When it comes to intangible cultural heritage, China currently has 38 items on the UNESCO list.     1    , none of them are food-related.

    2     (make) it on the list, a candidate must have deep cultural and social meaning, UNESCO said. This is something Chinese cuisine is rich     3     .

Many important dates in China     4     (mark) with food. The Spring Festival celebrations, for example, kick off with a bowl of “eight treasure” congee (腊八粥) on the     5     (eight) day of the 12^th lunar month of the Chinese lunar calendar.

Apart from its symbolic festive meaning, Chinese cuisine shows     6     unique theory of health. While the West has a food pyramid, the philosophy of yin and yang can be found in most Chinese dishes.

In addition to health concerns, some Chinese dishes show great social     7     (function). Take the “four dishes and one soup” idea     8     an example. According to legend, the notion originated in the Ming Dynasty. Emperor Zhu Yuanzhang served a dinner of four dishes and one soup to officials to advise against extravagance (铺张浪费).

Although each plate of Chinese food contains years of ancestral wisdom, sometimes it’s beyond a     9     (foreign) understanding. In 2011, the China Cuisine Association made an application to put more than 30 Chinese foods and food preparation techniques on the UNESCO Lists of Intangible Cultural Heritage items, but failed.

Now, the association is working on an     10     (improve) list of cuisine candidates to apply for UNESCO heritage status. And the result will be announced in November.

The latest technological advancement centering on the conversation at work, at school, and sometimes even at home, largely due     1     the emergence of chat-bots such as ChatGPT and Bard,     2     (be) Artificial Intelligence. These new conversational platforms use Artificial Intelligence (AI) to help users find instant answers, get creations,     3     learn new things. They can chat with you and provide responses that can help you do things.

While most of the Internet agrees it’s not as good as a human at performing many tasks, the debate continues as to     4     AI has the power to replace certain jobs, or even spell the end of humankind. Of course, it brings undoubted benefits,     5     (depend) on how you use it.

    6     (give) it’s often described in science fiction films and novels as a world-ending technology that results in killer robots, the present     7     (real) is less dramatic. AI is defined as a type of computer technology that is concerned with making machines work in an intelligent manner, similar to how the human mind works.

    8     (actual), it means we can ‘train’ computers to learn, respond and make decisions, but it still requires the ability     9     (learn) from humans to get   anywhere near good enough. While Al is a hot topic right now, the idea has existed for decades. The latest chat-bots are a form of Artificial Intelligence     10     can analyze huge amounts of data and generate responses, though they need a little reminder.

The Grand Canal (大运河) is the oldest and longest man-made waterway in the world with a history of more than 2,500 years,     1     construction started in the Spring and Autumn Period. The 1794 kilometers’ waterway is 22 times     2     length of the Panama Canal. It is a golden waterway second only to the Yangtze River in China. The Grand Canal runs from Zhejiang to Beijing     3     (pass) through six provinces and two municipalities and connects five main river systems.

The canal functioned     4     the backbone of the ancient empire’s inland communication and trading systems. Grain, salt, log and silk were transported along the canal to all directions.     5     (dozen) of towns along the banks developed, contributing     6     (huge) to ancient China’s economy. The canal enormously promoted economic interaction and cultural exchange between the north     7     south, which ensured the country’s steady     8     (grow).

In 2014, it was listed as a UNESCO world heritage site. In 2019 China issued a plan     9     (construct) national cultural parks for the Grand Canal. Over the last two years, building the Grand Canal national cultural parks     10     (recognize) as a key task in the 14th Five-Year Plan. In the near future, cities along the Grand Canal will form a new cultural belt, green belt and tourism belt.

The Silk Road is neither an actual road nor a single route. It instead refers to a trade network which     1     (date) from the Han dynasty of China. German geographer and traveler Ferdinand first used the term “silk road” in 1877 C.E.     2     (describe) the well-traveled pathway of goods between Europe and East Asia. Although the trade network is commonly referred to     3     the Silk Road, some historians favor the term Silk Routes because it better reflects the many paths     4     (take) by traders.

One of the most     5     (influence) travelers of the Silk Road was Marco Polo. He traveled with his father to China when he was just 17. Upon his return, he wrote about his adventures,     6     (make) him and the routes he traveled famous.

From China, merchants carried silk to Europe, where it was well received by the nobility and wealthy people.     7     traveled together with silk from Asia were jade, porcelain, tea and spices. In exchange, horses, glassware, textiles and manufactured goods traveled eastward.

The significance of the Silk Road to human history has received widespread     8     (recognize). Towns along     9     routes grew into multicultural cities. The exchange of information gave rise to new technologies and innovations     10     would change the world. Today, parts of the Silk Road are listed on UNESCO’s World Heritage List.

Wild Chinese sturgeon (鲟) are thought     1     (live) at the same time as dinosaurs and among the first class of protected animals in China. Last week,     2     wild Chinese sturgeon, which is believed to be the largest ever found in the past two decades, arrived in Beijing for better treatment. Only in the Yangtze and Pearl rivers     3     the species can be found, the Chinese sturgeon is one of the critically endangered species.

The Chinese sturgeon “Houfu”, which literally means “good fortune for ever after”, arrived at the Beijing Aquarium on Monday after 22 hours of transport     4     Hubei Province.

When found by a fisherman in the Yangtze River Basin, it had been suffering from multiple     5     (injure) as sent to the Yangtze River Fisheries Research Institute for treatment immediately.     6     she was so weak, local care takers had difficulty     7     (feed) it. The Yangtze River Fisheries Research Institute decided to move it to Beijing to receive     8     (far) treatment.

Nicknamed “Aquatic giant pandas” and listed as a wild creature under state protection,     9     (fortunate), the species has been struggling due to water projects, busy waterway traffic and pollution in recent years. The number of Chinese sturgeons living in the wild     10     (fall) sharply to about 50 now from about 1,000 in 1982 according to researchers’ estimates.

When Lin Qiaozhi was 18 years old, she didn’t follow the     1     (tradition) path of marriage like the majority of girls. Instead, she chose to go to Peking Union Medical College,     2     she studied medicine and got the Wenhai Scholarship. And then she worked as a doctor in-the OB-GYN department of the PUMC Hospital. A few years later, she     3     (send) to study in Europe and then in the US. Her American friends wanted her to stay in the US,     4     he refused and told them she wanted to work for her motherland with great     5     (determine).

In 1941, Dr Lin became the first Chinese woman ever     6     (appoint) director of the OB-GYN department of the PUMC Hospital. After the department was closed because of the war, she opened her own clinic.

Dr Lin Qiaozhi played a key role in the medical field of our     7     (new) built country. Though she held many important positions, she still tended patients,     8     (publish) medical research on care for women and children, and trained the next generation of doctors.

Known     9     the “mother of ten thousand babies”, Lin Qiaozhi died on 22 April 1983,     10     (leave) her savings to a kindergarten and a fund for new doctors.