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Liz Balmaseda, My friend Gloria

SOMETIMES I JUST FORGET who the world says she is. I think she's just an old friend from high school, She went to

Our Lady of Lourdes, a school for Cuban girls in Miami, and I went to Notre Dame Academy, another school for

Cuban girls in Miami. She was a year ahead of me. But you know how it is - you always remember those older than

you in school, but not those younger. So I remember her. And she doesn't remember me. She doesn't even

remember the time we went bowling together. Correction: the time we went bowling with friends.

It was the first time I met Gloria Fajardo and the only time I talked to her before she became Gloria Estefan and a pop

superstar.

She was our homegirl. Strangely enough, throughout my years as a journalist in Miami and her years as a singer, our

paths didn't cross until about three years ago.

We danced at the same high school dances, in the same cafeterias. And of course, there was Gloria and her

boyfriend Emilio's band, the Miami Sound Machine. They played in English, in Spanish, in Spanglish. They did Cuban

and rock'n'roll. Their music made us conga like street dancers in old Havana. We were the Miami Beat Generation.

Gloria and Emilio gave us the Miami Beat. But the great thing is that they took that song around the world four times,

but they never left us. Okay, so she lives in a big house on Star island, Miami Beach, but here's the larger point: She

never stopped being a cubanita. She could be feasting at the palace of Versailles in France, and you just know she's

craving platanitos from the Versailles cafeteria in Little Havana, Miami.

I believe we all gasped at once when we heard about her bus accident in I990. When I saw the news - Gloria in critical

condition, possibly paralyzed after a back injury - I cried, not for a star, but for a sister.

She started her fifth world tour in Atlanta on the day before the start of the summer Olympics. Her album 'Destiny'

includes a song she wrote especially for the summer games, "Reach." (She sang it at the closing ceremonies.)

Sometimes I think I'd like to join her for a part of the tour. In Europe, maybe. It must be strange, I sometimes think, to

see her so far from Miami, carrying so much of Miami on stage.

She is who we are.

 

(about 420 words)

 

from the magazine Si, October 1996, Los Angeles

 

1.1. What is this text about?

 

  
1.2. Which details do we get about Gloria?

 

  
1.3. Would you like to be a pop star? Say why or why not. Write at least 100 words.

 

 

 

2.1. If the weather is OK this weekend,

2.2. But if the sun does not shine,  

2.3. Dad would be very angry,

2.4. If she found a pen-friend in England,  

2.5. If we do this French test well,  

2.6. If you went to England next winter,  

2.7. If it was Sunday today,  

2.8. If he suddenly found himself in Buckingham Palace,  

2.9. I'd go to the cinema this evening,  

2.10. They'll be surprised,  

3.1. - "How long (you / know) Jayne?"

- “ (I / know) her for twenty years."

- (she / meet) your parents yet ?"

- "Yes, .”

3.2. - "When (you/see) him last ?"

- "I (see / not) him for at least two monthss. I think it (be) at Ian's birthday party that I  (meet) him last."

3.3. “ (ever / you / read) a book on Indians?"

- "Yes, I . I (read) 'Sitting Bull' last week."

- "How (you / like) it?

- "It (be) very thrilling.

3.4. - (you / take) any photos when you (be) in Wales last summer?"

- "Yes, I .   (I / show / yet / not) them to you?"