July 29th, 2010 
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Cosset Café embraces Maori language week in Owaira
The owners of Cosset Café have decided to awhi (embrace) Maori Language Week 2010 and it seems especially relevant given this year’s theme of ‘Te Mahi Kai – The Language of Food’.
Read more on Scoop.co.nz
April 24th, 2010 admin
The colourful origin of the language
Despite the fact that many languages are spoken by people of different nationalities in the world, the English language has managed to emerge as the globally accepted link language of the world today.
Read more on Sunday Observer
February 17th, 2010 admin
This interview is an excerpt from Kevin Gianni’s The Healthiest Year of Your Life, which can be found at http://thehealthiestyearofyour life. com. In this excerpt, Jim Katsoulis, shares on changes your body by changing your language and the Program Yourself Thin program. The Healthiest Year of Your Life with Jim Katsoulis, a certified yoga instructor, Master Hypnotist and Master MLP Practioner who’s helping others bring the excitement back into their lives. Kevin: How does someone get started off? Because that’s where people are coming from. Jim: It’s almost like you have to learn a new language, to a certain degree, but once you learn it it becomes very simple. What are the words you hear when people talk about losing weight? I really got to lose weight. That’s it. I need to do something now. They’ll talk about it like someone’s got a gun to their head, like they’re being forced to do it. Any time you talk about something in a way that you’re being forced to do it, you’re going to set up some resistance. This is what people always feel. There’s this internal resistance they have. Everything was going great, all of a sudden I just ate a pound of cookies, out of nowhere, this rebellious part of me. Well part of it because of the way they talk about losing weight. So with weight loss, we talk about it in such a way that it’s a negative experience instead of being the one thing you can do in your life that would probably bring you more happiness than anything else, short of relationship and other people’s health, even more than money, because I’ve worked with plenty of people that are very, very wealthy but if you’re not happy with your body and how you look and how you feel you’re not going to have the level of health and happiness that you want. So as you begin describing, what is it that you want? People don’t eat cookies by focusing all the negative things about it. They think about cookies because they think about the pleasure of it. So when you want to start eating better, when you want to look better, begin talking about the pleasure of it, because it’s there. How do you feel? Let me ask you, Kevin? Why do you eat well? Why do you exercise?Kevin: Because it gives me the energy to help more people. Jim: And you feel it every day, I’m assuming?Kevin: Yeah. Jim: It’s congruent in your voice. You can hear it. You’re connected into that pleasure, you see. So this is really the beginning, the starting point of it. You have to ask yourself, when you want to make a change in your life and you want to eat better and have a different body, you have to clearly define what is it that you want and then you have to ask yourself why you want it. What are you going to get out of it? Will it be pleasurable? One question I always ask people, this could help some people when they’re starting. Imagine a magic genie appeared in front of you and gave you one of two choices. They said listen: if you could wake up tomorrow morning with the exact body that you want, looking exactly the way that you want. Shape, weight, everything you want or you could have the most delicious meal that you have ever had in your life right now. Which would you take? No one’s ever taken the meal. Why would they take the body? Because everybody knows that that would give them more pleasure, be more long lasting, it would be a more deep, more deep sense of this is what I want, this is enjoyable. I feel good. Kevin: And if you have the body you get to have the meal, right?Jim: That’s when it gets really fun! You get to have your cake and eat it too! You get to have your body and eat it too! You eat the cake too! Because when you get things in control and you begin asking the questions, how can I have the body I want and eat the foods that I want? As opposed to in order to have the body I want I can never enjoy food again. That’s how some people look at it you know. So as you ask better questions, that’s what happens. The healthiest people I know, they don’t — it’s not about restriction, it’s all about pleasure. A lot of times when we go into it with people eating chocolate cake, when you start to really go into it, it’s not the most pleasurable experience because they’re beating themselves up the whole time. So when people get their eating under control and their body falls in line, and they start having the body they want, they come back and tell me I enjoy cake 1000 times more than I ever did and I eat less of it. Again, this is the thing. The reality of people — A lot of time when they start thinking about dieting it doesn’t allow these sorts of thoughts. It’s an either or an all or nothing. It’s realizing that that does not work. It’s about figuring out a plan that you can eat for the rest of your life. Kevin: And this isn’t so much about just weight loss it’s also about any level of health because it’s more of a system than it is a result. Is that correct?Jim: Oh yeah, yeah absolutely. That’s a great point. I’ll give you example money wise. A lot of times when people think about money it becomes very, very emotional. I don’t have enough money. I don’t have this and they start going into a state of mind and body where they’re not at their best. They’re nervous, they’re worried and so they’re not thinking great, but if you focus on it’s not the money part of it, the money is a result. It’s an end result. What happens is what you do for the last two weeks, what you’ve done for the last five years that brings you to that point. It’s the same thing with the weight. A lot of times people will step on scale and all of a sudden they’ll feel negative. They judge all their success by the results that they get day in and day out, instead of looking at what they’re doing behaviorally. For example, for me what worked, one of the things, was I stopped eating meat. I became vegetarian. For me that was a decision that was not only ethical, that was a part of it, but a part of me said if I stop eating meat I think it’s going to be a lot easier for me to maintain my weight. It gets rid of a whole bunch of discussions that I’d have to have. I concentrate on that. And I said to myself, if I make this happen, my weight is going to be easier. I’m not going to have to think about it. So it’s a different thing. There’s peacefulness to it, because you say this is who I am, this is what I do. The system of thinking is really what creates the changes and that’s where the attention needs to be placed. Kevin: Let’s talk about the system. Program Yourself Thin is your program. Let’s talk about some of the steps, obviously we don’t have time to cover everything, but let’s talk about some of the steps and how someone can get from where they are now to where they want to be, in any context. Jim: My approach – I felt so lucky being exposed to what I call kind of the science, the philosophy of hypnosis. Because I don’t think, being a professional hypnotist I did not see great results for me hypnotizing people and putting changes in them. I would see fantastic short-term results but the long-term results were sketchy at best. Then I came across neural linguistic programming which is a science of the mind that really explains – I call it a practical psychology. We’re taught psychology but it’s so theoretical we don’t know how to use it. What do you do with the ego and the id, and the super ego, these complexes? How do you work with it? You get kind of trapped in the problems, so neural linguistic program was always based on solutions. There’s a story to explain that. When he, the inventor Richard Banler, he wanted to help phobics and so a lot of times the traditional psychological model would be to study phobics. What makes them tick? How do they work? All the rest of it. He went into it and he put an ad in the paper for people who used to be phobic and no longer were. So he studied the solution. How do people change? What were the differences? It turned out it was the way that they perceived things, the way that they thought, the way that they felt. The basic distinction we make in psychology, hypnotic psychology, is there’s a conscious mind and an unconscious mind. Now, most of the time people focus on the conscious mind. So when they want to lose weight they say “Well, I need to lose weight. It would be better. I know I feel crappy when I eat too much. ” They know all this stuff. They know what to do, but they don’t have their feelings in line and that’s the unconscious mind. Unconscious mind operates through association. It’s Pavlovian. It’s Pavlov’s dogs. Pavlov’s a scientist who would put food in front of the dog, the dog would salivate and he’d ring a bell. Put the food in front, ring a bell and eventually all he would have to do was ring a bell and the dog would salivate as if the food was there. The dog linked up the bell and the food. Our minds do the same thing. We start to think of certain foods and we get emotional responses from it. People think about chocolate and they start thinking sensual. They think about ice cream they remember all the good times they had when they were a kid and they went out for ice cream. It goes far beyond logic into emotions and feelings. So from very basic simple understanding is that our behaviors are controlled by our feelings. I mean, everyone knows that eating too much ice cream’s bad. They know that 24 hours a day. So what happens at the time when they’re overeating too much of it? Well they feel like they want to eat a lot of ice cream. They feel like it’s pleasurable. This whole approach, Program Yourself Thin, is about going to the unconscious level and begin to influence those feelings we have, so that when you think about ice cream there’s an indifference, perhaps. Now, think about this. It’s estimated the average American sees 3000 ads a day, maybe 1500 of those are food related. Every single one of those ads is trying to get you all worked up and posit emotions to that food. The biggest problem people have is emotional eating. So why is that? We live in a culture where the answer to all our emotional issues through the advertising becomes these different foods. If you didn’t emotional eating, if there was no such thing as emotional eating, then when would you eat?Kevin: Just whenever you were hungry. Jim: That’s probably naturally how we were built. You would make much clearer decisions.
February 17th, 2010 admin 
Product DescriptionThis ASL DVD, approximately 2 hours and 20 minutes, is excellent for kids and adults to learn the fundamentals of American Sign Language about everyday life with fun and lessons about kindness and compassion. Go to everydayasl. com to sign up to receive email announcements from us about our DVD releases and related ASL products. This DVD includes: – Narration with hundreds of fascinating and important facts about animals at the Central Park Zoo in the heart of New Yo. . . More >>
American Sign Language for Kids and Adults, Volume 1: Everyday Lessons
December 9th, 2009 admin Sicily – the name alone conjures up images of an exotic island, a mysterious and fascinating past. I have wanted to explore Italy for some time now since I had not been there for a long, long time, and when I was pondering which region of Italy to explore Sicily came to mind. I figured this island would offer a combination of fascinating history, rich culture, scenic beauty, and an opportunity for a wide variety of activities. One activity I definitely wanted to pursue was to combine my journey with language studies: my earlier language study trips to Havana and Cuernavaca, Mexico, not only got me closer to the Spanish language, but these on-site language learning experiences really allowed me to explore the culture from within. So this time I was going to focus on learning Italian, and I was able to locate two language schools in Sicily that would both provide a totally different experience and a different way of exploring the island. Armed with no prior knowledge other than having read through an Italian grammar book, I was going to see how much of this beautiful language I would pick up in my three weeks in Sicily. My first eight days were spent in Taormina, a gorgeous mountain-top town on the eastern side of Sicily, whose main distinguishing feature is an ancient Greco-Roman Theatre that is still in use today. The town itself has to be among the most picturesque destinations anywhere, with its beautiful buildings, narrow streets and passageways and stunning views of Mount Etna and the Mediterranean. Shortly after my arrival I got to meet the people at the Babilonia Language School where I would be learning Italian for a week and exploring the culture of Sicily. My accommodation was in a lovely 13-room privately owned hotel that has been operated by the Sciglio family for more than 50 years. Mr. and Mrs. Sciglio are in their mid-eighties and continue to work extremely hard, without even a thought of retirement, and their son Salvatore works with them. In an interview I learned more about the hotel’s history and the family’s involvement in this business. On the second day I joined my first guided excursion with the Babilonia language school: a guided hike to the ancient village of Castelmola which was followed by a tasting of Sicilian delicacies in a local bistro. My first weekend in Sicily promised to be great: an excursion to the ancient town of Siracusa and an exploration of the gorgeous coastline just east of Taormina, including the town of Mazzaro and Isola Bella. The following Monday was my first day of language studies: first we went through the placement test, and then we had our first lesson which included some unique yet effective teaching methods. The next day was May 1, Italian Labour Day and a national holiday: a perfect opportunity to rent a car and drive into the countryside surrounding Mount Etna, Europe’s largest volcano, which by the way, had erupted the night before. The next day it was back to school, and Alessandro, the director of the Babilonia language school, gave me a personal history lesson about Sicily and also explained the origins of that famous Sicilian institution, the Mafia, to me in detail. That evening I joined in a cooking class in a private home offered by the language school. I was going to see first-hand how a real multi-course Italian meal was prepared, using authentic, locally grown ingredients. And of course, I would have a chance to taste the finished delicacies afterwards and partake of a nice meal with other language students and the local Ferrari family. My language studies the next day were followed by a visit to a local pottery painting artist, as Babilonia also offers pottery decoration courses, in addition to hiking, biking, golfing and diving programs. Perched on the rooftop patio of a Taormina hotel, with a perfect view of an ancient palazzo right next to Mount Etna, I learned about Sicilian pottery painting techniques. In the late afternoon I joined another excursion to hike up the southern flanks of Mount Etna. A visit to a winery and a nice dinner followed. Then I had reached my last day in beautiful Taormina and after my final language lessons it was time to say goodbye to the folks at Babilonia, and to my co-students, whom I had gotten quite fond of. With the exception of the occasionally grey and drizzly weather, my experience in Taormina had been great: the language learning, the interesting excursions and activities and the interaction with my international co-students had been a really great experience. I was a bit sad to leave Taormina where I had gotten so comfortable. But a new adventure was about to begin: I took the train to Milazzo on the northeastern side of Sicily, where the next day I would embark on a seven-day sailing trip through the beautiful Eolian Islands, offered by Laboratorio Linguistico, a Milazzo-based Italian language school. After meeting some of my six shipmates, who were really cool by the way, we were off on our sailboat, the 4 cabin “Solitaire II”, to our first destination: the island of Lipari, the largest of the Eolian Islands, and an extremely scenic place. Our expert skipper Francesco, a licensed captain, also happened to be the co-owner of the language school, and one of our two resident language teachers on this sailing trip. After Lipari we continued our sailing trip to Salina, a neighbouring island, where three of us went on a driving tour to see local villages and also the house where “Il Postino” was filmed. An Italian lesson on the backyard patio of a bar was our first introduction to Laboratorio Lingustico’s language teaching program. Of course Francesco and Franco, our second teacher and co-owner of the school, conducted all conversations during the entire sailing trip in Italian only, which allowed us to be fully immersed in the language all the time. After we had nourished our brains, a Sicilian seafood feast capped off our second day on the boat. On the third day we set sail for the island of Stromboli, which is still an active volcano. The town of Stromboli features such narrow streets that they are impassable to regular vehicles. No wonder the local “carabinieri” (Italian police officers) have to ride in golf carts. After a somewhat turbulent late-night voyage from Stromboli to Panarea we arrived late and anchored in a bay off the island. On a gorgeous morning the next day we first had another language lesson – where else but on the outdoor patio of a bar in Panarea, surrounded by gorgeous sunshine and beautiful flowers. Panarea is an extremely photogenic destination and offered great opportunities for hobby photographers like me. Our voyage continued to Lipari again where we would end an eventful day with a scrumptious outdoor feast on the main square. The next day three of us went on a driving tour of this beautiful island and from the south end we already saw our next destination: the island of Vulcano, which also features an active volcano. We anchored in a bay off this island, enjoyed some Italian lessons on the boat and after a delicious on-board dinner, our shipmates Franco, a gifted guitar player, and Agnieszka, a talented singer, entertained us with soulful melodies by candlelight on the back of the boat – magical moments that I will not forget for a long time. Then our final day on the boat arrived: we hiked up to the “Gran Cratere”, the active crater of Vulcano. Yellow rocks and thick clouds of sulphur announced that the forces of geology were indeed active right underneath our feet. And the view from the top over the six other Eolian Islands was breathtaking. After another Italian lesson on an outdoor patio overlooking the Mediterranean we had to say goodbye to the Eolian Islands and start to head back to Milazzo. Just as I thought our 7 day sailing trip would come to an anticlimactic end, one of my shipmates announced “DOLPHINS!!!”, and indeed four of these playful sea creatures were accompanying our sailboat, jumping in and out of the water, and having fun with us. The excitement continued when we ended up catching three tunas on a fishing line we had been dragging behind our boat. The following decapitation and evisceration scene though was a bit hard on my tender vegetarian soul. . . So we had reached land, and to celebrate the conclusion of a wonderful sailing trip and one of my shipmates’ birthdays we enjoyed another big Sicilian feast in Capo di Milazzo. The next day, we had a chance to relax a bit in our five-bedroom apartment conveniently located above the Laboratorio Linguistico Language School and do simple things like laundry and sit on the balcony. Franco, our language teacher took us on a guided walk of Milazzo which features a huge fortification that dates back more than 1000 years. After saying goodbye to my roommate Claudia I spent my final Sunday in Sicily in the picturesque medieval town of Cefalu, about a two-hour train ride from Milazzo. That city’s medieval core and huge Norman cathedral together with the ruins of an ancient castle on top of the rock that towers over the town left me with many vibrant treasured memories. Now I only had two full days left in Sicily. Following a tour of the Milazzo headquarters of Laboratorio Linguistico I went on a country excursion into the surrounding Nebrodi Mountains with my two Italian teachers Francesco and Franco. We visited the Rocks of Agrimusco, a cluster of mysterious-looking rocks on a high plateau with a gorgeous view of Mount Etna. Then we headed into the hilltop town of Montalbano Elicona, an authentic small Sicilian town, completely untouched by tourism. I finally had a chance to snap some pictures of the locals who love to congregate next to the church and discuss important issues of the day. My final day in Sicily had arrived – I had to say goodbye to the great team at Laboratorio Linguistico and board the bus towards Messina and from there to Catania from where I would catch a plane in the early morning the next day. After my arrival in the late afternoon I had a chance to briefly explore this city, the second-largest city in Sicily, and get ready for my flight home. On this trip I found out that Sicily is gorgeous, and a visit in the late spring around April / May is perfect since everything is in full bloom and the hoards of tourists do not really arrive until June, July and August. Sicily has remained amazingly authentic and is fortunately free of many of the signs of mass tourism that mar other Mediterranean coastlines. Taormina and the Eolian Islands are all stunning destinations, but the Sicilian hinterland in itself holds many hidden treasures. The history, architecture, culture and scenic beauty are astounding. And seafood lovers will definitely fall in love with this destination. I myself really enjoyed the language learning experience at Babilonia and Laboratorio Linguistico – as a matter of fact, my three weeks in Italy took me all the way up to Intermediate level and when I came back I was quite capable of communicating fairly competently in this new language. The people were great: the staff at both language schools was very helpful and knowledgeable, and the interaction with my co-students from all different countries was a real treat. Our crew on the sailboat in particular came together really nicely and some close personal bonds had developed after this experience. Without a doubt, language study travel is one of the best forms of travel in my opinion, giving you the chance to learn, to expand your mind, and to really discover the local culture. And without a doubt I’ll be back in Sicily – this fascinating island has so much more to explore. This entire article including photos is located at http://www. travelandtransitions. com/stories_photos/sicily_2007. htm
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