【推荐1】In a small village, there is a room with one hundred mirrors (镜子). One day, a small and happy dog runs into this place. When he arrives, he looks at the mirrors with his ears high and his tail wagging (尾巴摇摆). Then he finds that there are one hundred other happy dogs with their tails wagging quickly like him. He is good with them, and then gets one hundred great smiles (微笑) back. He is so happy to see those one hundred warm and friendly dogs. When he leaves the house, he thinks this is an interesting place. He says, “I want to come back and visit it often.”

In the same village, there is another dog. He is always not happy. One day, he also runs into this place. When he sees one hundred unfriendly dogs looking back at him, he shouts at them first, and is afraid to see one hundred dogs growling back at him. When he leaves, he thinks this is a terrible place. He says, “I never want to come back here again.”

All the faces in the world are mirrors. What you get from people is just what you give to them.

根据短文内容，回答下列问题。

I wasn’t satisfied with myself because I kept on comparing myself with other people. So I felt quite upset. One day my grandpa shared a story with me.

“Once upon a time, there was a dog called Rex.” Grandpa said, “One day, Rex went to a circus (马戏团) and he found the tightrope (钢丝) walker was talented. He wanted to be a tightrope walker, too. However, as soon as he tried it, he fell heavily to the ground. But that didn’t seem to teach him a lesson. This time, he talked with a snake in the park. The snake said so many good things about being a snake. So he decided to do what a snake did. However, when Rex practiced slithering (滑行) between rocks, he got stuck and it took him a long time to get out.”

“Why didn’t he learn to be himself?” I asked, “A dog is cute and friendly.”

“Yes, I’m very glad that you can understand what I’m talking about,” Grandpa said. Till then I knew I was wrong.

“Grandpa, thank you for telling me this story.” I said, “________________________________”

【推荐1】A Kentucky（肯塔基）family took a vacation to New York City. One day，the father took his son into a rather large building. They were surprised at everything they saw—especially（特别地）the elevator（电梯）at one end of the building.

The boy asked，“What’s this，Pa?”

The father answered，“Son，I have never seen anything like this in my life. I don’t know what it is!”

While the boy and his father were watching in surprise，an old lady walked slowly to the moving walls and pressed（按）a button. The walls opened and the lady walked into a small room. The walls closed and the boy and his father watched small lights above the walls light up. They went on watching the lights up in the opposite direction. The walls opened again，and a beautiful young lady stepped out.

The amazed（惊愕的）father quickly turned to his son and said，“Go，get your Mom here.”

A boy called Kenny moved to countryside from a large city. He wanted to buy a donkey (驴子) from a farmer. It cost him 100 dollars. The farmer agreed to bring the donkey the next day. The next day, the farmer came and say, “Sorry, the donkey died(死了).” “OK,” he said. “Please give the money back to me.” “But I have spent all the money!” “Then give me the donkey,” Kenny said. The farmer wondered, “Why do you want the dead donkey?” “I can use it as a prize in a draw lot (抽奖).” The farmer shouted, “No one wants a dead donkey! You are crazy.” Kenny answered , “Don’t worry! I won’t tell them the donkey is dead.”

A few months later, the farmer met Kenny. “How about the dead donkey?” he asked. Kenny said, “Well, I held a lucky draw lot, and I told them the prize is a donkey. I sold 500 tickets, 2 dollars each. So I got 998 dollars.” The farmer was very much surprised. “Why doesn’t anyone say ‘No?’ “Kenny answered, “Only the winner said ‘No’. So I gave the money that he bought the tickets to him.”

Many years later, when Kenny grew up, he became the chief of Anther (安然公司主管).

There was a beautiful peacock out on a rainy day in the forest. He looked at himself in a puddle (水坑). He said, “How beautiful I am!” But when he heard his own voice, he became sad. It was rough (粗哑的). Then, he heard a nightingale sing in the trees.

Listening to the nightingale’s sweet voice, he began to cry. “Why don’t I have such a beautiful voice?” At that moment, the goddess Juno appeared. She went to the peacock. “Why are you upset?” Juno asked. The peacock told her about his rough voice. “Why does the nightingale get such a beautiful voice? My voice sounds like rocks rolling over sand.”

Juno petted the peacock. Then she said, “Every living thing is special in its own way. The nightingale has a beautiful voice, but you colors! The nightingale told me he wants to look like you. He is sad about his brown color.”

The peacock stood up a little straighter. “Hmm, maybe you’re right,” he said. “I have the prettiest feathers (羽毛) in the forest. The nightingale has the prettiest voice. We are both great in our own ways.”

The peacock didn’t worry about his voice any more. Instead, he remembered what made him special.

Some people bring out the best in you in a way that you might never have fully realized on your own. My mom was one of those people.

My father died when I was nine months old, making my mom a single mother at the age of eighteen. While I was growing up, we lived a very hard life. We had little money, but my mom gave me a lot of love. Each night, she sat me on her lap and spoke the words that would change my life, “Kemmons, you are certain to be a great man and you can do anything in life if you work hard enough to get it.” At fourteen, I was hit by a car and the doctors said I would never walk again. Every day, my mother spoke to me in her gentle, loving voice, telling me that no matter what those doctors said, I could walk again as long as I insisted on practicing walking. She drove that message so deep into my heart that I finally believed her. A year later, I returned to school—walking on my own!

When the Great Depression hit, my mom lost her job. Then I left school to support the both of us. At that moment, I was determined never to be poor again.

Over the years, I experienced various levels of business success. But the real turning point happened on a vacation I took with my wife and five kids in 1951. I was dissatisfied with the second-class hotels available for families and was angry that they charged an extra $2 for each child. That was too expensive for the average American family. I told my wife that I was going to open a motel (汽车旅馆) for families that would never charge extra for children. Not surprisingly, mom was one of my strongest supporters. She worked behind the desk and even designed the room style. As in any business, we experienced a lot of challenges. But with my mother’s words deeply rooted in my soul, I never doubted we would succeed. Fifteen years later, we had the largest hotel system in the world—Holiday Inn. In 1979, my company had 1,759 inns in more than fifty countries with an income of $ 1 billion a year.

You may not have started out life in the best situation. But if you can find a task in life worth working for and believe in yourself, nothing can stop you.

【推荐2】In China, people think the tiger and the cat are good friends. They also think the cat is much smarter, so the tiger wants to learn from the cat. After three months, the tiger can do the same things as the cat can.

One summer afternoon, the cat sleeps and the tiger sits by him. ,Looking at the cat, the tiger thinks, Since (既然) I can do the same things as the cat can, why should I keep being friends with him? Then he wants to kill the cat for his dinner. At that time the cat wakes up（醒来). He runs away quickly and climbs up to a tree.

The next day, when the tiger meets the cat, he asks the cat why he doesn't teach him to climb a tree. The cat says, "I want to teach you,' but I don't want to teach you how to kill me.

How could a high school student have a part time job? After all, we are already so busy with our studies. Well, it can be done.

My new neighbors are a foreign family who just came to China. The parents are both English teachers and their son, John, is a student. One day, they asked me whether I would work as a “part-time teacher” to teach John some basic（基础的）Chinese so that he can get around better, and l agreed.

At first, I thought it would be a piece of cake. How hard would it be to learn Chinese? So I didn’t really prepare anything in advance（提前）. I thought I had enough Chinese to teach a foreigner.

However, thinking is one thing, and doing it well is another. When I started teaching John, I realized that there’s so much culture and history in our language. Why are there four tones（音调）in Chinese? Who created Chinese characters? How come some Chinese characters look like the things they stand for and some don’t?

I came home quite ashamed（羞愧的）for I didn’t know the answers to those questions. I always thought teaching Chinese was easy for me, but it turns out that it’s not. Chinese is a beautiful language because it is rich in culture. What we have learned about Chinese in school is just the tip of the iceberg.

This “part-time job” is actually a great learning experience for me. I realized that I needed a deeper understanding of my own language, so that one day, I would be able to proudly share more information about fantastic Chinese language.