1 . How do we make good things out of bad? How do we look at ourselves? Can there be a _______ side even in our pain?

There was an elderly woman who needed to walk down to the river every morning to _______ water for drinking, cooking and cleaning. She _______ two buckets, filled them up on the riverbank and walked back with them to her rural _______.

One of the buckets was newer, perfectly sealed (密封) and _______ its water completely. The second bucket was older and contained a few thin cracks that would _______ water as the elderly woman walked. By the time she arrived home, _______ about one third of the water in the second bucket was left.

One day, on the walk down to the river, the cracked bucket that had always felt like it wasn’t as good as the other bucket said to the elderly woman, ‘‘I want you to know that water has been _______ out every morning for the past several years. I’m so sorry for being cracked and making your life more _______. I understand if you need to ________ me with a better bucket.” The elderly woman ________, ‘‘do you really think I haven’t known about your cracks this whole time? Look at all the beautiful flowers that grow on the ________ from my cottage to the river. I ________ their seeds, but every morning it was you who ________ them.”

We all have a few cracks, but choose to see how it’s exactly those ________ that make us good enough.

2 . The “Double Seven Festival” is a traditional Chinese festival. It has a longer history than the ______ of Valentine’s Day in the West.

The origin of this festival is related to a cowboy and a weaving girl, whose love story has become a part of the Chinese culture. ______ there are many different versions of the story, the most popular one begins with a poor cowboy. Living with his elder and ______ brother, who treated him badly, the cowboy looked after an old cow every day. Though life was tough and boring, he put up with it in silence, without complaining.

Unluckily, even such a hard life didn’t last long. His brother got rid of him and all he got was the old cow. Although they couldn’t talk to each other, they ______ on each other for company. One day, miracle happened. The old cow started talking and told him that there would be seven fairies coming down to the Earth to ______ in a pond. All he should do was to ______ the dress of one of the fairies. Then that fairy would be his wife. ______ but excited, the cowboy followed the cow’s advice.

Every day the cowboy went to work ______ the fairy wove cloth at home. However, their ______ life came to an end when the Heavenly Goddess learned about it. She took the weaving girl away and drew a line in the sky that turned into the Milky Way, which ______ the cowboy meeting her wife. Due to the strong reaction from the young ______, the Goddess finally allowed them to see each other only once a year. The day was on the seventh day of the seventh month. That is ______ the Double Seven Festival came into being.

Although the love story doesn’t end up with a happy ending, it is to be told from one ______ to another. It reminds people to cherish every moment ______ with their loved ones and not to regret until we ______ them.

4 . Inconvenient Truths

If doctors lie, it is surely inexcusable. One of the basic_________ the public have of doctors is honesty. But what would you think if I told you that research has shown that 70 per cent of doctors   _________ to lying to their patients? If I am honest, I have told lies to my patients.

Mrs Walton was in her eighties and _________ to see her husband. She would try to get up to find him, despite being at risk of falling. “He’s on his way, don’t worry,” the nurses would say this to calm her down. I said the same thing to her. But it was a lie. He died two years ago. The truth, if I can use that word, is that it is a _________ to lie sometimes.

Mrs Walton is one of the dementia (痴呆) sufferers, who lose their short-term memory and the memory of_________ events, but hold memories from the distant past. Sufferers are trapped forever in a confusing past that many realize bears little   _________ to the present, but are at a loss to explain. Those with dementia often feel upset, scared and confused that they are in a strange place, _________ by strange people, even when they are in their own homes with their family, because they have gone back to decades ago.

They look at their adult children   _________ and wonder who they could be because they think their children are still little kids. I have had countless families break down in tears, not knowing how to react as their loved one moves further away from them back into their distant past and they are   _________ in the present. And how, as the doctor or nurse caring for these patients, does one manage the anger and outbursts of distress that comes with having no   __________ of your life for the past ten or 20 years? The lies that doctors, nurses and families tell these patients are not big, elaborate lies — they are   __________ comforts intended to calm and allow the subject to be swiftly changed.

__________ with them about this false reality is not heartless or unprofessional — it is actually kind. That’s not to say that lying to patients with dementia__________ is right or defensible. But what kind-hearted person would put another human being through the unimaginable pain of learning, ________ again and again, that they have lost their beloved ones. It would be an unthinkable cruelness.

Sometimes honesty is __________ not the best policy.

5 . It is important to have positive feelings in our daily life.

“Compared _______ some unhappy people, those who are always pleased and relaxed are less likely to suffer from colds,” _______ a new study. The researchers from New York University said, “being happy helps the body _______ diseases.”

“It seems that positive feelings may reduce the _______ of illness,” said the chief researcher Sheldon Cohen.

In an earlier study Cohen found that people who were _______ caught colds less often. And they seldom told their doctors that they felt _______.

In this study, Cohen’s team _______ 193 adults every day for two weeks. In this period, the people told researchers about their happy or sad _______ that day. Two weeks later, all of them were made to catch colds by doctors, and they had to stay _______ in a room for six days.

The results ________ that each in the study was equal to fall ill. ________, people who were lively and relaxed said they felt happy during the research. Their illnesses were less serious and lasted for a ________ time.

Cohen believes that ________ people have positive feelings, their body may produce a kind of chemical that helps to ________ illnesses. So if you ________ your health, please look on the bright side and make yourself happy all the time.

6 . Growing up in the 1960s, I was taught from an early age to send a handwritten thank­you note expressing ______ for kindness. My mother used to buy me a box of paper and ______ me in the art and value of saying “thank you”. She _____ to be right.

A study showed that it took less than 5 minutes to write the thank­you notes. Just 5 minutes to make another person feel overjoyed! ______, in our “instant” world, the idea of getting an actual pen and writing an actual note seems to never come to mind. We tend to do what is ______ to us — a quick text or an email.

It is easy to use the excuse of being busy, but even very busy and ______ businessmen find time to ______ thank­you notes. For example, when Douglas Conant became CEO of Campbells, the company had ______ half of its market value and morale (士气) was at an all­time low. He ______ fixing that by doing some simple things that probably not _____ in any MBA class. For one thing, Conant wrote to every ______. He gained their confidence and naturally, turned the company around.

In his ten years as CEO, Conant wrote over 30,000 notes to employees. It’s _____ not to ask how he did it. ______, he had many other things to do _____ writing thank­you note. Conant made time for it because he knew the impact each one would have. An expression of ______ in this crazy world still makes a difference.

7 . Recently my wife and I were faced with a difficult situation while traveling by car in the mountains with our hired driver. It was going to be a long ride and we were ________. Just as we began to doze (打盹), the engine made a strange, loud noise and then stopped working.

The sun was just setting and the air was getting ________. We tried communicating with the driver but with little success. He told us he was going to get help and then left.

In a(n) ________ location with no houses in sight, we started to hear the cries of wild animals. We also didn’t have much food it was getting colder and darker. I began to ________ confidence. Should we leave the car and seek shelter? Would our driver ever ________? Was he a trustworthy man? We were very ________.

A couple of hours passed. ________, the headlights from another car could be seen in the ________. An unfamiliar man got out of the car. He looked ________ at first until his mouth opened with a big friendly smile. He asked us to get into the car with him. He had such a kind face, so we knew we could ________ him. We climbed into the car.

Before we left, he put a note on the windshield (挡风玻璃) of our car with his phone number on it. Then he drove us to a nearby village, and we ________  his family. They offered us tea and local foods, and everyone asked us questions and were thrilled to have ________ guests.

Later that evening, the phone rang. It was our ________. He had kept his word and ________ the car. We prepared to leave and thanked our new friends.

I will never forget the ________ and hospitality (好客) we received on that day because we relied on a stranger for help.

8 . I remember, when I was growing up, that my mom would tell me stories about the kind acts my dad had done. One day, my dad met a close, long-time friend of his in the downtown area. They talked for a while and his friend _______ that he didn’t have money for _______ home. My dad gave him the _______ money he had, which was for his own train, so he just _______ home.

I also _______ these kind acts in our home. Dad would let me and my two younger brothers   eat first but he would eat after us. He would _______ whatever was _______ on the table. I remember the days when his older brother would sometimes come to our house and _______ money for his kid’s allowance (零花钱) in school and my dad would give him some. And when it was our time to ask for allowance he would tell us that he had no more money and we should ask our mom.

Dad was a _______ man and even after his death, there were many people who told me kind ________ that my dad had done for them, like ________ them food. He even ________ to help someone fix his roof and buy him a water pump when he had the money.

In my ________ life, I never met a man like my dad. For me, he was the kindest, most self-less man on Earth. He would always give ________ when he could and he gave it with a(n) ________ heart.

9 . The first time ever I realized that plastic was a serious matter for our planet was during a road trip in Western Australia, almost 12 years ago.

We________at a supermarket along the Coral Bay coast to buy some groceries and the lady at the counter told us they didn’t sell any shopping bags in order to prevent plastic in the________and to help preserving the endangered turtles living in that area. After a first reaction of surprise, we________all our shopping in our arms and left.

This was just one of the many experiences I’ve lived that made me more________about my impact and pushed me to adopt different habits to live and________more sustainably.

Our trip to Borneo was another life-changing________that has strengthened my resolution to a zero-waste lifestyle. While traveling in some Asian countries, we came to know that________drinkable water was always a challenge. So we had to travel with our water bottle, and we________to avoid using plastic during our trip.

Besides, we were also________impressed by our stay on Libaran Island. A sustainable turtle conservation________and the community had made big efforts to________ the beaches and creatively re-use plastic for ten years. Despite that, the shore is________daily with tons of plastic coming from the tides.

Facing this global issue________, raised in me a feeling of sadness and anger that soon turned into________: to do as much as possible to reduce plastic in our life. Small changes can________a difference!

10 . Senior high school began with meeting new friends, which was the most exciting part of that period. However, I noticed the _________ from junior high school right away since students around me were trying their best to get good _________.

It was surprising for me to _________ that my friends were no longer willing to meet very often after school. This made me _________ that perhaps I failed to know the true _________ of the three years of high school. I should state that it became especially _________after I talked to my best friend. He told me that he was really _________ because I seemed to have no plan when it came to _________ for college. To be completely honest, he was right.

_________ for me, my best friend was wise and able to explain his point of __________to me. Also, he offered to spend time studying with me and getting me ready for the test to make sure I did not __________anything meaningful from the textbook. This was surprising for me since I was __________ that activities like reading textbooks could not be enjoyable. I was wrong, and this __________ taught me that having fun in high school does not just mean going to parties or spending time in cafés. Instead, you can have a( n) __________experience that will also be worthwhile for your future.

I am glad that I was able to learn from this situation. Now, I am studying harder to __________ more knowledge and try to understand which subjects I am most interested in to find out what I want to study in the future.