1 . Going from middle school to freshman year of high school is a big change.     1    

Be open to new friendships.

High school is all about experiencing new things, including new friendships. Getting to know people you haven’t met before is a great way to broaden your horizons (眼界).     2     Simply sitting with a new person at lunch can be a good way to get it started.

Explore the campus.

For most people, going off to high school means heading off to a new campus.     3     They might be able to show you around the campus, which will make you a bit more comfortable as you go on with your freshman year.

Get organized (有条理的).

High school and middle school are very different in studying.     4     You can buy a planner and spend a few minutes each night going over the notes you took in class that day. Staying on top of your studies will make it much easier to get used to high school.

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While there’s no need to plan every day for the next three years, it can’t hurt to make a note of classes you want to take or activities you’d like to try. Believe it or not, the three years go by really fast. Having a plan in place will help you make the most of your high school experience.

2 . There is more of a connection between food and culture than you may think. On an individual level, we grow up eating the food of our culture. It becomes a part of who we are. Many associate food from our childhood with warm feelings and good memories and it ties us to our families, holding a special and personal value for us. Food from our families often becomes the comfort food we seek as adults in times of frustration and stress.

On a large scale, traditional food is an important part of culture. It also operates as an expression of cultural identity. Immigrants bring it wherever they go, and it is a symbol of pride in their culture and means of coping with homesickness.

Many immigrants open their own restaurants and serve traditional dishes. However, the food does not remain exactly the same. Some materials needed to make traditional dishes may not be readily available, so the taste and flavour can be different from what they would prepare in their home countries. Additionally, immigrants do not only sell dishes to people from the same countries as them, but to people from different countries. Therefore, they have to make small changes in the original dishes to cater to a wider range of customers. Those changes can create new flavours that still keep the cultural significance of the dishes.

We should not only embrace our heritage (传统) through our culture’s food, but also become more informed about other cultures by trying their food. It is important to remember that each dish has a special place in the culture to which it belongs, and is special to those who prepare it. Food is a window on culture, and it should be treated as such.