Travelling in Paris

The uniform sandstone of the Haussmann buildings, the variety of golden historic monuments, and the attractive Seine and its elegant bridges have arguably made Paris the most recognizable and romanticized cityscape in the world. But though the city wears its history with characteristic style, it is also increasingly looking to the future and outwards to the rest of the world.

Where to go

Those looking to explore the city’s rich heritage can spend long afternoons getting lost in the Louvre or wandering the Orsay Museum, or ducking in and out of Paris’s countless historical churches. For more contemporary tastes, there’s plenty of exploring to be done in the less jam-packed outer regions-from arts venues (场所) on the sloping streets of Belleville to the luxurious hotels and reinvented bars.

When to go

You can come to Paris any time but the atmosphere is quite different at different times of year. Winter is a time for festivals and feasting on games and oysters (牡蛎). Spring and early summer are the time to make the most of city parks and café terraces, with fireworks set off on June 21 and military parade held on July 14. In August the capital slows down and some people love it for the feeling of calm. The autumn renewable activities start with a burst of energy for the new cultural season and big exhibition openings.

What to buy

Choose from one of the tastiest cheese selections in the city at La Fermetteon Rue Montorgueil and vacuum-pack your selection to bring home.

Know before you go

Embassy/Consulate: 0144513100; ukinfrance. fco. gov. uk for passports and most other visitor services.

It’s an unconventional setting. Children of varying ages are reading actively. Seated next to them are teenagers, many of them girls, staring at the Hindi alphabet(字母表)on the blackboard. In charge of this class are three young girls, not much older than their students. But when Tabassum, Tarannum and Rubina, no more than 22, start speaking, you know the difference. Their confidence takes you by surprise.

A little over 10 kilometres from Varanasi lies the village of Sajoi where illiteracy(文 盲)was quite common. It had blocked out modernity until recently, especially when it came to its women. Educating girls was considered pointless, and the possibility of women stepping out of their homes, unthinkable.

Things began to change in 2010 when Human Welfare Association (HWA), identified Sajoi for a planned intervention. HWA set up a centre in Sajoi to offer free education but the villagers needed to be convinced to join in. The organization needed volunteers who valued education. Tabassum, Tarannum and Rubina embraced the opportunity.

After completing their high school education, the girls set out on another important mission-persuading the locals to send their children to schools. “We went knocking at every door, talking to elders, “recalls Rubina. Some villagers asked them to mind their own business. “We didn’t let all this distract our attention from the main goal, ” Rubina says.

The girls honed their approach. They didn’t ask people to stop their children from working, but urged them to send them to schools for an hour or two. Slowly, children started trickling(缓 慢增加)in. Motivational Learning Centre, as the girls call it, is no replacement for school. It is there, in fact, that they create the hunger for knowledge. It also helps school-going children so they don’t lose interest and drop out.

Those who doubted the girls’ intentions now recommend the centre to others. The number of admissions to schools has steadily increased and the dropout rate in Sajoi has fallen.

In the threatening trouble of climate change, growing commercial crops on solar farms is a potentially efficient use of agricultural land that can both increase commercial food production and improve solar panel performance and longevity(寿命), according to a new Cornell research.

“We now have, for the first time, a physics-based tool to estimate the costs and benefits of co-locating solar panels and commercial agriculture in terms of increased power conversion efficiency and solar-panel longevity, ” said lead author Henry Williams, a doctoral student in Cornell Engineering.

“There is potential for agrivoltaic (农业光伏) systems-where agriculture and solar panels coexist-to provide increased passive cooling through taller panel heights, more reflective ground cover and higher evapotranspiration (蒸散) rates compared to traditional solar farms,” said Max Zhang, professor in the Sibley School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, “We can generate renewable electricity and conserve farmland through agrivoltaic systems.” In New York, for example, about 40% of solar farm capacity has been developed on agricultural lands, while about 84% of land suitable for solar development is agricultural, according to a previous research study from Zhang’s group.

The engineers showed that solar panels mounted over vegetation reveal surface temperature drops compared to those built over bare ground. Solar panels were mounted 4 meters above a cotton crop and the solar panels showed temperature reductions by up to 10 degrees Celsius, compared with those mounted a half-meter above bare soil.

“As you decrease the solar panel operating temperature, you can increase efficiency and improve the longevity of your solar panels, ” said Williams, “We’re showing double benefits. On one hand, you have food production for farmers, and on the other hand, we’ve shown improved longevity and improved conversion efficiency for solar developers.”

“Up to this point, most of the benefits from agrivoltaic systems have been around areas with abundant sunshine, ” said Zhang, “This research is taking a step toward evaluating the application of agrivoltaics in climates representative of the Northeastern U. S. in relaxing the land-use competition it faces.”