1 . It was dark as Ibrahim Al Hussein came to. He couldn’t move and thick dust filled the air, blocking out all but a few small flames dancing close by. It was hard to breathe. Something wasn’t right and he could not feel his foot. As the smoke of the bombing cleared Al Hussein was saved but lost his lower right leg forever.

After several twists and turns, Al Hussein managed to escape from war-torn Syria to Athens, Greece. With no money left on him, he had to sleep on the streets and look for fruit in trees or eat grass from the park. Luckily, he later found work cleaning toilets at a local cafe. He worked every day of the week with no breaks and was proud to be supporting himself. But he was missing something — sport.

Al Hussein used to be a sportsman. As war broke out in Syria in 2011, all sports stadiums were forced to close, but now settled and safe in Athens, he was desperate to return to physical activity. In May, 2015, his prayers were answered. A swimming club gave him permission to train there.

“When I looked at the address I realised it was the Athens Aquatics Centre,” says Al Hussein, who, at the age of 16, had watched the 2004 Olympics unfold on a small TV in his cosy Syrian home. “Seeing those Olympics gave me motivation to do sport and although it was a flashback to the past, it was also a look to a better future because I had made it to the pool I’d watched and dreamt of swimming in.”

For much of 2015 he swam in the morning and then worked at the cafe until late in the evening. It was tough, but it worked for him and, in early 2016, he secured two medals at the Greek Para Swimming National Championships. People began to take note.

2 . It was eight o’ clock on Christmas morning, and Uncle Tom said he wanted to listen to the news. My 11-year-old self was wondering why grown-ups would be interested in the news when there were important things to be done, such as handing out presents. However, while I was only half-listening to the radio broadcast, I was confused that I had heard that report earlier.

My older brother, Colin, figured out what was happening. “Pete, it’s a tape recorder! We’ve got our tape recorder!” This was one of those rare moments when my inside gave an involuntary lurch (倾斜). Colin and I had both been blind from birth. In the late 1950s, tape recorders were definitely the top choice for blind kids, especially with the rise of rock ‘n’ roll.

But it wasn’t the first time I had been attracted to a tape recorder. I vividly remember walking into a room when I was four and hearing a child’s beautiful singing. It turned out that my dad had borrowed a tape recorder for preparing his projects. And for the first time, in the same way that a sighted child might react to seeing themselves in a mirror or a photograph, I got the sense of myself as a separate person who existed outside my head and was experienced by other people.

Then I became a broadcaster at school. I would wander around the school with my microphone, recording my thoughts in the style of the voices I heard on the radio. But the biggest challenge was not finding things to do with the tape recorder but taking it away from Colin. His generosity on the first day we got it did not extend to handing it over to his brother at school. “You’ll break it,” he would say.

But ten years later, I drew on the confidence gained from those early explorations of the sound and walked into a radio station, in the hopes of selling myself as a broadcast journalist. Eight years later, I presented my first report for BBC’s Six O’Clock News. I never thought that a Christmas present had changed my life.

3 . This past January, Captain Preet Chandi set foot on a historic, though decidedly icy trail by becoming the first woman of color to reach the South Pole alone, without assistance. While others might have been content to make history with this singular accomplishment, “Polar Preet” Chandi is not one to rest on her achievements. The journey to the South Pole was merely “phase one” of a larger and even more extraordinary goal for the adventurous British Army officer.

“For the phase two”, the 33-year-old has set her sights on crossing Antarctica — once again doing the journey alone and unsupported to become the first woman to achieve this goal.

On November 14, Chandi departed from Hercules Inlet, an ice-filled bay at the southwestern section of the Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelf bordering the Weddell Sea in Antarctica. Her goal is to reach Reedy Glacier within 75 days, a coast-to-coast journey consisting of roughly 1,100 miles. And “roughly” is the key word here — she’ll be pulling a sled (雪橇) with equipment, weighing about 264 pounds altogether, and she’ll be doing so in temperatures that can sink to minus 58 degrees Fahrenheit, with wind speeds of up to 60 miles per hour.

Her journey thus far required years of training. Prior to her 700-mile South Pole journey, she prepared by attending a polar survival course in Norway. She continued her training back home in the UK by dragging tires, the closest thing to pulling a sled, and a month-long practice run in Greenland. Ultimately, Chandi went on to finish her first South Pole expedition in 40 days, a full eight days ahead of schedule.

When not otherwise setting records of human endurance in extreme conditions, Chandi tries to inspire others in her day-to-day work.

Chandi will be posting interval (间隔) voice blog updates of her phase two progress on her website, polar Preet. com, where a live tracking map will also provide her current location at every point along her journey.

“Nothing is impossible. I’ve always had this idea that I can achieve something great, something that allows me to be a role model,” Chandi shared on her blog.

4 . We all strive to accomplish our goals before old age catches up with us—but for one San Diego woman, the loss of her ________ is far from a barrier.

Two days after Thanksgiving Laura Simon turns 106, and she’s still setting goals for herself. The secret to her longevity, she says, “is to live as ________ as you can and to work.”

Simon ________ one of her biggest goals when she turned 100: She ________ a book, titled I Am Still Here. Simon’s poor eyesight prevented her from ________ writing, so she dictated her book into a tape recorder over nine years. “I’m very ________ of this book,” Simon said.

The book’s 500 pages are ________ by dozens of black-and white photos. Her paintings are also throughout the book. It was only recently when it was ________ for her to continue that Simon stopped painting. “My paintings come from the very depth of my being,” Simon said. “It gives me life and ________.”

As for her recent ________? She said she wanted to be in the Library of Congress. And Simon did more than ________ it to the Library of Congress. Her publisher ________ her that she is one of the oldest ________ authors with a book in the nation’s library. “The rest of the authors are all gone, from the time of Washington. And my book is with all these great books,” Simon said, beaming. “...as my title says on the book, I am still here.”

Positive attitude about ________ has gotten Simon far. “Although I’m going to be 106 years old within the next week, I’m much ________ in spirit and more active in the depth of my thinking.” Simon said.

6 . I was born missing my left arm. In 1986, at 18 months, I was fitted with a prosthetic (义肢) device, a decision made by my parents and doctors so that I would develop “normally”.

I spent my entire childhood and adolescence trying to fit in. I did just about anything to ease the pains of the stares and pointing fingers from my classmates. By the time I was 8, I had no self-confidence, and the hand I was wearing was making it harder for me to fit in. So I decided I was better off without one. I didn’t need anyone to fix me.

To prove that I wasn’t limited by my disability, I developed a love for all sports, in particular swimming. I was selected to my first Australian women’s swimming team at age 13 and successfully represented my country for eight years. I realized I’d made a name for myself because of my disability.

I taught myself how to be comfortable in a society filled with insecurities. So when I was first contacted in 2021 by Covvi, a company trying to create the world’s most advanced bionic (仿生的) hand, I was a bit surprised. They asked me to trial the hand and, if possible, to become a patient advocate. Initially, I said no. Then, curiosity got the better of me.

While I was busy advocating for disability rights, a new generation of leaders, like Amy Purdy and Nick Vujicic, used the power of technology and social media to display wheelchairs or artificial limbs without explanation. People feared disability less. Society was beginning to see a person first, and their disability second.

Viewing disability through a social lens also meant acknowledging that a person is more disabled by their environment and the discrimination of others than by their actual disability. As those conversations shifted, I realized that there was an opportunity to use technology to steer the narrative for future generations. In July 2022, I decided to trial the hand.

The role of patient advocate is an enormous privilege. Through sharing my journey, I’m able to reach thousands of other people who would benefit from its extraordinary capabilities. That’s why I wear a bionic hand—not because I’m broken, but because I have an opportunity to enhance the human capabilities that already exist.

A video of a 66-year-old man called Erjiu, has gone viral on Chinese social media after his nephew Tang Hao shared the man’s brief but heartwarming life story on short-video platform Bilibili on Monday.

In the video, Erjiu is shown as a “young genius” who always performed well     1    (academic) at school during childhood. However, while he was a teenager, a high fever was misdiagnosed (误诊) and he     2     (give) the wrong medicine,     3     resulted in Erjiu losing the use of his left leg.

Erjiu, who     4     (lie) in bed in low spirits afterward, then learned carpentry by watching a carpenter     5    (go) about woodworking tasks for three days, and he later did woodworking in the village and the town.

According to Tang, it would be inaccurate to merely define Erjiu     6    a carpenter, since he demonstrated his broader     7     (skill) by fixing an electrical socket patch panel, a gas stove and a toy car. He also makes erhu — a traditional Chinese musical instrument — with wood, using fishing line as strings     8     snakeskin as covering.

The man, who uses a cane due to a longtime     9     (disable), is portrayed as a common hero who never bows to life’s difficulties, but struggles instead     10    (lead) a full and meaningful village life.

9 . Some years ago, a young man came to me for advice. He told me that reading a whole paragraph _________ made him tired. His _________ was that he was working at a dead-end job for two years. All his friends, none of whom enjoy reading, were in the same _________ . They were all working at low-level jobs with no _________ .

I told him that he had to learn to read well. However, he said he wanted to be successful at something that didn’t _________ reading. I told him that this was not a matter of _________ . The only jobs that have _________ to do with reading were the jobs they were doing. And they would even soon be _________ by younger people with better education. He finally accepted the _________ that he had to become a good reader. He began taking courses in reading. He ____________ a technical institute (技术学院). Because of his poor education, it took him almost three years to ____________ a two-year program in biomedical (生物医学的) engineering.

A small company employed him at $22,000 per year. It wasn’t much, but he ____________ it. He ____________ to read and studied. In his third year, he was ____________ by a company with $40,000 per year. Two years later, an international company ____________ his success and employed him at more than $50,000 per year, with other ____________ .

In eight years, he ____________ a lot, from a low-paid worker to a highly-paid one. He led a ____________ life. The interesting thing was that as he went around ____________ his old friends, he found they were still working as before. Eight years seems like a ____________ time in life, but it passes quickly when you are busy doing something and getting continually better at it.