INSTRUCTION: Answer questionin relation to text.

TEXT

If you think the food airline companies serve up is bland
or unappetising, it’s not necessarily their fault. Essentially,
you leave your normal sense of taste behind at the airport
departure gate. Get on board a plane and cruise to a level
[5] of thousands of feet, and the flavour of everything from
a pasta dish to a mouthful of wine becomes manipulated
in a whole host of ways that we are only beginning to
understand.

Taste buds and sense of smell are the first things to go at
[10] 30,000 feet, says Russ Brown, director of In-flight Dining
& Retail at American Airlines. “Flavour is a combination
of both, and our perception of saltiness and sweetness
drop when inside a pressurised cabin.”

Everything that makes up the in-flight experience affects
[15] how your food tastes. There are several reasons for this:
lack of humidity, lower air pressure, and the background
noise. The combination of dryness and low pressure
reduces the sensitivity of your taste buds to sweet and
salty foods by around 30%, according to a 2010 study.
[20] Interestingly, the study found that we take leave of our
sweet and salty senses only. Sour, bitter and spicy
flavours are almost unaffected.

But it’s not just about our taste buds. Up to 80% of what
people think is taste, is in fact smell. We need evaporating
[25] nasal mucus to smell, but in the parched cabin air our
odour receptors do not work properly, and the effect is
that this makes food taste twice as bland.

So airlines have to give in-flight food an extra kick, by
salting and spicing it much more than a restaurant on the
[30] ground ever would. “Proper seasoning is key to ensure
food tastes good in the air,” says Brown at American
Airlines. “Often, recipes are modified with additional salt
or seasoning to account for the cabin dining atmosphere.”

By Katia Moskvitch http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20150112-why-in-flight-foodtastes-weird (adapted)

Migrant crisis: Grim find of bodies in Austria lorry

AUGUST 27, 2015 -BBC NEWS

The bodies of between 20 and 50 migrants have been found in a lorry abandoned in a motorway lay-by near the Austrian border with Hungary, authorities say.

Austrian police say they think the people inside were already dead when the truck crossed into Austria. The lorry has been towed away for forensic examination. Police say they should be able to give more information on the number of bodies on Friday morning. The grim find comes as a summit focusing on migration takes place in the Austrian capital, Vienna.

Tens of thousands of migrants from conflict-hit states in the Middle East and Africa have been trying to make their way to Europe.

Austria's Chancellor Werner Faymann said the tragedy showed once again "how necessary it is to save lives by combating criminals and people traffickers".

The vehicle - a refrigerated lorry with Hungarian license plates - was found parked off the A4 motorway between Parndorf and Neusiedl am See, according to Burgenland police chief Hans Peter Doskozil. The vehicle was there from around 06:00 local time (04:00 GMT) on Thursday morning, Mr. Doskozil said. But Hungarian cameras had identified that the truck was on the Hungarian side of the border, very close to Austria, at 09:00 on Wednesday, he said, so it must have been driven across the border in the intervening time.

The decomposing state of the bodies would suggest that they had been dead for one and a half to two days, the police chief added, suggesting that the victims must have already been dead when the lorry crossed into Austria. On Thursday afternoon the truck was towed away to undergo forensic examinations in Nickelsdorf. Police will give a further news conference at 11:00 on Friday, when they should be able to say how many people have died. They do not yet know whether women and children are among the victims, or how they died.

Fonte: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-34073534

How many steps does it take to avoid a heart attack?

Researchers find out.

Walking can lower your risk of having a heart attack, as any doctor will tell you. Now scientists have found out exactly how many steps it takes to keep your ticker healthy.

Even people who are at risk for diabetes can cut their risk for heart-related events like a heart attack or stroke by 8%.

In new research published in the journal Lancet, scientists report that among people with early signs of pre-diabetes, taking an extra 2,000 steps a day – the equivalent of 20 minutes of moderate-paced walking – helped them lower their chances of heart problems.

The research team looked at data from 9,306 adults from 40 countries participating in a trial called NAVIGATOR. All of the volunteers were assigned to a program to lose weight and exercise 150 minutes a week. They were given pedometers that they wore for a week at the beginning of the study, and again a year later.

Using statistical modeling, the researchers studied the association between the number of steps the participants took on average and their relative risk for heart events in that year, accounting for potentially confounding factors that could influence heart disease rates such as diet and the participants’ previous history of heart issues.

Two thousand steps seemed to be the magic number. Even before the study began, for every 2,000 steps a day one participant tended to walk on average compared to another, he enjoyed a 10% lower rate of heart problems by the end of the year. During the study year, there was an additional 8% lower risk of heart disease for every 2,000 steps walked a day.

That should be encouraging news to those who have added exercise to their daily routine. You don’t have to take your doctor’s word for it — now there’s pretty convincing data on exactly how much walking it takes to avoid heart disease. (www.time.com. Adaptado.)

The trip that transformed me: The university graduate By Mia Simon

Australian Vanessa Costanzo expected her university

experience to prepare her for adulthood, but in reality, she

said, it prepared her only for a job. So after she graduated

from Curtin University in Western Australia in February

2013, she decided to travel.

Costanzo hoped to gain worldly knowledge that she

craved by spending seven months exploring Europe and

parts of the Middle East. Starting in 2014, the lessons

came fast and furious.

Her first stop was Dubai. Not long after she arrived,

she recalled watching men from Pakistan and India in blue

jumpsuits working tirelessly in the sweltering heat1 to

manage the upkeep of Sheikh Zayed Road, a major city

thoroughfare2.

Unlike Costanzo, they were not in a foreign country on

holiday. A cab driver told her that most were working for

minimal pay and living in substandard conditions. Much of

the money they earned they sent home to their families.

How did he know? He had a wife and child back home

in his native India. He hadn’t seen them in a year.

The lesson hit her hard: If you have the means to

travel, as she did, you’re fortunate. And you don’t need

material possessions to be happy.

Glossary:

1. sweltering heat: oppressively hot

2. thoroughfare: a main road

Source: http://www.bbc.com/travel/story/20150224-the-trip-that-transformed-me-the-universitygraduate. Adapted.

THE MAN IN THE CONVERTIBLE

[1] One morning, well after I was diagnosed with cancer, I got an email from Robbee Kosak, Carnegie

Mellon’s vice president for advancement. She told me a story.

She said she had been driving home from work the night before, and she found herself behind a man

in a convertible. It was a warm, gorgeous, early-spring evening, and the man had his top down and all his

[5] windows lowered. His arm was hanging over the driver’s side door, and his fingers were tapping along to the

music on his radio. His head was bobbing along, too, as the wind blew through his hair.

Robbee changed lanes and pulled a little closer. From the side, she could see that the man had a

slight smile on his face, the kind of absentminded smile a person might have when he’s all alone, happy in

his own thoughts. Robbee found herself thinking: “Wow, this is the epitome of a person appreciating this day

[10] and this moment.”

The convertible eventually turned the corner, and that’s when Robbee got a look at the man’s full face.

“Oh my God,” she said to herself. “It’s Randy Pausch!”

She was so struck by the sight of me. She knew that my cancer diagnosis was grim. And yet, as she

wrote in her email, she was moved by how contented I seemed. In this private moment, I was obviously in

[15] high spirits. Robbee wrote in her email: “You can never know how much that glimpse of you made my day,

reminding me of what life is all about.”

I read Robbee’s email several times. I came to look at it as a feedback loop of sorts.

It has not always been easy to stay positive through my cancer treatment. When you have a dire

medical issue, it’s tough to know how you’re really faring emotionally. I had wondered whether a part of me

[20] was acting when I was with other people. Maybe at times I forced myself to appear strong and upbeat. Many

cancer patients feel obliged to put up a brave front. Was I doing that, too?

But Robbee had come upon me in an unguarded moment. I’d like to think she saw me as I am. She

certainly saw me as I was that evening.

Her mail was just a paragraph, but it meant a great deal to me. She had given me a window into

[25] myself. I was still fully engaged. I still knew life was good. I was doing OK.

Fonte: PAUSCH, R. The last lecture. New York, Hyperion, 2008. p.64-65

Malala Yousafzai was born on July 12, 1997, in Mingora, Pakistan. For the first few years of her life, her hometown remained a popular tourist spot that was known for its summer festivals. However, the area began to change as the Taliban tried to take control.

Yousafzai attended a school that her father, ZiauddinYousafzai, had founded. After the Taliban began attacking girls’ schools in Swat, Malala gave a speech in Peshawar, Pakistan, in September 2008. The title of her talk was, “How dare the Taliban take away my basic right to education?”

In early 2009, Yousafzai began blogging for the BBC about living under the Taliban’s threats to deny her an education. In order to hide her identity, she used the name Gul Makai. However, she was revealed to be the BBC blogger in December of that year

With a growing public platform, Yousafzai continued to speak out about her right, and the right of all women, to an education. Her activism resulted in a nomination for the International Children’s Peace Prize in 2011. That same year, she was awarded Pakistan’s National Youth Peace Prize. Unfortunately, it also resulted in the Taliban issuing a death threat against her. On October 9, 2012, a gunman shot Malala when she was traveling home from school.

The shooting left Malala in critical condition, so she was flown to a military hospital in Peshawar. A portion of her skull was removed to treat her swelling brain. To receive further care, she was transferred to Birmingham, England. She survived, and has continued to speak out on the importance of education. She was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize in 2013, and again in 2014.

(Adapted from: Malala Yousafzai. The Biography.com website. Web, 2014. Source: http://www.biography.com/people/malalayousafzai-21362253. Accessed on: Oct. 10th. 2014.)