Catch up with the latest news around the world

Have a look at this website because it's well worth seeing to practice your listening skills at your level!

CNN Student News is a ten-minute, commercial-free, daily news program for middle and high school students produced by the journalists and educators at CNN. This award-winning show and its companion Web site are available free of charge throughout the school year.

Why not start to catch up with today's breaking news by watching the video below? You can activate the subtitles by clicking the "cc" button in the bottom righ-hand corner, once the video is playing.

For Amazon lovers...

Amazon to open its first-ever physical store in New York. 
Will it be worth a flight?

Have you heard about the spying scandal?

This cartoon by Schrank from The Independent on Sunday relates to the ongoing scandal over the bugging of German Chancellor Angela Merkel's mobile phone by the US security services. (Click on the words in bold to read more about it and practise real English!)

The cartoon is based on the traditional children's fairy tale Little Red Riding Hood about a young girl who visits her grandmother, only to find she has been eaten by a Big Bad Wolf. In Schrank's version, the role of Little Red Riding Hood is played by Angela Merkel (note the mobile phone in her basket). The wolf is U.S. President Obama (note the listening equipment on his bedside table and the stars and stripes bedclothes). Merkel tells Obama (in a strong German accent), "Mr Präsident ... vat big ears you hef!" (Mr President ... what big ears you have).
 

Obama wins election for second term as president

Breaking news this morning!!

Watch the videos below if you want to keep updated with the latest news or just to practise listening :-)



..and below you can watch and hear his victory speech. 

Amazing news: Missionary Church of Kopimism

The Missionary Church of Kopimism (in swedish Missionerande Kopimistsamfundet), founded by 19-year-old philosophy student Isak Gerson, is a congregation of file sharers who claim that copying information is a sacred virtue. The Church, based in Sweden, has been officially recognized by the Swedish Legal, Financial and Administrative Services Agency ("kammarkollegiet") as a religious community, after three application attempts.

The followers of the religion are called Kopimists from copy me. According to the church, "In our belief, communication is sacred." No belief in gods or supernatural phenomena is mentioned on their web site. CTRL+C and CTRL+V, familiar to those with rudimentary computing skills as the shortcut keys for "Copy" and "Paste," are considered sacred symbols.

• All knowledge to all
• The search for knowledge is sacred
• The circulation of knowledge is sacred
• The act of copying is sacred.

January 5, 2012, Kopimism was accepted by Sweden as a legitimate religion. The religion's association with illegal file sharing has been said to not be a sign that file sharing that steps beyond legal borders will be excused from Sweden's zero-tolerance approach to the matter.

 (source and picture: wikipedia)

* If you want to know more about them out of curiosity, check their website by clicking here

THEY'RE ALL OUT !!!

The longest underground nightmare in history ended safely — and faster than anyone expected.

In a flawless operation that unfolded before a hopeful, transfixed world, 33 miners who were trapped for more than two months deep beneath the Chilean earth were raised one by one Wednesday through a smooth-walled shaft of rock.

The last man out was the one who held the group together when they were feared lost, a shift foreman named Luis Urzua who enforced tight rations of their limited food and supplies before help could arrive.

"We have done what the entire world was waiting for," he said immediately after his rescue. "We had strength, we had spirit, we wanted to fight, we wanted to fight for our families, and that was the greatest thing."

Not even a full 24 hours after the rescue began, Urzua made the 2,041-foot ascent in a rescue capsule called Phoenix and emerged from a manhole-sized opening in the ground to a joyous celebration of confetti, balloons and champagne.

President Sebastian Pinera told him: "You are not the same, and the country is not the same after this. You were an inspiration. Go hug your wife and your daughter." With hardhats held to their hearts, the pair led a joyous crowd in singing the national anthem.

(Source: news.yahoo.com)