Laura Ponce

19’2026 (2026-01-19) – First day of the week

Posted on by What did you learn in School today ?

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Today, I learned about:

Have you ever thought about why the week contains seven days, at least in Western cultures? In Western cultures, it seems that 7 is a holy number used in many contexts, although Asians many times consider it a number that brings bad luck. More about that can be found in reference #1, under the heading History.

As I told you in my 10-year post on 9’2026 (2026-01-09) , during the upcoming posts I will review some of the older posts, and in fact, in the very second post on 10’2016 (2016-01-10), I mentioned that according to the international standard ISO 8601:2004, there is a normalized manner of writing dates in the format of “YYYY-MM-DD”.

But there are many more things to be considered in that standard, e.g. it states that the first day of a week is a Monday. However, you may live in a country that has the tradition of using Sunday as the first day of the week. Where I live, in Brazil, that is the normal way of thinking. And as a consequence, the days in Portuguese are named as Domingo, Segunda-feira, Terça-feira, Quarta-feira, Quinta-feira, Sexta-feira, and Sábado. You probably understand the meaning of what Monday through Friday is in Portuguese, but where does it come from? The Portuguese word “feira” means a sort of street market, where you can go and buy fruits, vegetables etc. In ancient Portugal, Sunday was the first day of the week with such a market, Monday was the second day, thus Segunda-feira, etc.!

Today’s header photo was taken in Schwerin, Northern Germany, by my friend Alfredo Acosta. It shows the castle built in the 12th century, replacing the ruins of a former slavic fortress and that is also the birth date of the city of Schwerin. More about Schwerin can be found in reference #2. (Alfredo’s wife, Laura Ponce, contributed with a photo from another German city, Greifswald, in my post 151’2025 (2025-05-31). Thank you both for your valuable contributions!

That’s what I learned in school today! 

Ref.:

1: Week history

2: Schwerin

*: What did you learn in school today?

151’2025 (2025-05-31) – Saturday

Posted on by What did you learn in School today ?

Today, I learned about:

My ongoing relation with CBDN, the Brazilian Confederation for Snowsports, has added another, impressive chapter. Earlier posts about CBDN can be found on 240’2022 (2022-08-28), 304’2022 (2022-10-31) , 334’2022 (2022-11-30) , 31’2023 (2023-01-31) , 272’2023 (2023-09-29), and 91’2024 (2024-03-31) .

On 146’2025 (2025-05-26), I was invited to a ceremony to mark the conclusion of the 2024/25 winter sport season. It was held in São Paulo at MIS, the museum for image and sound. The whole event was very well organized, with both an initial cocktail with delicious salty and sweet snacks and a bigger buffet during the half-time break.

It was really interesting to see the enthuiasm of so many talented athletes, both those with normal body conditions and those who participate in the para athletic disciplines. And the ceremony, which meant to reward the best of those, was also very well planned and executed, with a ceremony master, Beth Romero, who is a well-known sports journalist. A video from the ceremony can be found in reference #1 below, and here are also some photos:

As you can see from the photo in the upper left corner, the auditorium was packed with expectation from the athletes, their families, friends and supporters. The bottom photo in the left column shows the ceremony master, Beth Romero.
The three photos in the middle column show, from top to bottom: – Two of the most rewarded athletes, Aline Rocha and Cristian Ribera, both world champions in para ski cross country; – Cristian Ribera, showing the Crystal Globe as World Cup champion, rewarded as Athlete of the Season, flanked by CBDN President Anders Pettersson and COO Gustavo Haidar; – Some of the CBDN staff present during the ceremony, from left to right: Laura Dias, Luisa Crisol, Luíza Calaça, Thatiana Freire, Gustavo Haidar, Matheus Sales, Laura Costa, and Rafaella Malafaia.
In the rightmost column, from top to bottom: – CBDN President Anders Pettersson welcoming the audience to the cremony; – The trophy awarded to the Athletes of the Year in their respective disciplines; – The trophy awarded to the Athletes considered Revelations or Highlights during the Year.

Another highlight this month is related to my student of the Swedish language, Gabriel Bertho. I teach him Swedish so he can communicate well with his fellow colleagues at Linköping University of Technology. Gabriel, who is a technology student at UFSCar, the Federal University of São Carlos,  spent four months in Sweden in 2024 on a robotics project. The result of that project was presented by him at the 1st Brazilian Conference on Robotics in Belo Horizonte, MG, Brazil during the last three days of April, 2025. Here are two pictures of Gabriel and his presentation at the conference:

Finally, this month’s header photo was taken by another of my Swedish language students, Laura Ponce, who currently lives in Greifswald, Germany, where she took this springlike photo on 121’2025 (2025-05-01).

A beautiful spring photo taken on 121’2025 (2025-05-01) in Greifswald, Germany by Laura Ponce.

Thank you, Laura! More about Greifswald can be found in reference #2 below.

That’s what I learned in school today! 

Ref.:

1: Cerimônia de encerramento da temporada 2024/2025

2: Greifswald

*: What did you learn in school today?