The “Understanding Contemporary China” Foreign Language Contests were held in Beijing from December 4 to 8．

Nearly one million college students from more than 1,300 universities participated , with about 2,500     1     (enter) the national final. The contests aimed to     2     (deep) college students’ understanding of China, enhance their linguistic (语言的) abilities and intercultural communication     3     (competent), and provide a platform for them to tell China’s stories well.

The champion of the English group     4     (determine) through a simulated (模拟的) “Global Youth Summit”. Three contestants discussed     5     (topic) including cultural diversity and the future development of mankind with Xinhua News Agency’s reporter Simon Keith Robinson,     6     tested their knowledge and ability to handle diverse subjects.

Xu Chengcheng, from Beijing Foreign Studies University, won     7     national championship of the International Communication Contest. She demonstrated a high-level of English proficiency(熟练)and strong communication skills in the prepared speech     8     the Global Youth Summit session(会议).

A special session of “Multilingual Champions Showcase” was part     9     the closing ceremony, where champions used their foreign language skills     10     (share) stories about their understanding of China and communication with the world, showcasing youthful insights.

2 . The holidays can be a difficult time to stay on track with your fitness goals.     1    . Even the most disciplined people can find it difficult to stick to their fitness routines during the holiday season. Here are some expert-recommended tips that can help you stay on track.

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Planning is the best way to make sure you don’t lose track of your goals. Plan your workouts for the week and mark them in your schedule to assure they are a part of your day.

Exercise early.

    3    . Make sure workouts are in the morning and you’ll set yourself up for a productive day. Then you can enjoy holiday activities and time with family without worrying about when you’ll have time to exercise.

Keep moving.

Research shows that getting up for just five minutes every 30 to 60 minutes and performing light activities reduces the risk of heart disease risk factors. Small efforts to get moving can help your overall health during the holidays. In addition to staying active, try to avoid sitting for long periods of time, such as when watching football games or eating.     4    .

Think out of the box.

The holidays are busy, but do your best to avoid the “all or nothing” mentality when it comes to physical activity.     5     — like taking a family walk around the neighborhood before opening Christmas presents.

7 . A team of three students won $700,000 this week for using artificial intelligence (AI) to read passages from an ancient papyrus scroll (纸草卷轴). The document is one of the more than 800 scrolls known as the Herculaneum papyri that were carbonized by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD. Researchers discovered the passages in the 18th century, but attempts to read them proved in vain: Unfolding them by hand only caused them to fall apart.

That’s where the Vesuvius Challenge comes in. Brent Seales, a computer scientist, and two businessmen, Nat Friedman and Daniel Gross, launched the Vesuvius Challenge in March 2023, offering more than $1 million in prize money for reaching a series of milestones using “computer vision, machine learning and hard work”. For the biggest prize, the organizers released high-resolution CT scans of the scrolls and explained the contest’s rules: Participants would need to decipher (破译) at least 85 percent of four passages. A series of smaller prizes were also awarded throughout the year.

The winning team consists of Nader (an Egyptian PhD student in Germany), Julian Schilliger (a robotics student in Switzerland) and Luke Farritor (a computer science student in Nebraska). Their submission was “met with widespread amazement” by the review team of papyrologists. Farritor also won the challenge’s $40,000 “First Letters” prize in October, when he deciphered the scroll’s first word “porphyras”, which means “purple” in ancient Greek. Nader and Farritor began working together the following month and were joined by Schilliger shortly before the December 31 deadline.

The team ultimately trained machine-learning algorithms (算法) to decipher more than 2,000 characters—more than what was needed to win the Grand Prize. These passages appear to be a philosophical discussion of life’s pleasures, including music and food, though the papyrology team is still studying the results. “It seems familiar to us, and we can’t escape the feeling that the first text we’ve uncovered is a 2,000-year-old blog post about how to enjoy life,” write the organizers.