Since April 13, 2023, the China-Laos Railway (中老铁路) has started cross-border (跨境的) passenger service. The railway starts in Kunming, the capital of Yunnan Province, and runs south through Yuxi, Pu’er, Xishuangbanna, and the border town of Mohan in China. Then, it goes through Boten, Luang Prabang, Vang Vieng before reaching Vientiane, the capital of Laos. Now, it takes only 2 hours and 46 minutes to travel from Kunming to Pu’er, 3 hours and 24 minutes from Kunming to Xishuangbanna, 10 hours and 30 minutes from Kunming to Vientiane.

Traveling by China-Laos Railway is an exciting way to enjoy the unusual scenery (风景) and rich cultures along the line. On arriving in Kunming, travelers can visit the Stone Forest, Dianchi Lake and Dounan Flower Market. After getting off at Pu’er Station, tourists can experience the ancient tea-horse road in southern Yunnan and enjoy the tea gardens within half an hour by car. Starting from Xishuangbanna Station, visitors can reach the Wild Elephant Valley and Olive Dam within an hour by car.

If you are going to visit Yunnan and Laos, traveling by China-Laos Railway will be a great choice.

3 . Mike and Jack are on holiday in France. Mike loves to learn about _________ of different countries, so Jack agrees to sightsee some historical buildings with him. In a village, Jack and Mike see a beautiful old church, but when they go into the church, a service(礼拜)is already in progress.

“Shh! Just sit _________, so that we don’t stand out.” Mike whispers. Since they don’t really know French, Jack and Mike just sit down and _________ like others. During the service，they stand, kneel and sit to follow what the rest of the crowd do.

“I hope we don’t look like _________!”Mike tells Jack.

At one point, the priest(牧师)makes an announcement and the man who sits next to Jack and Mike stands up.

“We _________ stand up, too!”Jack whispers to Mike. _________, Jack and Mike stand up with the man. Suddenly, all the people burst into laughter!

After the service, Jack and Mike walk up to the priest, who speaks English.

“What’s so _________?”Jack asks.

With a smile on his face the priest says,“Well, there is a new baby born, and it’s a _________ to ask the father to stand up.”

Jack and Mike _________ each other and Mike shakes his head. He smiles and says,“I guess we should understand what people do __________ we act like the others!”

Travelling to a foreign country is a dream for many people. However, Luo Yuan and Ding Jia made their dream come     1     two years ago. They took a trip to Singapore. It is     2     island country in Southeast Asia. Singapore is very close     3     China. Now it has a population of about four million. and most of them are Chinese. English and Chinese are the main languages in Singapore. The temperature of the country is about 30 degrees every day, so it is     4     all year around.

Luo and Ding     5     a plane to Singapore. When they arrived, they could see the happy smiles on people’s faces. They visited lots of places, such     6     the Night Wildlife Zoo and Merlion Park. Luo and Ding stayed in a hotel near Chinatown. They did lots of shopping     7     tried the local food. They enjoyed     8     because of the good services in this country.

“Singapore is a very beautiful country with a blue sky and clear water. And the fresh air here     9     people feel comfortable. It has a warm welcome to everyone from all over the     10    . We will come here again one day,” said Luo Yuan and Ding Jia.

5 . 35-year-old Xiao Shuyao is a Chinese sailor. In 2020, she finished sailing around the world with a sailboat.

Xiao’s story about sailing dates back to 2010, when she ran a beach bar in Sanya, Hainan Province. In 2014, Xiao closed her bar and took part in a yacht（帆船）race. She then had a dream of sailing around the world for the first time in her life.

Xiao started off from Turkey in June 2017 and completed the voyage (航行) in November 2020. She traveled through the Atlantic Ocean, the Pacific Ocean and the Indian Ocean, and finally rounded the Cape of Good Hope (好望角). Xiao set a Chinese record of traveling 34,000 nautical miles. She reached more than 40 countries with her sailboat.

Xiao experienced lots of difficulties and dangers during the voyage, such as seasickness, pirates(海盗) with guns and bad weather. But Xiao says the beauty of sailing lies just in what looked impossible at first.

At the same time, she also went on land tours along the way. She shared stories about her trips and adventures. She introduced China’s unique (独特的) sailing culture. She also invited sailors from different countries and local people to drink Chinese tea and enjoy Chinese food on her boat. Many of them learned about China through her stories.

In this way, she hoped to spread traditional Chinese culture and show others the friendliness and kindness of Chinese people.

Now, Xiao is preparing for a non-stop round-the-world sailing alone. “I hope to tell more China’s stories through sailing to the world,” says Xiao.

7 . The tourist trade is booming. With all this coming and going, you’d expect greater understanding to develop between the nations of the world. Not a bit of it! Superb systems of communication by air, sea and land make it possible for us to visit each other’s countries at a moderate cost. What was once the “grand tour’’, reserved for only the very rich, is now within everybody’s grasp. The package tour and chartered flights are not to be sneered at. Modern travelers enjoy a level of comfort which the lords and ladies on grand tours in the old days couldn’t have dreamed of. But what’s the sense of this mass exchange of populations if the nations of the world remain basically ignorant of each other?

Many tourist organizations are directly responsible for this state of affairs. They deliberately set out to protect their clients from too much contact with the local population. The modern tourist leads a cosseted, sheltered life. He lives at international hotels where he eats his international food and sips his international drink while he gazes at the natives from a distance. Conducted tours to places of interest are carefully censored. The tourist is allowed to see                    only what the organizers want him to see and no more. A strict schedule makes it impossible for the tourist to wander off on his own; and anyway, language is always a barrier, so he is only too happy to be protected in this way.

The sad thing about this situation is that it leads to the persistence of national stereotypes. We don’t see the people of other nations as they really are, but as we have been brought up to believe they are. You can test this for yourself. Take five nationalities, say, French, German, English, American and Italian. Now in your mind, match them with these five adjectives: musical, amorous, cold, pedantic, native. Far from providing us with any insight into the national characteristics of the peoples just mentioned, these adjectives actually act as barriers. So when you set out on your travels, the only characteristics you notice are those which confirm your preconceptions. You come away with the highly unoriginal and inaccurate impression that, say, “Anglo-Saxons are hypocrites’’ of that “Latin peoples shout a lot’’. You only have to make a few foreign friends to understand how absurd and harmful national stereotypes are. But how can you make foreign friends when the tourist trade does its best to prevent you?

Carried to an extreme, stereotypes can be positively dangerous. Wild generalizations stir up racial hatred and blind us to the basic fact—how trite it sounds! That all people are human. We are all similar to each other and at the same time all unique.