1 . For most people traveling abroad, their first choice is probably to make a beeline for (直奔) tourist sights. For me, I find lots of joy in grocery (食品杂货店) shopping on holiday.

As a vegetarian (素食主义者), finding restaurants that meet my needs is not always easy abroad.     1     The first thing I do, after dropping my bags off, is to go to a grocery store. That enables me to cook breakfast in the morning without walking around for hours trying to find “vegan breakfast” near me.

The variety of foods attracts me every time I travel somewhere new. In Malta, I found the most delicious chocolate-filled cakes, a product I would struggle to find even in the UK.     2     I was so delighted that I could enjoy such an unexpected treat. Another surprise was their selection of ice cream available even in the smallest grocery stores.

    3     Looking for smoked tofu and corn pancakes turns into quite a mission whenever I visit Cluj-Napoca in Romania. There is usually only one variety of smoked tofu, sold in a very small tub (食品盒) and only in the cafeteria section.     4     That is because they are never available at the smaller ones.

Grocery shopping on holiday sounds unusual. But it means being involved in the day-to-day lives of a country’s citizens. I can pretend I am a local and put myself in their shoes. I can watch kids begging their parents for sweets, an international experience that needs no language, or watch couples pick up snacks and drinks for a party on a Friday night.     5    

2 . Bartek Ostalowski lost both his arms in a terrible aceident in 2006, but that wasn’t enough to kill his dream of one day becoming a professional race-car driver. Finding himself armless at just 20 years old and faced with the difficult task of learning to drive a car on a race circuit (赛车道) must have been quite the shock for Bartek, but he gathered the courage and the drive to push on. In three years, he became a master of driving a race-car with his feet. Today, Bartek Ostalowski is the world’s only professional sport driver who drives using his feet.

In order to deal with his physical limitations, Bartek transformed (改装) his race car according to his needs, adding a new engine, and stronger transmission (变速器). The ambitious Polish driver uses his right foot to control the pedals, while moving on with his left one. The race car is controlled with the shoulder.

“After my accident, I was looking for a solution. I asked myself if I wanted to race again what would I need to do?” Bartek told the reporter of Business Insider. “I heard about someone in Poland who, like me, had no arms, but he drove a car on a daily basis with no problem. After meeting him, my dream and passion for motor sports were alive and strong, and I made the decision to return to racing one day.”

In 2019, Ostalowski finished in ninth place out of 50 drivers in the Polish Drift Championship, one of the most competitive championship series in all of Europe, and the year before that, he won the international Czech Drift Series, beating dozens of other professional sports drivers.

“Of course, I encourage other people with disabilities to get involved in motor sports. It’s a beautiful passion and I think a great form of recovery too. So make your dreams come true,” the Polish driver said.

3 . Nuclear energy is one of the cleanest power on earth. It is cleaner than any energy source except wind. But that doesn’t necessarily mean nuclear is the long-term solution for the world because nuclear material is perhaps the most poisonous matter on earth. In addition, uranium, the element most commonly used in nuclear reactors, is not in limitless supply. But the biggest problem is nuclear waste.

How can we deal with nuclear waste? The answer is simple—put them somewhere where they can stay, undisturbed, isolated, forever. Finland is building just that. This region is largely lacking in natural disasters. It really doesn’t encounter any natural phenomenon that could damage a nuclear waste storage site, especially if it’s 1, 500 feet underground. Beneath an island on the Finnish Baltic Sea coast, the country is digging. They’ re building the very first permanent nuclear waste storage facility in the world in the stable bedrock 1,500 feet below.

Currently they’ re just finishing their dig down, then very soon they’ll start filling the facility with nuclear waste. They’ll dig long tunnels with small holes in which they’ll place nuclear waste then backfill the tunnels with clay to be left forever.

With this system, there’s near zero risk of nuclear material leaking out into the groundwater and, once it’s filled in the year 2120, it can just be left, forever. Because the material will be so far down and so difficult to get to, no human management will be necessary once completed.

No security, no maintenance, nothing which means it should be truly secure, but before leaving it, Finland needs to fight against one thing—human nature. As curious beings, it’s hard to fight a person’s urge of discovery. If someone finds a mysterious structure from thousands of years ago, it’d just be natural to want to open it up, and that’s a problem for nuclear waste sites.

We essentially did just that with the pyramids in Egypt. These structures were built as the final, permanent resting places and we opened them up because we were curious. Opening the nuclear storage facilities would release radiation into a future civilization, so we have to tell them to leave the sites alone, but that’s easier said than done.

7 . Your neighbors are probably the first line of defense in case of any problematic situation.     1     It gives you an assurance that you have people close by looking out for you. Here are easily applicable tips on creating stronger neighbor relationships.

The first step is introducing yourself when you move to a new neighborhood or when a newcomer moves in. Leave them a note under their door to introduce yourself.     2     It doesn’t have to cost you a fortune and opting for a potted plant or baked biscuits will do. These actions present excellent opportunities to connect with them.

Be respectful of your neighbors. It’s in poor taste to have regular insensitive parties at your place causing disturbances. Before your party, it’s good practice to notify your neighbors. Besides, avoid chatting them up for hours on end, which may be inconvenient, especially if you don’t know their schedules.     3     When you borrow anything, return it in due time. If you accidentally break their things, replace them without being asked to.

    4     You could offer to babysit your neighbors’ kids, help with snow removals or even keep an eye on their home when they’re away. Such acts of reaching out to your neighbors make for stronger relationships.

As Emma Seppälä put it, “social connectedness generates a positive feedback loop (圈) of social, emotional and physical well-being.” It feels so easy to just stay home without having to engage with your neighbors but connecting with them is worth the effort.     5    

8 . Jimmy Jiang envisions a future where every house is powered by renewable energy stored in batteries.

Jiang and his team at the University of Cincinnati have developed a new battery that could have far-reaching implications for the large-scale (大规模) energy storage needed by wind and solar farms.

“Batteries store renewable energy for when it’s needed, not just when it’s produced. This is crucial for getting the most out of wind and solar power,” Jiang said. “Energy generation and energy consumption is always mismatched. That’s why it’s important to have a device that can store that energy temporarily and release it when it’s needed.”

They described their novel design in the journal Nature Communications.

Traditional car batteries contain a mix of sulfuric acid and water. While they’re inexpensive and made from readily available materials, they have severe drawbacks for industrial or large-scale use. They have a very low energy density (密度), which isn’t suitable for storing sufficient power needed to power a city. And they have a low level for electrochemical stability, which means they can blow up.

Water has a voltage (电压) limit. Once the voltage of such a battery goes beyond the stability window of 1.5 volts, the water can decompose into hydrogen and oxygen, which is explosive.

But Jiang and his students have developed a battery without water that can generate nearly 4 volts of power. Jiang’s novel design does so by removing from a battery the membrane, which is a huge component of upfront costs and accounts for as much as 30% of the cost of the battery. They invented a new type of energy storage material that improves performance at a lower cost. “Membranes are also inefficient. They can’t separate the positive and negative sides completely, so there is always crossover,” he said.

The group has submitted temporary patent applications. “There is still a long way to go, but we’re advancing toward a dramatic battery transformation in the next decade. I’m confident about that. There is a lot of intense research going into pushing the boundaries of battery performance,” Jiang said.

9 . KidsWorldFun Short Story Contest

Calling all young writers from around the world! It’s time to release your creativity and share your incredible stories with us. KidsWorldFun presents the ultimate Short Story Contest, open to young people of all ages.

Two Modes of Entry

● Free Entry: get the chance to win a certificate and have your story published on our website.

● Entry Fee of $10: get the chance to receive a cash prize as well as a certificate and have your story published. Payment links will be sent via email for these entries.

Amazing Prizes Await

First Prize: $100, certificate and publication;

Second Prize: $75, certificate and publication;

Third Prize: $50, certificate and publication.

Highly commented stories will also be published for the world to enjoy.

Contest Categories and Word Limits

To ensure fairness, we have set three categories for writers to choose from and minimum and maximum word limits for each category.

Submission Guidelines

● Include proof of age with your entry (scan or take a photo of your identity card). Entries without proof of age will be disqualified.

● Your story must be original and unpublished.

● Type your story out.

Our judges will evaluate each story based on content, language and writing style. Their decision will be final. For more information, please contact us at enquiry@kidsworldfun.com. We’re here to assist you every step of the way.

Don’t miss this incredible opportunity to showcase your talent and win amazing prizes! Enter the KidsWorldFun Short Story Contest today!

10 . That dinosaurs ate the mammals (哺乳动物) that ran beneath their feet is not in doubt. Now an extraordinary fossil newly described in Scientific Reports, unearthed by a team led by Gang Han at Hainan Vocational University of Science and Technology in China, shows that sometimes the tables were turned.

The fossil -dated to about 125 million years ago, during the Cretaceous period-was formed when a flow of boiling volcanic mud swallowed two animals seemingly locked in a life-and-death fight. The one on top is a mammal. This animal is a herbivorous species closely related to the Triceratops (三角恐龙). Animal interactions such as this are exceptionally cam e in the fossil record.

One possibility is that the mammal was eating something already dead, other than hunting live prey. These days it is uncommon for small mammals to attack much larger animals. But it is not unheard of. And Dr. Han and his colleagues point out that those mammals which eat dead bodies typically leave tooth marks all over the bones of the animals. The dinosaur’s remains show no such marks. There is also a chance the fossil could be a fake. More and more convincing fake s have emerged, as this one did -though Dr. Han and his colleagues argue that the complexly connected nature of the skeletons (骨骼) makes that unlikely, too.

Assuming it is genuine, the discovery serves as a reminder that not all dinosaurs were enormous during the Cretaceous and not all mammals were tiny. From nose to tail, the dinosaur is just 1.2 meters long. The mammal is a bit under half a meter in length. Despite being half the size, the mammal has one paw firmly wrapped around one of its prey’s limbs, and another pulling on its jaw. It is biting down on the dinosaur’s chest, and has ripped off two of its ribs. Before they were interrupted, it seems that the mammal was winning.