Planning to travel abroad in the coming year in the post-epidemic times? Excellent! That means you have plenty of time to design your trip to include a few of the famous European festivals. Here are our top picks for annual European events:
Keukenhof: Amsterdam's Tulip Flower Festival (Netherlands)
April 1-April 30, 2023
During this festival, more than 500 flower growers show off what they have! The Keukenhof garden dates back to the 15th century. If you are crazy about flowers, this is a must-go event!
Stars of the White Nights Festival: St Petersburg's Annual Art Fair (Russia)
May 27-August 15, 2023
The Stars of the White Nights Festival in St Petersburg is one of the most popular musical and cultural events in Russia. The festival runs throughout the season of the midnight sun. You can enjoy music, opera, ballet, film and all sorts of outdoor celebrations.
Berlin Beer Festival: The Grey City's Celebration of the Golden Drink (Germany)
September 17-October3, 2023
2,000 beers from 87 different countries—amazing! The Berlin Beer Festival celebrates beer culture and everything that goes with it. Each year, around 800,000 visitors come here! What can you look forward to? The atmosphere, beer and some of the best music. There are national and international music acts throughout the festival!
Advent Markets: Austrian Christmas Festivities in Vienna (Austria)
November-December, 2023
If it's Christmas cheer you're after, look no further! Advent Markets are an age-old tradition dating back to the Middle Ages. Not sure what to get your loved ones? We're sure you'll find something as there are over 20 official Christmas markets. They sell all sorts of seasonal gifts and traditional Viennese treats.
As Ginni Bazlinton reached Antarctica(南极洲), she found herself greeted by a group of little Gentoo penguins longing to say hello. These gentle, lovely gatekeepers welcomed her and kickstarted what was to be a trip Ginni would never forget.
Ever since her childhood, Ginni, now 71, has had a deep love for travel. Throughout her career as a professional dancer, she toured in the UK, but always longed to explore further. When she retired from dancing and her sons eventually flew the nest, she decided it was time to take the plunge.
After taking a degree at Chichester University in Related Arts, Ginni began to travel the world, eventually getting work teaching English in Japan and Chile. And it was in Chile she discovered she could get last-minute cheap deals on ships going to Antarctica from the islands off Tierra del Fuego, the southernmost tip of the South American mainland. "I just decided I wanted to go," she says. "I had no idea about what I'd find there and I wasn't nervous, I just wanted to do it. And I wanted to do it alone as I always prefer it that way. "
In March 2008, Ginni boarded a ship with 48 passengers she'd never met before, to begin the journey towards Antarctica. "From seeing the wildlife to witnessing sunrises, the whole experience was amazing. Antarctica left an impression on me that no other place has," Ginni says. "I remember the first time I saw a humpback whale; it just rose out of the water like some prehistoric(史前的) creature and I thought it was smiling at us. You could still hear the operatic sounds it was making underwater. "
The realization that this is a precious land, to be respected by humans, was one of the biggest things that hit home to Ginni.
When people think of Beijing, the hutong style always comes to mind. It is no exaggeration(夸张) to say within hutong lives the city's history.
The word "hutong" referred to a place where people live, which was borrowed from the Mongolian word to mean "water well" about 700 years ago. Hutong we see today are made up of small paths formed by walls of siheyuan. They were built during the Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties.
When the People's Republic of China was founded in 1949, there were more than 3,000 hutong. Most of the city's population lived in this traditional housing. But with the modernization of the city in the 1980s and early 1990s, many hutong were pulled down to build roads, skyscrapers and modern houses.
The government has recognized the importance of hutong to Chinese cultural heritage. In 2002, Beijing listed 40 protected historical zones and increased its efforts to rebuild some key relics and older streets in the city. Nearly 500 hutong have survived.
Hutong that still exist are like oases(绿洲) of calm in the noisy city. Walking through them, it's common to see groups of elderly people sitting together playing cards, mahjong(麻将) or Chinese chess. In the early mornings and evenings, they gather to practice traditional forms of exercise such as Taijiquan as well as dancing and singing folk songs or Peking Opera. Hutong have become a museum of Beijing's folk customs and history.
Today's grandparents are joining their grandchildren on social media, but the different generations' online habits couldn't be more different. In the UK the over-55 s are joining Facebook in increasing numbers, meaning that they will soon be the site's second biggest user group, with 3.5 million users aged 55-64 and 2.9 million over-65s.
Sheila, aged 59, says, "I joined to see what my grandchildren are doing, as my daughter posts videos and photos of them. It's a much better way to see what they're doing than waiting for letters and photos in the post. That's how we did it when I was a child, but I think I'm lucky I get to see so much more of their lives than my grandparents did."
Interestingly, Sheila's grandchildren are less likely to use Facebook themselves. Children under 17 in the UK are leaving the site - only 2.2 million users are under 17 -but they're not going far from their smartphones. Chloe, aged 15, even sleeps with her phone. "It's my alarm clock so I have to,' she says. "I look at it before I go to sleep and as soon as I wake up."
Unlike her grandmother's generation, Chloe's age group is spending so much time on their phones at home that they are missing out on spending time with their friends in real life. Sheila, on the other hand, has made contact with old friends from school she hasn't heard from in forty years. "We use Facebook to arrange to meet all over the country," she says. "It's changed my social life completely."
Parents have an important role to play if they want their kids to spend more time in real life. Peter, 38, who spends most of his time in front of a screen, is recently determined to set a better example to his kids. In the evening or at weekends, he would leave his smartphone home and take his kids out to nature.
Develop Positive Relationships
One of the most profound experiences we can have in our lives is the connection we have with other human beings. Positive and supportive relationships will help us to feel healthier, happier, and more satisfied with our lives.
●Accept and celebrate differences.
Yet when we try to build relationships, we expect that people will think like we do. In this way, it is so much easier to create a friendly relationship. However, while we may find it initially easier, the novelty of sameness soon would wear off. So accepting that we are all different is a great starting point.
●Listen effectively.
Listening is a crucial skill in boosting another person's self-esteem. In active listening, we also are genuinely interested in understanding what the other person is thinking, feeling, wanting, or what the message means, and we are active in checking out our understanding before we respond with our own new message. This process is what distinguishes active listening and makes it effective.
●
In a world where time is of the essence, we don't always have the time to give to our loved ones. Being present in the time you give to people is important. In other words, when you are with someone, you are truly with someone and not living in the past or worrying about the future. Devoting time, energy, and effort to building relationships is one of the most valuable life skills.
●Manage mobile technology.
By now, everyone has a mobile phone and many people have two or more. While they are a lifesaver in an emergency, and an effective tool for communication, they also can be a complete distraction when people exhibit a lack of mobile phone etiquette (礼仪).
A. Give people your time.
B. Develop your communication skills.
C. We can perceive the world variously.
D. Active listening is the most useful listening skill.
E. So here are some tips to help you develop more positive relationships.
F. Pay attention to who you are with and answer the phone when necessary.
G. So technology has somewhat weakened our ability to build a good relationship.
For as long as there've been cars and planes, someone has been trying to combine the two. This Italian 1 was built in the 1940s. The trouble is, they've never been really 2 , but now things could be about to change. Andy Wall, Sales Director, PAL-V said," So, we had to stop 3 and we are now at the very last stage of processing the regulations within permissions for flight with this 4 . So. . . It's getting so 5 . " The PAL-V Liberty is made by a Dutch company which is nearing the end of the long process to get everything licensed and 6 .
The question is, who is going to buy one? Well, they've already got lots of 7 . Marco van den Bosch, Chief Commercial Officer, PAL-V told us," This is the 8 way to become a pilot. There's always a small James Bond seat in every heart of every guy and every girl, so that's where we're 9 to.
It takes less than ten minutes to turn it from a plane to a car.510 , isn't it? You could 11 it at any airfield and then drive home. If you want to 12 one of these, it's going to cost you 300,000. It sounds 13 but probably it will be a new motoring and air travel revolution if you want to be at the forefront of what they're promising. You'll need a private pilot's 14 in the UK, but you can learn both here in Coventry and in Oxford. There've been many false starts in bringing a flying car to market. Next year, they believe, is when you may 15 one driving along a street near you.
In the past, friendships were (great) limited by time space and attention. Increasing home and workplace mobility(流动性) has made it even harder to keep social relations over time. Through a combination of user controls, new technologies and changing standards of social behavior, Facebook is freeing us these limitations, (make) friendships more accessible, pleasant and diverse than ever before. First, Facebook allows you to find and rediscover friends and then reminds you of these (relate), so you are less likely (fall) out of touch with the long-lost school friend, or the family member in different country. Second, Facebook creates an environment, you are allowed to interact easily with others: You can share your photos, videos links and thoughts, and respond to what they share in turn. A recent study by Keith Hampton for the Pew Internet and American Life Project (discover) that users of social networking websites have larger, more diverse social circles, online and offline.
Time may limit our ability to keep social ties, but our desire for social communication is (limit). Facebook is a tool that allows (we) to stay more deeply connected with a larger and more diverse set of friends.
When I was in seventh grade, my parents paid a tutor (家庭教师)forty dollars a week for her coming to my house and helping me with math. It ended up raising my marks from fifty to fifty five.
I had to admit it was mainly my fault. Maybe I should have concentrated my math from the beginning. But studying math was a tough thing. Sitting on a chair to work on confusing math problems for two hours was a slow and painful process. During the process, I would fidget （坐立 不 安）and have many trips to the refrigerator in an attempt to get off that chair for at least five minutes.
During math tests, my teachers would always stay by my desk. My teachers and friends would frequently ask the question after tests, " How's your math this time? " So I became extremely afraid of math. While normal people of my age were scared of some insects and adventurous travels, I feared anything to do with numbers. The thought of a teacher picking on me in class made me feel scared. The red marks on the test paper were also terrifying.
My fear of math got worse in ninth grade. Every report card I received from my new math teacher Ms. Robbins had the comment to encourage me, "I'm glad to do what I can to help you. " But I couldn't tell her the real reason why I did n't ask for help — I didn't want to be considered stupid. Every question I had was, in my opinion at the time, something that the whole class had understood but I. So instead, I ended up not caring about anything related to math, without working hard on math at all. And I concluded everything would work out in the end.
Eventually, my classmates and I took the final test that would lead to our graduation from middle school and stepping into high school. Days after the exam — on a rainy summer morning, Ms. Robbins called me.
注意: 1. 续写的词数应为 150 左右；
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
With worry and uncertainty, I entered her office.
After I took the courage to tell my parents the bad news, they were silent._
