ordinary teen girl with usual interests such as studying, love, frineds etc. However, she is being so different, her main task is being a leader and the main director of the revolution in Syria. She ´s basically putting all of the protesting groups together through secret internet communities, she provides them with the right kinds of pills, medicine, weapons and spying equipment then sends them to the neighboring Lebanon so that they have free access to all these devices. She also contributes herself through putting videos of the street fights on the internet, but before it starts to go viral it´s necessary to smudge the faces of the protestant not to het them fragile and then just spread it out over the internet!
Both of the movies are full of very hursh scenes that are challenging to deal with, however this experience was extremely beneficial for us because many people had absolutely no idea what exactly has been going on there.
Valentina Lazzari
School Events
Think Big School
Think Big School implemented a one day long intensive educational program in selected cities in the Czech Republic. The Program took place in O2 buildings, from 9:00 to 15:30. Students divided into teams and tried to bring their ideas that could positively change the world around us to life. They were surrounded by professional advisers from the staff of O2 and young implementers of successful projects from the Think Big. During the day, teams also had to process a web page using digital tools like Thimble WebMaker, and created a comercial video to represent their projects. In the end, all of the teams presented their projects to the jury and the winning teams took home prizes.
7 This is my team. I can proudly say that we won. The prize? ...Coffee mugs :D
Our project, "I wanna sing", would offer young and talented musicians experiences on stage and interesting programs in clubs and restaurants. The main point of this idea was creating a website, where musicians and business owners could meet up for future cooperation. Our website would provide a diverse database of singers and bands of different kinds of music which would be searchable by genre or other criteria. Simply write them an email and have a free show in your bar or club! Doesn't that sound great? Performances in front of an audience gives you a lot of experience and you can also earn some money from tips or make a deal with the pub for a part time job. Contacts are very important and you never know who might see you there. The jury liked our idea very much and awarded us first place.
Caroline Johnová
School Events
The Ski Trip
At the beginning of February have we, the Freshmen, enjoyed a five days long ski trip in Austria in order to get to know it a little. Unfortunately, the only thing we got to know there was the supermarket. We stayed in a nice little town near the border called Ulrichsberg, which was our home for those few days. The place was nice, peaceful and silent, although I think it was a lot calmer after we left. Everyday was pretty much the same. We got up early in the morning (yes, I think 7:30 is early), then we had some breakfast and went skiing. The interesting fact was that we actually met more Czech people there than Austrians. I guess there was some secret Cech invasion going on then that no one was supposed to know about.
The most fun part of the day was lunch though. There was a huge restaurant with a cafeteria where they had dozens of cute little cakes which wanted me to eat them every time I walked past them. I’m not really sure how much money I spent there, and I probably don’t even want to know, but believe me, if you could see the hot chocolate with the cream on top that seduced me just when I looked at it, you would understand. After couple hours spent in the restaurant most of us went skiing again and then at four o’clock we got back to our dormitory, went for a walk to local supermarket to buy some food supplies for the night, enjoyed delicious dinner and went to get some sleep after a long day spent overtaking and complaining about little children on the track.
Luckily, there were almost no injuries, except for those usual ones like broken legs and dead people in the ditches. I’m just kidding, there were no ditches. There was only one accident where
8 a girl was probably looking for squirrels while skiing and while she was admiring the beauty of nature, she kind of managed to do a few pretty good somersaults. But everything has a bright side and from what I heard, the rescuing team appeard to have quite a handsome staff. No wonder some of us were looking for squirrels as well after that.
Even though the weather wasn’t really nice for the first three days, we all managed to get back home without any arms or legs missing. I’m sure no one would admit this, but all of us were looking forward cuddling with our teddy bears. We got to know our schoolmates a little bit better and created some new memories to share with those who decided to stay at school and watch ice-hockey. So to sum this up a little, I would say we had a pretty good time and the ski trip was exactly what it was supposed to be.
Josefina Simkova
An Interview with Mr. Michael Maritato
1) If you had a superpower, what would it be?
If I had a superpower, it would be the ability to control the weather. I could eliminate drought and forest fires and always have a sunny day in the park.
2) Do you have any Nicknames or another way to be called? If yes, would you like people to call you by that?
I've gone through a cycle of nicknames over the years, mostly variations of my surname. The most common were „M-sauce“ and „Tato“, however, the only one that my friends still use is simply „Mikey“.
3) What book have you recently read or what are you going to read ?
I'm currently reading Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut for class and for pleasure I'm reading The Electric Kool Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe. I've got a long 'to-read' list, and have been working my way through Czech authors like Kundera and Čapek.
4) Who´s the most famous person you have ever met, if you haven´t met any, who would you like to meet ?
I had the opportunity to visit the Chancellor's residence in Berlin and spend the afternoon with Gerhard Schröder and Henry Kissinger and talk about international relations. On the other side of things, I spent a little while hanging out with the members of Maroon 5 way back in 2004, but didn't know who they were until they invited us to come watch them play the next night.
5) How often do you read your horoscope, do you believe in it ?
I don't usually read my horoscope, but I think I'm a pretty typical Libra.
6) What´s the first thing that appears in your mind when someone says entertainment ?
That would have to be live music of some sort. I love going to concerts and checking out new bands.
9 7) Are you addicted to something ?
Nothing too serious, just pizza and caffeine. I start to have withdrawals if I go more than a day without either.
8) Do you have any New Year´s resolutions, can you stick to them for the whole year?
I prefer not to make resolutions, but rather goals for the year. I have a goal to visit as many countries as years old I am. I'm a little behind on that one, but I still have the year ahead of me. I also want to compose more music.
9) What makes you freak out ?
Nothing that I can think of. I consider myself pretty laid-back and I try not to sweat the small stuff.
10) Are you superstitious ?
Nope. I would break a mirror in front of a black cat as I walk under a ladder and not even think twice.
11) Do you collect anything, if you do, what and why?
I've collected many things throughout my life, but the only thing that I still collect is beer coasters. I must have close to 500 different ones now from all over the world. They remind me of trips and good times with friends and each one has a little story.
12) Do you have any risk taking habits ?
I wouldn't say I'm a habitual risk taker, but most decisions in life come with some degree of risk. I'll take a gamble from time to time, but never gamble with anything you're not prepared to lose.
13) What´s your favourite ice-cream flavour ?
I'm always torn between chocolate and strawberry. Great combination when they're put together.
14) What´s the most memorable place you've ever visited?
Since I was a little boy I have enjoyed visiting the Lake Superior shore in northern Minnesota. It is such a picturesque place and I have many fond memories of staying in a cabins there and enjoying the great outdoors.
15) What's your favorite music genre? What particular bands do you like?
I usually have music on all the time when I'm home and have my mp3 player with when I'm out and about. I listen to everything from classical to house and jazz to bluegrass. The only genres that I don't listen to are heavy metal, popular country-western and top of the pops radio hits. I've been listening to Beck's new album a lot this month as well as my favorite warm weather band The Grateful Dead.
16) Who do you admire the most ?
I admire my former violin teacher the most, even though she has since passed away. She lived to be 100 years old and did what she loved until the day she died. She always had an infinity for teaching and had endless patience with her students. She said that music kept her alive and she played in the symphony until her 99th birthday. She is an inspiration to many and left a remarkable impact on me and those she met.
10 17) What job did you want to get when you were a child ?
When I was a boy I really wanted to be an architect. I loved creating things with my Lego and wanted to find a job where I could be creative everyday.
18) What one word would sum up your time in high school?
That word would have to be „invincible.“ I look back fondly on high school and can see now how much I actually got away with. You can't let school get in the way of your education.
19) What was your favourite subject in school, why?
It is a tie between Music and English, mainly because of the teachers I had. I love reading books and writing and the discussions we would have about literature was really thought provoking. Music is a given, my best friends were in the symphony with me and our choir was one of the best. It was great to spend almost 3 hours a day playing music and having a laugh with our directors.
20) Who has influenced you the most?
I have to go with my parents on this one. They embody a live life to its fullest outlook and are always there for me. They have such a positive attitude and love experiencing new things. Constant encouragement. When I look at them I'm reminded of a song lyric; „If you never slow down you never grow old“
21) Have any of your dreams come true?
I have always been a vivid dreamer and keep a dream journal, so in the literal sense I have seen bits and pieces of dreams come true; especially when I experience Déjà vu. In a more figurative sense, I am living my dream everyday. I have the opportunity to live in Europe and I am the happiest I have ever been.
22) What is the best advice you have ever received?
I guess the best advice I have received and live by is a combination of “don't sweat the small stuff” and “don't take life too seriously, or you'll never get out alive”
23) What's something new you learned this week?
I always try to learn a little Czech every week and I'm ready for Easter now that I know “Hody, hody doprovody...”
24) If you could travel back in time, which century would you go to?
I would like to go to the 18th century, North America, before any explorers came from Europe. I could live in harmony with the earth and test my skills in agriculture and hunting and gathering.
25) If you were forced to change your first name, what would you change it to?
My dad really wanted to call me Mario, but my mom said I would get made fun of too much. I used to joke that I would change my name to that, but now I'm not so sure. I guess I would use my middle name, Anthony, if I had to change it. People could call me “Toník”.
11 26) Who´s your inspiration?
My parents of course, but if I had to go with a stranger it would have to be Chris Thile. He's an amazing mandolin player who continues to cross genres and is passionate about what he does.
27) Do you have any strong belief you always stick to?
I'm a firm believer in having a positive mental attitude. I always seem to have things work out for the best and even when things don't go according to plan, having a positive attitude can help you see the silver lining in any situation.
Sports
It’s Spring You Guys, Get Up and Move!
The weather’s getting better every day, flowers are waking up, the way the trees smell make me love life, the birds are singing so beautifully – nothing compares and you’re sitting at home? Ha, nonsense! I’m going to give you some places to go where you can be productive and good to yourself and your health. Even if you can’t go to any of them just go and run or go on a walk. I’m sure you can do that everywhere and any time you like. Everything’s so beautiful in the Spring, it would be a shame to stay at home.
Where to go rollerblading or cycling Ladronka, Stromovka, Letná, Pod Vyšehradem – Zbraslav, Praha Troja - Bohnice, Hlavní Nádraží – Krejcárek, Hloubětín – Nová Harfa – Vysoany, Horní Poernice – Zelene, Dolní Poernice – Dolní Měcholupy, Sportovní areál Na Korunce, Vítkov, Židovské pece
Places perfect for yoga, walks or jogging... Františkánská zahrada, Letná, Parukářka, Riegerovy sady, Petřínské sady, Stromovka, Vítkov, Židovské pece, Hostivařský park, Hvězda, Kunratický les, Ladronka, Michelský les, Milíovský les
I’m sorry to all the people not living in Prague since all of these places are in Prague, but as I said in the beginning, you can always go on a walk, do whatever, just please go outside and be active. Winter’s over and you’re not allowed to hibernate anymore, no excuses, all it takes is once and you’ll fall in love, I guarantee it!
Anna Issova
12 Sports
Fitness is in the Air
More and more often I hear from people around me: „hey, let´s go to the gym after school“. Exercising, working out, simply taking care of our health should be a necessary part of our daily lives. Here we are going to talk about new trends in this area.
Fashion Magazines, TV series, internet and movies are the right example of the main devices that are being used for fitness centers, swimming pools or any other kinds of sport places advertising. They often show wonderful bodies looking so lush, healthy and beautiful and our mind is being stimulated and our subconscience is appealed to going and getting a membership card for the brand new fitness center in our city. I personally think that it is an amazing idea, because of it´s comfort, if you think about it, the gym will be always there for us plus it´s entirely up to us when we will turn up no matter the weather or some different enviromental conditions, it´s always great to stretch our muslces and to be aware of our heart rate. More equipped gyms have also the fat, carbohydrates and protein measuring machine and now that we can know the level of these three factors in our body, it´s quite simple to estabilish the right amount of every workout. That would not be technically possible in the ordinary nature. This is one of many perks but we all know that there are also many drawbacks, believe it or not, such as the artificial fluorescent light bulbs that can´t be compared to the moment when we feel the sun shine on our skin while we enjoy ourselves jogging around and watching the beautiful view of the day. But we are here to talk about the beneffits of the fitness centers in general. Another major perk is the fact that we time dependent, most gyms are avalaible from 7:00 am to 9:00 pm and there are also these ones that are open even during the night to satisfy the busy folks and the workaholics, basically to adapt their offers to everybody.
On the topic of protein bars, drinks, energy chewing gums or L Carnitin drinks, people on the internet are literally fighting over these things, there are so many arguments so far that are supporting the same ideas and challenging the other ones. We all know and are perfectly aware that if somebody exaggerates, the results are not going to be great, maybe they will satisfy us first, however this state of happines is always temporary! With pure water nothing can go really wrong, but I do kind of understand that desire to make or wish happen faster so we long to use these products no matter how old or young we are, I am not gonna tell you not to do it, because I have tried them myself. The main thing is not to get accustomed to their overusage.
Valentina Lazzari
13 Opinion
Travelling: Moscow
It was a February evening – well, almost night, when my plane landed in Moscow, Russia. After going through security check and getting my old, but still functional suitcase, I finally met my father. We were both glad to see each other again after such a long time. We caught a bus from airport and off we went.
When I looked through the bus windows, I cannot really see these snowdrifts I’ve dreamed about, conversely, I could barely see any snow. That leads to beating a stereotype: in Moscow, there isn’t always snow.
After getting home, we chit-chated a little bit and then went to prepare ourselves for an interesting day tomorrow via well-deserved sleep.
The next morning we decide to visit an exhibition of Natalia Goncharova’s paintings. She was a very famous avant-garde painter and designer. Her paintings are sone of the most expensive in the world. They can bring you joy as well as sadness or make you think deeply.
Since my Dad and I are both very cultural human beings, we didn’t end up visiting just one art museum. We also went to explore Van Gogh paintings. But it wasn’t just an ordinary exhibition with works of this genius hanging on the wall. No, it was way more special! As soon as we entered the exhibition hall, I was surprised and thunderstruck – the whole room was a huge canvas with projection of Van Gogh’s most famous and less famous pieces of art. Visitors could sit on seats or just walk around and enjoy the changing images. Thematic music was playing simultaneously, which induced a very unusual atmosphere.
When visiting Moscow, I never forget to „greet“ the Red Square. It is even more beautiful in winter with all the decorations and flickering lights. In the middle of the square there’s an ice-skating rink with joyful children and adults also, who merrilly enjoy each other’s company.
However, this rink isn’t the greatest one in Moscow. In Moscow there are a lot of areas where you can ice-skate in winter. Our favourite is the biggest (and the best) one in Gorkiy Park. If you imagine just a big oval skating-rink, you are imagining wrong! Here, you don’t just ice-skate in circles till you get bored and go home. You actually ice-skate right in the park alleys! A lot of happy people skate around park, music plays and there is beautiful illumination when it gets dark! This skating area is actually what I like the most about winter Moscow.
Since I’m sort of a fan of museums and exhibitions (as you can tell), my father and I visited another museum - the museum of mineralogy. This museum has one of the biggest museum showing minerals and stones. It includes pieces of meteors as well, so you’re not only admiring the beauty of nature’s creations, but you also learn some new interesting information. It took us about two hours to look at each stone and examine its richness.
I love Moscow with all of its downsides and strengths, which I think are more dominant. This city is made for people not to only live and work in, but to enjoy spending their free time here. With all the parks, museums, theatres, sport spaces and many other stuff, I find Moscow a great place to visit and experience its ambience! Olga Moiseeva
14 Opinion
Travelling – Ireland, Dublin, Arklow
Some say that the best way to relax is to throw all of our daily misgivings and problems away by geting under that softly fluffy big sheet and just doing nothing. That might be one of the many ways to get yourself refreshed, however it is not the only one. We often see many pictures showing us luxurious spa resorts in for example Miami, Dominicana or Cuba. While we look at them, most perople are probably wondering what this experience could be like. I went through similar reflections and realized that there could be even more ways to take a rest.
If my memories are still clear enough, it was the end of February when I went for several days to see some friends, to breathe the unpolluted air and simply to enjoy myself in Ireland. This country has its own sparkle. Ireland is considered to be the Italy of North. People are so open-hearted, they are always more than willing to help you and the thing that I particularly appreciate is their way of accepting newcomers. Irish people are extremely open-minded towards other mentalities plus they are veru hospitable, which is very precious. In the following paragraphs I would like to tell you about my Irish experience.
The city of Dublin has so many faces. It can be a great place for retirement because of its lush green parks with their peaceful atmospheres. It can also be seen as something wild with absolutely no control, as young folks enjoy their extensive selection of alcoholic drinks in the Temple Bar area. In Dublin there are two praised and famous universities, which results in the fact that Dublin is a very international place with a lot of cultural and religious diversity.
When it comes to historical monuments and places to visit in general, I enjoyed the antique Dublin castle located just in the centre of the city. The tourists have the opportunity to explore the whole thing. The paid guide usually brings people to see
15 the legendary dungeon and the even more famous torture chambre. You can also go and see the beautiful National Gallery, which holds art from all over the world.
Ireland is simply a place that I love. It has an enormous sparkle that gets into people´s minds and will be there forever. keeping the beauty of this amazing country in their memory!
Valentina Lazzari
Healthy Lifestyle
Confessions of a Coconut Lover
On our trip in London we found this cute little exotic stand on Oxford street selling fresh coconuts. Now that's something you don't find on every street, especially not on one such as Oxford street. So naturally, many of the Amazon students had to buy one. Now coconuts don't just look good in selfies, as many of our fellow students discovered via Instagram or Facebook, they also have a variety of usages and most importantly, amazing benefits. As I could not run around and tell all my friends/classmates these benefits I decided to write an entire article about the delicious and very useful coconut, as I use coconuts every single day and it has, believe it or not, changed my life. Coconuts are full of healthy medium-chain triglycerides (which helps activate fat burning), electrolytes, anti-viral and anti-fungal properties (which will aid in restoring healthy gut flora) and did I mention they are delicious!?
Coconut oil is used mainly in tropical countries, especially India, Sri lanka, Thailand, Philippines etc., which have good production of coconut oil. Coconut oil was considered harmful for the human body due to it's high saturated fat content until the last decade when people began to question these claims. So don't panic, it's the good kind of fat that aids our body against diseases and helps us keep a healthy weight. iIt even helps the heart despite popular disbelief. It contains about 50% lauric acid, which helps in actively preventing various heart problems like high cholesterol levels and high blood pressure.
Here are a few ways you can use coconut oil:
-In the kitchen. Coconut oil can be used instead of butter or regular oil. Consuming coconut oil instead of butter will help prevent heart problems as I've mentioned before and when when baking something sweet with coconut oil it will smell (and taste) better!
-Hair care. Coconut oil is extensively used in India for hair care. Most of the people in India apply coconut oil on their hair every day after bathing or showering. It is an excellent conditioner and helps the re-growth process of damaged hair. It also provides the essential proteins required for nourishing and healing damaged hair.
Tip: Make yourself a nice hair-mask once a week by gently massaging coconut oil all over your scalp and at the ends of you hair, leave it over night and then wash of. By regularly doing so you can ensure that your scalp is not dry and will even make your hair grow faster(awesome right!?)! It also helps keep your head free of lice and lice eggs.
-Make up remover. For all my ladies out there coconut oil is an excellent make up remover. It removes makeup almost instantly and at the same time moisturizes the skin. Also because it is an oil it removes make up very gently, not tugging the skin which causes unnecessary wrinkles, which is also something you should think about. Be gentle to your skin ladies! Also, coconut oil is less expensive then your average make up remover product and more importantly it does not
16 contain any harmful ingredients such as parabens, which can cause you skin cancer and other harmful diseases.
There are many forms of consuming a coconut. It can be coconut oil, water or coconut meat. Either way it will sure to make your skin, hair, nails and over all health better. Sounds pretty good to me.
Fact: Researchers have found that our skin absorbs 60% of the products we use into the bloodstream.
Rina Hasani
Music Reviews
Music Video Reviews
A lot of amazing and interesting music videos came out lately, here’s a review on some of them. :]
Shakira – Empire Beautiful dresses, beautiful woman with curves to die for letting the world see them in such a classy way as always, lots of flowers and beautiful nature. So girly! Love it, love it, love it!
Coldplay – Magic Even though the story line is a bit cheesy and isn’t really original, this video’s so freaking awesome and suits the song lyrics so well. It made me pay attention the whole time which is very rare and I looooove the black and white theme.
Rita Ora – I Will Never Let You Down Very girly and fun. Personally I like the black and white parts the best but the colorful ones are cool too!
The Chainsmokers - #SELFIE Entertaining! Hahaha! Couldn’t help but laugh the whole time. Also, love it how they gave everyone a chance to be a part of it, that’s very cute. :]
5 Seconds Of Summer – She Looks So Perfect Bubbly, cute, fun and weird. Don’t videos like this make you want to run down the street spontaneously in your underwear? Because I totally almost did that.
Avicii – Addicted To You Wonderfully made. Even though I like happy endings a lot, this was even better.
Sky Ferreira – I Blame Myself I was excited and curious to see this video since Sky said it was very personal and special for her. Many people claimed it to be racist which made Sky very upset, as I’m sure she didn’t mean to insult anyone and personally I like it a lot.
Also, don’t miss the Billboard Music Awards 2014, live Sunday, May 18th! Hope you’re at least half as excited as me!
17 Book Reviews
Invisible Monsters
When I decided to read this book I had no idea what I was getting myself into. After seeing the movie Fight Club which was the movie version of Chuck Palahniuk’s novel, I wanted to read some of his books. I read some reviews and then found this book. This novel was published in 1999 and it is one of Palahniuk’s most controversial works ever. It’s about a girl called Shannon who is a former model. She stopped modeling when she was shot in the face and could never talk or eat normally again. When she was in the hospital she met a girl called Brandy who introduced her to a brand new meaning of life. They travelled the whole US using fake names everytime and they would steal drugs and sell them to earn money. Then one day Shannon revealed Brandy’s secret and everything started to make sense. I can guarantee that you won’t get bored of this book because something new and exciting happens in each page and even if reading is not your favorite thing to do you won’t be able to stop reading. Sometimes things get so weird but it makes the book a little funny. There are also many philosophical thoughts which we can all relate to even today. I never thought I’d want to read a book twice but now I have the urge to re-read this one. If you’ve never read or heard about this book I strongly recommend it to you!
Mariam Gamdjianová
Creative Writing
Dear Diary, This day was one of the weirder ones. As I wrote before, I met Kyle. He’s really tall, about 1,90 meters (every time I look at him I have to look very high… I feel like I’m sinking into the ground…), muscular, has a big, pointy nose, green eyes like a wild cat and dark blond hair. He can play guitar better than Jimi Hendrix - I’m serious! This tall guy is also a tramp. I have been with him on one road and it’s wonderful. He’s showed me a lot of miracles of nature and we’ve had a lot of fun. When we were sitting on red pillows in local tea room, we were smoking a water pipe and thinking about our lives. Meanwhile, our friend Luke read from the poem collection of Robert Pinsky Sadness and Happiness and we were sipping herbal tea from snowy white cups with navy blue ornamentation. “Soul, one's life is one's enemy. As the small children learn what happens Takes over, and what you were goes away.” ended Luke with an atypical silence. We didn’t know why he ended in the middle of the poem but he looked up at us and after a while he said, “we have to go somewhere.” We didn’t know why he was so mysterious, why he was staring at us like an owl without a soul full of memories. Kyle sipped the rest of his tea and stood up, “so get up and get into the car…” he said. “What do you wanna do?” I had to ask. It sounded so crazy; just go somewhere, where you don’t know anyone, where you don’t know where to go, where you don’t know what to do. “We’ll make a little stop at yours, at mine and at Luke’s for some food, clothes and something necessary-“, I stopped him “You don’t answer to me!” I was on the edge of confusion. I was excited but also scared.
18 “That’s the adventure.” he smiled. Luke slapped this adventurer on his back. “Come with us. It was fun last time, wasn’t it?” Meanwhile I was remembering what we had done. Climbing on the biggest hill in country. We were like mountain sherpas who finely jumped on every stone they saw. We were running like a night which is turning into a sunny cold morning. “Um... Okay…” I tried to look excited but actually I was confused. We have to enjoy this summer, though, and our youth will be fuller and fuller with crazy moments like this. When I stopped thinking my friends and I went to our homes for big backpacks. When we met again I saw Luke’s little rucksack full of clothes and so on. Kyle also brought a guitar and so did I. “Looks like there will be two of us playing.” He smiled and we went to a train station. It was big, green, covered in graffiti and and had an original smell that reminded me of the smell of hospitals mixed with gas and weed. We ran at the first train we saw. It transported some boxes with a lot of numbers on them. We sat next to each other. I leaned on Kyle and my eyes got heavy. I felt his warm body and it made me fell asleep. When I woke up, I saw Luke reading a book. “What are you reading?” “Junky by Burroughs” “Uh…” I didn’t know what to say. His eyes were like glued on the page. “What?” He closed the novel and looked at me. “Nothing. Don’t you have something else for me?” “Here you go…” he gave me something with a red cover. “What is it?” “It’s Bel-ami by Guy de Maupassant.” Soon we were lost in pages. After two hours Luke woke up when our wagon stopped. Kyle and I took our luggage and Luke grabbed our guitars. In a few minutes there was nothing that would tell them that we were there. Our trip had begun. Old grey trains contrasted with the enormously green landscape. Treetops were dark green like moss and the noises of animals and trains were flying through the air... We were on our way, enjoying the beauty of nature and the silence of empty civilization. The sun was setting and Luke ruffled his red hair, “we must find a place where we can sleep.” “And quickly…” said Luke and his belly started rumbling. I gave him a müsli bar that I had in my package. He thanked me and his eyes smiled at me. When the sun was going to sleep and the sky started to shed red tears we were tired. “Okay so what are we going to do…” Luke tried to think. “I hear water!” said Kyle and we ran to where he heard it. He found a beautiful place. A little lake, frogs, nature, just the three of us... What else could I ask for? I sat on the ground and watched our stuff. The boys were looking for some timber. For a while my mind was again with Georges Duroy… When they came back we made a fireplace. Our guitar strings were shaking with our fingers and our voices were changing notes from highs to lows. After a little fun jamming with guitars I prepared some meat and apples for us. Luke brought some instant coffee in a little jar so I also boiled some water. “It’s disgusting but better than nothing.” said Kyle. I had to agree. “Be glad that I brought something…” Luke was still calm and drunk from his brown cup. When our stomachs were full we spread out some blankets to lie on. The sky was deep blue and the stars were like nature lit millions of candles. Goodnight!
19 26th August 2013
After a small breakfast of coffee and oatmeal we cleaned the place and went turther and after an hour it started raining. It didn’t take long beofre we saw a house, or a little farm to be more specific. Goats were bleating under a small roof and we ran in front of the door. Kyle knocked and an old woman opened,“May I help you?” “Hello, we were tramping across this land but clouds were cruel and they sent a big rain on us.” Kyle smiled. I was already all wet and Luke, that ginger, had my guitar as an umbrella!
“Hurry up! Or you’ll be sick!” She let us in. We were so happy so we didn’t even noticed one group of goats in which the main billy-goat looked incredibly angry. The woman was thin, short and looked really nice. Blue eyes were like lights into her soul. Deep and kind. “Thank you so much!” She told us to take a seat and we did it. “Where are you from?” granny asked and gave us three glasses of milk. It was goat milk. “From one smaller town that is two hours from here…” Luke stared at the glass. “I can’t let you go! But I don’t have enough space for you to sleep…” she said and thought about where she could warm us up. We sat in front of a radiator and changed our clothes. The little granny was talking with us about her daughter who moved to the capital city and never talked with her anymore. The sadness came and stood for a couple of minutes in us, but the boys brought in our wooden babies and we played some songs to make her day a little bit happier. She lent us an umbrella and we ran over a little barn. It was full of hay but it was more comfortable than mud. We closed the door, turned a flashlight on and lay on our jackets that we had in our backpacks.
27th August 2013
Even the cold light of morning didn’t make three sleeping beauties alive. BAM! Something opened the door and because Luke woke up, he stretched his legs and kicked me. “What the hell…” When I opened my eyes the angry billy-goat stood in the door and ran to us and showed us his horns. Luke and I were running really fast but were still sleepy. Kyle firstly had to recognize what was and why is there such a noise. “Kyle! You idiot! Run!” screamed our ginger and jumped through the window.
When he saw what was near him, he stood up and jumped on a ladder, which was the nearest thing on his left side and he climbed up. I exploited the billy-goat's lack of attention and ran away from the barn. But he saw me and got off the ground. The sleepy jumper could go down because now the billy-goat was chasing me and I ran away. Little granny was already with the little goats and when she saw me she couldn’t stop laughing. “You poor child!” she smiled. When I looked back my chaser was tired and slower. After a couple of minutes the goat didn’t run anymore. My face was red and my lungs and heart were pumping. “He’s harmless but he wanted to scare you.” said the tiny grandma and got back to work. We packed our stuff and got on our way. This is the alarm clock that everyone needs. Anonymous
20 AMAZON SHAKE STAFF
Editor in Chief Valentina Lazzari
Writers Olga Moiseva
Mariam Gamdjianová
Anna Issová
Caroline Johnová
Josefina Simkova
Anila Hasani
Tereza Radova
Valentina Lazzari
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