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    In 2009 a new flu virus was discovered. Combining elements of the viruses that cause bird flu and swine flu, this new virus, named H1N1, spread quickly. Within weeks, public health agencies around the world feared a terrible pandemic (流行病) was under way. Some commentators warned of an outbreak on the scale of the 1918 Spanish flu. Worse, no vaccine(疫苗) was readily available. The only hope public health authorities had was to slow its spread. But to do that, they needed to know where it already was.

    In the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) required that doctors inform them of new flu cases. Yet the picture of the pandemic that showed up was always a week or two out of date. People might feel sick for days but wait before consulting a doctor. Relaying the information back to the central organizations took time, and the CDC only figured out the numbers once a week. With a rapidly spreading disease, a two-week lag is an eternity. This delay completely blinded public health agencies at the most urgent moments.

    Few weeks before the H1N1 virus made headlines, engineers at the Internet giant Google published a paper in Nature. It got experts' attention but was overlooked. The authors explained how Google could "predict" the spread of the winter flu, not just nationally, but down to specific regions and even states. Since Google receives more than three billion search queries every day and saves them all, it had plenty of data to work with.

    Google took the 50 million most common search terms that Americans type and compared the list with CDC data on the spread of seasonal flu between 2003 and 2008. The idea was to identify areas affected by the flu virus by what people searched for on the Internet. Others had tried to do this with Internet search terms, but no one else had as much data-processing power, as Google.

    While the Googles guessed that the searches might be aimed at getting flu information—typing phrases like "medicine for cough and fever"—that wasn't the point: they didn't know, and they designed a system that didn't care. All their system did was look for correlations(相关性) between the frequency of certain search queries and the spread of the flu over time and space. In total, they processed 450 million different mathematical models in order to test the search terms, comparing their predictions against actual flu cases from the CDC in 2007 and 2008. And their software found a combination of 45 search terms that had a strong correlation between their prediction and the official figures nationwide. Like the CDC, they could tell where the flu had spread, but unlike the CDC they could tell it in near real time, not a week or two after the fact.

    Thus, when the H1N1 crisis struck in 2009, Google's system proved to be a more useful and timely indicator than government statistics with their natural reporting lags. Public health officials were armed with valuable information.

    Strikingly, Google's method is built on "big data"—the ability of society to handle information in new ways to produce useful insights or goods and services of significant value. However,   ▲  . For example, in 2012 it identified a sudden rise in flu cases, but overstated the amount, perhaps because of too much media attention about the flu. Yet what is clear is that the next time a pandemic comes around, the world will have a better tool to predict and thus prevent its spread.

    We are deep into January, and winter is in full swing. The days are short, grey, and cold, and many of us are fighting the annoying u Winter Blues". Yes, lack of sunlight can cause a type of depression called seasonal affective disorder (or SAD). Sunlight causes an increase in serotonin­a "happy hormone" ­in your body, and with a long winter ahead of us we must look for other choices to improve our moods.

    One of the best ways to fight off SAD is with light treatment. This treatment is safe, accessible, and easy and there is a wide range of different light lamps available on the market. After about 3 weeks of using the lamp for about 30 minutes a day, users report that their symptoms greatly improve. Most of these lamps are small and simple, and can easily slip into your home's decoration­just switch it on and carry on with your normal day.

    When buying your light treatment device(设备), keep a few things in mind. Make sure that the light you are buying gives off at least 10, 000 lux of light. Less than that and the light might not be effective. There are many reviews online, and it will be easy to find the best lamp for you.

    Try to find one whose bulb is easy to find and replace. You don't want to be stuck trying to figure out how to put the lamp back together.

    Finally, do your full research. There are so many different types and styles of lamp. Do you miss exercising outside? There is even one that you can put to your treadmill（跑步机）in order to copy running outdoors.

    There are larger lamps which are considered to be the most effective. There are small, nice lamps that don't take up too much space. There are modern designs such as vintage­style light­bulbs. There are even happy lamp alarm clocks, which are like sunrise, giving their users a gentle, natural wake­up.

    So, no need to go on a trip to Jamaica to get some sun and shake out the winter blues­instead, invest in a happy light which will keep your home sunny and happy all winter long!

    A scientist working at her lab bench and a six-old baby playing with his food might seem to have little in common. After all, the scientist is engaged in serious research to uncover the very nature of the physical world, and the baby is, well, just playing…right? Perhaps, but some developmental psychologists have argued that this "play" is more like a scientific investigation than one might think.

Take a closer look at the baby playing at the table. Each time the bowl of rice is pushed over the table edge, it falls in the ground—and, in the process, it belongs out important evidence about how physical objects interact; bowls of rice do not flood in mid-sit, but require support to remain stable. It is likely that babies are not born knowing the basic fact of the universe; nor are they ever clearly taught it. Instead, babies may form an understanding of object support through repeated experiments and then build on this knowledge to learn even more about how objects interact. Though their ranges and tools differ, the baby's investigation and the scientist's experiment appear to share the same aim(to learn about the natural world ), overall approach (gathering direct evidence from the world), and logic (are my observations what I expected?).

Some psychologists suggest that young children learn about more than just the physical world in this way—that they investigate human psychology and the rules of language using similar means. For example, it may only be through repeated experiments, evidence gathering, and finally overturning a theory, that a baby will come to accept the idea that other people can have different views and desires from what he or she has, for example, unlike the child, Mommy actually doesn't like Dove chocolate.

Viewing childhood development as a scientific investigation throws on how children learn, but it also offers an inspiring look at science and scientists. Why do young children and scientists seem to be so much alike? Psychologists have suggested that science as an effort —the desire to explore, explain, and understand our world—is simply something that comes from our babyhood. Perhaps evolution provided human babies with curiosity and a natural drive to explain their worlds, and adult scientists simply make use of the same drive that served them as children. The same cognitive systems that make young children feel good about feel good about figuring something out may have been adopted by adult scientists. As some psychologists put it, "It is not that children are little scientists but that scientists are big children."

    Addyson Moffitt is an 8-year-old from Kansas City, Missouri. Maurine Ghelagat is a 9-year-old from a village in Kenya called Bartabwa. It might not seem as if the girls have much in common, but when they met at a dinner two years ago, in Kansas City, they immediately hit it off.

    "We had this one little red ball to play with," Addyson told TIME for Kids. "We didn't have any electronics or phones, no iPads or TV. It was just us playing." Addyson and Maurine still keep in touch now.

    The dinner was hosted by the nonprofit group World Vision International, which builds wells, pipelines, and rain catchers in communities where people find it hard to get clean water. Addyson, was at the dinner because her family supports World Vision. Maurine was there because her village had been without clean water. World Vision fixed that by building a water station there.

    "People helped Maurine so she could have clean water, and kids are dying because they don't have it," Addyson says. "I want to help."

    Races are one way World Vision raises money to pay for its water projects. Runners run a race, often a 26-mile marathon or 13-mile half marathon. They ask people to support them by donating(捐赠) to World Vision.

    Addyson decided to run the 2017 Kansas City Half Marathon for World Vision. At age 7, she was one of the youngest-ever runners in the race, and had to get special permission to take part.

    Addyson spent four months training with her parents, waking up before 6 a.m. to run. Meanwhile, she started fundraising(募捐)by asking friends to make donations as birthday presents and clearing tables at a restaurant for tips.

    By October 2017, when Addyson ran the race, she'd raised more than $20,000. She's the youngest person in World Vision history to raise more than $10,000. In 2018, she ran again and raised $36.000.

    But Addyson's work is not finished. "My goal is for every kid to have clean water," she says.

    Most maps show places you can visit and how to get there. Most maps, however, were not made by astronomers. At a recent meeting in Texas, three teams of these scientists presented new maps to show where dark matter was.

    Dark matter neither produces nor reflects light, which means it's invisible (看不见) to human eyes and to most scientific instruments. That makes it a challenge to measure and study. What makes the matter more upset: Scientific measurements show that the universe holds about five times as much dark matter as ordinary matter. Making up the known part of the universe, ordinary matter includes you, your dog, Earth, the sun, stars and planets.

    Scientists find dark matter in the same way, they discover other things we can't see by observing how the invisible matter affects things we can see. We can't see wind, for example, but we can feel a gentle wind or watch a windmill(风车)turning on a hill. Dark matter doesn't turn windmills, but it does have gravity(引力). Like ordinary matter, dark matter holds everything around it firmly with gravity. Dark matter's gravity holds galaxies (星系) together and bends rays of light as they move past.

    To make the new maps, astronomers trained powerful telescopes to watch for bending light arriving from distant galaxies. These telescopes recorded light that came from galaxies billions of light-years away. By studying how the light changed as it traveled through space, the astronomers could work out the location and shape of dark matter groups.

    One of the new maps shows dark matter is more than 600 times as large as a full moon. The other covers an area more than a thousand times as large. But that's just the beginning: The astronomers want to carry on further studies to better understand the dark matter.

    Millions of people suffer from motion sickness (晕动症). They have a lot of activities they fear. They often avoid doing these activities which include long-distance airplane travel, sea-trips, road-trips, even certain movies and video games. However, the French company Boarding Ring promises that it has its way to solve the problem, as long as the users are willing to wear Boarding Glasses!

    Why do many people suffer from motion sickness? It is believed that the brain fails to deal with mixed signals from body parts. For example, when you are looking at your phone on a moving bus, your inner ear realizes the move but your eyes, focused on the screen, think you don't move.

    Boarding Glasses tries to ease (减轻)motion sickness by making the user's eyes and ears transmit the same message. After the brain receives the same message, it will think you are in a moving environment Though that sounds difficult, the science behind the glasses is surprisingly simple.

    The plastic frames (框架), made up of two round frames on the front and two on the side, are filled with some blue liquid. Any movement can cause the liquid to flow around the eyes. This allows the eyes to sense the move and send the correct signal to the brain.

    According to Antoine Jeannin, CEO of Boarding Ring, Boarding Glasses has been tested. The CEO said that over 95 percent of the users felt better after wearing the glasses. The best part is that Boarding Glasses only has a frame, so a single pair can be worn among a group of friends, or even an entire family!

     I am often laughed at for my habit of traveling by foot. I often walk about 3 miles from home to work rather than take the subway. Sometimes, kind-hearted drivers will offer me a ride, thinking that my car has broken down.

    But for me, walking is a good opportunity to relax myself. Besides, it helps my back recover from a day spent bent in front of a computer screen. In terms of health, I have always thought I'd have the last laugh, and now there's even more evidence on my side.

    Nine years later, brain scans showed that those who had walked more had greater brain volume(容量) than those who walked less. Four years after that, the volunteers were tested again—this time for dementia (痴呆). Among the group, 116 people showed signs of memory loss or dementia. Those who had walked the most—at least 7 miles each week—were half as likely to have cognitive(认知)problems as those who walked the least.

    A study has found that the simple act of walking may improve memory in old age. As we age, our brains shrink, which can lead to the loss of memory. However, experts say there's still not enough data to prove that exercise can prevent memory loss. It's also too soon to say whether exercise may prevent dementia or simply delay it in people who would eventually develop it anyway. But for those who suffer from dementia(痴呆), even a short delay could mean great losses in quality of life.

    Nowadays with the development of technology, people have gradually relied on the mobile phones seriously.Many people, especially the younger generation, like to use social media to connect with others. However, everyone is ignoring an important point- face-to-face communication between people is missing.

    Social media is all about connecting with others. But a new study suggests that too much social media use leads to disconnection and loneliness. The study finds that heavy use of platforms such as Facebook, Snapchat, and Instagram is associated with feelings of isolation among young adults.

    Brian Primack and his team in the study surveyed that 1,787 U.S. adults aged 19to 32 and asked them about their usage of 11 social media platforms. Surprisingly,people that spend more time on social media feel lonelier than others.

    Tom Kersting, a psychotherapist, said"Although people think being on social media all the time makes them 'connected' to others, they are actually disconnected,'because the more time one spends behind a screen, the less time one spends face-to-face." Kersting continued. "They are spending a lot of time looking at everyone else's posts, where they are, where they are going and what they are doing.The constant connection to everyone else's perfect'life experiences causes feelings of being left out, and of being lonely."

    So what's the answer?"It's simple," says Kersting—although it does involve a significant amount of willpower."The solution to this is refusing the addiction to look at everyone else's life.Just focus on your own life, where you're going, what you are grateful for, and what you want to achieve in this world. Then go out and do it, andstop wasting so much time comparing."

    When students and parents are asked to rate subjects according to their importance, the arts are unavoidably at the bottom of the list. Music is nice, people seem to say, but not important. Too often it is viewed as mere entertainment, but certainly not an education priority (优先). This view is short­sighted. In fact, music education is beneficial and important for all students.

    Music tells us who we are. Because music is an expression of the beings who create it, it reflects their thinking and values, as well as the social environment it came from. Rock music represents a lifestyle just as surely as a Schubert song. The jazz influence that George Gershwin and other musicians introduced into their music is obviously American because it came from American musical traditions. Music expresses our character and values. It gives us identity as a society.

    Music provides a kind of perception (感知) that cannot be gained any other way. Science can explain how the sun rises and sets. The arts explore the emotional meaning of the same phenomenon. We need every possible way to discover and respond to our world for one simple but powerful reason：No one way can get it all. The arts are forms of thought as powerful in what they communicate as mathematical and scientific symbols. They are ways we human beings "talk" to each other. They are the language of civilization through which we express our fears, our curiosities, our hungers, our discoveries, and our hopes. The arts are ways we give form to our ideas and imagination so that they can be shared with others. When we do not give children access to an important way of expressing themselves such as music, we take away from them the meanings that music expresses.

    Science and technology do not tell us what it means to be human. The arts do. Music is an important way we express human suffering, celebration, the meaning and value of peace and love.

    So music education is far more necessary than people seem to realize.

    Not long ago, Egypt marked the 150th anniversary of the opening of the Suez Canal. The canal connects the Mediterranean Sea to the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean. It helped speed world trade between the East and the West. But the man-made waterway has also helped speed the rise of other things, such as invasive (入侵的) non-native species (物种). Scientists say the invasive creatures have damaged the Mediterranean's environment and caused native species to disappear.

    The number of non-native creatures has risen since the Suez Canal was widened in 2015. The "New Suez Canal" has raised concerns in Europe and brought disagreement from many Mediterranean countries. Bella Galil is an Israeli biologist who has studied the Mediterranean for over 30 years. She says much of the ecological (生态的) damage cannot be repaired. She said urgent action is needed to ease the effects of the invasive fish and other sea life.

    Galil works at Tel Aviv University's Steinhardt Museum of Natural History. She noted that the widening and deepening of the Suez Canal has created a "moving aquarium" of species. These creatures could make coastal waters almost unusable for human beings. Galil believes the number of invasive species has reached 400. That is twice the number 30 years ago. She said this is a "historic example of the dangers of unintended consequences."

    Israel is now dealing with huge numbers of poisonous (有毒 ) jellyfish that affect coastal power centers and keep people from visiting the seashore. Other poisonous species, such as the lionfish and silver-cheeked toadfish, are also appearing.

    Galil said the problems of invasive species can be compared to those of climate change, pollution and over-fishing. She argues that the new species have caused a major "restructuring" of the environment. This has endangered native species.

    Some experts have suggested that increasing salt levels in the canal itself could create a barrier (障碍物) that would keep invasive species out.

    King Midas used to love gold. One day he met a fairy who allowed him to make a wish for something. The king replied at once, “I love gold. I want everything I touch to change into gold”. “Very well, tomorrow morning, everything you touch will turn into gold.” Saying this, the fairy disappeared.

    The king waited excitedly till the next morning. To his joy, everything he touched changed immediately into gold. “I'm the richest man in the world now.” He shouted.

    Soon Midas became hungry. He sat down at his table. All the foods and drinks turned into gold in his hand. “I'm dying of hunger.” He cried.

    Just then his daughter came running in. “Why are you so sad, dad?” she asked, putting her arms around him. There and then she became a golden statue. The king loved his daughter very much. Seeing this, he began to cry. He looked up and suddenly saw the fairy before him. “Don't you like the golden touch?” asked the fairy. “Please take it away,” begged the king, “give me back my daughter.” “Well, you have learned your lesson. Go and wash in the river. Then the golden touch will be gone.” The king ran quickly to the nearby river.

Academic learning is usually in the spotlight at school, but teaching elementary-age students "soft" skills like self-control and how to get along with others might help to keep at-risk kids out of criminal trouble in the future.

Once a program called Fast Track was started in the early 1990s for more than 7,600 children of 55 schools in America. They were identified by their teachers and parents to be at high risk for developing aggressive behavioral problems. The students were randomly divided into two groups; half took part in the intervention, which included a teacher-led curriculum, parent training groups, academic tutoring and lessons in self-control and social skills. The program, which lasted from first grade through 10th grade, reduced delinquency (少年犯罪), arrests and use of health and mental health services as the students aged through adolescence and young adulthood.

In another latest study, by looking at the data from nearly 900 students in previous findings, researchers found that about a third of the influence on future crime outcomes was due to the social and self-regulation skills the students learned from ages 6 to 11.

The academic skills, or hard skills like learning of physics, which were taught as part of Fast Track, turned out to have less of an influence on crime and delinquency rates than did the soft skills, which are associated with emotional (情绪的) intelligence. Soft skills might include teaching kids to work cooperatively in a group or teaching them how to think about the long-term consequences when they make a decision.

Researchers drew the conclusion that these soft skills should be emphasized even more in our education system and in our system of socializing children. Parents should do all they can to promote these skills with their children as should education policymakers. To the extent we can improve those skills, we can improve outcomes in delinquency.

We all want to be happy. In the pursuit of happiness, we often purchase shiny things, visit new places, and change our appearances, but the truth of the matter is that these small bursts of high excitement cannot last long. We tend to let one simple human necessity slip away: conscious kindness.

Conscious kindness is an act of looking for opportunities to be kind to others and yourself. Usually acts of kindness are performed when the opportunity arises, such as holding the door open for someone and returning an item dropped on the ground to the person walking ahead of us. We call these "random acts of kindness". In other words, there is no pattern, meaning or plan to focus on your act. Conscious kindness pushes you out of your comfort zone and sends you into the world to deliberately add moments of kindness to someone's life.

A recent study set out to investigate the effect of a seven-day kindness activity on changes in subjective happiness. It was found that performing acts of kindness for seven days boosted the participants' well being more than that of the control group who performed no acts of kindness. It's no surprise that “a positive correlation can be drawn between the number of kind acts and an increase in happiness”. (Lee Rowland & Olive Scott Curry, The Journal of Social Psychology)

When you open your mind to changing the way you see the world, you begin to be consciously kind. To do this, you must begin with yourself. Being kind to yourself first and this is where goodness will be born; the goodness that comes from you can then be shared and spread to those around you. Speak gently to yourself. You become what you think about. Struggling with and dwelling on negative thoughts will only waste your energies.

Then move on to giving conscious kindness to those around you. Realize that behind every face you see on the street is a story you will never fully know. Understand that, overall, people are good, and they just want to live a happy life. Practice being a kind person, and you will be amazed at those who follow you and you will silently influence their lives.

Fast food has become indicative of our thoughtless, throwaway society. Yes, it may taste good to some people, but the truth is, it is terrible for health. For those who live in a fast food fantasy world, eating it every day, believing that it is fast, convenient and inexpensive, it can be catastrophic (灾难性的).

Contrary to being cheap, fast food is very expensive on many levels. To start with, a home­cooked nutritious meal will cost a lot less than any fast food meal and you will know exactly what ingredients are in your food.

However, the expense is not only in terms of the money you spend at the restaurant. There are hidden costs. Not only does it cost money to pay for the petrol to go and get this nutritionally poor food, but also it is very wasteful of paper, plastic and styrene (苯乙烯), all of which do serious damage to the environment: plastic and styrene cannot be got rid of, but break up into small particles (颗粒) and end up in our water supply or our air, and therefore in our food chain. It is a very serious circle.

Besides not being good for you, fast food is also addictive (上瘾的). The more you eat, the more you want, and so, more and more kids are suffering from fatness. Fast food restaurants have become a favorite hangout for teens, and not just for something to eat. If fast food was designed to be quick and easy, why do many of them have cafes, a Wi－Fi zone and an eat­in restaurant? Those are not things a person in a hurry would use. The goal now is trying to attract customers to stay longer and thus spend more money. Their marketing is aimed at attracting kids because they are the ones who have money to spend and are customers of the future.

Fast food is dangerous to your health, hard on your wallet, addictive and harmful to the environment. Through the power of the media (媒体), children, teens and adults are attracted to "fit in and be cool", be part of the fast throwaway lifestyle it promotes. How to resist the hype (促销广告)? Just take a good look at the results on those who eat it. Then look at yourself.

Maybe you live in places where English is not the main language. When you speak, your speech might be slower than you would like. This is because your mind is still translating things from your first language into English, which can also sound unnatural. English, like every other language, has its own sentence structure. The good news is that thinking in English can bring you a huge step closer to fluency! It is not very difficult, but it does take conscious effort and practice.

Think in single words

Charles Thomas has taught English to Union members, children and teenagers for over 10 years. He tells his students to name the things that they see around them, wherever they are. Start with nouns and then add in verbs, he suggests.

Think in sentences

For example, if you are sitting in a park, you can tell yourself things like," It's such a beautiful day" and "People are playing sports with their friends." Once this becomes easy, you can move on to more difficult sentences.

Think in conversation

This is a great way to practice what you might say in a real conversation. For example, let's say the imaginary person asks you a question like, "What did you think of the talk show last night?" How would you answer? Imagine the conversation and practice it in your head. You can do this out loud or in silence.

Practice it daily

"When you're doing it every day, over and over again, little by little, that's the key. Because when you make things a habit, it just pops up into your mind without thinking and then, before you know it, really, you're thinking in English," Thomas says.

Until now, much of the effort in search for life on the other planets has been on finding liquid water, because most of the extremely important chemical reactions that happen in plants and animals can only take place in the presence of water. And water is very common. In fact, the elements (元素) that make water (hydrogen and oxygen) are the first and third richest chemicals in the universe. This means that we can find water almost everywhere we look, from the surface of planets in our Solar System to the depths of space.

But for life as we know it to exist, it needs a planet where water exists in a liquid state, or its cells (细胞) would freeze or boil away. Earth is the only known planet that stays in a perfect position from our Sun to support water in a liquid state. Astronomers call this perfect distance from a star the "habitable (宜居的)" or "Goldilocks zone".

Scientists last year discovered that there is liquid water on the Mars, which made a lot of people very excited since finding a world within a star's habitable zone where liquid water can exist would be a great start to finding life.

Water is also found on the Mercury, and there are vast water oceans on some of Jupiter's and Saturn's moons. But we still haven't found life on the Mars, or any other planet in our Solar System.

Therefore, finding liquid water isn't enough. We still need to be able to detect other conditions that support life forms (scientists call them "biosignatures"). For example, we have to look into a planet's atmosphere and see what gasses are in it. If we find a planet with lots of oxygen, we have one more evidence to support the idea that there may be life there. Unfortunately, at the moment, it is not possible for us to detect the biosignatures on Earth-like planets beyond Mars. We have not perfected the technology to do it yet.

For the first time since local extinction in 1996, Nubian giraffes have returned to Pian Upe Wildlife Reserve in northeastern Uganda. Fifteen of this vitally endangered animals were moved over 400 km from Murchison Falls National Park in October 2019.

The 11 female and 4 male giraffes are aged two to four: "We chose younger giraffes because they have a longer reproductive lifespan," says Robert Aruho, a doctor of Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA), who let the move.

Northern Uganda is home to Nubian giraffes. They have large, rectangular blotches (矩形斑点) set irregularly against a cream background. The lower legs are noticeably white and not patterned. Pian Upe's grassy land held large numbers of giraffes in the 1960s before conflict in the Karamoja region saw them hunted illegally. "The habitat is perfect, and effective anti-hunting measures are now capable of supporting at least 700 individuals," explains Aruho.

Nubian giraffes are Uganda's only giraffe species and most of them inhabit Murchison Falls. "We can't have all our eggs in one basket," Aruho says, "We have a unique opportunity to act now to prevent them dying out."

Back in 2015, the UWA moved 15 Nubian giraffes from Murchison Falls to Lake Mburo National Park. After that, 9 of the 10 females quickly became pregnant. From a little over 300 Nubian giraffes in the mid 1990s in Uganda there are now about 1,650. A further 25 giraffes will move from Murchison to Pian Upe in October 2020.

"In Uganda we continue to work closely with the UWA to increase numbers and populations of threatened Nubian giraffes. Boosting existing populations is vital for securing their future in the country," Aruho says.

There was once a lonely girl who longed so much for love. One day while she was walking in the woods she found two starving songbirds. She took them home and put them in a small cage, caring them with love. Luckily, the birds grew strong little by little. Every morning they greeted her with a wonderful song. The girl felt great love for the birds.

One day the girl left the door to the cage open accidentally. The larger and stronger of the two birds flew from the cage. The girl was so frightened that he would fly away. So as he flew close, she grasped him wildly. Her heart felt glad at her success in capturing him. Suddenly, she felt the bird go weak, so she opened her hand and stared in horror at the dead bird. It was her desperate love that had killed him.

She noticed the other bird moving back and forth on the edge of the cage. She could feel his strong desire—needing to fly into the clear, blue sky. Unwillingly, she lifted him from the cage and threw him softly into the air. The lucky bird circled once, twice, three times.

The girl watched delightedly at the bird. Her heart was no longer concerned with her loss. What she wanted to see was that the bird could fly happily. Suddenly the bird flew closer and landed softly on her shoulder. It sang the sweetest tune that she had ever heard.

Remember, the fastest way to lose love is to hold on it too tight; the best way to keep love is to give it wings!

Do you know how to plant a tree? Once you've chosen a tree, you'll need to prepare your place for planting.

Planting the Tree

Dig a hole a foot deeper than and twice as wide as the root ball of the new tree. Loosen the soil at the bottom and sides of the hole, so roots will be able to easily enter the soil.

Gently remove the tree from the container and guide the tree into the hole. Build soil up and around the roots if necessary, so the tree is at the same soil level as it was originally grown.

Straighten the tree in the hole. Before you begin filling, have someone view the tree from several directions to confirm that the tree is straight. You should fill the hole with existing soil that has been mixed with rich materials. At this time you can also add bone meal and then water the tree.

Caring for the Tree

Caring for the tree once it is planted is an important step so you should provide regular watering. Always feel the soil before watering, as over­watering can also harm the tree. When soil is dry below the surface of the covering, it's time to water. You will probably need to water at least once a week.  Continue until mid­fall, when lower temperatures call for less­frequent watering.

When to Plant a Tree

Now that you know how to plant a tree, the next step is deciding when to plant. Spring and fall are generally the best times to plant a tree. This gives the tree time to adjust (调整) before summer heat or winter cold arrives. In areas without cold winters, trees may be planted during the winter.

In the world of water, 2021 was another year for the record books. Parts of Western Europe suffered from deadly floods while large areas of the southwestern United States remained locked in a massive drought.

One might think that our impressive water management would safeguard society from such catastrophic events. Yet when it comes to water, the past is no longer a good guide for the future and most of the water engineering is unprepared for consequences of increasingly occurring extreme weather. One of the most alarming wake-up calls came from the city of Cape Town, where the water taps of 4 million residents were nearly forced to be shut off after severe drought dried up its reservoir (水库).

Appealing as it might be, the solution is not to further build bigger and higher dams (水坝) that often result in more disastrous flooding. Rather, it is to work more with natural processes.

The Netherlands avoided major damage from the historic floods in July 2021 thanks to its recently completed project, which gives river room to spread out by redirecting floodwaters into wetlands, lowering parts of the stormy river by more than a foot. Agricultural practices offer another strategy. Scientists have found that boosting organic matter in the soil by 1% can increase the soil's water-holding capacity by up to 18,000 gallons per acre, creating flexibility to both intense rains and dry periods. This means farmland practices such as the planting of cover crops can not only raise output but improve water management.

Solutions don't come easily, but they are key to a livable future. While it's too late to avoid the impacts of climate change, we can avoid the worst of those impacts by investing more in such nature-based water solutions.