Traveling to Europe can be expensive, butif you get creative and avoid tourist hot spots like London and Paris, you may be able to avoid high price tags. According to average hotel prices,flight deals,available vacation packages and affordable attractions, you can choose the best cheap European vacations.

Apart from the price of flying here,you won’t have to dish out too much money to experience Prague. Many of the city’s most popular attractions are free to visit, including Old Town Square, the Charles Bridge and PetrinHill. You can also find five-star hotels for less than $200 per night here, plus plenty of solid three and four star accommodations with even cheaper rates.

This cheap Portuguese destination is getting increasingly popular,so make sure to visit while it’s still affordable. Right now, you can take the train from Porto to Lisbon for as little as $ 30 one way. Once you arrive in, you’ll be delighted to learn that several top attractions here, such as the Dom Luis I Bridge, the Porto Cathedral and the Crystal Palace gardens, are free to visit.

Valencia has numerous beautiful beaches. It is also a lot more affordable. The city offers a diverse range of free things to do, including relaxing on the sand, wandering through Plaza del Ayuntamiento, exploring the Valencia Cathedral and shopping at the Central Market, one of the oldest food market areas in Europe.

Tallinn draws travelers to Estonia with its charming atmosphere and historical attractions. Start by walking through the capital’s Old Town, which is webbed with cobblestone streets, old-world buildings and all kinds of medieval delights. Then, explore the city’s museums. If you plan on visiting multiple museums, it may cost about $ 65.

On a typical day, off the coast of a small Brazilian island, Pereira headed out to fish. He was disheartened to find that an oil leak had polluted the waters. Staring out at the waves with their oil sheen(光泽), he decided it was not a good day to fish. But walking on the beach that day, he found a struggling penguin, covered in oil and starving.

Pereira took the penguin home, gently cleaned it and spent the next week nursing it back to health. He named it Dindim, which belongs to a species known for living in the seas of South America. In order to bear babies, they must return to Patagonia, 8,000 kilometers from Pereira’s home. Pereira patiently took Dindim back to the ocean and taught it how to swim again. Soon enough, it was time for Dindim to return to life in the wild. Pereira watched Dindim swim away, believing it would be the last time he saw it.

But the next June,Dindim returned. The two shared a warm-hearted greeting, and Dindim stayed for a month,wandering around the fisherman’s house. The time to leave arrived, and Pereira thought this surely would be the last time he would see Dindim. But in the same month of the year after next, the penguin with a long memory returned again.

It is a common belief among scientists that animals have short memories. So, a couple of them put a tracking device on Dindim to seeif it was indeed the same penguin that returned year after year. To their surprise, but not Pereira’s, Dindim returned, year after year, for more than a decade.

A college degree is helpful for many practical reasons, ranging from your increased competitiveness to the increased likeliness that you’ll be promoted within your job. However, people think little of the degree of personal growth that they’ll experience as they’re working through their degrees. A college education requires students to overcome all types of difficulties and prepares themselves not only for the workplace, but for dealing with many of life’s challenges.

Time management and organization, for example, are just two examples of the skills that you’re likely to get the hang of during your time in college. Both are needed to successfully deal with the many courses you will take and the tasks before you. Tests, exams, and home-work dates can all become confusing when you’re dealing with multiple classes. Good organization can help you manage all of your responsibilities, and it’s a skill that will be useful once you have your degree. Not only is it useful in the workplace,but it can help you manage your personal responsibilities at home as well. Even simple tasks like bill payments are made easier when you can properly track what is due and when.

Of course, on a larger level, the sort of personal development you’ll experience will large-ly be related to overcoming difficulties. College requires that you overcome one challenge after another, ranging from learning courses to passing tests or completing projects. You’ll need to be not only intelligent but disciplined in order to complete your schooling. These traits(特质)are often developed slowly throughout college. As you learn how to better respond to stress and difficulties, you’ll slowly find that you’re better able to deal with difficulties in a number of situations.

March 3 is World Wildlife Day, an opportunity to celebrate the wonderful diversity of plants and animals on earth. This day also marks the 50th anniversary of an international agreement between governments to ensure the trading of wild animals and plants—which is estimated to be worth billions of US dollars globally—doesn’t threaten species’ survival.

The voluntary deal, called the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora(CITES), provides varying degrees of protection to more than 37,000 species globally. The text of the convention was agreed at a meeting on March 3,1973 and it came into force in 1975. It provides a framework for 184 participants to ensure sustain-able trading of wild species for products such as food, fur and medicines.

“Without CITES, we’d lack a vital mechanism to turn off the ever-flowing and sorrowful deal of species driven by market demand,” said Abigail Entwistle at conservation charity in a press release.

The mountain gorilla is one species benefiting from a total trade ban under CITES in partner ship with this charity. Since this began, the population size has risen fourfold to more than 1,000 individuals. The pygmy hippos(侏儒河马)are also protected by CITES. They are found in the forests and swamps of West Africa, with most living in Liberia. Recently, conservationists have confirmed that pygmy hippos have a wider distribution than previously thought.

Grenadines pink rhino iguana(犀牛鬣蜥)is a striking species, which is threatened by hunting, because it still lacks CITES protection. Since 2016, the charity has been working with local and international partners to protect this species. The important point is that it works. The charity says“a CITES listing would be the logical next step”to better protect its survival.

Left-handed people make up around 12% of the global population. One really interesting fact that I picked up was from a scientist who believed that left-handed people tended to be more independent as a result of having to adapt to a world that is largely built for right-handed individuals.    36    !

A study found that left-handed people were 11 times more likely to suffer from allergies than right-handed folk.    37    .

    38    , meaning that the right side controls the left side of the body and the other way around. Hence there is a well-known saying “only left-handed people are in their right minds”. The right-hand side of the brain is thought to control the left side of the body and tasks to do with the arts and creativity.

    39    ! One 2007 study “Effect of handedness on intelligence level of students”shows that lefties are more likely to have higher IQ. However,another 2010 study “The relationship between hand preference, hand performance, and general cognitive ability” suggests the exact opposite!

Experiments showed that when given two tasks to complete simultaneously (同时), lefties performed best. This is because right-handed people tend to solve problems by breaking them down into parts and analyzing each piece one at a time. While left-handed people tend to look at the problem as a whole and use pattern-matching to try and solve it.

Sha’Kyra was planning a party with her husband at home on a winter afternoon. Outside their house, a_______was sweeping through her city violently. Her three children were_______at one of their friends’ home due to the snowstorm. She suddenly heard a man _______ for help outside her door. She immediately dialed 91l to help the_______trapped in the freezing cold. Due to the dangerous weather, dispatchers (调度员)_______her that they would add her request to the already_______ list of incoming emergency calls.

Sha’Kyra took matters into her own_______. Her husband helped her carry the helpless man into their home so she could care for him until_______arrived.

The man, Joe White, lives nearby in a group disability home. He was_______his usual path home from his job when he found himself________stuck in the storm. The rapidly worsening storm conditions and angry winds made it________for him to continue on his journey home.

Joe’s terrible________included severe frostbite (冻伤). Sha’Kyra used a blow dryer to________the ice from his red hands. She________his body in blankets and kept him as________as possible as he rested. Joe gave Sha’Kyra his sister’s phone number. Sha’Kyra talked with his sister, Yvonne, over the________, which comforted Joe.

Sha’Kyra knew that Joe needed immediate________attention. She pleaded (恳求) for help on social media. Kind community members________to her request and traveled to her home to transport Joe to the________hospital. Joe remained in stable conditions at the hospital.

Yvonne believes that Sha’Kyra’s kind actions saved her brother’s life. She said that she and her brother now “have an________family member”.

Ever wonder    61    it would feel like to hide away in a dark cave without being connected to the outside world for 40 days? Fifteen people in France just did that. The group    62    (live) in a cave as part of the Deep Time project. The project was conducted by scientists from the Human Adaptation Institute, who wanted to see how they would react to and cope with being    63    (total) disconnected from the modern world. Since the volunteers    64    (cut) off from the outside world, they had to rely    65    their body clock to know when    66     (wake) up, go to sleep and eat. As expected, those in the cave lost their sense of time. “Time seemed to pass more slowly in the underground cave, where there were neither clocks    67    sunlight,” said Deep Time’s director Christian Clot.

The majority of the volunteers said they enjoyed the experience of total isolation. Two-thirds expressed a desire to remain underground a while    68    (long) in order to finish projects they had started. “The experience tested humans’ ability to adjust    69    (they) to the sudden huge changes in living conditions and environments,” said Clot. “We hope to better understand how our brains are capable of    70    (find) new solutions, whatever the situation.”