【推荐1】I remember waking up early on Saturday mornings when I was 12 to go and see patients with my dad. He volunteered once a month at a health center in downtown that served the city’s Spanish-speaking population. He would bring his own equipment — a lamp and a large machine called an autorefractor (自动验光仪). There was always a line of people waiting when we arrived. I’d sometimes help with translating, but often my father would ask me to run the autorefractor, which would give a judgement of the patients’ visual acuity (视力).

After completing checks and treatments, my dad would offer a deeply discounted operation on a later date to those who needed it. Besides volunteering, my father’s practice was one of the few in the area that accepted people without insurance, despite the risk of losing money. He sometimes came home with a piece of artwork or some food from patients who couldn’t pay for their care and instead offered a gift of their talents. He thought all the patients should receive the same care, regardless of their ability to pay.

Volunteering seemed like a task to me at the time. Little did I know that my father was planting the seeds (种子) of serving the Spanish-speaking community in my mind and heart. He never forced me to go into medicine, but what I saw through him was that one person can truly make a difference in the world.

It’s this type of character of devotion and service that has inspired so many doctors to apply for medical school every year. I am fortunate that my father has given an example of this in his 40 years as a doctor because it was what he had done that inspired me to dive into this great job. I can only hope that I can be that same type of light for others.

【推荐2】Bruce is a manager who had a team of around 40 people. Most of them were bright, enthusiastic, and hardworking young fellows. This helps to promote their independence.     1     But as a team, they are not so good, which is crucial for the organization.

    2    He invited everyone to a hall for a game consisting of 3 rounds. For the first round, he told everyone to blow a balloon kept on the table and then write their name on it without bursting it, and each of them did it. Then they took a break outside for the second round. Soon after he called them back in, with more balloons scattered around without names on them. He declared that they had 15 minutes to find the balloon with their name written on it.     3    

For the next round, Bruce told them if any team member found a balloon with a name on it, he or she had to give it to the owner of the name. All started searching, and within a couple of minutes everyone had their own balloon with their name on it. Bruce went to the dais and said, “You see, in the second round, no one was able to find their balloons as they were working on individual targets. But in the final round. within a couple of minutes, everyone had the balloon with them.     4    ”

Most of the time, people hide information, avoid collaboration, and distance themselves from their team members.    5    And it also, in the long run, affects the individual. So, everyone in the team should share and work effectively for greater ambition for the team.

【推荐3】Alysa Liu is an ice skater. In 2016, the then 10-year-old girl became the youngest intermediate figure skating （花样滑冰）champion in U.S. history. In 2018, Liu became the youngest to compete in and win the U.S. junior championships.

In January, 2019, she made history again at the Geico U.S. Women's Figure Skating Championships. At the championships, things were initially going well for the defending U.S. champion Bradie Tennell. But later Tennell had a falling in her performance. Meanwhile, Liu became the first and youngest U.S. woman to land three triple axels （三周半跳）in competition.

Though Liu made them look, easy, triple axels are extremely challenging. The skater has to jump from the outside edge of one skate, turning in the air. "Double" or “triple" refers to the number of rotations （旋转）the skater completes before landing. The term is a little misleading given that the skater has to do an extra half rotation, meaning that for a triple, the skater is actually completing 3.5 rotations. To be successful, the skater has to have both incredible body strength and control.

When asked about her great performance, Liu thought it was not worth showing off. And she was enthusiastic about preparing for bigger games. But Liu was ineligible to compete at the 2019 World Figure Skating Championships in Japan due to the minimum age requirement of 15. However, that didn't bother her.

Liu fell in love with ice skating during her first lesson at a center. She showed such talent that Laura Lipetsky, who was teaching the group lessons, asked her father to let her receive private lessons. Lipetsky said, “She wanted to learn, and I wanted to guide." The two have been inseparable since then. In 2017 Laura sent Liu to the University of Delaware for a certain analysis that researchers have created to help outstanding American skaters improve their jump techniques.

Liu has been homeschooled since the age of 10. She gets her homework done between daily practices, and usually eats dinner in the car on her way home. Though that might appear to be a lot for someone so young, Liu takes it happily.

【推荐2】George Ahearn, who grew up in the farming town of Othello, Washington, co-founded EastWest Food Rescue after learning that COVID-19 was costing local farmers so much business that they were willing to destroy their crops.

His nonprofit has since moved three million pounds of produce from farms in eastern Washington to the western part of the state for distribution to hundreds of food banks and meal programs. “I know these people that I grew up with on one hand, and on the other hand I know there is a need here; I’m just going to connect the two dots,” said Ahearn, 45, who now lives in Bothell, Washington.

He started by calling local food banks who said they would be glad to take some of the produce that would otherwise go to waste. But when he called the farmers, they wanted to give him truck loads of potatoes and onions—more than Ahearn’s car could handle. He also had another problem; food banks needed the potatoes and onions to be cleaned and bagged before donation (捐赠). “What I didn’t realize was the logistical nightmare because I thought I could just show up with potatoes harvested straight from the ground and give them right to the food bank... I couldn’t believe it.”

So, Ahearn put out a call for help on Facebook. That’s how he connected with his two co-founders, Nancy Balin and Zsofia Pasztor. While Balin helped organize the convoy (运输) to drive across Washington to pick up the produce, Pasztor assembled volunteers to clean and bag the food, which was then distributed through connections at her another nonprofit Farmer Frog.

Since May, EastWest Food Rescue has grown the size of its operations and convoys. They have reached three million pounds of donated food.

Aheam has a message for anyone who wants to make their community (社区) a better place, “I have seen minutes of effort move thousands, and thousands of pounds (of food). Just figure out what you are passionate about and what you could get involved in.”

【推荐3】

If you have ever seen a snowflake design on jewelry or a bag, chances are it was based on one of Wilson Bentley’s more than 5,000 photomicrographs of snow crystals (晶体).

At first, though, Bentley did not have any way to share his enjoyment of the delicate hexagons (六边形) other than to draw them. He spent hours outside or inside his unheated storeroom with a microscope. He would pick up a snow crystal and transfer it to a microscope slide. There, he flattened it with a bird feather. Then, holding his breath, he observed the crystal and hurried to draw what he saw before it turned forever into thin air.

A few years later, Bentley began his pursuit to photograph a snow crystal. He attached a microscope to a camera. Time after time, his negatives appeared blank. The following winter, he finally figured out that too much light was reaching the camera. His solution was to place a metal plate with a tiny hole in the center beneath the stage of the microscope. It cut down the stray (杂散的) light and allowed only the light waves carrying the image to reach the camera.

On January 15, 1885, at the age of 19, Bentley finally photographed a snowflake! He spent many hours over the next 45 years in his tiny darkroom developing negatives.

Bentley lived his entire life on his childhood farm. He farmed for a living. To his friends and family, he was kind, gentle, and funny “Willie”. But to scientists, he was the untrained researcher who became a snow crystal pioneer. He wrote for science journals. He not only photographed snow crystals but also became an authority on dew (露水) and frost. He kept a detailed daily log of local weather conditions throughout his life. He developed a method to measure the size of raindrops too.

Bentley never made more than a few thousand dollars from his work. It had been a labor of love, and he was satisfied to be able to share the beauty of his snow crystals with the world. And today, he is remembered as Snowflake Bentley.