Off-topic

The EU has made a list of eight key competences for lifelong learning - eight requirements for an educated European. Communication in other languages is listed second, which underlines its importance. Each year the EU invests lots of money in the promotion of multi-lingualism. Most of us also invest a lot to be able to speak at least one foreign language well. What are the returns?

I read some shocking news from my fellow babelblogger. It made me realise how little I know about the history of the Balkans. Does anybody know more about this? Were there any explanations from the Vatican, apologies? Can't really spend much time researching that at the moment, but I'd certainly want to go back to the story.

The company called "Palink" (as far as I know, it belongs to the IKI supermarket chain) seems to be, consciously or unconsciously, hiding the existence of a harmful chemical in one of its imported products, namely, canned shrimp. I noticed it myself as I was going to use the product.

The Lithuanian ingredient list is the following: "Sudėtis: lukštentos krevetės (180 vnt. ir daugiau), vanduo, druska, cukrus, rūgštingumą reguliuojanti medžiaga E330, antioksidantai: E223, E685 (natrio disulfitas)." It lists the shrimp, of course, salt, sugar, and three ingredients marked with E, which people often view with caution.

The producer's French version of the ingredient list, stamped on the can, is the following: "Ingredients: 180 crevettes et plus, eau, sel, sucre, exhausteurs de gout: E621 (glutamate monosodique), acidifiant: E330, antioxygennes: E223, E685".

I don't know if the importer is concsiously hiding the fact that the product contains harmful monosodium glutamate (E621), which causes light forms of addiction, distorts the sense of taste, may cause obesity and is thus not recommended for children. Most people usually don't know what side-effects E621 produces. However, a few months ago there was an article about it on Delfi, the most popular news portal, so quite some people must have read it.

I can never memorise the codes for all of the harmful chemicals, but I try to avoid those that I know. It is very difficult, if not impossible, to avoid E621 if you like herring or chilli nuts.

People do marry out of financial and other "rational" reasons - and they have a right to! But all of the sudden, when one of the spouses is from outside the EU, the presumption of guilt is valid: it's a sham marriage unless they can prove it's not.