Recycling together, we can save the world

How many times did you hear about the strikes of garbage collectors? Do you remember the thirteen weeks long shortage of disposal service in Thunder Bay? Increasing refuse in municipal area comes up with fast growth of disposal service positions and budget. Of course, this expanded cost is deducted from the tax we pay, which could be wisely used on other public services such as medical care and road maintenance.

Do you know producing one ton of aluminum from ore may cost 15,000 kilowatt-hour electric powers which can light up a 100 watts bulb for 17 years? And do you know refining pop cans to one ton of aluminum consumes 5 percent of this energy only? By recycling used metal, glass, plastic and paper instead of producing them from the raw material, we can save a considerable amount of energy.

Do you realize, for every ton of waste glass recycled in a furnace there is a saving of 1.2 tones of sand and limestone? Do you realize every ton of waste paper can be reproduced into 0.8 ton of high quality paper, which can also save 17 trees? And do you realize avoiding the dumping of one button size battery can save 600 tons of clean water? Furthermore, these savings can contribute to the preservation of our natural environment.

You may ask “Can I save the world just by saving such a small stack of newspaper?” Yes, you can. It is a small amount from an individual, but it could be one truck load from a community and one ship load from a city. It is said, many a little makes a mickle. On the other hand, recycle projects rely on the involvement of the whole population. A single person or a small group cannot get the job done. Your participation not only contributes the recyclable waste but also shows a good example to your children and stimulates the people around you.

Recycling is a lifelong procedure. It should become an important component of the ordinary routines in our lives. So please keep in mind: do the recycling whenever and wherever you can.

Casual expressions in oral English

One of the keys for a foreigner to speaking English like a native is the ability to use and understand casual expressions, or idioms. Casual expressions are widely used in everyday conversations, TV shows, magazines, newspapers and even books. Casual expressions can add colors to our conversations. For example, if a student is rushing to do a review for the next day’s quiz, he may tell his tennis partner he has to “hit the book” rather than just saying “start studying”. Here, “Hit the book” is not only giving the meaning of “start studying” but the sense of “rush”. Furthermore, casual expressions help us communicate in an efficient manner. For instance, the thunderwolf hokey team won every game in the past three months. Instead of saying “Our team is lucky since we keep winning game after game”, we may just say “Our team is on a winning steak”. In addition, people prefer to talk by using simple words and expressions in place of literal or professional terminologies which mostly appear on the written paper. As British author Alan Alexander Milne said, it is more fun to talk with someone who doesn't use long, difficult words but rather short, easy words like What about lunch? However, casual expressions are difficult to be explained literally even though they consist of simple words only. For example, When we say “Peter is not Mary’s cup of tea”, we do not consider whether Peter is made of tea or not. Instead, we use the expression to describe “Peter is not a person Mary likes”. But for a foreigner, it is hard to catch this meaning just through word-by-word translating. In fact, more than one thousand of these simple-word-combinations are frequently used in ordinary speaking English. There is no doubt casual expressions can raise a barrier for an English learner to achieve speaking English in a native way.

(Composition Assignment #2)