Great Family-Friendly Festivals
Fête Du Citron, February 15—March 3
What to do with 145,000 tons of citrus fruit（柑橘属水果） for two whole weeks? Artistic masters create a series of mind-blowing sculptures and patterns exhibited around the city of Menton, in the south of France. Highlights include the Golden Fruit Parades that occur every Sunday, which are an endless series of coaches, entertainers, bands, folk groups, dance groups and citrus fruit fioats.
Haro Wine Festival, June 28-30
Forget food fights. How about a wine fight? The wine fight, a feature of Wine Festival in Haro, a quiet town in Spain, reunites thousands of locals and tourists and uses more than 130,000 liters of wine during the battle. There's even a kid-friendly battle a couple of days before using grape juice.
Guca Trumpet Festival, August 8—11
Held in Guca in the middle of Serbia, it's regarded as the world's largest brass（铜管乐器） music festival. Each band gets to play three tunes as folk dancers dance for an enthusiastic audience. Visitors become part of Serbia for a night, dancing to brass band concerts all night long.
Cascamorras, September 6-9
In the towns of Baza and Guadix in Spain, the athletic festival is a whole lot of fun. Villagers from Baza invite tourists to get covered in black olive oil and brightly-colored paste（糊） in neighboring town Guadix.
In Baza, people run down the hill into the village and in Guadix through the town, ending in the evening when they're attacked by water from villagers and then sprayed with foam（泡沫）. The chosen villager "Cascamorras" must try to stay clean.
Drew Lanham grew up on the farm his grandfather built in the 1920s. Lanham, now 54, says his father felt a responsibility to stay on the land and care for the animals and crops planted there. "I saw my father through the land, and I saw the land as my father's heart," he said.
As a kid, he remembers being attracted by the wildlife he would encounter on the short walk between his parents' farm and his grandparents' house. Even though the journey was less than a quarter-mile, he recalled, back then it "seemed like a thousand miles".
Above all, he was captivated（迷住） by the birds."From a very early age, I believed that I would be someone who studied birds-who somehow found a way to fly,"Lanham said. He said he lost track of that dream on the road to becoming an engineer. "Once I left for college, everybody said," You're good at math and science. Be an engineer, Drew,'" he said.
As a student studying engineering at Clemson University, it was a trip to the farm that helped him circle back to his love of birds. "I can remember coming back home, and all of these wonderful forests that I'd grown up in had been cleared away. And losing that land was like losing my father all over again," he said. Lanham's father had died years before.
Though much of their home had been destroyed, some wildlife remained. "I remember when I drove on the dirt road, I heard birds singing. It was the most hopeful thing for me," he said. The bird songs li t a fire under Lanham. After his visit back to the farm, he couldn't see himself returning to work as an engineer. At Clemson he got on track to study to become an ornithologist（鸟类学家）.
"The long hours of work were often hot and hard. But when I looked up, there would be flocks（群） of birds. I realized I was doing what I had always dreamed of,"he said.
Over the last five months, local and regional competitions have been held across Kenya for Maasai men of"warrior（勇士）"age. They are part of the Maasai Olympics, which have been held every two years since 2012. These men compete in six events: 5,000m, 800m, 200m, high jump, javelin and the rungu（a wooden throwing club） throw. There are also two events for women: 1,500m and 100m.
December 15,2018 marked the final round with crowds gathering in Kimana, near the Amboseli National Park, about 200 km south of Nairobi（the capital of Kenya）. Different kinds of medals are among the prizes for the winning individuals and communities.
International charity Born Free, a main sponsor of the events, helped to offer Maasai warriors an alterative to killing lions as part of their traditional ceremony. It was the brainchild of the wildlife charity Big Life Foundation and eight Maasai elders who wanted to"stop lion hunting by our warriors once and for all, making it a cultural taboo（禁忌）."
"As human populations grow, and our wants seem to increase—with little sympathy for those other species with whom we share the planet—the pressing need for co-existence, and examples of how this may be achieved. are few and far between," said Born Free's CEO Howard Jones.
"The Maasai have a 500-year-old tradition of hunting lions to prove the courage of young men. As a result, an estimated 2,000 lions now remain in Kenya. The Maasai live and work alongside these creatures, so they are expected to play a key role in their protection and conservation," added Jones.
The Maasai Olympics were developed to encourage young men to compete in an organized sports completion based on their traditional warrior skills. As well as the competitive element, the events also aim to educate local people about conserving lions and wildlife, and the importance of human-wildlife co-existence and tolerance.
Older adults sometimes get themselves a dog for companionship. But the pets are increasingly sending their owners to the emergency room（ER）. Injuries that happen while walking a dog can result in life-changing circumstances and such accidents are increasing, according to a study published in the medical journal JAMA Surgery.
The study looked at patients who made visits to hospital emergency departments throughout the United States from 2004 to 2017．Researchers said that there were more than 32,000 emergency room cases of fractures（骨折） associated with walking leashed（用皮带束缚的） dogs among people 65 and older. Cases increased from 1.671 ER visits in 2004 to 4,396 in 2017.
According to the study, nearly 80 percent of the patients have been women, whose generally lower bone density（密度） than that in men may be a reason. Being female means you are more likely to suffer fractures and bone disease, such as osteoporosis（骨质疏松症）. Susan Bush, 69, says she has been injured multiple times while walking her dogs, including suffering a broken leg while trying to prevent her dog from running after a bear that came out of the woods near her Pennsyivania cottage, But despite this, she refuses to give up her pets. "Dogs are our soulmates," she says.
Some seniors may be underrating the physical risks involved in walking a dog every day, says Dr. Jaimo Ahn, a lead author of the study. In most cases, Ahn blames what he called a"small person/big dog"scenario（情景）， where there is a disparity between a pet and its owner's ability to handle it. He also says that some seniors might not be as prepared to handle a pet as they should be. "Some of them are really well-trained, but others are really poorly trained," he says.
The researchers suggest that clinicians work with patients who use dog walking as exercise to reduce the risk of injury. That could include training dogs not to make sudden movements when leashed and suggesting smaller types of dogs.
Managing Time with the Pomodoro Technique
The Pomodoro Technique, one of the most efficient time management techniques, was developed by Francesco Cirill o in the late 1980s.These blocks are separated by short breaks. Each block is known as a "pomodoro"， the Italian word for "tomato". Cirillo named the system after the tomato-shaped kitchen time r that he used to track his work time when he was studying as a university student. He developed a habit of doing short blocks of work followed by resting periods. He realized this method could help him work with time instead of struggling against it.
First, choose a task that you'd like to get done. It can be something big, something small, or something that you've been putting off for months. What matters is that you are ready to give it your full attention. Next, set a timer for 25 minutes. Try to spend the full 25 minutes with your complete attention on the task.Sit back, have a drink, go for a short walk, or do something else that is not work-related. Once you have completed four of these 30-minute cycles, treat yourself to a longer break that lasts 15 to 30 minutes.
After trying the Pomodoro Technique, you may want to experiment a little. Some people have found that 90-minute blocks work best, while others might perform better with more flexible periods.Just remember, like many things in life, simpler is often better!
A．It varies from person to person.
B．Cirillo was struggling to focus on his studies.
C．Then, when the timer goes off, take a five-minute break.
D．It uses a time r to break down your work into 25-minute blocks.
E．The Pomodoro Technique is built around a handful of important steps.
F．In 2006, Cirillo published his Pomodoro Technique for people to use for free.
G．In theory, the longer break will allow your brain to get ready for the next round of pomodoros.
Susan and I both worked at Children's Healthcare of Atlanta for over a decade and were in the same department for five years. Both of our husbands were experiencing kidney（肾）1 . We generally just2 and said hello when we3 one another. But a five-minute restroom conversation last September changed everything.
We ran into each other in the restroom as we were4 our hands. It proved to be a life-changing5 . We started having a conversation about where my husband and I were in the transplant（移植） evaluation process. And with that we started talking about blood types. To our surprise, we soon6 s an was a match for my husband, Rodney, and I was a match for Susan's husband, Lance.
A sudden7 jumped into my head. at if we could8 our kidney s to each other's husbands? We both9 . I went back to my office and set everything up with her donor coordinator（协调人）. Seven months later, Susan, Lance, Rodney and I10 a paired kidney exchange transplant. All four surgeries went smoothly and Lance's and Rodney's bodies accepted their new kidneys.
"We are11 because a lot of men and women and children wait years—and I mean seven tonine years, not just one or two," Susan said. "And sometimes, their time on the wait12 will outlive them."
According to doctor Christina Klein, our experience is very rare. She has been a doctor since 2008, and she has personally never seen this13 before. Going through the transplant process together gave our families a unique14 . "We skipped friendship," Susan said. "We bypassed friendship and we are15 family now."
In Europe and around the world, Germany（see） as a country of wealth and hope—good job opportunities, good transport links and lots of（culture） attractions. But there are problems below the surfacecould affect the younger generation.
Peter Matuschek, chief political analyst at the German polling（民意测验） institute Forsa, says that while Germans tend（be）content with their own lives, they feel less satisfied with the direction the country is taking.
So what（exact） is going on? Youth unemployment here was
6.4% in 2017, far （low）than that in EU countries like Italy or Greece. But there is still a feeling that the older generation isn't focusing enoughareas that will affect young people.
"The politics we have now here in Germany are more for middle-aged people, said 24-year-oldAaron Hinze（work） in health care in Berlin. "When I look in the future and askis going to pay for my retirement when I get old, the answer is nobody."
However, elsewhere in Europe and the world, Germany remains a promised land for young people. Dino Cviko, a 24-year-old journalism student in Sarajevo, said that he hoped to move to Germany when he finished his studies--even if it meant giving up the（possible） of working in journalism.
The Christmas Spirit Strikes Again
I always dreamed of making a big surprise of a lifetime. Thanks to a little determination, some luck, and a generous helping of Christmas Spirit, my dream became a reality.
My family is Canadian, although my sister moved down to Australia a few years ago to study. She was graduating just before Christmas, but due to my own scholarly schedule back home, I would be unable to make it down in time for her graduation. She was understandably disappointed, and I felt guilty that I wasn't able to be there for her on this special occasion.
While I was talking to my professor the week before my sister's graduation, she commented, "Well, if you want to go, just go ahead!"I couldn't believe my luck! I nearly jumped for joy. "Just make sure you get permission from administrator（行政主管），" she added. My heart sank. The administration at my school was infamous for denying any sort of time-off requests. I almost didn't bother asking, because I knew it would be a waste of time. But something in me decided to try, just in case. Maybe it was the hope that the Christmas Spirit would somehow affects the administrator at this time of year. When I returned home to check the reply in my inbox, I steeled myself for disappointment. I held my breath, opened the e-mail, and started to read. And re-read, just to make sure I'd understood. Approval? I couldn't believe my luck!
Immediately, I called the airline. Unexpectedly, even during the busy Christmas season, I was able to change my ticket to arrive the day before my sister's graduation. With news this fantastic, I was bursting to tell my sister. But, fingers on the dial（拨号盘）， I paused. Wouldn't it be much more fantastic if I could surprise her? What a state of shock she would be in! Slowly a great idea came to my mind. I decided a much more dramatic arrival than just a ring of the doorbell. What if I couldn't arrive in a box?
注意：
1．续写词数应为150左右；
2．请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
I started to plot.
I, hidden in the big box, heard the mailmen ringing my sister's doorbell.
