THE PINEAPPLE STORY

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“A pineapple garden, a group of natives, a missionary who fought hard & long for something that God eventually called him to release…. Join Otto Koning as he shares about dealing with surrendering rights and conquering anger in a Dutch New Guinea village.”

It is not only full of adventure and wisdom, but also… funny. I really recommend you to watch it. This story is split in 6 parts, each 10 min long.

Part 1 of 6

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Part 2 of 6

THE JUNGLE BOOK

 

The Jungle Book (1894) is a collection of stories written by Rudyard Kipling. Kipling was born in India and spent the first 6 years of his childhood there. After about ten years in England, he went back to India and worked there for about six-and-half years. All of the stories were published in magazines in 1893-4. The original publications contained illustrations, some by Rudyard’s father, John Lockwood Kipling. These books were written when Kipling lived in Vermont.

The tales in the book (and also those in The Second Jungle Book which followed in 1895, and which includes five further stories about Mowgli) are fables, using animals in an anthropomorphic manner to give moral lessons. The verses of The Law of the Jungle, for example, lay down rules for the safety of individuals, families and communities. Kipling put in them nearly everything he knew or “heard or dreamed about the Indian jungle.” Other readers have interpreted the work as allegories of the politics and society of the time. The best-known of them are the three stories revolving around the adventures of an abandoned ‘man cub’ Mowgli who is raised by wolves in the Indian jungle. The most famous of the other stories are probably “Rikki-Tikki-Tavi”, the story of a heroic mongoose, and “Toomai of the Elephants”, the tale of a young elephant-handler. Kotick, The White Seal seeking for his people a haven where they would be safe from hunters, has been considered a metaphor for Zionism, then in its beginning.

As with much of Kipling’s work, each of the stories is preceded by a piece of verse, and succeeded by another. The title of each is given in italics in the list of stories below.

The Jungle Book, because of its moral tone, came to be used as a motivational book by the Cub Scouts, a junior element of the Scouting movement. This use of the book’s universe was approved by Kipling after a direct petition of Robert Baden-Powell, founder of the Scouting movement, who had originally asked for the author’s permission for the use of the Memory Game from Kim in his scheme to develop the morale and fitness of working-class youths in cities. Akela, the head wolf in The Jungle Book, has become a senior figure in the movement, the name being traditionally adopted by the leader of each Cub Scout pack.

Animation
Disney’s 1967 animated film version, inspired by the Mowgli stories, was extremely popular, though it took great liberties with the plot, characters and the pronunciation of the characters’ names. These characterizations were further used in the 1990 animated series TaleSpin, which featured several anthropomorphic characters loosely based on those from the film in an comic aviation-industry setting.
Chuck Jones’ made for-TV cartoons Mowgli’s Brothers, Rikki-Tikki-Tavi and The White Seal stick to the original storylines more closely than most adaptations.

There was a Japanese anime television series called Jungle Book Shonen Mowgli broadcast in 1989. Its adaptation represents a compromise between the original stories and the Walt Disney version. Many of Kipling’s stories are adapted into the series, but many elements are combined and changed to suit more modern sensibilities. For instance, Akela, the wolf pack alpha eventually steps aside, but instead of being threatened with death, he stays on as the new leader’s advisor. Also, there is an Indian family in the series which includes Rikki-Tikki-Tavi as a pet mongoose. Finally at the series’ conclusion, Mowgli leaves the jungle for human civilization, but still keeps strong ties with his animal friends.

The Japanese anime was dubbed in Hindi and telecast as “Jungle Book” by Doordarshan in India during the early 1990s. The Indian version featured original music by Vishal Bharadwaj (with words by noted lyricist Gulzar) and a very good choice of dubbing artistes for the voice acting, which made it quite popular among television series of that time.

The anime was also dubbed in Arabic under the title “فتى الأدغال ” (Fatah El Adghal: Boy Of The Jungle) and became a hit with Arab viewers in the 1990s.

In 1973, another animated adaptation was released in the Soviet Union called “Mowgli” (Маугли), also known as the ‘heroic’ version of the story. It’s also very close to the book’s storyline, and one of the few adaptations which has Bagheera as a female panther. It also features stories from The Second Jungle Book, such as Red Dog and a simplified version of The King’s Ankus. “Rikki-Tikki-Tavi” has also been released in 1954 as a cartoon and in 1976 as a feature film. The former made its way into the hearts of viewers and is even now sometimes aired by TV stations of the Former Soviet Union countries as a classic of Soviet animation. Interestingly, in keeping with Soviet ideology, the Colonial English family in Rikki-Tikki-Tavi has been replaced with an Indian family.

from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Jungle_Book

QUICKNESS TEST

Perspicuity test:

1. There are 5 houses.

2. The Englishman lives in the red house.

3. The Japanese smokes “Pall Mall”.

4. The Russian drinks tea.

5. The Spanish owns a dog.

6. When you watch the line of the houses, the white house is somewhere on the right side of the green house.

7. The Norway-man lives in the first house.

8. There are snails in the garden of the man who smokes “Old Gold”.

9. The Englishman’s neighbor smokes “Chesterfield”

10. The house close to the Norway-man is blue.

11. The yellow house’s owner smokes “Camel”.

12. The neighbor of the person who smokes “Chesterfield” owns a fox.

13. That one who smokes “Lucky Strike” drinks orange juice.

13. In the green house, the owner drinks coffee.

14. The neighbor of the person who smokes “Camel” owns a horse.

15. In the house which is in the middle of its line, the owner drinks milk.

 

Questions:

- Who drinks water?

- Who owns a zebra?

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HELPING MOTHER

 

A short funny video: see how a little girl is helping her mother:

FUNNY CATS

Here it is a funny Youtube file 

THE ARISTOCATS

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The Aristocats is a 1970 animated feature produced and released by Walt Disney Productions. The twentieth animated feature in the Disney animated features canon, the story revolves around a family of aristocratic cats, and how an alley cat acquaintance helps them after a butler has kidnapped them to gain his mistress’ fortune which was meant to go to them.

Set in Paris, France in the year 1910, this is the story about a mother cat named Duchess and her three kittens: her daughter Marie, and her two sons Berlioz and Toulouse. They live in the mansion of retired opera singer Adelaide Bonfamille, along with her big-nosed butler Edgar. Also living on the estate are Frou-Frou the horse, and Roquefort the mouse, who is a good friend of the cats.

 

 

Adelaide wants to settle her will with her lawyer Georges Hautecourt (a senile old man who denies his old age and refuses to accept Edgar’s offer of taking the elevator instead of the long staircase, which results in Georges’ walking cane getting tangled up in Edgars’ suspenders which snap, so when Edgar announces Georges’ arrival to Adelaide his trousers fall down).  Adelaide tells Georges that she wishes to leave her entire fortune to her butler, but only after her cats reach “the end of their lifespans.” Edgar overhears this plan through a speaking tube and is dismayed, as he worries that he will die before he is able to collect the inheritance (incorrectly assuming that the cats will each have nine full lifespans of twelve years, totalling 108 years).

In the same evening, Edgar drops some sleeping pills in the cats’ milk, putting them to sleep. After night falls, Edgar takes the sleeping cats in their travelling basket far away from home, hoping to drop them on the banks of a river near a farm. However, two farm dogs, Napoleon and Lafayette, hear Edgar approach. Believing him to be an intruder, the dogs attack him, biting him on the rear end. This causes him to drop the basket on the river bank. Edgar manages to escape, but is forced to leave his motorbike’s sidecar, his prized hat, the basket, and his umbrella.

Back at the mansion, Madame Bonfamille has a nightmare about the cats going missing. On going to their sleeping basket, she finds this fear confirmed. Roquefort, hearing the terrible news, goes out to look for them.Meanwhile, Duchess and the kittens awake to find themselves in unfamiliar settings. Worried, they decide to sleep in their basket and wait for morning.  When the sun rises, Duchess meets a friendly, self-absorbed, worldly stray cat named Thomas O’Malley, who befriends the cats and helps them get home.

 

From the first, O’Malley is smitten with the beautiful Duchess, and she with him. He takes on an indulgent, paternal role toward the kittens, who are quite awed with this handsome, seemingly knowledgeable newcomer.Roquefort returns to the mansion, and miserably tells the downhearted Frou-Frou that he couldn’t find the cats anywhere, even after searching all night. Edgar, the only happy person in the mansion, dances into the stable and tells Frou-Frou (believing that she can’t understand him) that it was he who kidnapped the cats.

It is then that Edgar remembers that the only evidence left to convict him is the stuff he left at the farm(motorcycle sidecar,the basket umbrella, and hat) the previous night, and that he must retrieve it before the police do.O’Malley, Duchess and the kittens continue the journey home, and befriend some gossip-loving geese named Abigail and Amelia Gabble, and their Uncle Waldo on the way. Abigail and Amelia (possibly modelled after the sisters Gwendolyn and Cicely in the earlier movie “The Odd Couple“) are bombastic English geese, who misinterpret O’Malley’s every move; Waldo is their uncle, a frivolous gander who greatly amuses the party, being drunk after bathed by a chef in white wine. Later on the cats find an old house to stay in with O’Malley’s musical alley cat friends led by Scat Cat.

Do you remember the song “Everybody wants to be a cat”?

Meanwhile, Edgar sets off to the farm to find his things, and sees that Napoleon and Lafayette have made beds out of the things they stole from Edgar. The butler bumps the sidecar and the dogs go flying. Edgar lures the two dogs away from his things. After another fight, he manages to escape again, (on a one-wheeled haystack) this time with all the stolen items. Napoleon and Lafayette stare at the triumphant butler in disbelief.

  

The next morning, the cats arrive at their home. Duchess says goodbye to Abraham DeLacey Giuseppe Casey Thomas O’Malley. Edgar opens the door for them, letting them in. Before Roquefort can warn them, Edgar slams a sack over them, tying them up and hiding them in the oven. Horrified, Roquefort runs to get O’Malley, who tells Roquefort to call his alley cat friends while he holds Edgar off. Thomas sneaks into the barn, where he sees Edgar lock Duchess and the kittens in a trunk, hoping to send them to Timbuktu.

Meanwhile, Roquefort goes to the alley, nearly getting killed after misremembering Thomas’s name as O’Toole, O’Brien, and O’Grady, but avoids getting impaled on Scat Cat’s claw by shouting at the last second, “Why did I ever listen to that O’Malley cat?!” He tells the cats that O’Malley needs them, and the cats rush off to help their friend.O’Malley stops Edgar and closes the barn door. Edgar and O’Malley fight over the trunk, but Edgar, being human, overpowers the stray cat and pins him to a wall with a pitchfork. To his surprise, O’Malley finds himself not impaled and dead, but caught between two prongs. At that moment, Roquefort and the alley cats arrive and stall Edgar while Roquefort unlocks the padlock on the trunk. He yells “Quiet!”, then everyone holds still and keeps quiet, then after the trunk opens the carrying on fighting again.

After a fierce battle, Frou-Frou kicks Edgar into the trunk, just as the delivery men arrive. They ship him to Timbuktu.That night, Adelaide accepts O’Malley into the family, and erases Edgar from her will. She also gives the cats a surprise: her new cat foundation, which makes her house a home for all the alley cats of Paris. Adelaide urges Georges to make provision in the will “for their future little ones”; presumably the offspring of Duchess by O’Malley (their future children).

A party is thrown in the foundation room, involving nearly everyone from the movie: Scat Cat and his band, Frou-Frou, Roquefort, Napoleon, Lafayette, Amelia, Abigail and Waldo.

From: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Aristocats 

The original movie – site: http://disney.go.com/disneyvideos/animatedfilms/aristocats/