Be yourself and always follow your heart. Never let anyone change who you are. This is the lesson I have learned from my childhood experience when I figured out I wasn’t invited to the party, Bridget’s party.

One morning, I got off the bus and saw my friends except me hugging under the tree where we used to stand. The circle seemed tighter as I approached；the white invitation cards being hastily stuffed into backpacks gave it away. I knew as well as the entire universe that Bridget’s party was this weekend. Bridget was the most popular girl in our class. She was thin and beautiful, always wearing fabulous clothes and fine makeup.

Why hadn’t she invited me? My feet were too big? No. Maybe. My face was broken out? Why did she invite every person in my group except me? I tried to think of any interactions I’d had with Bridget recently. A few days earlier, we’d been partners during a sixth period project. I was determined to get the project done and she was absorbed in looking at fashion magazines. She barely spoke to me except to say, “You’re so serious. You know, you should smile more."

Soon, I had overheard all the details about the party. They were going swimming. It was a sleepover. They were renting scary movies and were going to stay up all night. Each time someone mentioned the party, I smiled weakly and nodded, with my stomach in knots.

When having my favorite English class, I found myself just unable to concentrate on the short stories we were supposed to be reading in class. Maybe she didn’t invite me because of my coat. It is pretty ugly compared to some of the other girls’ coats. I should have bought another color. Maybe I should smile more but I just can’t get into smiling at people unless I know them really well. But I just couldn’t pretend to be the person I wasn’t. I felt sick.

At lunch, my friend Kate who had been invited came over to me, trying to show off.

I was about to let it go when Bridget invited me as a substitute for a girl who couldn’t come.

I’m not Chinese, but I love Chinese New Year. There are many fun New Year     1     (celebrate), but nothing quite matches the excitement of the lion dance which can wake up the spirit     2     (complete).

The sound of the drums,       3     you can feel throughout your entire body, is quite inspiring. The two performers are very flexible. But it is actually very difficult as the lion head is very heavy and being the     4     (low)part of the lion is tiring as he has to bend his back and also carry     5     person in front sometimes. The lion head is made with paper over a bamboo frame,       6     (cover)in gauze (纱布), and decorated with beautifully-colored materials.

The lion dance     7     (believe)to have first appeared in the Qianlong Emperor's dream during his Southern tour, and he ordered an animal     8     (make)in the likeness of his description and used in festivals from then on.

I love all about the lion dance. The other day, I saw a film about a left-behind teenager who insisted on pursuing his dreams despite difficulties and     9     (succeed)in lion dance. As Master Xu translates: “Heaven has made us talents; we’re not made     10     vain.”

4 . As a speaker of 10 languages I know the benefits of speaking more than one language. To start with, we need to dispel (消除) four common misconceptions about language learning.

You have to have a gift for learning languages.

No, you don’t.     1     In Sweden and Holland most people speak more than one language. They can’t just all be gifted at languages. In language learning it is attitude, not aptitude (天赋) that determines success.

    2    

Some immigrants to North America never learn to speak more than broken English. Yet we meet people in other countries who speak flawless English. With the Internet, language content is available to anyone with a computer.     3    

To learn a language you need formal classroom instruction.

Classrooms may be economical to run and a great place to meet others. They have the weight of history and tradition behind them. Unfortunately, a classroom is an inefficient place to learn a language.     4     A majority of school kids graduate unable to communicate in languages that they study for 10 or more years.

I would love to learn but I don't have the time.

How about the time you spend waiting in line or going for a walk? Why not use that time to listen to a language on your iPad? Once you get started, even 10 or 15 minutes a day will soon grow to 30 minutes a day, or one hour.     5     As I do, you will find the time.

5 . Skeleton is one of the three sliding sports at the Beijing 2022 Olympic Winter Games, alongside the luge(单雪橇)and bobsleigh(大雪橇). With only six medals up for grabs, skeleton has the fewest events at the Winter Games—which means competition will be fierce.

The sport of skeleton has its roots in the most popular winter pastime: sleighing. In the mid-19^th century, British and American holidaymakers built the first toboggan(平底雪橇)run in Davos in 1882, and thus the sport of sleighing began.

Two years later, in 1884, the famed Cresta Run—a natural ice skeleton racing toboggan track—was built in St. Moritz, Switzerland(the course has hosted the annual Grand National championships since 1885).

In 1892, a new sledge made entirely of steel was introduced, and some claim that its bony appearance gave the sledge and the sport the name ‘skeleton’.

Men’s skeleton was first introduced on the Olympic program in the 1928 Games in St. Moritz. But due to the sport only being available at the Cresta Run at the time, it fell into obscurity(默默无闻)while the luge and bobsleigh grew in popularity. However, in 2002, the skeleton was reintroduced as a men’s and women’s event at the Salt Lake City Winter Olympics, and has remained a part of the Olympic program ever since.

While Great Britain has the most medals(nine)in skeleton competition at the Olympics, the top spot belongs to the United States(eight medals)by virtue of having four silvers to Great Britain’s one(both nations have three golds, while Britain has five bronze medals, and the United States one).

Great Britain is the only nation to have won a medal every time skeleton has featured at the Olympic Games, and has won at least one medal in each of the five contests of women’s skeleton since its introduction.

Xueqiang, a local ethnic (民族的) dance in Derong County of Sichuan Province, has won national fame among cultural workers and researchers. It was listed     1     a national intangible cultural heritage in 2008.

Over time, Xueqiang became standard entertainment at gatherings and     2    (party). Especially at night during the harvest festival, people would dance the Xueqiang around a bonfire while drinking and singing. Some would risk     3     (jump) the bonfire, making the night even more     4     (excite). Xueqiang has no accompaniment or tools. Its main features are the stomping (跺脚) and stepping rhythms that are sometimes strong and powerful, sometimes soft and free.

Xueqiang singing is complicated in its tune structure, which is     5     (usual) divided into four parts — intro, bridge, verse, and outro. The intervals are full of ups and downs, while the melody (旋律) is bright and     6     (nature). At the end of the melody, dancers stomp their feet to fill the pause, creating a remarkable ending.

As for the origins of Xueqiang, it can be traced back to the Tang Dynasty    7     Princess Wencheng was sent to marry the King of Tubo,     8     ancient kingdom in Tibet. The local artists got together to compose songs and dances     9     (greet) the princess as she passed through. Eventually, Xueqiang     10     (create), combining the artistic spirits of different ethnic groups co-existing at the time.

8 . The SNAG stands for stereotyped nature-inspired aerial grasper and it’s a 3D-printed bird robot with claws. It can fly, stay on various surfaces catch and carry objects, just like the mighty falcon（隼）that was used as the source of inspiration in its development.

Each leg of the SNAG has two motors, one for helping it move back and forth, and the other one for grasping. Twenty printing attempts were necessary for the robot to finally reach its current structure, but it was worth it. Now, according to researchers, the flying machine has an impressively strong and high-speed clutch（离合器），being able to land and wrap its claws around a branch in about 20 milliseconds. SNAG has ankles lock, and there’s an accelerometer （加速计）on its right foot that reports that it’s landed while triggering（触发）a balancing process to stabilize it.

Scientists have already conducted several tests with the robot in rural areas and on different surfaces. In all the situations, the SNAG was able to catch objects thrown by hand, such as bean bags, a tennis ball, and more.

As for the applications of the bird-like robot, the SNAG can get attached to drones（无人机）and be used for search and rescue missions, wildfire monitoring, to offer just a few examples. Another great application is environmental research, with the SNAG also featuring a temperature and humidity（湿度）sensor. By using a robot that can act like a bird, you can unlock new ways of studying the environment, as explained by William Roderick, mechanical engineer and one of the researchers involved in the project. Now scientists are moving on to improving the robot’s situational awareness and flight control.

This isn’t the first time that nature has inspired groundbreaking technologies. We also wrote a piece recently about the F-SAM micro drone, which was inspired by the flight of samara（翼果）seeds, also known as “twisters” which have a special way of spinning down to the ground.

9 . When asked what his father did for a living, Mike explained to his kindergarten teacher that “he steals things, but it’s OK, because he gets paid to do it. ”

He isn’t wrong. His father is a hacker(黑客), who is proud of his job, just like doctors are proud of the work they do. Thanks to security researchers’ hacking practices, leaks in a new version of the most common Wi-Fi code standard(WPA3)were found before criminals could use them to break into home and business networks. In another case, criminals found an unknown weakness in Google’s Android operating systems before security researchers did, giving the bad guys full control of more than a dozen phone models.

However, finding Mike’s father’s personalized plates for his car with the word ‘HACKING’, an employee of the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles quickly took them away, claiming that a license plate displaying “HACKING” publicized criminal activity. While this reaction really isn’t the fault of the well-intentioned employee, it’s a sign of how a deeply rooted misrepresentation of his profession has created a fixed wrong image. It seems that the way that hackers are described in Hollywood has contributed to the word ‘hacker’ paralleling ‘criminal’, where hackers are often referred to as figures in dark rooms engaged in illegal activity while tapping at keyboards.

But actually, hacking is just an activity. What separates any activity from a crime is, very often, permission. People are free to drive, but they do not have permission to drive 150 miles per hour, which is a criminal offense. Since a driver is just a driver, why must a hacker be a criminal? Someone who engages in the illegal use of hacking should not be called a ‘bad hacker’ but a ‘cybercriminal’. Contrary to popular belief, most hackers like Mike’s father undoubtedly play an important role in keeping companies and people safe.