25th December

Christmas celebrates the birth day of Jesus Christ. Catholic, Christian and Protestants celebrate Christmas. Christmas celebrations in Australia include family gatherings, giving presents to family or friends and decorating the Christmas tree .

Many Australian families try to be home together for Christmas. At Christmas the main meal is eaten at lunch time .Australians eat food such as prawns and lobsters along with the traditional English food like turkey , Xmas cakes, pudding, chocolate and biscuits.

Santa claus is white bearded man ,wearing a red coat with white collar and cuffs, white cuffed red trousers and a black belt and boots. Santa Claus is known as father of Christmas. Santa claus brings gifts to the homes of good children .

In Bangladesh we don't celebrate Christmas widely because most people are muslim but we do have just a day's holiday on 25th of December.

My Study plan of 2011

I have a plan to study more next year so that's why I've applied for Certificate IV in Community Service Work and I want to continue my English study as well .

I think I need to improve my English skills for further study or to get a job. But I don't know exactly how many hours already I've used this year and also I don't know my result for this term.

Halloween

Originally 'Halloween' word comes from "All Hallows Eve'. Halloween is a night celebrated on 31st October each year. Halloween celebration started from 2000 years ago.

Its stayed with cultural religious and traditional. Actually peoples believe ghost walk in the earth this time that's why people gather and make huge fire to keep away from ghost. Lots of country including Europe America have tradition to celebrate Halloween. People maintain lots of custom to celebrate Halloween night eg; helps to neighbour to remove a gate from the house , fire etc.


I didn't know anything about Halloween holiday because my country Bangladesh haven't any holiday like this.

Two Weeks Break

My first week was lots of house work cleaning washing and a bit of outing like meet the friends. 5th of October I went royal national park at bundeena to see aboriginal culture,bush walk and alsoI enjoyed the sands walk around the beach.




second week was busier than First week because 9th October was my younger son (ratul) 's birthday. We booked novotel VIP lounge to celebrate birthday with only family and the 10th of October was another party at my home with other people specially for kids.



So I can say this break was so nice and busy for me spent maximum time with peoples gathering .

Winning the lottery

Normally once a month I go shopping to the Bay city shop in Arncliffe. Last month on 15th of July it was Bay city's first birthday. Bay city arranged a raffle draw to celebrate its first birth day. The first three winners would each get 40 items of free shopping from Bay city.

The good news is I was the one of three winners. It was really great for me. My younger son and I picked out 30 shopping itemes last week from Bay city and we still have 10 items remaining. I can say that my last week was so happy.

Odd one out

I don't have negative feelings about integration. I'm lucky because I don't have any experience about being 'called names'.

However, I think the language barrier is a very big difficulty for new migrants to face. Sometimes I felt like the 'Odd one out' when I first came to Australia. For example, once when I went looking for a job and I spoke to the employer, I felt my English wasn't good enough for that job. I thought I needed to develop my English skills more.

Tips for learning English

1. Watch TV .


2. Talk to native English speakers.


3. Speak English when you go shopping.


4. Write down new words and try to remember them.


5. Don't be afraid to make mistakes.


6. Write something in English everyday.


7. Read the local news paper.


8. Listen to English music.


9. Try to increase fluency.


10. Increase your vocabulary and improve you pronunciation..

Nilgiri

Nilgiri is the nicest place in Bangladesh. I went to Chittagong and visited lots of places but Nilgiri was really a great place for me in 2008 . It looks a bit similar to the Blue Mountains of Australia but I can say definitely it is better than the Blue Mountains, because the Blue Mountains are green on every side but one.On the other hand Nilgiri is green on all sides.

Another amazing thing is that if you stand on top of the mountain you can see rain on one side and a rainbow on the other side at the same time. Also I have seen clouds blowing that look like snow from one side and yet there is bright sunlight just opposite at the same time.

One more interesting thing here is that nilgiri is a Bangali word whose English meaning is blue mountain (nill means blue and giri means mountain).

My first blog-Introducing myself

This is a map of Bangladesh

Hi
My name is Mst Lutfun Nahar and I come from Bangladesh . Now I'm doing an AMEP course at St George TAFE, Kogarah. This course is more convenient for me because right now I live in Kogarah. I hope to do a course in community service work after finish my AMEP. I already have a Masters in History from my country and have three years and six months experience as a community worker.
I came Australia in 2004 with my husband. We now have two lovely boys Mitul and Ratul.