The great-grandmother is learning English with the help of her family when she is at the age of 91. She hopes to use the language at next year's Olympic Games in Tokyo. Takamizawa was one of the more than 200, 00 people who requested to volunteer for Tokyo's 2020 Games. English is not required for service, but it is a useful skill for volunteers to have.
But Takamizawa had not been able to learn the language when she was young. Takamizawa said that she was in high school when World War Two started. She said, "In my second year there, English was banned because it was the enemy language."
Takamizawa said her grandchildren helped persuade her that she was not too old to learn. "When I talked to my grandchildren about my wish, they said, 'It's not too late. We will teach you one word a day' ". Natsuko is Takamizawa's granddaughter and main English teacher. Natsuko sends a new English word to her grandmother's phone every day. They also often work together directly on phrases that Takamizawa will need for the Olympics. "Welcome to Tokyo, this is the Olympic stadium, how can I help you?" Takamizawa answers when asked to say an English phrase she has learned. Natsuko explains that she wanted to give her grandmother something to enjoy. "I can clearly see her English is getting better. It's my joy now."
The EF English Proficiency Index is a measure of the level of English spoken in a country. Japan ranks 49th among countries where English is not the first language. This situation is slowly changing as younger generations welcome English. However, Takamizawa believes real change will not happen unless Japanese people become more open to the rest of the world. With around 500 days to go until the games begin, the whole Takamizawa family is ready to welcome the world to Tokyo.
You can either travel or read, but either your body or soul must be on the way. The popular saying has inspired many people to read or go sightseeing. Traveling just like reading, is a refreshing journey from the busy world. Books, brain food, can keep you company on your travel.
On the Road, 1957, by Jack Kerouac
The book is a globally popular spiritual guide book about youth. The main character in the book drives across the US continent with several young people and finally reaches Mexico. After the exhausting and exciting trip, the characters in the book begin to realize the meaning of life. The book can be a good partner with you to explore the United States.
Life is Elsewhere, 1975, by Milan Kundera
Jean-Jacques Rousseau once said, "Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains." The book tells a young artist's romantic but miserable life, about how he reads, dreams, and has a relationship. Experience the artist's passionate life in the book during a trip to Central Europe. The book invites you to deeply reflect on your current life.
The Stories of Sahara, 1967, by Sanmao
The book narrates the author's simple but adventurous life in the Sahara Desert, which seems a desolate and dull place. The fancy natural scenery and life there, along with the author's romantic and intensive emotion, will inspire you to explore the mysterious land. Reading the book is like participating in a dialogue with the author, who is sincere and humorous.
Lotus, 2006 by Annbaby
This novel set in Tibet, tells three people's stories, each with their unique characteristics. It reveals modern people's emotions and inner life, their confusion about love, and exploration of Buddhism. The book is a good partner to bring you to the sacred land Tibet.
Our world is more connected than ever before thanks to technology. {#blank#}1{#/blank#} Indeed, it is becoming increasingly important that we all learn how to deal with this painful feeling.
You should be determined to actively end your loneliness. We often end up passively waiting for someone else to make us feel less lonely. You may feel that your loneliness indicates that nobody is willing to connect with you. And there is nothing you can do about it. But that is far from the truth. {#blank#}2{#/blank#}
You should find reasons why you are lonely. We all feel lonely for different reasons. Some of us have no one to interact with on a consistent basis and that's why we feel lonely. You may feel that the people in your life don't share your thoughts and ideas. {#blank#}3{#/blank#} you need to identify it. And you know exactly how to handle your loneliness.
{#blank#}4{#/blank#} People who are lonely tend to fall into destructive mental habits. They try to avoid the pain of not being understood and being disconnected by not giving people an opportunity to understand and connect with them. So the solution is to share your thoughts and feelings with others and to do so openly and fearlessly.
You should find people who share your interests. {#blank#}5{#/blank#} everybody is interested in something. And just as there are many interests, there are many people who share those interests. Find what interests you and connect with others on that basis.
A. Whatever the reason is,
B. When you feel really lonely,
C. If you want to make friends with them,
D. Whether it's coin collecting or video games,
E. You should be open about your thoughts, ideas and desires.
F. Ending loneliness is something that you can and should pursue actively.
G. However, more and more of us find ourselves having to stand loneliness.
Donald lived in three different foster homes and changed schools with each move. The experience left him 1and often dropping out of school, making Donald lose all 2for school. Then he 3 Mr. Felipe, the CIS site coordinator (协调员) at his school.
Mr. Felipe 4 developed a plan to meet Donald's needs. He 5 school supplies and clothes for Donald and encouraged him to join the schools karate (空手道) program. After months of working with Mr. Felipe, Donald's 6 changed. He became more 7and optimistic. He 8 making friends at school and building 9 with his teachers and classmates. Meanwhile, his grades 10 as well.
"My mom has 11 that my attitude has changed a lot, and my grades are much better too. I like to come to the CIS classroom because it is 12 to be here. Mr. Felipe gives us snacks and provides school supplies for us. We work in the garden and we get the 13 we need to study and do our homework. I feel happy and motivated when I come to this 14."
For Donald, Mr. Felipe is the person who changed his life. "I was in foster care when I was 4-5 years old and was 15 from my brother for part of the time. I'm back with my family now and happy to have them in my 16," said Donald. "But I still 17 that time and the bad depression I felt. At school, art and football helped me forget and let it all 18. It is Mr. Felipe who helped me when I was 19. Because of him I became more serious about 20 and work in general. "
Mochi (年糕) is a traditional food popular in Chinese and Japanese cooking, made from {#blank#}1{#/blank#} (special) treated rice. It is often presented in the form of a round cake, and is traditionally exchanged at the New Year.
Mochi is made by {#blank#}2{#/blank#} (put) sticky rice into water overnight, cooking it and pounding it into a sticky paste. The paste is made into shapes ranging from simple to complex rounds, some of {#blank#}3{#/blank#} are stuffed with sweet fillings. Mochi is often decorated with {#blank#}4{#/blank#} (flower) or fruits, especially when it is exchanged as {#blank#}5{#/blank#} gift at celebrations like birthdays and the New Year.
Traditionally, wooden mortars (臼) and pestles (杵) {#blank#}6{#/blank#} (use) to pound mochi rice. Fresh mochi is usually cooked and served warm {#blank#}7{#/blank#} a variety of sauces. Steaming and boiling are both popular preparations in Japan, along with cooking. Fresh mochi is soft but it{#blank#}8{#/blank#} (hard) quickly. Prepacked mochi blocks, flattened and cut into square pieces or shaped into rounds, are available at grocery stores. Mochi can go bad easily, so it's {#blank#}9{#/blank#} (good) to cook soon than to keep it in your fridge.
Hard mochi pieces can be cooked, deep-fried, boiled, and more. Cooked mochi is very sticky, so be careful not {#blank#}10{#/blank#} (choke) on it.
A robot created by Washington State University (WSU) scientists could help elderly people with dementia (痴呆) and other limitations live independently in their own homes.
The Robot Activity Support System or RAS, uses sensors installed in a WSU smart home to determine where its residents are, what they are doing and when they need assistance with daily activities. It navigates (定位) through rooms and around obstacles to find people on its own, provides video instructions on how to do simple tasks and can even lead its owner to objects like their medication or a snack in the kitchen.
"RAS combines the convenience of a mobile robot with the activity detection technology of a WSU smart home to provide assistance in the moment, as the need for help is detected," said Bryan Minor, a postdoctoral researcher in the WSU School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.
Currently, an estimated 50 percent of adults over the age of 85 need assistance with every day activities such as preparing meals and taking medication and the annual cost for this assistance in the US is nearly $2 trillion. With the number of adults over 85 expected to triple by 2050, researchers hope that technologies like RAS and the WSU smart home will relieve some of the financial strain on the healthcare system by making it easier for older adults to live alone.
RAS is the first robot researchers have tried to incorporate into their smart home environment. They recently published a study in the journal Cognitive Systems Research that demonstrates how RAS could make life easier for older adults struggling to live independently.
"While we are still in an early stage of development, our initial results with RAS have been promising," Minor said. "The next step in the research will be to test RAS' performance with a group of older adults to get a better idea of what prompts, video reminders and other preferences they have regarding the robot."
增加：在缺词处加一个漏字符号（∧），并在其下面写出该加的词；
删除：把多余的词用斜线（\）划掉；
修改：在错的词下划一横线，并在该词下面写出修改后的词。
注意：1）每处错误及其修改均仅限一词；
2）只允许修改10处，多者（从第11处起）不计分。
Hello, Jack! I need your help. I am going to organizing a money-raising project for poor students. However, I am at a loss about what to start. I don't know what type of people was most likely to donate. Is it a good idea to visit to local business people? Besides, what is best way to let the public know your ideas? Last but not least, how can I guarantee that the raising money will be sent to the students who really needs it? Considering that you have much experience in organizing similarly projects, I am wondering whether you could give me some suggestion.
In 2015, a man named Nigel Richards memorized 386, 000 words in the entire French Scrabble Dictionary in just nine weeks. However, he does not speak French. Richards' impressive feat is a useful example to show how artificial intelligence works—real AI. Both of Richard and AI take in massive amounts of data to achieve goals with unlimited memory and superman accuracy in a certain field.
The potential applications for AI are extremely exciting. Because AI can outperform humans at routine tasks—provided the task is in one field with a lot of data—it is technically capable of replacing hundreds of millions of white and blue collar jobs in the next 15 years or so.
But not every job will be
replaced by AI. In fact 
four types of jobs are not at risk at all. First, there are creative jobs. AI needs to be given a goal to optimize. It cannot invent, like scientists, novelists and artists can. Second, the complex, strategic jobs—executives, diplomats, economists — go well beyond the AI limitation of single-field and Big Data. Then there are the as-yet-unknown jobs that will be created by AI.
Are you worried that these three types of jobs won't employ as many people as AI will replace? Not to worry, as the fourth type is much larger: jobs where emotions are needed, such as teachers, nannies and doctors. These jobs require compassion, trust and sympathy—which AI does not have. And even if AI tried to fake it, nobody would want a robot telling them they have cancer, or a robot to babysit their children.
So there will still be jobs in the age of AI. The key then must be retraining the workforce so people can do them. This must be the responsibility not just of the government, which can provide funds, but also of corporations and those who benefit most.
Rich countries are racing to dematerialise payments. They need to do more to prepare for the side-effects.
For the past 3,000 years, when people thought of money they thought of cash. Over the past decade, however, digital payments have taken off— tapping your plastic on a terminal or swiping a smartphone has become normal. Now this revolution is about to turn cash into an endangered species in some rich economies. That will make the economy more efficient—but it also causes new problems that could hold back the transition(转型).
Countries are removing cash at varying speeds. In Sweden the number of retail cash transaction per person has fallen by 80% in the past ten years. America is perhaps a decade behind. Outside the rich world, cash is still king. But even there its leading role is being challenged. In China digital payments rose from 4% of all payments in 2012 to 34% in 2017.
Cash is dying out because of two forces. One is demand— younger consumers want payment systems that plug easily into their digital lives. But equally important is that suppliers such as banks and tech firms (in developed markets) and telecoms companies (in emerging ones) are developing fast, easy-to-use payment technologies from which they can pull data and pocket fees. There is a high cost to running the infrastructure behind the cash economy—ATMs, vans carrying notes, tellers who accept coins. Most financial firms are keen to abandon it, or discourage old-fashioned customers with heavy fees.
In the main, the prospect of a cashless economy is excellent news. Cash is inefficient. When payments dematerialise, people and shops are less open to theft. It also creates a credit history, helping consumers borrow.
Yet set against these benefits are a couple of worries. Electronic payment systems may risk technical failures, power failure and cyber-attacks. In a cashless economy the poor, the elderly and country folk may be left behind. And a digital system could let governments watch over people's shopping habits and private multinationals exploit their personal data.
