Showing posts with label National geographic. Show all posts
Showing posts with label National geographic. Show all posts

Sunday, September 23, 2007

Breaking the silence in conversation

We all may have had this happen to us once before or for some, still. You happen to see a girl or guy at and you know he or she likes you but when you finally come close and say your quick hello, the conversation dies. There's a wall of silence that some how pops up. Thoughts race in your minds like what to say next. Does that person like me? There's nothing being said he/she must think I'm a complete idiot.

Things like this happen so what can we do about it? Here are a couple of tips to keep handy. My advice is to store some knowledge about things that they show in National Geographic, Discover Channel or Lonely Planet. There's a host of subjects that you can talk about and you can keep yourself well informed about interesting subjects. Start off by asking where the person has traveled before or went on holiday. What was the culture like? Where will they like to visit next? This may lead to you discussing about making plans on going there together.

Simple one is movies. Lots of people watch them so it's a no brainer that you got lots to talk about. Find out if the person likes comedies, romance, period dramas or whatever the fancy is. Discuss your favourites. Which stars do they like? Also move to TV shows as lots of people have likes and dislikes of certain shows. If you want to talk about music that could be good as well because there's lots of entertainers to talk about. See how the conversation gets moving. As it continues it will feel more pleasant. Just remember to give the other a chance to talk so as well.

Another one you can talk about is festive days. Ask what they did last Christmas or what their New Year's resolution was. This generally leads to why they did or made the resolution at the end of that year. It normally is because they year may have been bad and they wanted to change things. Most people are glad to just purge themselves so they are willing to bring up all the stuff that they dislike and off load it to any listening person. Let them do most of the talking. you'll find that you just became their 'best friend' when you become a sympathetic listener to them.

Remember one thing as you get further into conversation. Your main interest was getting to know the person better so as conversation deepens you must also add the attraction factor into it. Underline your conversations, from time to time, with sublime suggestions. By this I mean that your main thoughts should be to add to the attraction of the person and getting him or her to be more interested in you. Where possible add suggestions about going somewhere together. Maybe a holiday, watching a movie or getting a couples massage spa treatment. If you can reach that last one, you've scored big.

Don't get me wrong. Those are just suggestions that will help out but there's lots of other stuff you can use. The main thing is to keep handy some of these so the silence won't be visible and you don't look or feel like a complete idiot. Please don't go researching on topics like lymphatic nodes disorders to make yourself sound wiser. The silence will definitely be worse and you can hear a pin drop after because the other person won't have a clue how to respond to you. Your voice will be the only thing you'll hear and you would have forced the silence into the other person. Don't make the other person seem stupid. The point is to talk about things that are more common and the conversation flow will be a two way street.

Bar advice. The silence can be broken if you just open your mouth and if you got a whole bag of topics to discuss.

Sunday, July 8, 2007

Live Earth. SOS. 7/7/07

Well as I'm writing this the "Live Earth" concert is ongoing. There are concerts from Johannesburg, London, Washington, Tokyo and more. The message that this 24 hour long broadcast is simple but deaf to the ears of people that don't bother about mother earth.

Saving the planet. Usage of fossil fuels, green house gas emissions, industrialization and general daily but subtle changes can make a huge difference in the reduction of global warming. For the first time in history more then 150 artist have come together to share their time and energy to help in getting this message across to people and governments.

The partnerships of MSN, The alliance of climate protection, The climate croup, I count, Control room, National geographic, WWF, AISO, Earthlab foundation and many more sponsors have pulled this off. A monumental undertaking that will be recorded in the history but that all wont mean a thing if the message doesn't get through to people.

Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore is the Chair of the Alliance and Partner of Live Earth. Live Earth was founded by Kevin Wall, the Worldwide Executive Producer of Live 8, an event that brought together one of the largest audiences in history to combat poverty. Wall formed a partnership with Al Gore and the Alliance for Climate Protection to ensure that Live Earth inspires behavioral changes long after 7/7/07.

The mission of the SOS campaign is to empower individuals to change their consumer behaviors and motivate corporations and political leaders to enact decisive measures to combat the climate crisis. The message of SOS is that everyone, everywhere can and must "Answer the Call" to solve the climate crisis. The SOS campaign's identity and language is based on the international Morse code distress call: three dots, followed by three dashes, followed by three dots.(..._ _ _ ...) The SOS signal will be used as a continuous call to action to prompt individuals, corporations and governments around the world to "Answer the Call" with immediate and sustained action.

Are we to believe that things will really change after this. It is going to be a long uphill battle to change what is happening to the world right now. Anyone almost anywhere in the world will testify that their countries weather, seasons, wildlife, rainfall and temperatures have changed. Things will only get worst before it can get better. The fact is that we can do something about it and do it now.

People live on just this one planet. Resources are scarce. There's more than 6 billion people that need food, water and shelter. If we don't do anything about the problem then surely all of us, including the plants, trees, animals, birds and everything in the oceans will be cooked like an egg on a grill or drowned like sewer rats when the polar ice melts. The dawn will become bleak. Mass panic for survival will take place and it will become "every man for himself" tactics involved.

This Live Earth party seems a joyous event but its sobering note is for people to make changes. Learn to recycle, reduce and re-use what we have so we don't make more damage to the environment. Teach your kids. Share what you know with others. Show by example. Live with a daily thought about the environment and we will all smile about it some time in the near future because other generations will see us as the ones that put a stop to the destruction of the planet and it's resources.

Imagine if our planet was an island and the vast universe was the ocean with all the other planets as other islands but inhabitable. If we destroy all there is on the island we're on, where then will we live. It's not as if we can go some place else or get more resources from any other place. Hell, we can't even get to the next planet and we already know that we can't live there. Then what?

Bar advice. What we change today will benefit us later. Governments globally, get mad and do something for the planet and for the human race.