South Koreans have enjoyed their first close-up look of new baby giant pandas at a name-revealing ceremony that is also     1     early celebration of the 100 days since the twins’ birth.

What to name the twin sisters was widely discussed among netizens after they were born on July 7 in theme park Everland. The names were     2     (ultimate) decided on through two public voting     3     (procedure). One is named Rui Bao, which means wise treasure, and the other is Hui Bao or shining treasure. Half a million panda lovers helped choose their names with a handful of lucky fans     4     (invite) to the ceremony. “They are even     5     (cute) in real life than they appear on screen,” said a college student in attendance.

The baby pandas,     6     have just begun teething and crawling, are very healthy. Everland has shared videos documenting the pandas’ growth online. The twins’ birth has gained 640,000 views since it     7     (upload). “This feels like a great opportunity to call for better     8     (preserve) of pandas,” said Donghee Chung, head of the park’s zoo. Chung noted that between 40% and 50% of panda births result     9     twins.

Everland said it would monitor the twins’ health     10     (determine) when the twins are ready to be open to the public.

3 . About one-tenth of the world’s population suffers from hunger and nearly one in three people face food insecurity, according to recent estimates. Yet behind those striking figures hides another, closely related threat: water insecurity.

In a new 25-country study, researchers report a strong link between water insecurity, a lack of reliable access to sufficient water, and food insecurity. The researchers analyzed data from a nationally representative sample of over 31, 000 people ages 15 and older in 25 low-and middle-income countries across Africa, Latin America and Asia. Overall, about 18% of participants were classified as water insecurity. This ranged from about 15%in Asia to over 34% in sub-Saharan Africa.

The findings, based on data collected for the first time in 2020 by Northwestern University and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations(FAO), suggest that improving access to water could be key to sustainably and effectively addressing food insecurity in many places.

While the study did not assess the causes of food or water insecurity, researchers said several factors could explain the linkage. For those living in poverty, spending money on water can mean less money available for food. For farmers, water insecurity can mean less water available for growing crops and raising livestock. Time is also an issue: Traveling far from home to collect water shifts the time available to generate income or prepare food.

Based on these findings, researchers suggested food insecurity and water insecurity should be measured and addressed at the same time. This would ensure that insufficient water does not pose an additional barrier to food security and in particular to food utilization (使用), for example, by preventing people from using food provided by food assistance programs because there is no water to prepare it. As such, efforts to improve access to water could also bring benefits for food security.

5 . For the past three weeks, students across India’s capital have been attending a new course: happiness. The Delhi government introduced “happiness classes”.     1    . In a country that uses normal testing to determine student success, offers a limited number of seats in top universities and sets high expectations, educators have been seeing mental health effects.     2    . He said, “It will address the growing concern, which is that levels of happiness and well-being are decreasing.”

“We have given best-of-the-best talents to the world,” Sisodai said, according to The Washington Post. “    3    . We have been successful so far. But have we been able to deliver best-of-the-best human beings to society, to the nation?”

The Washington Post says children came out of their first happiness class with some excitement. “We should work happily,” 11-year-old Aayush Jha, a seventh grader at a public school in Delhi, told the paper. “When you work sadly, your work will not be good.”

Sisodai hopes to deliver these tools to help students live more happily inside and outside of the classroom, whether or not they’re achieving their academic standards. “I don’t know if happiness can be learned, but yes, it can be practised,” he says. “    4    .”

One in four Indian children aged 13 to 15 struggles with low spirits, the World Health Organization reported last year. As journalist Susan Brink reported, “The government has made changes after noticing that some young people under great stress to do well in school tended to commit suicide (自杀) if they felt they did poorly.” “In South India, they observed higher suicide rates after exam periods among schoolchildren who failed,” Alexandra Fleischmannn, a project coordinator for the WHO’s Preventing Suicide report, told Brink. “    5    , and that reduced suicides.”

6 . Humanitarian(人道主义的)groups and lawmakers have criticized Italian authorities for preventing migrants who were not considered to be“vulnerable(脆弱的)”from disembarking(登陆)from rescue ships in Sicily on Sunday.

Charities and politicians blamed the selection process as illegal and regarded the actions of the Italian government as inhumane, reported the Associated Press news service, or AP.   Italy’s new government is reportedly targeting foreign-flagged rescue ships in a new procedure that is part of a regulation brought about by Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi.

Italy allowed a rescue ship carrying 179 refugees and migrants to enter a port in Sicily on Sunday and then later begin disembarking children and sick or“vulnerable”people, but 35 men on board were blocked from getting off the ship, reported the Reuters news agency. Later, agencies reported that 144 people had been allowed to disembark the Humanity 1 rescue ship,which sailed under a German flag. In the afternoon,357 people were allowed off the Geo Barents ship operated by Doctors Without Borders, which sails under a Norwegian flag, but 215 people remained blocked on board.

Authorities continued to refuse safe harbor for hundreds of migrants onboard two other ships in nearby waters, said the AP. Humanity 1’s captain refused to leave the port of Catania “until all survivors rescued from great suffering at sea have been disembarked”, said SOS Humanity, the German-run charity that operates the ship. The charity strongly criticized Piantedosi’s decision to only allow vulnerable people to disembark and on Monday said it would launch legal action against the Italian government,claiming Italy’s actions violate European law and the Geneva Refugee Convention.

The BBC noted that Italy is one of the main entry points into Europe, and, according to the United Nations, 85,000 migrants have arrived there on small,overcrowded boats since the start of the year. Italy’s new prime minister,Giorgia Meloni,has promised to take action to stop those making the hazardous journeys across the Mediterranean.

Nongovernmental organizations say coastal nations are responsible by the law of the sea to rescue people who are suffering and that they are responsible to provide a safe port as soon as possible.

Till Rummenhohl，head of operations at SOS Humanity，said people were being “held hostage (人质)”onboard the Humanity 1 vessel.”“We had health authorities onboard who decided who’s weak enough, who is basically in urgent medical case and who’s not,”Rummenhohl told DW News.“The people are not really sure what’s happening to them. They have an uncertain future. They are afraid of being pushed back from Italy, into international waters or even to Libya. That’s their greatest fear,” he said.

7 . Along Route 1, in Thomas-tomatines a store filled with handicrafts—birdhouses and dollhouses, salad bowls and sailing ships — all made in Maine state prisons. Ted and Barbara Waylayer have been shopping here for decades. “We found the quality to be excellent,” said Ted.

Prisoners have been making things in Maine since the 1800s. Charlie Jones came here when he was 20, sentenced to 75 years in a state where there is no parole(假释). In the workshops, he discovered he had a talent for carving. One of Jones’ earlier projects was a golden eagle, which he learned to carve from a book.

“It’s amazing to see the amount of talent that the residents have here,”said Randall Liberty, commissioner(局长)of Maine’s Department of Corrections.“We have more than 100 residents working here daily. They do about US $1.6 million worth of work. “One of Maine’s programs allows residents to earn a college degree. The money for it was donated by Doris Buffet, who lived in Dockland, Maine. “She gave us an initial US $2 million donation,” said Liberty.   “And that’s the best money I’ve ever seen invested in anyone.”

Charlie Jones is one of the graduates. “The college program is incredible,” Jones laughed. “When we used to walk to dinner, we could hear people talking about their former crimes. But now when going to dinner, you’ll hear somebody talking about their philosophy class or their history class.”

Liberty said, “The individuals that graduate have about a 5% recidivism(再犯) rate, as opposed to a 60-65% nationally. That means 95% of the people who go through this program don’t go back.”

When Doris Buffet died in 2020, Charlie Jones made a table, with legs made of books, to honor her. It’s also carved with the names of courses open to prison residents, and the professors who teach them. On the table was a book telling Daris Buffet’s story, and a thank you note.

8 . Tens of thousands of Chinese have joined a debate on whether students should be separated into science and liberal arts classes in high school, a practice that allows them to stay competitive in college entrance exam by choosing preferred subjects. The debate came after the Ministry of Education and began to ask for opinions from the public on Friday on whether it was necessary and possible to stop the dividing system, which has been accepted for decades.

In a survey started by www.qq.com, more than 260,000 people cast their votes as of Saturday, with 54 percent of those voted for the abolishment and 40 percent against.

A netizen from Chengdu said:“Science can activate the mind, while arts could strengthen their learning ability.”

But some people disagreed with him. A netizen nick-named “gentle scholar” said the students would have more burden if they have more subjects to study.“You don’t even know how difficult the courses are. I suggest a survey among students.”

“Abolish the current system of division? We have to study nine subjects? Finally we will study everything and have learnt little,” wrote another netizen.

Li Yanling, an education expert in Beijing, called on education authorities to consider students’ school burden.

Chinese students are required to choose either arts or science subjects after ten years’ education, which include six years in primary school, three years in junior high school and one year in senior high school.

Besides the Chinese language, mathematics and English, which are must for everyone, science students are required to take physics, biology and chemistry, while arts students study politics, history and geography.

9 . Happiness is not a warm phone, according to a new study exploring the link between young life satisfaction and screen time. The study was led by professor of psychology Jean M. Twenge at San Diego State University (SDSU).

To research this link, Twenge, along with colleagues Gabrielle Martin at SDSU and W. Keith Campbell at the University of Georgia, dealt with data from the Monitoring the Future (MtF) study, a nationally representative survey of more than a million U. S. 8th-, 10th-, and 12th-graders. The survey asked students questions about how often they spent time on their Phones, tablets and computers, as well as questions about their face-to-face social interactions and their overall happiness.

On average found that teens who spent more time in front of screen devices — playing computer games, using social media, texting and video chatting — were less happy than those who invested more time in non-screen activities like sports, reading newspapers and magazines, and face-to-face social interactions.

"The key to digital media use and happiness is limited use," Twenge said. "Aim to spend no more than two hours a day on digital media, and try to increase the amount of time you spend seeing friends face-to-face and exercising — two activities reliably linked to greater happiness."

Looking at historical trends from the same age groups since the 1990s, it's easy to find that the increase of screen devices over time happened at the same time as a general drop-off in reported happiness in U. S. teens. Specifically, young peopled life satisfaction and happiness declined sharply after 2012. That's the year when the percentage of Americans who owned a smartphone rose above 50 percent. By far the largest change in teens' lives between 2012 and 2016 was the increase in the amount of time they spent on digital media, and the following decline in in-person social activities and sleep.