A convenient truth!

Today, I am going to blog about one topic that caught my attention last night while I was watching the news on the BBC channel. It is a story that made me think about how unfair or undemocratic a so called great democracy could be. But before doing so, I apologize if I hurt anyone’s feelings because what I am going to mention in the lines beneath could be seen as an attack on a particular country. On the contrary, it is not my intention; it is only my reflection of the program I have seen.
Yesterday night, a documentary on a new Arabic TV show was presented. As the majority of the news channels, they broadcast daily news. This specific channel covers information from the hectic Middle East region. However, unlike its western counterparts, it offers the things from another point of view. A point of view that perhaps does not match the ways things are shown by the programs we, western people, traditionally watch. Still, what makes this channel unique is that it presents a different perspective in a language now being understood by more and more people all over the world, English. According to the documentary, the main goal of this program is to show a distinct opinion to the world, or at least to those who can deal with the language spoken.
What raised concerns in me was the fact that according to the program, a certain democratic government is encouraging the private companies within its boundaries to avoid transmitting the aforementioned channel signal. Apparently, they are doing so by manipulating the situation telling the TV companies that it is a patriotic behavior. And I wonder what could be the consequences for the TV chains if they do not pay attention to the advice of the government. Does not that attend to the concept of democracy? Where everyone is supposed to have the right to choose and structure its own opinion about a specific topic even knowing that journalists could also manipulate a fact. In my opinion that is one of the advantages of democracy, and it should be respected by everyone.

Unemployed!

This time I will not blog about any scientific topic. I will not even blog about the beauties of my country. Perhaps what I am going to talk about you will find it improper or uninteresting, yet it is something related to my personal life. Since the beginning of the semester, I started working at the Dino’s athlete department as an event staff. Even though the experience did not fulfill me with any professional knowledge since it was completely unlinked to what I used to do for living, it did allow me to live an interesting new experience.
Working in a Canadian environment surrounded by English native speakers, definitively has made me improve not only my listening skills, but it has helped me getting more confidence regarding my speaking. I have to recognize that sometimes is very challenging to do so because at times people speak so fast that it is very difficult to catch up with some dialogues. Additionally, this experience has also helped me with my finances. Although I just worked on weekends, it was enough to earn a few hundreds. But as any part time job, everything comes to an end. Unfortunately this end arrived before I was expecting it and as the Dinos season finished, the event staff become unemployed. So, if anyone knows about any weekend opportunity, please do not hesitate to contacting me.

Natural Gas: environmental effetcs.

As we have previously indicated in the last blog, there are important advantages that make natural gas a better option among the fossil fuels currently used. The most important one is the way it affects the environment. Nowadays, natural gas is considered by many people as the less harmful and most friendly of the hydrocarbon resources. In the lines beneath, this text will cover some of those environmental issues related to the use of natural gas.
Among all the fossil fuels, natural gas is the cleanest one. In almost every combustion process, such as the one that takes place while burning gas, carbon dioxide (CO2), water vapor, sulfur dioxide (H2S), and nitrogen oxides (Nox) are the primary products release to the into the environment. However, the amounts of each one of these products is far smaller than the amounts released by the combustion of heavier fossils like coal and fuel oil. The reason is linked to the fact that natural gas is mainly composed of methane (CH4), whose molecules contain lighter chain of carbons. Additionally, contrary to other hydrocarbons, natural gas does not release considerable quantities of ash particles which are another important pollutant usually invisible or imperceptible to the human eye.
Green house emissions, smog, air quality, industrial and electric generation emissions, and pollution form the transportation vehicles are some of the problems our society is facing right now. As human population continues to grow, we begun to use more and more resources and fossil fuels are our fist choice. A simple example is represented by the use of cars and other common methods of transportation, but cars or any other transportation vehicle are a necessity. Thus, the emissions released into the atmosphere keep increasing with the time. The rate of emissions stands side by side the consumption of fuels. Natural gas, even though does not eliminate the problem, it minimize the effect. For example, vehicles operating with compressed gas have reductions in carbon monoxide (CO2) emissions of 25% in comparison to those emitted by traditional gasoline or diesel cars.

Natural Gas, where does it come from?

One of today’s most popular sources of energy is natural gas. Even though it belongs to the family of the hydrocarbons, there are a lot of differences between the traditional oils, resulting from the process of upgrading the petroleum, and the natural gas. These differences can be more appreciated in the way the resource is storage, handled, and the environmental connotations related to its production and use.
In order to understand how natural gas is used, it is very important to explain first where the source does come from. Natural gas, as it was indicated above, is a hydrocarbon that we can find in the under ground. Usually, the way to reach it is by drilling a well, a term used in the Oil & Gas industry regarding the place where great many amounts of resources, and particularly petroleum and gas could be found. Gas, generally speaking, is obtained associated or not associated with petroleum. This means that while drilling a prospective well people can obtain a fluid composed by both petroleum and gas, or a fluid whose main composition is only gas. Once the fluid has been discovered it is necessary to condition it for commercial purposes. This goal is achieved with the help of chemical and mechanical processes, whose principal objective is to remove impurities from the fluid, impurities such as water, soil, hydrogen sulfide (H2S), and carbon dioxide (CO2). However, the story does not end at the point where gas is suitably produced; moreover, it is just the starting point for a long trip. The next stage to obtaining natural gas, better known as methane (CH4) is based on a chemical process of separation, where the gas current is divided in its primary elements for which methane is the major one. Once the process of separation has been completed, the quantities of natural gas are ready to continue the journal using pipelines and many types of equipment until the end point or final customer.
This blog only covers the basic principle of natural gas production. In the next blog, I would like to talk about what makes natural gas different from other hydrocarbons.

Los Roques

A lot of people think about the Caribbean beaches and only picture places such as Jamaica, the wonderful beaches of Mexico, or the famous islands in the Caribbean Sea like Puerto Rico or the Dominican Republic. However, unless you know someone who is familiar whit the entire region, it is very difficult to find places as beautiful as the ones aforementioned. An example of that if Los Roques, an archipelago located in the waters of Venezuela.
At a distance of about 168 km away form the harbor of La Guaira, Caracas, Los Roques is group of keys formed by more than 50 islands. The most important, El Gran Roque or the Great Rock, is the only one inhabit and is where the airport is located. The other important islands are Francisqui, Nordisqui, Madrisqui y Crasqui.
Los Roques is considered a paradise by those who have had the pleasure of visiting it. As many other wonderful places in the Caribbean Sea, is a place full of spectacular beaches and splendid blues characterizing its waters. But what make Los Roques different are two very important features. First, the huge extension of its peaceful waters, the presence of lagoons in the middle of some of its keys, and the quality of the white sand of its beaches. Secondly, although it is an excellent place for tourism, the archipelago remains unknown for a great many tourists around the world and there is not a big infrastructure development there, so the keys stay almost as in their natural ecosystem. It does not mean that you will not find a bed where to sleep; on the contrary, any one interested in spending a whole weekend in this paradise can choose among a variety of lodges or inns.
Los Roques is an ideal place for snorkeling, fishing, windsurfing, or kite surfing, and if you ever decide to go there you will never forget it.

Angel Falls

Salto Angel or Angel Falls is considered one of the natural wonders of the world. This fall is also considered the world’s highest free-falling waterfall with a total high close to the one thousand meters, and they are situated in the south east area of Venezuela, in a the middle of the Canaima National Park in which is known as La Gran Sabana or The Great Plain. The falls receive their name after an American aviator named James Crawford Angel visited them in the year 1935, when they really became familiar to the Western world. The indigenous term used for the falls is Kerepakupai-meru which apparently means “waterfall of the deepest place”. And I say apparently because this is what I found on the internet and I have no idea of the Pemon language which is the one responsible for the name aforementioned.
This amazing creation of the nature is a gift for human kind. The waterfalls them selves and all the surroundings typified by countless rivers, lagoons, rain forests, savannas, and a particular mountain formations called Tepuys which are impressive table top mountains, involves visitors in a unique experience. Angel Falls and the Canaima National Park is one of the places perfect for those who love the environment and would like to experience a real contact with an untouched ecosystem. Besides the features describe before, one can also find the magic and reality of the fauna and flora characteristic of that particular atmosphere.

Venezuela - Heritage

Venezuela is a country with a superficial area of about 952.000 square meters, located on the northern coast of South America. It was discovered by Christofer Columbus during his third trip to America when he and his crew reach the shores of today’s country eastern region. The population of Venezuela, approximately 26 millions of people, is mainly Mestizo, which is a mixture of three different races, the white Europeans, the Amerindians who lived in the region before the Spanish conquest the black Africans who were brought form Africa to work as slaves in the old cotton plantation during the first three centuries of the country’s existence. The European immigration in my country occurred in two periods of time or tides. The first one took place when Venezuela was colonized in the beginning of the 16th century, and this wave last over 200 years. The second wave took place after WW II, leading Spaniards, Portuguese, Italians, Germans, and people from other European nationalities to amass Venezuela as their new country. Thus, this combination of nationalities has resulted in a multicultural society with a diverse heritage background, so nowadays is not easy to find someone under his or her twenties with a homogeneous cultural background.

1. Why I came to U of C to do Leap Course

More than eight months ago, in Venezuela, my home country, when I first went into the internet looking for English-speaking programs, one of the premises that I considered while doing the research was the fact that I wanted to study in a program held by the university where I was interested in pursuing my graduate studies. Consequently, I wanted to feel the culture and living experiences of the school of my choice, and I also wanted to remain involved some how with the Energy industry, and as you may know, Calgary is a city driven by an energetic one. I choose University of Calgary because it has developed graduate programs helping those who wish to continue their career within the boundaries of the field aforementioned, acquire a great deal of knowledge related to it. Thus, I thought that by experiencing U of C, I would have had a better perception of this school, the people, and the city as a whole. That perception has not changed not even a little, and today, I am more convinced that this is the place where I would like to study my degree.
In my opinion, The Leap program in conjunction with the experience of being in Calgary are the best tools for international students chasing academic studies. U of C offers two main English-speaking programs for international students. I have had the opportunity to study both of them since I arrived last September. The first one, ESL (English as a Second Language), is an excellent experience of getting to know the Canadian culture while practicing your fluency. Leap, on the other hand, is an experience that prepares you for future studies whether they are undergraduate or graduate studies. I believe the Leap represents the next step in the process of learning English, focusing it in an academic way and training prospective U of C students for better future academic performances.
Having a romantic language as my mother tongue, it is important to say that more than just the speaking differences between Spanish and English, there are plenty grammatical rules that make academic communication in both languages very dissimilar. The Leap program deals with this fact, and with the quality of its teachers, staff and based on a demanding course, helps students improve their communication skills in a way people can use English accurately and effectively. Unfortunately, I have not reached that goal yet, but I am sure this program will set the basis for a good path.