【推荐1】India is known for many colorful and fun festivals. But none is as popular as the festival of lights, Diwali, which is also called Deepavali.

The celebration begins on October 21st, with Dhanteras. For those who love shopping, this is the best day of the celebration. That’s because in addition to honoring Lakshmi, the Hindu goddess of wealth, the day is also considered lucky to buy everything—from gold and silver ornaments (装饰品) to new clothes.

The following day is Kali Chaudas, or Narak Chaturdashi. For some Indians it is celebrated with good food and fireworks. For others, it is the time to drive out bad spirits from homes. No matter how it is celebrated, everyone’s mind is already focused (集中) on the big day that comes after—Diwali!

Diwali begins with a visit to temples where prayers (祷告) will be given. Then families and friends get together and celebrate by exchanging gifts and sweets. Those who missed the opportunity to buy goods on Dhanteras can make up for it on this equally lucky day. In the evening, households light up their homes with oil lamps and prepare delicious Indian food. Then starts the real fun—fireworks! What makes the displays exciting is that everyone gets to create his/her own show by lighting up their favorite fireworks.

For Indians, Diwali also marks the end of the year. They will celebrate the first day of the New Year the following day.

The final day of the festival honors the relationships between brothers and sisters and is celebrated with more special food and prayers.

For kids, Diwali is like Christmas, except earlier. They get a week’s vacation from school! It is no wonder that most kids consider Diwali the best festival of all.

【推荐1】Making my way slowly along the cliff (悬崖) face, I gazed (注视) at the great appearance of each temple I passed. As I entered the first cave and looked up at the feitian—an imagined flying god in Buddhist art, I wondered how many hundreds of thousands of others, from near and far, have looked at the same great paintings and statues.

Sometime between the 4^th and 14^th century, Mogao was an important Buddhist center connecting East Asia and South Asia. Hundreds of caves were carved into a cliff face running along the Daquan River. Located on the ancient Silk Road, one of the great trade routes in ancient times, it created an environment of artistic and cultural exchange between the different cultures.

My personal adventure to Dunhuang had taken me, by way of train and bus, from Xining in Qinghai Province to Lanzhou in Gansu Province, and through the Jiayu Pass. From there, I continued on through Yumen Pass, also known as the Jade Gate, and crossed the Gobi Desert to find this small and sleepy desert town, and to see these caves for myself.

As I explored the temples,I was amazed by the vividness (生动性) of the paintings and statues. It was almost as though they were painted or carved the day before. I had discovered the reason why people travel.

There are more than 2,000 coloured statues that were carved 1,500 years ago. More than 1,400statues are well-protected so they can still be appreciated. During the thousand years of artistic activity,the style of the wall paintings and statues changed. The early caves show greater Indian and Western influences,while during the Tang Dynasty the influences of Chinese painting styles became noticeable.

Today, the Mogao Caves stand out from the desert like a shinning pearl on the Silk Road.

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【推荐3】Getting a solid night’s rest when you’re sick can seem like an unattainable goal for any number of reasons. It’s difficult to fall asleep and stay asleep when you’re troubled by a stuffy nose, a constant cough, or other unbearable symptoms(症状). Fevers can make quality sleep even harder, thanks in part to fever dreams: especially vivid, unbelievable, or downright disturbing dreams that occur when you have a fever.

As the Sleep Foundation explains, fever dreams sometimes involve spatial distortion, such as moving walls and melting objects; threats or danger, which can be anything from insects to terrorists; and illness. If you were to have a dream fitting this description when you weren’t sick, you might just regard it as a common nightmare(噩梦). But since people seem to experience such strange dreams more often during fevers, it’s given rise to the idea that the two things must be linked.

While there’s a lot about fever dreams we don’t know, there is at least a little evidence supporting the theory that some people’s fever dreams are different from their regular dreams. In one study from 2016, researchers asked 62 people to describe past fever dreams and found them to be more unbelievable, more emotionally intense, and often negatively toned than regular dreams from an age and gender matched sample. Of the 164 people who participated in a 2020 survey, 100 reported fever dreams. The researchers noted that these dreams included more references to health and temperature sensations(感觉)compared to normal most recent dreams.

As for why fevers beget strange nightmares, scientists have some ideas. “One theory is that the brain doesn’t process sensations normally when we have a fever,” Dr Beth Malow, director of Vanderbilt University Medical Center’s sleep division, told Health in 2020. So burning up in your bed might just clearly show itself in a dream full of melting objects and seemingly unrelated dangers.