【推荐2】The Wrestler Who Became an Author

Pete Watson looks like the biggest, sweetest teddy bear you ever saw. It is only when he opens his mouth that you notice his missing front teeth. He is a three-time world champion wrestler and now an author who has written several novels. However, what impresses people most is not his status as a champion or an author, but his unique understanding of wrestling.

Watson does not come from a traditional wrestling family. His father was an athletics director with a PhD, while his mother was a physical education teacher. He was a big boy, who was often bullied for his size. One day his neighbor had a go at him, and for the first time Watson realized that he could use his weight and size instead of feeling awkward about it. It was a turning point.

At college, he did a degree in communication studies. Meanwhile, he was learning the ropes of professional wrestling. His parents did not object to his learning to wrestle. They were just really insistent that he finished college. “I am pretty sure that they thought I’d get hurt and quit, but I didn’t,” he said. Watson insisted on the training and enjoyed every game. Once he said to his fans, “The process of the games is the most enjoyable thing for me. It’s good to have a lot of cheers during the games. They encourage me to do it better.”

Some fans asked him what he thought of wrestling, for they wanted to know if he had to be a good actor to become a good wrestler. Watson gave a definite answer. “I used to really dislike the acting label,” he said. “But it is acting. When it’s really good, when you’re feeling it and letting that real emotion fly, it comes closer to being real.”

Now Watson has retired and devoted the time to his family and books—his next novel is about boy wrestlers living on the same block. He does not think this life is so different from wrestling. “Wrestling is all about characters,” he says. “So when my fans hear I’ve written a novel, I don’t get the sense that they feel I’ve abandoned them.”

【推荐1】A new term has started in not only China, but also in Japan, the UK and Mexico. But as COVID-19 continues, how are these countries controlling the pandemic(大流行病)?

Since Aug 24, school has restarted in Japan. To help control the pandemic, some schools delayed opening school by one week, some schools divided their students into two groups for half a day twice a week and some schools tried hard to avoid the 3Cs(closed spaces, crowded places and close-contact settings). One solution was to open all the areas between classrooms and hallways to increase the spacing of desks.

Pupils are returning to school across the UK, even though new daily cases peaked at 54,674 on July 19 according to Reuters.

All young people aged 16-17 in England were offered a first dose(剂量) of a COVID-19 vaccine by Aug 23 to give them protection before returning to school.

The Department for Education said schools and colleges would be maintaining appropriate protective measures. Pupils will be encouraged to carry on the twice-weekly testing regime(管理制度). Schools will also take measures, such as opening windows to help keep children and staff safe.

“The huge expansion of rapid testing for those working in education is a milestone moment in our work to keep schools and colleges open for all,” said Education Secretary Gavin Williamson.

In Mexico, with temperature checks and open windows, millions of Mexican school children began returning to classrooms on Aug 30 after more than a year of distance learning. The government said the return would be “voluntary and safe”, saying it would adopt a mixed model with both face-to-face and distance learning. Mexican classrooms have a maximum of six students at a time, and desks are covered with plastic and spaced farther apart. Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said that more and more families will choose a “new normal” life, according to AP News.

【推荐3】There have been few positives during the Covid pandemic but British academics may have spotted one: People look more attractive in protective masks.

Researchers at Cardiff University were surprised to find that both men and women were judged to look better with a face mask covering the lower half of their faces. They also discovered that a face covered with a disposable-type surgical mask (一次性外科罩) was likely to be considered the most attractive, which may be a blow for producers of fashionable coverings and the environment.

Dr Michael Lewis, a reader from Cardiff University’s school of psychology, said research before the pandemic had found that medical face masks reduced attractiveness because they were associated with illness.

“We wanted to test whether this had changed since face coverings became popular,” he said.

“Our study suggests faces are considered most attractive when covered by medical face masks. This may be because we’re used to healthcare workers wearing blue masks and now we associate these with people in caring or medical professions. At a time when we feel weak, we may find the wearing of medical masks secure and so feel more positive towards the wearer.”

The first part of the research was carried out in February 2021 by which time the British population had become used to wearing masks in some places. Forty-three women were asked to rate on a scale of 1 to 10 --the attractiveness of images of male faces without a mask, wearing a plain cloth mask, a blue medical face mask, and holding a plain black book covering the area a face mask would hide.

The participants said those wearing a cloth mask were much more attractive than the ones with no masks or whose faces were partly covered by the book. But the surgical mask- which was just a normal, disposable kind-made the wearer look even better. Lewis said it was also possible that masks made people more attractive because they directed attention to the eyes. He said other studies had found that covering the left or right half of a face also made people look more attractive, partly because the brain fills in the missing gaps and beautify the overall effect.

The results of the first study has been published in the journal Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications. A second study has been carried out, in which a group of men look at women in masks; it has yet to be published but Lewis said the results were probably the same.