Many people have tried to simplify (简化) the spelling of English words. Unlike other languages, English sometimes spells the same sounds in very different ways. For example, there is “light” but “white”, “loan” but “phone”, and there are at least seven different ways of pronouncing “ough”, “though”, “through”, “bough”, “cough”, “enough”, “ought” and “thorough”.

    The American President Theodore Roosevelt almost succeeded in simplifying English spelling. In 1906, one of the richest men in the United States of America, Andrew Carnegie, started the Simplified Spelling Board whose plan was to make the spelling of words nearer to the way they sound. For example, the word “though” would be spelt “though” and “through” would become “thru”. Other people on the board were Melvil Dewey, the head of the New York libraries, and Professor Brander Matthews of Columbia University. They explained their idea to President Roosevelt who thought that it was indeed logical (合理的).He immediately instructed the government printer to use simplified spelling in all government letters.

    But people did not like the change — even if it made life easier— and the new, simpler spelling was not popular. More importantly, when the American politicians discussed the plan, they did not like it either. Because Roosevelt did not want to have any problems with the politicians, he changed his mind and told the printer to go back to the old way of spelling.

    Since then no one in any government has dared to simplify English spelling. However, people do simplify some words, mainly in advertisements. For example, we often see “tonite” instead of “tonight” and “thru” instead of “through”.

    On September 7, 2013, Chinese President Xi put forward the idea in his speech: China is glad to strength maritime(沿海的) cooperation with ASEAN because we hope to make good use of money to develop maritime relationship. Therefore, to build the 21^st century Maritime Silk Road is the best decision to realize this goal. On November 8, with the help of APEC held in Beijing, the idea of the Belt and Road(一带一路) that run through Asia. Europe and Africa came true. Over 2,000 years ago, ancient Silk Road was from Changan (now Xi'an) and Laoyang, Gansu and Xinjiang to Central Asia and West Asia at last. It also connected kinds of maritime countries. Countries next to Silk Road changed a lot of goods(物品) with each other. 2,000 years later, we believe the beautiful Silk Road will contribute greatly to the development of the nearby countries.

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Hot pot(火锅) and Hotpot

    I'm learning English in the UK where I meet a lot of new friends and eat something delicious. Hot pot is many Chinese people's favorite food, including(包括) me. After having three days of hamburgers, sandwiches and potatoes in the UK, how excited I was to know that there was going to be a free meal of hotpot to welcome the new students. On the way to the canteen, I seemed to smell the hot pot in the air.

    To my surprise, when I stepped into the room, in front of me were still potatoes and bread. Where was the hot pot?

    With many questions in my head, I sat down to have the free meal. After talking with a French girl, I got to know that hot pot is completely different from hotpot. Chinese hot pot is written in two words and hotpot, one word, is a traditional English dish.

    Hotpot is made from mutton and onion. On the top there are sliced potatoes. People put it in the oven all day in a heavy pot and on a low heat. You can often see it at parties in the UK because it's easy to prepare for a large number of people and is not expensive.

    Hotpot doesn't taste bad. However, I still miss hot pot, two words!

    Can you speak English? Maybe you know a lot of English words. You can read, speak and understand English, but there is another kind of language—the language of the body. All over the world, people "talk" with their hands，their heads and their eyes. When Japanese people meet, they bow. When Indians meet, they put their hands together. When British and American people meet someone for the first time, they shake hands. They do not usually shake hands with their friends. Women sometimes kiss their women friends, and men kiss women friends on the cheek(脸颊). When a man meets a man friend, he just smiles, and says "hello". Men do not kiss each other, or hold hands. Even fathers and sons do not often kiss each other.