1 . Use this list of winter festivals to plan your trip or plan around them, as many of these festivals will tie up transport and accommodations and drive up prices. It’s all up to you: either plan your travel dates around them, or arrive early enough to jump into the festive atmosphere!

A day-trip away from South Korea’s capital Seoul, the Garden of Morning Calm is a must-see during the Festival. The lights there cover an area of some 330,000 square meters, using 30,000 colorful LED lights hanging from the trees. Wander around the fairy-like wonderland created by the lights-through such fields like Bonsai Garden, Moonlight Garden, and the Garden of Eden.

·Where: Gapyeong County, South Korea

·When: December-Mid-March

Millions of tourists visit this icy festival every year, drawn by the massive ice sculptures that decorate the fairgrounds next to Songhua River. The sculptures, ice palaces, mazes and slides are simply massive in scale, constructed from some 260,000 cubic yards of ice blocks harvested from the river. They range in size from life-scale carvings of animals and fantastic creatures, to massive 250-foot structures that tower over the crowds.

·Where: Harbin, China

·When: January 5-February 5

Japan’s biggest winter festival has expanded in size and scope since its first celebration in 1950.The Festival covers two main sites in Sapporo. The centerpiece Odori Park site features some 100 ice sculptures dazzlingly lit up after dark. The Susukino district site features a smaller scale of ice sculptures decorating the district. The sculptures cover animals both real and fantastic, including anime-based creatures like Pokemon. Visitors can also enjoy snow mazes, street food, musical performances and skating on the ice rink near Odori Park.

·Where: Sapporo, Japan

·When: February 4-11

The Pingxi Sky Lantern Festival in Taiwan, China is Taiwan’s most visited lantern festival, lighting the skies with floating lanterns bearing messages for the gods. Its counterpart in the Yangshui District favors a noisier kind of illumination-the Tainan Yanshui Fireworks Display takes place at Tainan’s Wumiao Temple, where locals dare to be hit by small fireworks as a test of their strength and to ward off evil.

·Where: Pingxi and Yangshui, Taiwan, China

·When: February

Wang was born and grew up in America, but she    1    (build) solid ties with Chinese culture since she was a little girl. She is now riding a new trend: mixing and matching modern clothes with traditional Han dress, or hanfu. She has been posting videos of     2     (she) dressed in hanfu on the Internet, which has attracted many fans on Chinese lifestyle. “I love hanfu. I’ve made many videos,    3    (aim) to help more people learn about it,” Wang told Beijing Review.

Whenever Song Jing visits a museum, she never fails to check out the section on ancient books. In addition to appreciating the wisdom hidden in those historical volumes, she focuses on     1     they were joined and presented. Song     2     (work) in the restoration division for ancient books at the National Library of China in Beijing for eight years.

The seasons come and go outside her workshop, but time is relative for Song and her fellow restorers. Their work is calculated not through “years”     3     “lifetimes”. The flow of time may be hardly felt except through the yellowing pages and the graying of hair.

The primary objective or ancient book restoration is     4     (extend) the life period of the document. The     5     (high) the similarity between the original and the restoration materials, the more consistent their rate of aging will be, and thus the better the ancient books can     6     (preserve).

As a child, Song was fascinated by     7     (documentary) about the world’s cultural relics and became deeply interested in antique restoration. She spent hours researching cultural relics,     8     (frequent) local museums and reading related books.

It usually takes at least two to three years from learning and following a master     9     one can independently lead a restoration project. “Ancient Chinese civilization has left behind a vast number of books, many of     10     require restoration,” Song says. “Hopefully, I can inspire more young people to find their lifelong passion in the field of cultural heritage preservation.”

One of the largest research libraries in the world, the British Library has added 16 Chinese online novels to the collection.     1     (cover) themes of science fiction, history, reality and fantasy, these works are viewed     2     the classics of Chinese online literature from the past 20 years.

The library houses more than 170 million     3     (collection), the cultural relics of different civilizations from throughout history included. The library usually selects works     4     (base) on their popularity or by considering an item’s value. Readers can check the information about the 16 books on the library’s website     5     borrow printed copies.

As one of the current pillars of mass cultural consumption,     6     began with “fastfood” romances, fantasies and mysteries, the Chinese online literature industry     7     (mature) quickly during its fast development over the last two decades.

In 2019, 10 online novels, including Great Power, Heavy Industry,     8     (be) added to the collection of the shanghai Library.And between 2020 and 2022, 144 online novels like Battle Through the Heavens and Lord of Mysteries were entered into the collection of the National Library of China.

“It’s     9     (true) unexpected to me that online fiction can be added to the collection of     10     foreign library. It feels like the path of online novel writing is becoming ever wider,” Yi Qianchong adds.

6 . I still remember my father’s sheepish expression at breakfast the morning after he’d been invited to have dinner at a colleague’s house. _______ arriving in Brazil, back in the dark ages, he’d _______ his hosts by making a hand gesture which he had always understood to mean “OK”, but in Brazil, it meant something quite _______.

_______, he’d raised his fingers to his _______ and made a kissing sound, which again, he meant as a way of _______ that something-in this case the meal he’d just been asked to_______-was delicious.

The faux pas (失态，失礼) was_______forgotten. My father’s colleague and his wife understood he probably wasn’t yet_______of the local meaning of the gesture. I was ________of this moment myself a few months into my stay in China. After ________ a colleague’s WeChat message with a Van Gogh sticker that I thought meant “keep fighting”, a second colleague appeared.

“The Chinese version is a bit different,” she said, taking out her phone. “See these ________?” They mean “I will hit you.”

Needless to say, I didn’t use that ________ Van Gogh again.

Life is full of ________ meanings. We generally understand that even if it stings, a mistake is only an insult when it is________. Yet as we look around, much friction originates from ________, and history is full of the ________ outcomes of crossed communication.   

My father’s faux pas was________ because of context-he had just arrived, he could not know, and it didn’t make sense that he’d be offensive by design. But when ________ is missing or differently understood—perhaps it is time we all think twice before typing or talking, especially when the consequences can be much ________ than the misuse of a WeChat sticker.

Chinese food and the differences between Chinese and Western diets are both things that cause the    1    (curious) of most people who visit China. Moreover, when    2    (travel) through China, you'll most likely pick up on a few differences in the way of eating food. For example, soup in the West     3    (enjoy) generally as an appetizer (开胃菜) at the start of a meal, while the Chinese prefer to enjoy their soup at the end of a meal.

You might also notice some distinct differences in meal preparation and cooking techniques. Therefore, cooking classes are becoming an    4    (increasing) popular activity among those interested in learning more about China's culture through its cuisine. If you're looking to take it a step    5    (far), keep an eye out for cooking classes    6    (hold) by residents in their own homes.

    7    it comes to traditional Chinese games, the Chinese have always been sociable people. Despite the country's super technological advancement and the increasing popularity of personal electronic devices. the majority of Chinese would rather spend time socializing with others than sit alone at home. From popular board games like Go (围棋) and Chinese chess to kids' games like Chinese jump rope, China offers    8    (vary) options to keep people busy. Most locals are more than happy to share their traditions    9    foreign visitors, so don't be shy to ask the next time you go for    10    walk through the park!

The Jiaohe Ancient City Ruins,     1     (locate)10 kilometers west of Turpan, Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region is the largest, oldest and best-preserved earthen architectural site in the world,     2     holds great political, cultural, historical and artistic value.

Guri Bakri, a 39-year-old conservator of the Jiaohe Ruins, starts her daily inspection at the site as usual, ensuring the safety of tourists and     3     (make) photographic records along the way. She is the third generation of Guri’s family who have been working as local cultural conservators,     4     (constant) guarding this historic site since her grandfather     5     (become) the only conservator in Jiaohe in 1961.

After graduating in 2013, Guri returned to her hometown and became one of her father’s     6     (colleague). Talking about Jiaohe, Guri said that she would always remember June 22, 2014, when the Jiaohe Ancient City Ruins     7     (name) the World Heritage Site. She was proud of her participation in the application     8     the title.

In recent years, the state cultural protection department has invested more than 100 million yuan ($ 14.8m) in the     9     (protect) of Jiaohe Ancient City Ruins. This year, Jiaohe Ancient City Ruins will take the fifth round of structural reinforcement (加固).     10     team of conservators has also expanded to 12. This old city of more than 2,000 years is gaining new energy.

With its landscape of plateaus (高原) bound by mountains, Shanxi province in North China is regarded as being associated with fields of wheat and iconic wheat products. Daoxiao noodles is one of the most popular     1     (dish) there. This dish     2     (date) back to China’s Yuan Dynasty (1271—1368), so this type of well-received noodles has a long history.

    3     (make) Daoxiao noodles, hold the dough (面团) with one hand, and on the other hand, using a sharp knife that’s     4     (specific) made, slice the noodles into a pot of boiling water. According     5     the locals, some of the most skilled chefs can slice up to 200 noodles a minute. At restaurants, customers often watch in amazement as     6     (talent) chefs perform a dance while making lamian, which means pulled noodles. The chefs swing the noodles around with elegance as they stretch longer and longer, thinner and thinner before finally     7     (land) into the pot for boiling. There is always thunderous applause for     8     routines.

In the city of Taiyuan, capital of Shanxi province, any number of fine restaurants can     9     (find) serving up delicacies (美食) from across the country such as from Sichuan and Hunan. But it is the Shanxi food     10     really gets most people to have a big appetite.