Data from an e-commerce platform show that searches     2     dragon-related goods via its online marketplace have reached 23 million.    3     is said that since January, goods with dragon-themed elements, such as daily necessities, alcohol and gold jewelry,     4    (prefer) by consumers.The purchasing excitement is expected to     5    (huge) boost consumer confidence and improve the recovery of consumption．

Purchases by the post-1990s and post-2000s generations accounted for nearly 55%, while consumers in Guangdong province, Beijing, Jiangsu province in that order,     6    (be) the top three spenders on dragon-featured items.Because the dragon is an important symbol of Chinese traditional culture     7     good luck, Chinese consumers are expressing their hopes for     8     better life in the new year.

“Brands should capitalize on traditional Chinese culture to launch more innovative     9    (product),” a research fellow said,     10    (stress) that Spring Festival is the traditional festival Chinese people attach the most importance to, and it’s also a peak season for consumption.

3 . Many people lead busy lives and think they barely have time to work out every day.     1     They are short workouts that often involve high-intensity(高强度的)exercises. Here we explore some reasons to do micro workouts.

Require Less of a Time Commitment

Committing to exercising for a certain amount of time per week can be difficult, especially when you do not have the time or motivation to work out for an extended period. Microworkouts are good alternatives. They take up only 10 to 30 minutes of your day. Many people spend much longer scrolling through social media each day.     2    

Make Scheduling Workouts Easier

It can be challenging to commit the time needed to exercise every day,but it can also be hard to fit a workout into a tight schedule. However, a study suggests that it may be possible.     3     For example, walking your dog, using the stairs, parking farther away from adestination, or walking during your lunch break are all ways you can try.

Need No Equipment

Investing in expensive home gym equipment can be a real burden. When you decide to domicro workouts, though, you don’t need a bunch of equipment.     4     For example, you may choose to do steps on your stairs, run on the spot, or even do some star jumps. Since youcan choose what type of workout you’d prefer to do, it means that you can exercise wheneveryou please.

    5     Now that you know all about micro workouts, you can add them to your day.Get as creative as you please and think about the types of movements that suit you. You neverknow-it might just boost your health and wellness.

4 . Imagine driving behind a huge truck shooting clouds of smoke into the air while your new fully electric vehicle cleans up its carbon emissions (排放). This dream may soon be a reality. A team of students in the Netherlands has created an electric car that not only doesn’t produce carbon dioxide when driving, but actually pulls it out of the air.

The two-seater sports car was designed and built in less than a year by a team of 32 students at Eindhoven University of Technology. Called “ZEM”, which stands for “zero emission mobility”, the car is equipped with special devices that remove carbon dioxide from the air as it drives. The team says if ZEM is driven about 32,000 kilometers, it can remove 2 kilograms of carbon dioxide from the air. That’s not a huge amount. The team calculates that 10 ZEM cars on the road for a year would remove as much carbon dioxide as a typical tree does during that time. However, they also point out that there are over a billion passenger cars in the world that could be using this technology. And if a billion cars were removing carbon dioxide instead of producing it, the result would be huge.

ZEM also has several other innovations that help to make it more capable of being sustained: the car’s frame and panels (面板) are 3D printed to reduce waste; it was built using recycled and recyclable materials; and it can be easily taken apart so that many of its parts can be reused. ZEM’s battery is also reusable, and has another handy feature: it can be charged with solar panels on the car’s roof—and can even be used to provide power to your house when the car isn’t on the road.

According to the statistics, transportation was responsible for over 20% of global carbon dioxide emissions in 2020—and of those emissions, cars were responsible for 41%. The Eindhoven team says its goal is to challenge the electric car industry: If 32 students can build a car like this in less than a year, then surely car manufacturers (生产商) are expected to adopt these innovations, too.

5 . Compassion has not been a traditional characteristic of sport. With its UK roots in 19th-century British public schools and universities, modern sport developed as way of creating strong military leaders, training them to develop adaptability defined in those times by iron will and biting the bullet. Fear and harsh criticism were crucial to toughening up players and soldiers alike. The “tough guy” narrative was strengthened by 20th-century media stereotypes and Hollywood’s heroes and became rooted into sport and society.

I’ve heard countless stories like the popular culture I found when I joined the Olympic rowing team in the mid-1990s. We were expected to suffer after mistakes or losses to show that we truly cared, and everyone believed coaches needed to be severe and unforgiving to get results. These approaches still exist. But an alternative approach with compassion at its center addresses aims of performance and wellbeing for those with greater ambitions.

This isn’t some soft option which plays down hard work, as supporters of the earlier traditional sporting mindset might criticize. Research across branches of psychology — behavioral, sports, positive — shows how compassion creates the strongest foundation for adaptability and sustained performance under pressure whether in sport, the military, healthcare or business. Rather than activating our threat system which began to help us survive way back, compassion helps us to feel safe and protected, leaving us free to learn, connect with others and start exploring what we’re capable of.

The continuous need to improve performance has led top coaches to appreciate that high performance requires levels of support to match the level of challenge. When you provide that, players start thriving while striving to achieve more. Rooted in compassion, a different coach-athlete relationship thus develops.

The dictionary definition of compassion includes the recognition of another’s suffering and the desire and support to relieve it. Compassion has been shown to decrease fear of failure and increase the likelihood of trying again when failure does happen. But how many talented athletes experience that depth of support in moments of crisis and failure?

Under the boundless blue sky, soft grasses wave in the breeze, herds of cows and sheep leisurely grazing on the plains, white round yurts (蒙古包) dotting throughout the endless green, and pearl-like rivers zigzagging to the mysterious distance. This is picturesque Hulunbuir Grassland, ideally     1    (locate) in Hulunbuir City of Inner Mongolia,     2     history can be traced back to 209 BC.

Hulunbuir’s name has been illuminated (照亮) on the national stage, with the 14th National Winter Games successfully drawing a close on Tuesday February 27, regarded as the most significant comprehensive winter sports event in China after the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics. In the past month, Hulunbuir,     3    (remarkable) employing its great geographical advantages,     4    (integrate) the Winter Games theme into its urban landscape through     5    (variety) ice and snow sculptures, transforming the region into a bustling (繁华的) center of sports and cultural activities.

This grand event not only leaves behind memories of thrilling moments but acts as an example of the power of sports in enhancing unity and celebrating diversity. Hulunbuir is home     6     diverse ethnic minorities such as the Mongolian, Daur, Evenki, and Oroqen ethnic groups, weaving its rich heritage into the fabric of this     7    (compete). The opening ceremony,     8    (feature) performances by noted artists from these ethnic groups, showcasing their traditional music, dance, and art,     9    (hold) with flying colors on February 17.

The Spring Festival holiday period witnessed an extraordinary surge in tourism, with Hulunbuir attracting     10     total of 1.67 million visitors. Hulunbuir, a magic wonderland, will continue to shine and bloom in the future.

7 . Falcons are powerful birds that may be trained to hunt in cooperation with humans. The art of training falcons as “hunting dogs of the skies” is called falconry (训鹰术). It was developed in the ancient Arabian Desert around 4000 B. C. In the past, falconry mainly involved hunting with falcons to supplement one’s diet. But now, it has become the favorite sport and pastime in the Arabian Peninsula.

Falconry includes three major processes: acquiring the falcons, training them, and hunting with them. Every year, falconers begin capturing wild falcons in June and July, the migration season. The best birds to catch are the ones with naturally nurtured hunting skills, aged one or two years. Once the falcons are captured, their heads are immediately covered with a leather hood. This is essential because they imprint as their master whomever they see first after the hood is removed. Right after a bird is caught, the training process starts. It begins by depriving (剥夺) the bird of food to make it easier to tame. The birds are taught to know their own name and respond to their master when called. Arab falconers live with their birds day and night in order to build a strong relationship with them.

By the end of October or mid-November, the trained falcons are ready to hunt in the desert. They have excellent vision, 2. 6 times greater than that of a human. They are also the fastest divers on the planet. One hunting technique that sets them apart from other animals is that they can be trained to deliver their prey, without killing it first. This is vital in Islamic culture because animals used for food must still be alive to ensure that the meat is halal, that is, properly prepared according to Islamic law.

Falcons have played such a crucial role in traditional Islamic cultures that a number of countries in the Middle East have made them their national bird. Falconry has grown so popular that specialist hospitals have been established to take care of these magnificent birds. Falcons are even issued their own passports. They are the only animals in the United Arab Emirates that are legally allowed to travel inside planes, enjoying a level of luxury that some humans can only dream of.

8 . At 13, I resolved to be an amazing teacher, overwhelmingly driven by a _________ desire for superpowers, which some of my gorgeous teachers had.

In fifth grade, Ms. Charlotte, an English teacher could magically _________ us to different worlds every day. She encouraged us to find something beautiful on our way home or to school. Perhaps, it could be a _________ of freshly baked bread drifting from someone’s house, or the sound of breezes slightly rustling leaves. She _________ curiosity into us. She guided us to bravely _________ joy, peace, love, hope, sharing, modesty, loyalty, duty, kindness, friendship, sympathy, generosity, creativity, truth and faith.

She told us stories from books we would otherwise never _________. Currently, I still remember highlights of the classic she shared, The Old Man and the Sea. After Santiago, an old fisherman came in empty-handed for eighty-four days, we couldn’t imagine what difficulty he had _________ a huge marlin. At the sight of the beautiful huge _________, he was unable to _________ his excitement, with a bright smile __________ to his face. Yet, a __________ battle lay ahead. He felt faint but held on the great fish with all his strength. “I moved him,” he thought, “Pull, hands. Hold up, legs. Last for me, head. You never went.” For two days and nights __________, the huge fish dragged the boat drifting. The elderly was in danger. Once, twice more, once more he tried and he felt himself extremely __________ when he turned the fish. Finally, the fish was stabbed (刺，戳) and tied to the boat.

What a man! So Ms. Charlotte inspired us to fight for our own pride and defend it, __________ the fact that life will set obstacles on the way to future with challenge, hardship, perhaps loneliness too, which will take all of our courage. It is true that a man can be destroyed physically but cannot be defeated spiritually.

Now, dear teachers, we love you and thank you from the bottom of our heart! I will keep the __________ song you’ve taught us in mind.

When your dreams come alive you’re unstoppable

Take a shot, chase the sun, find the beautiful

We will glow in the dark turning dust to gold

9 . Nanako Hama gets a lot of mail, mostly from strangers who live in her home city of Tokyo. In light envelopes, they send locks of their hair, hoping to recycle it.

People generate a huge amount of hair waste. Nearly all of that waste ends up in landfill, where it can release harmful greenhouse gases that contribute to climate change.

But hair possesses useful qualities that it’s a shame to simply throw it away. That’s why people all around the world, like Hama, have been collecting hair and finding innovative ways to recycle it, including making mats (垫子)out of it for removing oil leaks.

Hama is part of the nonprofit Matter of Trust (MoT) members working at more than 60 centers dotted across 17 countries, using machines to make hair donated from local salons and individuals into square mats, which are then used to clean up the floating oil.

Hair is particularly well-suited for this, says MoT co-founder Lisa Gautier. “That’s because its rough sort of outer layer lets oil stick to it.” MoT’s mats have been used in major oil leaks. including the 2010 Deepwater Horizon and 2007 Cosco Busan incidents.

In a 2018 study, Murray, an environmental scientist at the University of Technology Sydney, in Australia found that mats made of recycled human hair could absorb 0.84 grams of oil onto its surface for every gram of hair—significantly more than polypropylene (聚丙烯), a type of plastic that’s typically used to clean up floating oil.

Besides, hair is also useful as fertilizer (化肥). Hair contains a relatively high nitrogen (氮), a chemical element crucial for plant growth, and each lock of hair is made of roughly 16 percent of this essential nutrient. Last year, more than 560 gallons of liquid fertilizer made from human hair was sold to farmers in northern Tanzania and the feedback from the farmers has been very encouraging.

“It’s just a great way to use hair in a productive way. Hair is an answer literally hanging in front of our eyes—for oil and soil,” Hama says.

My dad, John, was a basketball fan. He played in college and even coached a local youth team for a few years. His love for the game was unbelievable, and some of my earliest memories are of us playing basketball in the nearby court. I’ve even seen old photos of him in his college days, a proud smile on his face as he held a basketball. But when it came to my own involvement in basketball, he was surprisingly positive that I should focus only on study. “Basketball won’t pay the bills,” he’d often say, a statement that always struck me as ironic (讽刺的) given how much he loved the sport.

I loved basketball too, and I was pretty good at it. My school coach, Coach Miller, saw potential in me and encouraged me to join the school team. He said I had a natural talent that could take me far if I trained hard. But my dad was against it. He believed that sports would distract me from my studies, and with the final exam around the corner, he didn’t want to take any chances. “Your future is in the classroom, not on the court,” he would insist, dashing my dreams of following in his athletic footsteps.

This tension between us reached a peak when my head teacher, Mrs. Williams, announced a school basketball tournament (联赛). It was a big deal; students from the whole city would come to watch. My friends were excited, and even some teachers were talking about it. However, I knew I couldn’t participate without my dad’s approval. It felt like an invisible chain holding me back, a conflict between my passion and his expectations.

Then something unexpected happened. Mrs. Williams called my dad for a meeting. I was nervous but also hopeful. Mrs. Williams was not just an educator; she was also a parent and understood the balance between academics and extracurricular activities. She had seen students succeed in both, and I hoped she could convince my dad.

After the meeting, my dad seemed to be in deep thought. He didn’t speak immediately, taking his time as if weighing his words carefully. Finally, he broke the silence, “Mrs. Williams made some good points about teamwork and discipline. Maybe it’s time to rethink my stance (立场) on you playing basketball.”

I was thrilled but also cautious. “So, can I play in the tournament?” I asked.

As I scanned the audience, I spotted my dad.