1 . Movie stars might think their lives are private after leaving the acting location, but they ought to know that they have much power over their audience. The power gives them an ability to change people, events, even history, making them to have the responsibility of being good role models.

With time going on, movie stars become celebrities (名人) and in the process get a large number of fans. Some of them follow their deeds, dress, and act like them. In reality, they want to be like their favorite movie stars. If a movie star engages in acts that the society does not approve, those who look up to them, especially the teens, will do the same. Movie stars should be responsible for what they do and say as following the actions is now simpler because of social media. It is important to behave like a role model even when they think no one is watching.

Nobody is perfect, and movie stars also have had their down moments. They may not have been good role models at the time, but they can change the narrative by doing the right things. They can also turn the past shortcomings into positives by opening up about problems and how they overcame the challenges. And their audience can learn to discuss their problems and seek help.

People starring in movies are the target of companies to promote their products or services for a fee. Their celebrity status is a reason enough to think beyond the payment. A movie star should not recommend something that will influence the way teens live negatively. It would be wrong to promote something like sweetened drinks or foods without health benefits. Movie stars face problems like other people, but because of their influence, they have a responsibility to be role models in the public eye.

2 . With the rapid development, the city of Chongqing is becoming more and more attractive to outsiders, including foreigners. For 26-year-old Moldovan Gabriela Cojocaru, who has the Chinese nickname Li Xiaoxiao, Chongqing is the beginning of a dream.

In September 2014, Xiaoxiao, who has studied ethnic dance and ballet since childhood, graduated from the Moldovan National Dance Academy, and several classmates joined her on a trip to China. However, she did not know any Chinese or even English. She made many friends from China, which gradually solved her obstacles in language communication and made herself better adapted to life in China.

“I think as a foreigner, first you have to learn Chinese,” she said. “Then you can go to better understand the culture and the Chinese people.” But after learning what she thought was Chinese, she discovered that the language she had spent two years learning is actually the Chongqing dialect. Such is her delivery that even a Chongqing local would be hard to tell that she is a foreigner by just hearing her voice. As Xiaoxiao thought Chongqing dialect was standard Chinese, she took considerable efforts to be good at it. This “mistake” has turned out to be a lucky strike.

But she is more interested in doing something that helps the two countries understand each other. As such, she introduced Chinese food or Chongqing food, and stories about China to her friends in Moldova. She plans to introduce the history and specialties of Moldova, such as Moldo van wine, to the Chinese. She hopes to let more people know that this country actually has a rich history of more than 5,000 years of wine-making.

“I’d love to do it,” she said. “I will continue to strengthen the culture of the two countries and hope that the two countries will become better and better.”

3 . During my university years in the early 2000s, I worked part-time with kids at a neighborhood YMCA, which mainly focused on child care. Each year, we hosted a Christmas party for the community.

Most of the people working there were women, so we had to search for a male volunteer to play Santa Claus. We didn’t have many choices. John was a tall, twentyish man who was much too thin to be Santa Claus. No amount of stuffing (填充物) could possibly make him look like a common Santa Claus. He was, however, available.

On the day of the party, John put on his costume (戏装) and waited for the children. Many of the children who knew John said, “It’s just you, John.” If they didn’t know him, they said, “You’re too thin to be Santa.” We thought it might be a bad decision, but then everyone seemed to enjoy their time there, so it didn’t really matter.

Then, a lovely little girl entered the room. She was dressed beautifully to see Santa and seemed a little shy. Her mother brought her up to our Santa. “She’s deaf,” the mother explained. “If she could just sit on your lap (大腿) and have her picture taken, she would be happy.” John, the skinny Santa, smiled at the little girl, and she sat on his lap.

Then, the skinny Santa began using hand gestures to communicate with the girl fluently, and the little girl smiled happily and answered him quickly with her hands. Their conversation lasted quite a while. When I looked at the mother, I saw that she was crying. In fact, I don’t think there was a dry eye in the room. Santa Claus really was there.

There was so much we didn’t know about what was happening. This girl had never met John before, and few of us were aware that he knew how to sign — it all added up to a magical surprise.

5 . Laura Madden is a small business owner and sustainable fashion advocate. “ReFashioned Art is a purpose-driven business, combining style and sustainability (可持续性),” Madden says,“I love fashion, but I also care deeply about the environment.”

She slowly built her network and became an influencer who ran a popular blog. She shares that her passion for sustainability came about in 2015 when she watched a life-changing documentary about the social and environmental issues brought up by the fashion industry. “My guilty pleasures－ shopping and fashion － that I assumed weren’t hurting anyone, were in reality hurting a lot of people,” she says.“I couldn’t stand the fact that something I loved so much was creating so much suffering on the planet. How could something that brought me so much beauty and joy be so dirty and destructive?”

With this realization, Madden became an advocate for sustainable fashion－including purchasing most of her own clothes second-hand and supporting sustainable brands. Although she was busy enough in 2019, she became a professional artist, creating pieces made from sustainable materials.

She notes that ReFashioned Art is first and foremost an art brand. “I am using my work to tell a story and create a narrative that style and sustainability can co-exist,” she says. “By repurposing old items into something more fashionable, elegant, and contemporary, I hope to inspire you to look for beauty where it is not normally found.”

For those interested in supporting sustainable art and fashion. Madden shares,“Get creative and look for beauty. Looking forward, I would love to partner with more designers.”

She adds,“We only have finite resources. The best thing we can all do is ask, ‘How else can I use this item?’”

8 . San Francisco Park ranger Amanda Barrows, who registered in City College of San Francisco (CCSF)’s Poetry for the People class, began to place a nightstand (床头柜) in Golden Gate Park with a note “take a poem, leave a poem” in December 2022. Since then, over 100 handwritten poems have been placed in the nightstand. “It’s completely unexpected,” said Barrows. “I’m really taken aback by the outpouring of support.”

Park ranger by day and poet by night, Barrows said she began writing and attending poetry workshops in 2020. The poetry course she attended was founded by Leslie Simon in 1975. The class advocates for a focus on the neighborhood, and the cultivation (培养) and public presentation of new poems. For Barrows, the idea that she could combine her job and her hobby by bringing poetry into parks was an inspiration. Barrows asked her friends to contribute their favorite poems to the nightstand as poems that could be taken.

Armed with an old nightstand, Barrows filled the stand with pens and paper. An added drawer at the bottom holds the poems that people “donate”. The concept reminded her of Little Free Libraries, which are fixtures across the city. “I was having anxiety. I had no idea what I was going to do; then it sort of just came to me,” said Barrows. “I was inspired by the little free libraries you see in SF, where you ‘take a book, leave a book’, and thought, ‘Maybe I could do this with poetry.’”

One of the teachers at the CCSF poetry course, Lauren Muller, told The Washington Post that “people need poetry now”, which she suggested as the reason for the success of Barrows’s project.

Past student projects included writing poetry on sidewalks in chalk and placing poems on the windshields (挡风玻璃) of cars. “It’s exciting to see the work that students are doing,” Muller continued. “My hope is that this will happen across city parks… elsewhere.”