DON'T GIVE UP! VISIT UNIVERSITY COLLEGE LONDON, UCL

Today, The Grandma has visited University College London, the public research university, that was established on a day like today in 1826. She is very interested in learning how to help The Morgans in his job search in Sant Boi de Llobregat.

That's why he's been talking about the Adult Training Centers (CFA) and the IOC, two reference centers when it comes to updating one's own training and starting a new one.

Meanwhile, The Morgans have been at the Cumberland reviewing Imperatives and Prepositions of Time.

More information: Imperative I, II, III & IV

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More information: Prepositions of Time

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University College London, which operates as UCL, is a public research university in London, United Kingdom.

 

It is a member institution of the federal University of London, and is the second-largest university in the United Kingdom by total enrolment and the largest by postgraduate enrolment.

Established in 1826, as London University (though without university degree-awarding powers), by founders inspired by the radical ideas of Jeremy Bentham, UCL was the first university institution to be established in London, and the first in England to be entirely secular and to admit students regardless of their religion.

It was also among the first university colleges to admit women alongside men in 1878, two years after University College, Bristol. Intended by its founders to be England's third university, politics forced it to accept the status of a college in 1836, when it received a royal charter and became one of the two founding colleges of the University of London, although it achieved de facto recognition as a university in the 1990s.

It has grown through mergers, including with the Institute of Ophthalmology (in 1995), the Institute of Neurology (in 1997), the Royal Free Hospital Medical School (in 1998), the Eastman Dental Institute (in 1999), the School of Slavonic and East European Studies (in 1999), the School of Pharmacy (in 2012) and the Institute of Education (in 2014).

More information: UCL

UCL has its main campus in the Bloomsbury area of central London, with a number of institutes and teaching hospitals elsewhere in central London and has a second campus, UCL East, at Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in Stratford, East London. 

UCL is organised into 11 constituent faculties, within which there are over 100 departments, institutes and research centres.

UCL operates several museums and collections in a wide range of fields, including the Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology and the Grant Museum of Zoology and Comparative Anatomy, and administers the annual Orwell Prize in political writing.

In 2021/22, UCL had a total income of £1.75 billion, of which £525 million was from research grants and contracts. The university generates around £10 billion annually for the UK economy, primarily through the spread of its research and knowledge (£4 billion) and the impact of its own spending (£3 billion).

UCL is a member of numerous academic organisations, including the Russell Group and the League of European Research Universities, and is part of UCL Partners, the world's largest academic health science centre. It is considered part of the golden triangle of research-intensive universities in southeast England.

UCL has publishing and commercial activities including UCL Press, UCL Business and UCL Consultants.

UCL has many notable alumni, including the founder of Mauritius, the first Prime Minister of Japan, and one of the co-discoverers of the structure of DNA.  

UCL academics discovered five of the naturally occurring noble gases, discovered hormones, invented the vacuum tube, and made several foundational advances in modern statistics. 

As of 2022, 30 Nobel Prize winners and three Fields medallists have been affiliated with UCL as alumni or academic staff.

UCL was founded on 11 February 1826 as an alternative to the Anglican universities of Oxford and Cambridge. 

It took the form of a joint stock company, with shares sold for £100 (equivalent to $8,900 in 2021) to proprietors, under the name of London University, although without legal recognition as a university or the associated right to award degrees. London University's first warden was Leonard Horner, who was the first scientist to head a British university.

UCL is primarily based in the Bloomsbury area of the London Borough of Camden, in Central London. 

The main campus is located around Gower Street and includes the UCL Faculty of Engineering Sciences, economics, geography, history, languages, mathematics, management, philosophy and physics departments, the preclinical facilities of the UCL Medical School, the London Centre for Nanotechnology, the Slade School of Fine Art, the UCL Union, the main UCL Library, the UCL Science Library, the Bloomsbury Theatre, the Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology, the Grant Museum of Zoology and the affiliated University College Hospital.

Close by in Bloomsbury are the UCL Cancer Institute, the UCL Faculty of Social and Historical Sciences, the UCL Faculty of the Built Environment (The Bartlett), the UCL Faculty of Laws, the UCL Institute of Archaeology, the UCL Institute of Education, the UCL School of Pharmacy, the UCL School of Public Policy and the UCL School of Slavonic and East European Studies.

In 2014, it was announced that UCL would be building an additional campus at the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, referred to as UCL East, as part of the development of the so-called Olympicopolis site at the southern edge of the park. UCL master planners were appointed in spring 2015, and the first University building was, at that time, estimated to be completed in time for academic year 2019/20.

Elsewhere in Central London are the UCL Institute of Ophthalmology adjacent to Moorfields Eye Hospital in Clerkenwell, the UCL Institute of Child Health adjacent to Great Ormond Street Hospital, the Royal Free Hospital and the Whittington Hospital campuses of the UCL Medical School, and a number of other associated teaching hospitals.

The UCL School of Management is on levels 38 and 50 (penthouse) of One Canada Square in the financial district of Canary Wharf. The UCL Observatory is in Mill Hill and the Mullard Space Science Laboratory is based in Holmbury St Mary, Surrey. The UCL Athletics Ground is in Shenley, Hertfordshire.

More information: University of London

 

A man who has never gone to school
may steal from a freight car;
but if he has a university education,
he may steal the whole railroad.

Theodore Roosevelt

VISITING STONEHENGE, A MYSTERIOUS CERCLE OF LIGHT

Today, The Fosters and The Grandma have visited Stonehenge, the prehistoric monument on Salisbury Plain in Wiltshire, England. 

They have chosen this place because today is February, 2, the day of the light, the feast of Candelaria, and Groundhog Day, that marks roughly half of the period between the winter solstice and the vernal equinox, similar to All Saints' Day or All Souls' Day, which marks the middle of the period between the autumnal equinox and the winter solstice.

Before visiting this mysterious ancient site, they have been talking about Prepositions of Time, and sharing some stories that create a link between Antoni Gaudí, Sant Boi de Llobregat and the incredible magic of light in Architecture.

Download Prepositions of Time (I)

More information: Prepositions of Time (II)

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Antoni Gaudí (25 June 1852-10 June 1926) was a Catalan architect and designer as the greatest exponent of Catalan Modernism. 

Gaudí's works have a highly individualized, sui generis style. Most are located in Barcelona, including his main work, the church of the Sagrada Família.

Gaudí's work was influenced by his passions in life: architecture, nature, and religion. He considered every detail of his creations and integrated into his architecture such crafts as ceramics, stained glass, wrought ironwork forging, and carpentry. He also introduced new techniques in the treatment of materials, such as trencadís which used waste ceramic pieces.

His work transcended mainstream Modernisme, culminating in an organic style inspired by natural forms. Gaudí rarely drew detailed plans of his works, instead preferring to create them as three-dimensional scale models and moulding the details as he conceived them.

He is nicknamed God's Architect.

Download Colònia Güell

Download Barcelona's Natural Wonder

Download Antoni Gaudí's Works

Download Antoni Gaudí's Sagrada Família A Monument to Nature

Download Antoni Gaudí a Sant Boi (Catalan Version)

Download Art & Mathemathics in Antoni Gaudí's Architecture

Those who look for the laws of Nature as a support

for their new works collaborate with the creator.

Antoni Gaudí

Stonehenge is a prehistoric monument on Salisbury Plain in Wiltshire, England, 3 km west of Amesbury. It consists of an outer ring of vertical sarsen standing stones, each around 4.0 m high, 2.1 m wide, and weighing around 25 tons, topped by connecting horizontal lintel stones. Inside is a ring of smaller bluestones. Inside these are free-standing trilithons, two bulkier vertical sarsens joined by one lintel. The whole monument, now ruinous, is aligned towards the sunrise on the summer solstice. The stones are set within earthworks in the middle of the densest complex of Neolithic and Bronze Age monuments in England, including several hundred tumuli (burial mounds).

Archaeologists believe that Stonehenge was constructed from around 3000 BC to 2000 BC. The surrounding circular earth bank and ditch, which constitute the earliest phase of the monument, have been dated to about 3100 BC. Radiocarbon dating suggests that the first bluestones were raised between 2400 and 2200 BC, although they may have been at the site as early as 3000 BC.

One of the most famous landmarks in the United Kingdom, Stonehenge is regarded as a British cultural icon. It has been a legally protected scheduled monument since 1882, when legislation to protect historic monuments was first successfully introduced in Britain. The site and its surroundings were added to UNESCO's list of World Heritage Sites in 1986. 

Stonehenge is owned by the Crown and managed by English Heritage; the surrounding land is owned by the National Trust.

Stonehenge could have been a burial ground from its earliest beginnings. Deposits containing human bone date from as early as 3000 BC, when the ditch and bank were first dug, and continued for at least another 500 years.

More information: English Heritage

The Oxford English Dictionary cites Ælfric's tenth-century glossary, in which henge-cliff is given the meaning precipice, or stone; thus, the stanenges or Stanheng not far from Salisbury recorded by eleventh-century writers are stones supported in the air. 

In 1740, William Stukeley notes: Pendulous rocks are now called henges in Yorkshire... I doubt not, Stonehenge in Saxon signifies the hanging stones. Christopher Chippindale's Stonehenge Complete gives the derivation of the name Stonehenge as coming from the Old English words stān stone, and either hencg hinge (because the stone lintels hinge on the upright stones) or hen(c)en to hang or gallows or instrument of torture (though elsewhere in his book, Chippindale cites the suspended stones etymology).

The henge portion has given its name to a class of monuments known as henges. Archaeologists define henges as earthworks consisting of a circular banked enclosure with an internal ditch. As often happens in archaeological terminology, this is a holdover from antiquarian use.

Despite being contemporary with true Neolithic henges and stone circles, Stonehenge is in many ways atypical -for example, at more than 7.3 m tall, its extant trilithons' lintels, held in place with mortise and tenon joints, make it unique.

The twelfth-century Historia Regum Britanniae (History of the Kings of Britain), by Geoffrey of Monmouth, includes a fanciful story of how Stonehenge was brought from Ireland with the help of the wizard Merlin. Geoffrey's story spread widely, with variations of it appearing in adaptations of his work, such as Wace's Norman French Roman de Brut, Layamon's Middle English Brut, and the Welsh Brut y Brenhinedd.

According to the tale, the stones of Stonehenge were healing stones, which giants had brought from Africa to Ireland. They had been raised on Mount Killaraus to form a stone circle, known as the Giant's Ring or Giant's Round. The fifth-century king Aurelius Ambrosius wished to build a great memorial to the British Celtic nobles slain by the Saxons at Salisbury. Merlin advised him to use the Giant's Ring. The king sent Merlin and Uther Pendragon (King Arthur's father) with 15,000 men to bring it from Ireland. They defeated an Irish army led by Gillomanius, but were unable to move the huge stones. With Merlin's help, they transported the stones to Britain and re-erected them as they had stood.

Mount Killaraus may refer to the Hill of Uisneach. Although the tale is fiction, archaeologist Mike Parker Pearson suggests it may hold a grain of truth, as evidence suggests the Stonehenge bluestones were brought from the Waun Mawn stone circle on the Irish Sea coast of Wales.

Another legend tells how the invading Saxon king Hengist invited British Celtic warriors to a feast but treacherously ordered his men to massacre the guests, killing 420 of them. Hengist erected Stonehenge on the site to show his remorse for the deed.

More information: History

 Hello, Stonehenge!
Who takes the Pandorica, takes the universe!

Doctor Who

OSCAR FINGAL O'FLAHERTIE WILLS WILDE, THE IDENTITY

Oscar Wilde

Today, The Grandma and The Stones have continued studying English Grammar. It is their first week together after the confinement and they must start step by step to not collapse.

They have been talking about the Present Simple and the Prepositions of Time and they have practised how to write compositions using connectors and paying attention about how many information they want to express.

Finally, The Grandma has talked about the importance of agriculture for European communities along our history with three little stories about Malta and Comino Islands, Sant Boi de Llobregat sites and the Irish Potato Famine. These stories have been a good introduction to talk about Oscar Wilde, one of her favourite writers and, in her opinion, one of the most incredible writers of Universal Literature.

More information: Present Simple & Prepositions of Time

Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde (16 October 1854-30 November 1900) was an Irish poet and playwright.

After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s, the early 1890s saw him become one of the most popular playwrights in London. He is best remembered for his epigrams and plays, his novel The Picture of Dorian Gray, and the circumstances of his criminal conviction for gross indecency for consensual homosexual acts, imprisonment, and early death at age 46.

Wilde's parents were Anglo-Irish intellectuals in Dublin. A young Wilde learned to speak fluent French and German. At university, Wilde read Greats; he demonstrated himself to be an exceptional classicist, first at Trinity College Dublin, then at Oxford. He became associated with the emerging philosophy of aestheticism, led by two of his tutors, Walter Pater and John Ruskin. After university, Wilde moved to London into fashionable cultural and social circles.

As a spokesman for aestheticism, he tried his hand at various literary activities: he published a book of poems, lectured in the United States and Canada on the new English Renaissance in Art and interior decoration, and then returned to London where he worked prolifically as a journalist. Known for his biting wit, flamboyant dress and glittering conversational skill, Wilde became one of the best-known personalities of his day.

At the turn of the 1890s, he refined his ideas about the supremacy of art in a series of dialogues and essays, and incorporated themes of decadence, duplicity, and beauty into what would be his only novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890).

The opportunity to construct aesthetic details precisely, and combine them with larger social themes, drew Wilde to write drama. He wrote Salome (1891) in French while in Paris but it was refused a licence for England due to an absolute prohibition on the portrayal of Biblical subjects on the English stage. Unperturbed, Wilde produced four society comedies in the early 1890s, which made him one of the most successful playwrights of late-Victorian London.

More information: The Paris Review

At the height of his fame and success, while The Importance of Being Earnest (1895) was still being performed in London, Wilde prosecuted the Marquess of Queensberry for criminal libel. The Marquess was the father of Wilde's lover, Lord Alfred Douglas. The libel trial unearthed evidence that caused Wilde to drop his charges and led to his own arrest and trial for gross indecency with men. 

After two more trials he was convicted and sentenced to two years' hard labour, the maximum penalty, and was jailed from 1895 to 1897.

During his last year in prison, he wrote De Profundis, published posthumously in 1905, a long letter which discusses his spiritual journey through his trials, forming a dark counterpoint to his earlier philosophy of pleasure.

On his release, he left immediately for France, never to return to Ireland or Britain. There he wrote his last work, The Ballad of Reading Gaol (1898), a long poem commemorating the harsh rhythms of prison life.

Wilde died of meningitis on 30 November 1900. Wilde was initially buried in the Cimetière de Bagneux outside Paris; in 1909 his remains were disinterred and transferred to Père Lachaise Cemetery, inside the city. His tomb there was designed by Sir Jacob Epstein. It was commissioned by Robert Ross, who asked for a small compartment to be made for his own ashes, which were duly transferred in 1950.

In 2017, Wilde was among an estimated 50,000 men who were pardoned for homosexual acts that were no longer considered offences under the Policing and Crime Act 2017, homosexuality was decriminalised in England and Wales in 1967. The 2017 Act implements what is known informally as the Alan Turing law.

Download The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

 

No great artist ever sees things as they really are.

If he did, he would cease to be an artist.

Oscar Wilde

THE WATSONS VISIT DENMARK, CORAIMA'S COUNTRY

Arriving to the Copenhagen Airport Kastrup

Today, in the morning, The Watsons have been preparing their next travel to Denmark. They have written budgets and some plannings to stay the next five days in Coraima's country.

The Grandma has also explained the importance of Sant Boi de Llobregat as a sanctuary city for European minorities during the Middle Age, especially gipsies and cathars.

Denmark, in Danish Danmark, is a Nordic country in Northwest Europe.

Denmark proper, which is the southernmost of the Scandinavian countries, consists of a peninsula, Jutland, and an archipelago of 443 named islands, with the largest being Zealand, Funen and the North Jutlandic Island. The islands are characterised by flat, arable land and sandy coasts, low elevation and a temperate climate. The southernmost of the Scandinavian nations, Denmark lies southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and is bordered to the south by Germany. The Kingdom of Denmark also includes two autonomous territories in the North Atlantic Ocean: the Faroe Islands and Greenland.

During the flight from Barcelona to Copenhagen, the family has been studying some English grammar. They have practised Prepositions of Time (In-On-At) and they have played some word games like Scatergories, The Bomb, The Hanger and Simon.

More information: Prepositions of Time (In-On-At)

More information: How to Create a Budget

More information: How to Create an Effective Action Plan

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In the evening, they have arrived to the Villa Copenhagen, the hotel where they are going to stay during these five days in Denmark.

At night, they have gone to rest waiting to live an amazing experience in the country of Hans Andersen, the most popular tales writer.

More information: Villa Copenhagen Hotel

Copenhagen, in Danish København, is the capital and most populous city of Denmark. It forms the core of the wider urban area of Copenhagen and the Copenhagen metropolitan area.

Copenhagen is situated on the eastern coast of the island of Zealand; another small portion of the city is located on Amager, and it is separated from Malmø, Sweden, by the strait of Øresund. The Øresund Bridge connects the two cities by rail and road.

Originally a Viking fishing village established in the 10th century in the vicinity of what is now Gammel Strand, Copenhagen became the capital of Denmark in the early 15th century.

The Grandma in Villa Copenhagen Hotel

Beginning in the 17th century it consolidated its position as a regional centre of power with its institutions, defences and armed forces. During the renaissance the city served as the de facto capital being the seat of government of the Kalmar Union, governing the entire present day Nordic region in a personal union with Sweden and Norway ruled by the Danish monarch serving as the head of state. The city flourished as the cultural and economic center of Scandinavia under the union for well over 120 years, starting in the 15th century up until the beginning of the 16th century when the union was dissolved with Sweden leaving the union through a rebellion.

After a plague outbreak and fire in the 18th century, the city underwent a period of redevelopment. This included construction of the prestigious district of Frederiksstaden and founding of such cultural institutions as the Royal Theatre and the Royal Academy of Fine Arts.

After further disasters in the early 19th century when Horatio Nelson attacked the Dano-Norwegian fleet and bombarded the city, rebuilding during the Danish Golden Age brought a Neoclassical look to Copenhagen's architecture. Later, following the Second World War, the Finger Plan fostered the development of housing and businesses along the five urban railway routes stretching out from the city centre.

More information: The Independent

Since the turn of the 21st century, Copenhagen has seen strong urban and cultural development, facilitated by investment in its institutions and infrastructure. The city is the cultural, economic and governmental centre of Denmark; it is one of the major financial centres of Northern Europe with the Copenhagen Stock Exchange.

Copenhagen's economy has seen rapid developments in the service sector, especially through initiatives in information technology, pharmaceuticals and clean technology. Since the completion of the Øresund Bridge, Copenhagen has become increasingly integrated with the Swedish province of Scania and its largest city, Malmø, forming the Øresund Region. With a number of bridges connecting the various districts, the cityscape is characterised by parks, promenades and waterfronts.

More information: Visit Copenhagen

Copenhagen's landmarks such as Tivoli Gardens, The Little Mermaid statue, the Amalienborg and Christiansborg palaces, Rosenborg Castle Gardens, Frederik's Church, and many museums, restaurants and nightclubs are significant tourist attractions. The largest lake of Denmark, Arresø, lies around 43 kilometers northwest of the City Hall Square.

Copenhagen is home to the University of Copenhagen, the Technical University of Denmark, Copenhagen Business School and the IT University of Copenhagen. The University of Copenhagen, founded in 1479, is the oldest university in Denmark.

Copenhagen is home to the FC København and Brøndby football clubs. The annual Copenhagen Marathon was established in 1980. Copenhagen is one of the most bicycle-friendly cities in the world.

The Watsons walk across Copenhagen at night

The Copenhagen Metro launched in 2002 serves central Copenhagen. Additionally the Copenhagen S-train, the Lokaltog, private railway, and the Coast Line network serves and connects central Copenhagen to outlying boroughs. 

Serving roughly two million passengers a month, Copenhagen Airport Kastrup, is the busiest airport in the Nordic countries.

Copenhagen's name reflects its origin as a harbour and a place of commerce. The original designation in Old Norse, from which Danish descends, was Kaupmannahǫfn, meaning merchants' harbour. By the time Old Danish was spoken, the capital was called Køpmannæhafn, with the current name deriving from centuries of subsequent regular sound change.

An exact English equivalent would be chapman's haven. However, the English term for the city was adapted from its Low German name, Kopenhagen. Copenhagen's Swedish name is Köpenhamn, a direct translation of the mutually intelligible Danish name.

Copenhagen is part of the Øresund Region, which consists of Zealand, Lolland-Falster and Bornholm in Denmark and Scania in Sweden. It is located on the eastern shore of the island of Zealand, partly on the island of Amager and on a number of natural and artificial islets between the two.

More information: Arrival Guides

Copenhagen faces the Øresund to the east, the strait of water that separates Denmark from Sweden, and which connects the North Sea with the Baltic Sea. The Swedish towns of Malmö and Landskrona lie on the Swedish side of the sound directly across from Copenhagen. By road, Copenhagen is 42 kilometres northwest of Malmö, Sweden, 85 kilometres northeast of Næstved, 164 kilometres northeast of Odense, 295 kilometres east of Esbjerg and 188 kilometres southeast of Aarhus by sea and road via Sjællands Odde.

The city centre lies in the area originally defined by the old ramparts, which are still referred to as the Fortification Ring (Fæstningsringen) and kept as a partial green band around it. Then come the late-19th- and early-20th-century residential neighbourhoods of Østerbro, Nørrebro, Vesterbro and Amagerbro. The outlying areas of Kongens Enghave, Valby, Vigerslev, Vanløse, Brønshøj, Utterslev and Sundby followed from 1920 to 1960. They consist mainly of residential housing and apartments often enhanced with parks and greenery.

More information: Rough Guides

Copenhagen is in the oceanic climate zone. Its weather is subject to low-pressure systems from the Atlantic which result in unstable conditions throughout the year. Apart from slightly higher rainfall from July to September, precipitation is moderate. While snowfall occurs mainly from late December to early March, there can also be rain, with average temperatures around the freezing point.

June is the sunniest month of the year with an average of about eight hours of sunshine a day. July is the warmest month with an average daytime high of 21°C. By contrast, the average hours of sunshine are less than two per day in November and only one and a half per day from December to February. In the spring, it gets warmer again with four to six hours of sunshine per day from March to May. February is the driest month of the year. Exceptional weather conditions can bring as much as 50 cm of snow to Copenhagen in a 24-hour period during the winter months while summer temperatures have been known to rise to heights of 33°C.

Because of Copenhagen's northern latitude, the number of daylight hours varies considerably between summer and winter. On the summer solstice, the sun rises at 04:26 and sets at 21:58, providing 17 hours 32 minutes of daylight. On the winter solstice, it rises at 08:37 and sets at 15:39 with 7 hours and 1 minute of daylight. There is therefore a difference of 10 hours and 31 minutes in the length of days and nights between the summer and winter solstices.

More information: Times of India

Denmark has long been regarded

as one of the world's most attractive nations,

for citizens and tourists alike.

My own visits there,years ago as a student,

were delightful.

Elliott Abrams