Most Brits have been talking about one person this week.  Any ideas who that might be? I’ll give you a clue: she was known as the ‘Iron Lady’ and Meryl Street recently played her in a movie of the same name.

The lady on everyone’s lips this week is former British Prime Minister Baroness Thatcher, who has died at the age of 87.  She suffered a stroke and died peacefully in hospital.

Lady Thatcher was Conservative Prime Minister from 1979 to 1990. She was the first woman ever to hold the role, surprising even herself.  Seven years before her victory she said: “It will be years before a woman either leads the Conservative Party or becomes Prime Minister. I don’t think there’ll be a woman prime minister in my lifetime.”  Clearly she was wrong.

BBC political editor Nick Robinson said Lady Thatcher had been a ‘controversial’ politician who inspired “passion” among those who loved her and those who hated her alike.  Whoever you are in Britain, you are likely to have an opinion on her.

She became the Conservative MP for Finchley in north London in 1959 and went on to become the leader of the Tories in 1974, winning general elections in 1979, 1983 and 1987. Her government privatised several state-owned industries, such as gas, water and electricity and during her power, she battled to reduce the popularity and influence of trade unions.

Her funeral will take place next Wednesday 14 April at St Paul’s Cathedral.

Vocabulary focus

Match the numbered words/phrases in the first list (1-10) from the text on Margaret Thatcher with their definitions in the second list (a-j)

1. to give sb a clue

2. Baroness

3. to suffer a stroke

4. to hold the role

5. controversial

6. to go on to

7. general elections

8. privatised

9. trade unions

10. to take place

 
a. to experience a sudden change in blood supply to the brain, which can often cause the loss of ability to move or speak

b. to have a job/position

c. former government run company or industry, sold to private ownership

d. to happen (usually an event)

e. a title given to a British woman by the Queen

f. occasions when a nation votes for the political leader they would like to see in power

g. an organisation that represents and protects the rights of employees in a
particular industry

h. to provoke discussion/disagreement

i. to give some guiding information

j. to start one activity after another

So, it’s International Women’s Day. A time to celebrate all the progress made by women towards autonomy and equality in the last 40-50 years. Certainly, there is a lot of evidence to suggest that in Europe anyway, women are no longer facing a glass ceiling at work and that they can, and often do reach the heights in commerce, politics, academia and the media. One report this morning talked about how women’s professional sport has made so much progress and gets a lot of media coverage these days.

Reason for optimism then?  Perhaps, but not for satisfaction. The most important word to remember in the previous paragraph was ‘Europe’ , the developed world if you like. In the rest of the world, it’s not a picture to be admired.

To begin with, the big world religions ; Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, all put women firmly in second place to men. There seems to be a scale; the more religious you are, the more inferior, you will consider women to be. The American Christian Taliban have reinvented the subservient role of a wife to serve and obey their husbands. If Hindu girls oppose their strict parents’  views of how they should live their life or who they should marry, they can find themselves attacked or even killed. In Pakistan, a girl was shot by men who opposed her wish to have an education.

Even among non-religious communities like the Chinese, there is still an obvious preference for male children. People have ‘got rid of’ a female baby because they are only allowed one child, or in other countries, parents have aborted female foetuses, preferring to wait for a boy.  The proportion of the population between boys and girls is being distorted.

Away from the headlines, ask yourself this: Why are women victims of human-trafficking and not men? In modern Japan, why are Japanese girl students so unfamiliar with giving personal opinions? And why does my charming student, Jose, tell the class, in an embarrassed way, that when his family have dinner, he and his dad are served by his mother and sister?

We have a limited number of free special books, published by the British Council, to help students with London 2012 Olympic & Paraolympic phrases and vocabulary.  If you would like one, speak to Claire in Reception.  Be quick – we only have a few!

The cost of filling up a car is a very sensitive and import issue to most people across the world. People need to fill up their car with petrol so that they can do their daily routine, but if the cost of this increases it has a large knock on effect on the rest of their life. That is why you will never find the cost of petrol out of the news. Considering that London is on of the most expensive cities in the world and with the tax on petrol being very high, you would think it had the priciest petrol. However that is not the case, London only just makes the top ten. Here is the list:

10. London – £1.35 a litre with 58p of that being tax

9. Amsterdam – £1.36. 44% is government duties plus 16% VAT.

8. Brussels – £1.39 with a 58p tax

7. Stockholm – £1.39 with a 48p tax

6. Copenhagen – £1.43 with a 51p tax

5. Monaco – £1.44

4. Athens – £1.44 57p tax and some of the heaviest traffic congestion in Europe.

3. Oslo – £1.58 with a 48 p fuel tax and a 9p carbon tax

2. Asmara – £1.64. It’s the Eritrean governments main source of income.

1. Istanbul £1.65 – 85p fuel tax.

Some of the countries on the list are a bit surprising and I think most of the residence of these cities will be very jealous of the citizens where you an fine the cheapest petrol in the world. Here is the list.

10. Algiers, Algeria – 20p a litre. 95% of Algeria’s export income is from oil so it has to keep its oil fields truly open.

9. Muscat, Oman – 20p. The country exports 600,000 barrels of oil a day.

8. Cairo, Egypt – 19p. Egypt has no oil itself so providing petrol at this price costs the country 13 billion dollars a year.

7. Doha, Qatar. 15p. Exports $27 billion of petrol and year which accounts for 60 % of its GDP and 70% of government revenues.

6. Kuwait City, Kuwait – 14p. 95% of government revenues come from oil sales.

5. Manama, Bahrain – 13p. Petrol sales account for 70% of government revenue.

4. Ashgabat, Turkmenistan – 12p. This former soviet country also has a large gas reserve.

3. Tripoli, Libya. 9p, Political has not stopped the petrol prices remaining low.

2. Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, – 8p. The country has 20% of the world’s oil reserves.

1. Caracas, Venezuela. –  3p. Another country where petrol accounts for 95% of exports.

If you’re a celebrity and you’re about to have a baby there is only one thing left for you to do. Go to the book shop and find that ‘crazy baby names’ book because you don’t want to give your baby a regular name like Sarah, John or Peter.

 Over the past couple of years celebrities from all over the world have been “battling” each other about who can give their child the most ridiculous names. So far it has been a close contest. Here are some of the names been given so far:

 Bear Blu  – Clueless actress, Alicia Silverstone has given then name to her new son.

 Moroccan Scott and Monroe – Singer Mariah named her daughter Monroe after her idol Marilyn Monroe and her son Moroccan as this was the room in which Husband Nick Cannon proposed to her. Scott is also Nick’s middle name.

 Hero – TV personality has given this name to her new daughter as she like the character Hero from Shakespeare’s Play ‘ Much Ado About Nothing’.

 Buddy Bear, Daisy Boo, Poppy Honey and Petal Blossom – Celebrity Chef Jamie Oliver and his wife are clearly fans of crazy names having given these names to their 4 children.

 Cosima Violet – Claudia Schiffer gave this name to her daughter in 2010.

 Egypt Daoud – Alicia Keys choose this exotic name to give to her first son.

 Shiloh Nouvel – Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie went all out with their first child. Shiloh means peaceful one in Hebrew, where are Nouvel is new in French.

 Jermajesty – The name given to Jermain Jackson’s son in 2000.

 Peaches Honeyblossom, Fif Trxibelle and Pixie – Bob Geldof and his wife Paula Yates were obviously fans of spring names for their daughters.

 So out of these names which do you think is the craziest?

 Having just had a wedding watched by 2 billion people across the world, Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge now has a new claim to fame. Catherine has joined the likes of Nicole Scherzinger, Halle Berry and Penelope Cruz in the Wizard Jeans top Ten beauty list. Ever since her wedding, Catherine has been hot property and this poll will sure give her a boost as she gets used to life in the Welsh countryside. Here is the full top ten:

1. Nicole Scherzinger

 2. Freida Pinto

3. Penelope Cruz

 4. Keira Knightley

 5. Michelle Pfeiffer

6. Angelina Jolie

 7. Halle Berry

8. Bar Refaeli

 9. Catherine Duchess of Cambridge

 10. Sophia Loren

Superhero’s are back and they are British!! This week it was announced who would take on the legendary of America’s greatest superhero. However neither of them are actually American. Andrew Garfield who was recently in the hit film, the social Network grew up in Surrey and is to be the new Spider Man. The new Superman is also a British Actor who goes by the name of Henry Cavill. He has started in a number of films and is most famous for his role in the British TV show The Tudors.

 For both actors this is a huge step up in their careers and show the amount of confidence Hollywood has in British actors. There is now a continuing trend to pick British actors for key roles. Christian Bale is about to return in the role of Batman in which he as been a huge success. And it is not just in super hero films that Britain is having success. One of the most popular films of the year so far has been the King’s Speech and the main actor, Colin Firth is set to pick up an Oscar for his role as King. It would seem that the Brits have landed and they are there to stay!

Here at UIC we often have cinema trips so keep your eyes out on the social programme.