4 . With a continuous 1,300 kilometer-long coastline and beautiful beaches, Wales is a popular holiday destination in the United Kingdom. Most Welsh people live in south Wales in the capital city, Cardiff, and two other big cities: Swansea and Newport.

Language

The official languages of Wales are English and Welsh, and “Wenglish" is a Welsh-English dialect. Everyone speaks English, but if you go to school in Wales you have to learn Welsh until you are 16. Street signs are written in Welsh and English, and villages, towns and cities have an English name and a Welsh name. The Welsh language is one of the oldest languages in Europe and around 20 percent of people in Wales speak Welsh.

Sports

The Welsh enjoy watching and playing sports, especially rugby and football. The modern Millennium Stadium in Cardiff can hold 74,500 people and is where you go if you want to watch a football or rugby match or a concert.

Water sports are popular in Wales. You can go surfing or wakeboarding. If you like unusual sports, visit the small town of Llanwrtyd Wells. Every year in this town there is a man versus horse marathon and a bog snorkeling competition.

Food

There are lots of sheep in Wales, so people eat a lot of lamb. Typical Welsh dishes include “cawl”, which is lamb stew, sausages and “rarebit”, which is a type of cheese on toast. There are also Welsh cakes, which are small, sweet, round cakes with dried raisins inside.

Symbols

If you ever go to Wales, you will see dragons everywhere; red dragons are a symbol of Wales. Other symbols include the leek (a long, green vegetable) and the daffodil.

5 . The National Geographic Museum in Washington D. C. hosts rotating exhibitions year-round.

The National Geographic Museum

1145 17th Street, NW

Washington, D. C. 20036

Museum Hours: Monday — Sunday: 10:00 A. M. — 6:00 P. M.

Closed on Thanksgiving Day and Christmas Day

Museum Ticket Pricing

You can purchase tickets online, over the phone Monday — Friday through our ticket office, or in person daily from 10:00 a. m. to 5:00 p.m. at our National Geographic Museum ticket desk. We recommend purchasing ahead of time, as many of our events sell out quickly.

About Your Visit

With a wide range of changing exhibitions, the National Geographic Museum is a perfect destination for all ages. Visitors get to know the work of National Geographic conservationists, photographers, and scientists through charming, dynamic exhibitions, which feature everything from photography and world-famous artifacts to interactive learning stations and behind-the-scenes stories.

During Your Visit

We do not store bags or any other personal items. We do offer a small coat rack and umbrella bins. There is no food or drink allowed inside the museum. Seating is available in each exhibition.

The National Geographic Society has a cafe and a cafeteria located in our M Street building. Our cafe is open from 10:00 a. m. to 4:30 p. m. and the cafeteria from 11:30 a. m. to 2:00 p. m. Monday through Friday. Both are closed Saturdays and Sundays.

Contact Us

The National Geographic Ticket Office: 202-857-7700 | ngtickets@ngs.org (Monday — Friday, 10 a. m. to 4 p. m.)

Group Sales: 202-807 -3232 | groupsales@ ngs. org

6 . On March 17 there will be an explosion of green color across the world in celebration of St Patrick’s Day. The Irish traditionally wear something colored green on this day as the color is connected with Ireland. Another St Patrick’s Day tradition is for the non-Irish to make jokes about the Irish. Usually these jokes will be about Irish stupidity or their famous thirst for alcohol, or their reputation (名声) for telling tall (untrue) stories. These characteristics are all part of the famous Irish stereotype (成见) that Irishmen are hot-tempered drinkers, who love to fight and will do anything to avoid a day’s work.

The real joke, however, is that this negative Irish stereotype still exists. The stereotype might have had some truth back in the 19th century when Irish was poverty-stricken and starving. Many Irish moved to the United States to escape famine (饥荒), but there they had to compete, occasionally with their fists, for jobs and housing with other immigrant groups. It was on America’s streets that the Irish earned their reputation for street fighting. However, it was far from truth today, with the exception of the drinking perhaps.

Today, the Irish are admired for their story telling gifts and musical talents. It is no accident that several of the greatest writers of the 20th century were Irish. Or that many of today’s most popular music groups such as singer Enya and rock band U2 are Irish born and growing. LonelyPlanet readers even ranked Irelandas the friendliest country in the world.

However, one bit of the Irish stereotype is true, their love for drink. Drinking in Ireland is a job, but it’s not necessarily something to criticize. It was the Irish alter all who created one of the world’s best-loved beers, Guinness.

7 . Welcome to BookCrossing!

It’s a smart social networking site, where books get new life.

There are currently 1,583,246 BookCrossers and 11,350,976 books travelling throughout132 countries.

It’s easy to find books, share books, and meet fellow book lovers.

Step 1. Label

Register your book for FREE, and get a unique BookCrossing ID (BCID). This ID allows you to follow your specific book. There are several ways you can label your book:

Download free BookCrossing labels here and print them from your computer.

Create custom labels with our Bookplate Creator using your own image and message.

Step 2. Share

There are a few different ways you can share your book:

Give it away. Pass your book on to a friend, or a stranger! You can find someone in the BookCrossing community who’s looking for your book and make their day by sending it to them. These particular methods are referred to as “controlled releases”.

Release it into the wild. Referred to as “wild releases”, this type of sharing needs you to leave your labeled book on a park bench or in a train station — anywhere it’s likely to be caught by another delighted reader.

Be creative! BookCrossers might establish an “Official BookCrossing Zone”, a physical location where books are regularly caught and / or released. They may start a “bookring”, “bookray” or “bookbox”, all of which are controlled ways of passing books throughout a set group of members.

Step 3. Follow

Once you’ve labeled and shared it, follow your book’s adventures.

When another reader finds your book, they can enter the BCID on BookCrossing.com and report that it’s been caught. Some books tend to stay in one region while others really move!

8 . Here are two interesting questions. Are you very happy with your life now? Are people happier as they get older? A study found that people generally become happier and experience less worry after age 50. In fact, it-found that by the age of 85, people are happier with their life than they were at 18.

The finding came from a Gallup survey of more than 340,000 adults between the age of 18 and 85 in the United States.

Arthur Stone in. the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Science at Stony Brook University in New York led the study. His team found that levels of stress were highest among adults between the ages of 22 and 25. Stress levels dropped sharply after people reached their fifties.

Happiness was highest among the youngest adults and those in their early seventies. But the people least likely to report feeling negative emotions were those in their seventies and eighties. The survey also found that men and women had similar emotional patterns as they grow older. However, women at all ages reported more sadness, stress and worry than men did.

The researchers also considered possible influences like. having young children, being unemployed or being single. But they found that influences like these did not affect the levels of happiness and well-being related to age.

So why would happiness increase with age? One theory is that, as people get older, they become more thankful for what they have and have better control of their emotions. They also spend less time thinking about bad experiences.

The original goal of the study was to confirm the popular belief that aging is connected with increased sleep problems. The survey did find an increase during middle age, especially in women. But except for that, people reported that they felt their sleep quality, improved as they got older.

9 . It’s nearly exam time, so check out some of the best free apps around to help you manage the stress of exams and ensure you are studying effectively over the coming weeks.

This app can help to remind you how many days, hours, and minutes you have until the exam. This can help to motivate you to hit the books before it’s too late.

Are you constantly checking your cellphone when you should be writing an essay? Or perhaps do you often take your attention away from your study because of a battle in League of Legends? Download this app to prevent your attention from getting away by temporarily(暂时) blocking Internet sites on your mobile. Simply add the websites you want to block and the period of time to block them for, making sure you get yourself focused on that assignment.

The US Department of Veterans (老兵) Affairs developed the app, CBT-i Coach, to help with insomnia ( 失 眠 ) and help people who would like to improve their sleeping habits. It provides several key parts: information about sleep and insomnia, ways to improve sleep, relaxation skills and a helpful sleep diary.

Yoga has great health benefits both for the mind and body and will help you to perform at your best while at high school. Download this app and have your own personal yoga instructor in your living room. You can choose from short or long workouts and have a qualified instructor teaching you how to do each pose (姿势). Choose from a variety of yoga routines and watch the instructional videos. Go on and stretch out those sore muscles.

10 . Over 70 percent of the “double single-child couples” in China need help from their parents in taking care of their own kids, according to a recent survey.

Women of China magazine and a consulting company carried out a survey recently on young couples of the “single-child” generation, the Morning Post reports. The couples surveyed were around 29 and have been married for three years on average, with university education and monthly income of 4,000 yuan. Among them, 43.5 percent have kids.

Results show that 71.9 percent of the young couples have help from their parents in taking care of their kids.

Grown up as the “single-child”, the only child in a family since the family planning policy (政策) was adopted in 1979, this generation depends much on their parents.

The parents of the “single-child” generation focused more on their children’s physical well-being rather than their attitudes and values, according to some psychologists.

The research also found that the “double single-child couples” follow a rather traditional value system.

Survey shows that 27.5 percent of them got married after dating for one to two years, 25.2 percent two to five years, and 20 percent didn’t tie the knot until dating for five years. Also, 30 percent of the couples were schoolmates, while 43.8 percent were introduced by someone.

Since their marriage is based on enduring relationships, 65.2 percent of the husbands and 62.9 percent of the wives think that compromise and tolerance are necessary in their marriage. Meanwhile, 21.7 percent of the husbands and 37.1 percent of the wives support the idea that happiness is the key standard for a marriage.