Babe Didrikson Zaharias was one of the most extraordinary athletes of all time. She achieved particular success in basketball, track and field, and golf. She also competed in baseball, boxing, diving and many other sports. In 1950, the Associated Press declared Babe Zaharias to be the “Woman Athlete of the Half-Century”.
From a young age, her goal was to be “the greatest athlete to ever live”. As a teenager, she acquired the nickname “Babe” in reference to Babe Ruth, a professional baseball player. She never passed up a chance to play ball. One day, when she was a little girl, her mother sent her to the grocery store to buy some beef for dinner. On the way home, Babe spotted some boys playing baseball. She dropped her purchases and joined the game. An hour later, her angry mother showed up, looking for the groceries. Babe pointed to where she’d left it. A dog was happily enjoying the last piece.
Zaharias gained fame at the 1932 Olympic Games. She won gold medals in the javelin (标枪) throw and the 80-metre hurdles (跨栏), but she was deprived of a third gold medal in the high jump because she had used the unorthodox (不正规的) Western roll to achieve the highest jump. Her Olympic success brought her national attention.
In 1932, Zaharias began playing golf and was soon winning important championships in the sport. In 1950, Zaharias helped found the Ladies Professional Golf Association, and she became the LPGA’s star competitor. Not only did she attract interest in the women’s game, she revolutionized the sport and was known for her powerful drives.
Zaharias died of cancer in 1956, at the age of 45.
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DJ: Hello. A lot of you have probably just got your A-levels and you’re looking forward to going to university. But more and more young people are deciding to take a gap year before they start their degrees. Today I’m talking to a group of young people who’ve all decided to take a year out before they go to university. What are they going to do? Rosie? What are your plans?
Rosie: I’m going to work in a department store.
DJ: Why do you want to do that?
Rosie: Two reasons really. I’m going to study Management at university and this will give me the chance to find out what it’s like to work in a big organization. And I’ll also be able to earn some money.
DJ: What about you, Christopher?
Christopher: I’m going to do community work with a conservation group. I think it’ll be good to do something really useful. And I’ll meet a lot of interesting people, I’m sure.
DJ: Will you get paid for it?
Christopher: Well, we won’t get rich doing it, but we’ll be all right. We’ll get about £20 a week plus food and accommodation.
DJ: Helen, what are you going to do?
Helen: I’m going to travel around Europe.
DJ: Are you going to work there?
Helen: I hope so, or I’ll have to come home again. I might try and get a job—you know—in a hotel or something like that.
DJ: Why do you want to do it?
Helen: Well, mainly because it’ll be a change. After all, I’ve been at school for 13 years. I just want to do something different. It’ll give me new experiences and I’ll need to be more independent.
Note: A-levels英国普通中等教育证书考试高级水平课程, 也是英国学生的大学入学考试。
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On 15 September 2016, Typhoon Meranti, stated to be the world’s strongest typhoon so far this year, made landfall in Xiang’an district of Xiamen City at 3:05 a.m. Thursday, causing widespread damage. Chinese state media reported one death and one person missing, and thousands of people were evacuated (撤离) from their homes, as high winds and rain shattered windows on tall buildings, knocked down trees and disrupted water supplies in China’s Fujian province, causing a widespread blackout in the coastal city of Xiamen.
“The winds and rain got extremely loud after 3 a.m. The cracking sound of windows and tree branches were also scary. The power went out in the shop several times,” Su Binglin, a night-shift shop assistant at a 24-hour convenient store told state-run Xinhua news agency. He said he had to use a metal plate to strengthen the shop door to prevent it from shattering. He also used boxes filled with mineral water to consolidate the plate.
At around 6 AM, the winds abated. Streets in Xiamen are scattered with glass shards, broken tree branches and blown down billboards. “It is so wretched. Many trees by road sides are fallen, and there are also blocking traffic,” Hu Rong, a delivery man said. “All the trees on both sides of the street have fallen down. You can hardly pass through. The water is very, very high. No vehicle smaller than mine could possibly pass,” said Xiamen local resident.
The Xiamen Power Supply company said the typhoon has caused severe damages to the power network in Xiamen, leading to mass blackout. The electricity supply was also disrupted in Xiamen’s outlying islands and with the typhoon further moving inland, more power outages are likely.
While the full impact of Meranti is still unknown, it’s likely much of the damage is beyond repair. Meranti will continue to lose strength as it pushes inland and up towards China’s commercial capital of Shanghai, but will bring heavy rain.
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People who live in the countryside generally live longer than those who live in the city. A number of reasons may also help explain this point.
To start with, farmers are in close contact with nature. They breathe fresh air. They make friends with trees and stones, cows and dogs. They listen to the songs of birds. They fight with strong winds. This contact with nature is good for the health of both body and spirits.
Next, hard physical work keeps farmers fit and healthy. It is widely believed that farmers suffer from far less diseases than people in the city. They are many diseases that are common in the city, but not in the countryside. For example, near-sightedness is almost unknown to farmers. Besides, being free from urban pressure does good to the health of farmers.
Moreover, because there are less cars, motorcars and other kinds of vehicles in the countryside,one can walk more freely without being afraid of accidents. The environment is better in the countryside, which makes the farmers live a quiet and peaceful life.
The farmers can also get fresh grain, vegetables, fruits and milk easily. They enjoy these advantages that people living in the city cannot.
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When you hear the word “vacation”, what comes to mind? For most it means having fun, pampering (纵容) themselves to some degree or simply relaxing and catching up on sleep. Most people consider it a time to relax and recharge away from work and the stress of life. However, the reality for some is that they end up feeling even more stressed and exhausted than they did before they went on vacation. How is this possible?
A common misconception that people have about going on vacation is that they need to make the most out of their trip. Before they go on every tour they can research 101 places to visit and then pack 98 of those suggestions along their trip. While making the most of your time away, most people over-pack their schedule and overwhelm (压垮) themselves with too many things which result in more stress and less rest.
Today, technology and social media have over-promoted and normalized sharing every experience we have — especially while we are on vacation. The saying “If you didn’t post it, did it really happen?” drives our current culture of documenting and sharing EVERYTHING. Also you may spend more time taking the perfect selfie (自拍) at every stop than you do actually participating in the activity. You end up sacrificing the quality of the trip for the quantity of posts you get out of the trip.
To better appreciate your vacation time, you’d better give yourself one day to recover before returning to work after a vacation. This allows your body and mind to adjust to being back home and getting back into your work routine. You want to go on vacation to recharge, so don’t overcrowd your schedule with late night or early morning activities. Make sure you rest and get plenty of sleep. It’s okay to schedule a lazy day during your vacation when you can sleep. However, don’t overdo it. Try to fit in the minimum recommended amount of daily exercise and if you don’t exercise take this as an opportunity to start a new habit.
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It is possible to wake up first thing in the morning with excitement. But in order to do so, you need to turn your alarm clock into a positive trigger (触发器) first. To begin with, you need to set up a situation that's going to make the desired result happen, such as moving your alarm clock — the fact that the alarm clock is across the room or in some different room forces you out of bed to turn it off. And when you get out of bed, you’re off to a good start.
If you don’t have specific goals, you are unlikely to turn your alarm clock into a positive emotional trigger. In fact, without clear goals, you will have a hard time creating motivation (动机), happiness, hope, or a good future. You need very specific and realistic goals, because human beings are drawn toward the future, and only by owning specific goals can you own your future.
Everyone follows a routine in daily life. The point of a routine is to make the process smooth so you can make progress. However, what got you here won't get you there. Just because one routine helped you in the past doesn't mean it will help you now. For example, for over 3 years, I woke up, walked to a nearby coffee shop and wrote articles there. That routine helped me become a successful author. But that routine isn't fit for who I am now. To stay healthy, I recently started running first thing in the morning.
The last tip is starting your activity as soon as possible. If you wake up first thing in the morning but don’t get up at once, your brain will remain fuzzy (模糊的) longer than it needs to. How you spend the first few moments of your morning sends a powerful signal to your brain about how the rest of the day will go. If you wake up and immediately get going on a task, your brain will activate very quickly. The longer it takes to get started on your first task, the harder it will be to make progress.
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Extreme tourism (极限旅游) is travel that has a strong sense of adventure or even physical danger. Some extreme tourists like to travel to places that are considered fairly or even extremely unsafe for some environmental reasons. For example, they may travel to areas that have been influenced by some disasters, or to countries that are at war.
Another form of extreme tourism includes traveling to a place in order to take part in one or more relatively dangerous activities. While there are many different extreme activities for extreme tourists to choose, most of these activities are physical in nature. For example, an extreme tourist may take a trip which includes staying with great white sharks, base jumping, traveling across a desert, or exploring underwater caves.
Some tourists plan their own extreme travel trips, while others work with an extreme travel company. As extreme activities and places can be dangerous to the tourists, many travel experts advise extreme tourists to book trips through a company. Working with experienced extreme travel professionals can help make sure that the tourist is provided with proper things during his or her trip and that he or she receives proper medical attention if he or she is hurt. An extreme travel company may also be able to connect the tourist with local guides or translators when necessary.
People who are against extreme tourism think that this form of travel may bring damage to certain areas of the planet. For example, extreme travel to the Antarctic (南极) rose greatly from the late 20th century to the early 21st century. Many environmentalists and scientific researchers argue that continued Antarctic tourism may lead to the pollution (污染) of the area as well as the introduction of some harmful foreign things, which could threaten the safety of its ecosystem (生态系统).
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Getting rid of dirt, in the opinion of most people, is a good thing. However, the attitudes to dirt are always changing.
In the early 16th century, people thought that dirt on the skin was a means to block out disease, and washing off dirt with hot water could open up the skin and let ills in. A particular danger was thought to lie in public baths. By 1538, the French king had closed the bath houses in his kingdom. The king of England did something similar in 1546. Thus began a long time when the rich and the poor in Europe lived with dirt in a friendly way. France’s Henry IV was famously dirty. Upon learning that a nobleman had taken a bath, the king ordered that, to avoid the attack of disease, the nobleman should not go out.
Though the belief above was long-lived, dirt has no longer been regarded as a nice neighbour ever since the 18th century. Scientifically speaking, cleaning away dirt is good to health. Clean water supply and hand washing are practical means of preventing disease. Yet, it seems that standards of cleanliness have moved beyond science since World War II. Advertisements repeatedly sell the idea; clothes need to be whiter than white, cloths ever softer, surfaces to shine. Has the hate for dirt, however, gone too far?
Attitudes to dirt still differ hugely nowadays. Many first-time parents nervously try to warn their children off touching dirt, which might be responsible for the spread of disease. On the contrary, Mary Ruebush, an American immunologist(免疫学家) , encourages children to play in the dirt to build up a strong immune system. And the latter position is gaining some ground.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________This holiday season, millions of children will soon open presents containing the latest computer chip-operated toys, but many lucky children will be thrilled to find timeless classics under the tree-wooden toys.
Although traditional wooden toys have been around since ancient times, they have been, rare since the introduction of computerized, high-tech toys. But the popularity of wooden toys appears to be making a comeback, says Betsy Komes, associate publisher of Playthings magazine, a 105-year-old trade publication serving all aspects of the toy industry. She and her associates have seen an increase in demand for these traditional wooden toys.
Traditional wooden toys are among the top themes her company focuses on as part of their move toward more eco-friendly toys to appeal to the environmentally conscious consumers. But Komes thinks that the environment isn’t the only reason for the increased demand. Many parents are looking for toys that encourage more creative play.
“In today’s market where toys are often computerized with a lot of lights and sounds, many parents feel the traditional wooden toys encourage children to be creative and imaginative,” Komes says. “And sometimes there’s a fear with electronic games that play is often too individualized and doesn’t encourage interaction with other children. Parents don’t want their kids to sit in front of a computer all day and are looking for toys — like wooden blocks, for example — that encourage group play.”
There is also a nostalgia (怀旧) factor: “Given everything going on in the world, there are a lot of parents and grandparents right now who see the traditional toys as things that remind them of their own childhoods,” she says. “I think it’s their way of sharing the memories they have of a time when the world seemed less complicated.”
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Common Characteristics of Folktales
Most of us know some very old folktales. People shared these stories orally for years before writing them down. Since people told stories instead of writing them, the stories changed in between places and with each storyteller. Each new storyteller made changes to the stories based on his own traditions and culture. For example, many cultures have stories like the raven tale about how people got light. In these tales, though, the main character is another type of animal.
Next, the characters in folktales are similar. They are usually ordinary characters who do extraordinary things. They usually have only one or two strong characteristics. For instance, the chief in the Raven story is selfish and not very smart. But Raven is very generous― e wants to help people. And he’s very clever as he finds a way to get the light. In addition, often the characters in folktales are not people but animals with human qualities. They talk, make plans, and have strong emotions. Small animals such as the popular spider and turtle play this role in West African stories. In summary, the characters of folktales are simple but often clever in achieving their goals.
Finally, the plot, or what happens in the folktale, is usually exciting. Most folktales begin with an expression like “a long time ago” and then move very quickly into the story, which starts with a problem. For instance, a strong, bad character often gives a weaker character a task and promises something if he completes the task. The weaker character often uses clever tricks, special skills, or magic to complete the task. In the end of a folktale, the good characters usually win and the bad characters lose. In conclusion, the plot of a folktale is interesting.
So, in summary, we know that the tradition of folktales is very old. They are told all over the world, but they share several of the same features, as said above.
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