Country: Italy Capital: Rome Main Language Spoken: Italian Currency: Euro We visited the floating city of Venice (Venezia) which has no roadways, only waterways!! Therefore you can only travel by boat as a method of transportation. Can you beat that experience? The city of Venice begins at about 400 A.D. when people fled to the Venetian Lagoon from the Barbarians who had come to conquer mainland Italy. At that time Venice hadn’t been built so the refugees crowded on to fisherman villages (like Burano). Everybody kept trying to go back to resume their normal lives but soon realised that it was impossible to live there. So only then was the decision to build Venice, a city safe from Barbarians, made. But after that they had to put wood brought from Croatia on 118 mud islands, and then join those islands together with canals and bridges! Thus was the magnificent and floating city of Venice built. It is amazing that a ‘city built in fear’ turned out to be one of the most glamorous cities ever to be built. Did you know, Venice has been sinking since it was built. Not only has sea level been rising but as Venice was constructed on mud islands the weight of the city has been pushing the mud down causing the city to sink even more. Till now Venice has sunk nine inches. The central square, St Marks Square, has an ornately decorated church which adorns the main square and there is usually always a long line to get inside. On the facade there are pictures depicting Jesus’s life. There is also a 99m tall red bell tower ( St Marks Campinile) in this square that had been destroyed in 1912 and then been rebuilt again. In the middle of the square are loads of crows and I can’t tell you how much me and my brother enjoyed chasing them. Another point of interest is the Bridge of Sighs, which was made to connect the Old Prison and the interrogation rooms in the Doge’s Palace to the New Prison, which was across the canal. Legend says that prisoners used to sigh when they saw the bridge because it was their last sight of the outside world before being taken into the dungeons. Below the bridge the small and elegant gondolas were rowing slowly down the canal. Unfortunately we couldn’t go in a gondola but just seeing them is a pleasurable sight. There is an old saying that if it is the exact moment of sunset, the bells of St Marks Campinile are ringing, you are in a gondola and you manage to kiss the Bridge of Sighs you will be granted infinite love. Did you know that the Bridge of Sighs is built by Antoni Contino whose uncle, Antonio da Ponte built the Rialto Bridge? Another lovely piece of architecture is the Rialto Bridge. It was the first bridge to be built cross the Grand Canal. Locals thought the current bridge would not last long. The bridge crosses over the narrowest point of the Grand Canal. The Grand Canal is the main canal of Venice and it divides the city in two parts. The bridge is jam packed with people trying to get their pictures taken. The whole route of the Grand Canal crosses only 4 bridges and it eventually leads into the Adriatic Sea. The grand canal is the most craved place to stay on. The next day we visited the islands around Venice. The first one was the colourful Fishermans village Burano. Burano is well known in Venice for its colourful houses of every imaginable colour which is what the tourists make a beeline for. The island also has a tall leaning bell tower that is leaning 1.83 metres (which makes at least 2 leaning towers in Italy. Murano, the second island we visited, is renowned for Murano Glass. For a long time it was the only glass made in the world. Italians were so possessive about their art they confined workers to the island giving the false reason that it was dangerous to work with a furnace in the city. The Italians threatened that if a worker would escape they would kill his or her family. On the island we visited a furnace that explained the process of producing Murano Glass. First silica and soda are mixed together and then put in a furnace. Then you add different substances depending on what colour glass you wanted. When the glass comes out it is molten and you must shape the glass when it is still in that form. After that you blow through a blowpipe ( with the glass at the other end) and carve with tweezers to get the desired shape. This is the part which requires extreme skill and one could see the masters at the work quickly moulding the glass into various intricate shapes. Finally you cool it down. If you cool it down too quickly the glass will shatter. Another lovely experience added to my diary. My best experience though was none of the above, it was travelling in boats everywhere. We had gone in the Vaporetti (boats – and the public transport in Venice) or a floating bus! There were floating stops tied to the floating city! Every time a boat would pass, the boat stop would bob up and down. Instead of bus numbers you had a boat number. Of course, Venice is a bit derelict in some parts, does have a humid smell in some lanes as you walk and it’s easy to see why – the lower part of building always in contact with water have blackened over time and gathers moss constantly. Its definitely easier to clean up the land than water. During rains, flooding is also a regular problem. With so many tourists flocking in every year, it’s indeed a challenge for the denizens to maintain their city. While I was reading about Venice’s history I found a quote that I
Young Bloggers
Phone Addiction is Strengthening the Human Brain
Note: this entire blog is satire and should not be taken seriously. A shocking study shows that after people look at their phones, two things happen that go against anything anyone will ever tell you about phone addiction. First, your brain gets bigger as it retains more information in various forms of media: video, audio, text, image, etc. Second, your eyes are strengthened by the UV light coming from the screen as they form an immune system (of a sort) against it; it grows stronger by being exposed to UV light intensively and for long periods of time. The effects of these changes are already apparent. John Smith, a current student at Tech High School, said, “Miracles have been working on me ever since I got a phone. After looking at it on a daily basis for just one month, I was somehow able to retain information during lectures that I would normally daydream through and the glare of the sun that always bothered me on my walk home is now no more to me than a tiny speck of light in the distance. It is a win-win situation!” But, the goodness doesn’t stop there. Scientists are developing new phones that incorporate smell and texture as media options, enabling the human brain to grow unlike ever before, and that also uses rougher “training” lights to truly achieve the coveted ability of “night vision” and possibly even X-Ray vision. Scientist Gina Wright says, “We are excited at the prospect of a phone that would make addiction a good thing; a thing that could grant us superhuman abilities.” She is currently working to create a new phone company, Superphone, that will supposedly be “the tech of the generation.” But even a regular phone works; just be sure to stare at it every day! As important as they may be, phones aren’t the only ones in this business. Laptops and desktops can grant superhuman powers at an even faster rate, mostly due to the volume of “rough” light and media taken in at once. However, even though these devices empower you at a faster rate, they aren’t as commonly stared at as phones, thus trading speed for time. Even though eye and brain improvement and expansion are the main aspects that are being focused on right now, technology addiction can also cause physical changes. On a phone, since most scrolling and texting is done with your thumbs, they will also grow bigger and stronger. The effects of a tablet are similar. However, for laptops or desktops, the effects are different. Instead of having your thumb grow, all your fingers grow, but each at a slower rate. This is good if you often have to do things that require multiple fingers at once, but if you have trouble with something like opening a can, which is mostly a one-fingered job, it is better if you stick with a phone or tablet. You can also get devices that focus on just one aspect. For example, a television set would focus on improving and expanding the eyes, while a CD player would focus more on expanding the brain. Isn’t it exciting to think that, with only the help of everyday objects, Earth could be inhabited by superheroes? Maybe one day, our brains will be so advanced we could obtain the skill of telekinesis, and your eyes would be so durable they wouldn’t be burned when looking directly at the sun. I’d like to leave you with this final thought: we can only dream of these things because scientists found the good in something we previously thought bad. Perhaps if you dig down deeper into something, you might uncover astonishing and world-changing secrets!
Is Apple Really as Green as it Seems?
Every year, around 151 million Apple products are thrown away. This is because they are made explicitly hard to repair, and the constant production of new products encourages Apple users to discard their old products and buy the new ones to keep up with the trend. Nearly every year, Apple makes a new Macbook, a new iPhone, a new iPad, and pretty much a new version of every product that they’ve made. Also, because Apple doesn’t carry replacement parts, most repair is done by third-party companies. In addition, although Apple claims it runs on 100% renewable energy, many third-party companies that manufacture Apple products don’t. As a result, because of their limited repairability, and therefore the encouraged discarding of old Apple products, greater e-waste is being contributed by Apple, and although Apple claims to have good environmental initiatives, it might not be as green as it seems. Apple products are very hard to fix once they are broken. Many parts are glued together, making them hard to dissect when trying to replace parts that can no longer function. One example is the 2013 Retina Macbook Pro. According to David Veksler, the Director of Technology at the Foundation for Economic Education (FEE), “It has non-upgradable solid state drive and memory that is soldered to the mainboard, the battery is firmly glued in place, the display assembly is bonded into a single unit, and proprietary pentalobe screws discourage me from opening it at all.” While all this wording may seem complicated, Mr. Veksler’s point is easy to understand: the design of Apple products discourage breaking them up and/or repairing them. For example, if your battery got damaged, it would be very tedious to take it out and replace it. But, Apple does have its reasons for doing this. It is often easier to design computers the way Apple is: bonding multiple components together. This is because If they bond parts together, it could provide modular advantage, and their employees don’t have to carry replacement parts or need to be trained for repairs. However, sometimes pieces are bonded together even when no modular advantage. Also, if you were to take apart your Apple device, it would void your warranty, which would be considered a risky move for most consumers. This lessens the amount of people that are willing to attempt to dissect Apple products even more, to the point that Apple wouldn’t profit much if they sold replacement parts. Finally, the fact that Apple makes its products hard to repair encourages Apple users to discard their old products to buy new ones. When a new Apple product is released, consumers are lured to buy it. Many will want it because they feel like their old products are out of date, but a lot of this also has to do with Apple products’ limited reparability, life, and durability. Because the typical consumer doesn’t have contact to third-party repair shops, and because Apple doesn’t carry replacement parts, most consumers’ only choice when it comes to a broken iPhone, iPad, or MacBook, or any hardware problems, is to straight-up buy a new device. Here is Mr. Veksler’s experience: “I replaced [my old computer] in 2016, only three years later because I had filled up the hard drive and decided to upgrade to a new computer. My new, maxed-out MacBook Pro with Touch Bar cost just about $3,000.” Just think about that $3,000, invested just because your hard drive was maxed out. Most hard drives cost no more than a few hundred dollars! As you can see, this scam results in more profit for Apple. Although Apple does care about the environment, they clearly care about profit more. Each year, around 150 million Apple products are thrown away, mostly because of the open-looped flow of products, detailed above, in which products are tossed rather than recycle and reused. An even more appalling fact is that last year, Apple made around 265.6 billion dollars, yet they didn’t use a whole lot of that to help the environment. Clearly, they could have invested money into reducing their e-waste (e.g. making hardware that is easier to repair), but they really haven’t. Also, not only is Apple dishonest in their sales, they are dishonest in their claims, too. Perhaps you have heard about how Apple runs on 100% renewable energy. “We’re committed to leaving the world better than we found it. After years of hard work, we’re proud to have reached this significant milestone,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “We’re going to keep pushing the boundaries of what is possible with the materials in our products, the way we recycle them, our facilities and our work with suppliers to establish new creative and forward-looking sources of renewable energy because we know the future depends on it.” This is partly true, but again, Apple is lying. Although nearly all of Apple’s in-house operations are running on 100% renewable energy, many third-party factories which manufacture Apple products do not. Although Apple has initiated a Supplier Clean Energy program, Apple relies on more than 200 manufacturers, and only a fraction of them have reached the goal of running on 100% renewable energy, and around a quarter and at most half are aiming for it. According to Harry Domanski at Techradar (Of April 2018), “The 23 suppliers that are currently on board represent a promising start to the program, but Apple will need to do more than ‘drive broader awareness’ and ‘empower suppliers to set goals’ if it wants to incentivize the uptake of the program to the remaining 200 odd suppliers and, ultimately, reduce the 21,175 million metric tons of carbon emissions that the manufacturing process produces.” This means that, although Apple has good intentions, it needs to find a better way to make people believe them than lying or telling half-truths. Apple’s failed efforts to make dishonest profits, and even worse, their efforts to cover them up with lies, does not bode well for the reputation of the company. If Apple really
