UNDERAGE DRINKING

Did you know that for an American teenager who wants to buy alcohol, it would be easier to come and buy it in Chile than in the USA?
From my perspective, we should implement more ways to control the selling of alcohol in Chile.

Underage drinking has become very common in Chile nowadays. We can see that in most of the licor stores people are not asked for their ID when buying alcohol. This means that teenagers can easily buy a bottle of beer just by saying that it is for an adult who asked them to buy it.
In places such as discos or clubs there is more control, because ID is required to enter. However, there are many underage people who use a fake ID and the guards at the entrance do not even notice.

I would like to compare this to the measures taken in the USA to control the consumption of alcohol, because from my point of view, we should consider some of them. In the United States, people can not buy any kind of acohol if they do not show their ID or passport. They are asked for identification in licor stores and supermarkets.
They also have to be over eighteen years old to buy cigarettes and they are asked for their date of birth.
At the disco, people are given a color bracelet, which means they are over twenty one, so they are allowed to buy alcohol at the bar without showing identification. But people under twenty one years old have to wear a bracelet with a different color. That way it is known who can drink and who can not.

Some of these measures could be really helpful for our society, because alcoholism is affecting young people more and more everyday. Besides making people get drunk, it affects learning and people's behavior.
Putting this into practice in Chile and being more strict in this area, will definitely decrease alcoholism and some teenage behaviors, such as street fights and delincuence, which are becoming more common everyday.

"CULTURE SHOCK"

Time ago it was very uncommon to see black or asian people walking around Santiago. They were probably here for business or for vacation time, but today there are lots of foreigners living in our country, as well as in some other countries around the world. They work and their children go to school. Most of us know at least one person from another country and we spend time with them. Thing that time ago would had been an amazing experience to tell, but today it is not a big event. So, why is this term of " culture shock" so common nowadays?

Working or studying in a foreign country has become one of the most common activities among young people. They feel attracted for the new experience of meeting people with a different culture and a diffrent language. They would like to know some other ways of living, habits and customs; but sometimes this could be a "shocking experience". People are used to certain habits and behaviors, which in another place could be completely different or misunderstood. There are also external factors that could affect; such as weather, food, transportation, currency, language, etc.

What could we do not to be affected by this? We should be prepared for what we are going to live by investigating about the place we want to visit and about the people who live in it. Once we are there, we should be very careful about what we say and the way that we ask for things. This is because there are some cultures which have very special religious customs and they do not do or eat some things.
Maybe in your country people are very affectionate, some other cultures are kind of cold. And we should involve a little bit in the language, if it is different than ours, because that way we can ask for things like directions, go shopping, and having conversations. This way our stay will be much better and pleasant.

SMOKING

Everybody has heard about people who try to give up smoking by reading books or attending different courses, but nothing works for those compulsive smokers.
Would it be that people only quit smoking when they realize they are dying, even though they have always known that smoking kills you?

COMPUTER GAMES

Computer games have become part of children's culture nowadays. There is no kid who does not know how to play these games and they spend hours in front of the computer as if they were hypnotized. But, could this affect children's behavior because of the violence of these type of games? Should parents worry about what their children do when they are in front of the computer screen?