“Can I see my baby?” asked the new happy mother. Unluckily, she found her baby had been ________ without ears when it was in her arms.

Time proved that the baby’s ________ was perfect. He got on well with his classmates. But one day, he rushed home and said to his mother ________ tears in his eyes. “ A boy, a big boy ________ me a freak. As the boy ________, he developed a talent for art and music.

The boy’s father had a meeting with the family doctor. “Could anything ________ done?” He asked the doctor.

“I believe I could graft(移植) a pair of outer ears ________ you could get them,” the doctor said.

However, two years ________, nobody wanted to offer the young man ears. Then one day the father said, “Son, ________ will offer his ears to you, but it’s a secret.” The operation was a great ________.

Time kept the secret, but the day did come…. The young man stood with his father ________ his mother’s body. Slowly, the father held out a hand and raised the thick, brown hair. ________, the son found his mother had no outer ears.

“Mother said she was glad she ________ let her long hair be cut,” the father said gently, “ and nobody ever thought mother ________ beautiful, did they?”

Real ________ lies not in what is done and known, but in what is done but not known.

It has more than 845 million users worldwide. If it were a country, it would have the third largest population(人口) in the world, behind China and India. This is Facebook, a popular website from the US. It is similar to Renren in China.

Mark Zuckerberg was born on May 14, 1984. As a little kid, he loved creating little fun computer programs. He set up the network in February of 2004. He was then a second-year student at Harvard University. One day, he had the idea of building a website for Harvard students to get to know each other. He set up the Facebook website. Harvard students could share photos and their personal information there. Soon, the website became very famous. Zuckerberg decided to leave Harvard to run Facebook full time. It was the biggest adventure(冒险) in his life and later brought him great success. Now, the service is popular around the world.

Greeting such as “Have you checked your Facebook page today?” became a part of young people’s everyday language in the US. People can exchange messages and get the latest information about their friends on Facebook. Zuckerberg’s dream is to connect people through the Internet. “Facebook is to make the world more open and connected,’’ he said.

What’s the young man’s secret to success? Zuekerberg believes it’s important to have an open mind and be ready to try new things. “The riskiest thing is to take no risks,” he once said in an open letter. Sometimes the simplest ideas go furthest. We hope Mark can go much further, maybe even further than Bill Gates.

In Western society, especially in the English-speaking world, the chance for young people to see the other countries and experience life is considered important. Many young people, when they finish school at the age of 18, take a gap year before they go to university.

Parents often want their children to grow up a little and see what the real world is like when they finish school. Although they are worried about their safety, many think that the advantages of independence and experience are worth the worries. Children are encouraged to be brave, independent and to explore the world on their own or with friends.

Young people also want to experience freedom and see what life is like on the other side. This other side could be the other side of the world or just the other side of life. For example, if they have a rich life, they may want to see how people in poor areas live.

A gap year after school is also an important chance for young people to spend time thinking about what they want to do with their lives. A little bit of growing up and experience will help them make their important career decisions, especially when they are unsure about what they want to study.

Another reason for going straight after school is to get a break from studying before they start the next few years of university. So anywhere you travel in the world, you will meet young European people exploring the world.

So much of the world has been travelled and explored. The young people are now looking for more worthy experiences. Some of them work as volunteers to do something for the country they are visiting. Many gap year volunteers are now spending a few months teaching English in Thailand, helping feed giant pandas in China or building a well(井) in a village in Africa.

These young people’s wish to explore the world is an expression of the values of the societies that they are part of. Both discovering the world and making a positive difference in it are important parts of the Western mind.