As a child, Alain Robert was afraid of heights. When he was 12, he returned home from school. At the front door of his building, he looked for his keys. he didn't have them. It was 3:30 and his parents worked until 6:00 pm. Alain looked at his apartment on the eighth floor. He saw an open window. He closed his eyes and imagined himself climbing the building. When he opened his eyes, he told himself ,"I can do it." Fifteen minutes later, he was in his house and his fear of heights was gone.

    Today, Alain still climbs buildings. In 2003 , he climbed a building in London dressed as Spiderman(蜘蛛人) to advertise the movie. In 2004, he climbed Taipei 101 (one of the tallest buildings in the world). To reach the top of a building, Alain uses only his hands and special shoes. He has no rope or other safety tools.

    Alain climbs as a hobby. He also does it to make money for charity. When he climbs, he wants to send a message to people. If you have a dream—something you really want to do—it can become real. But you must be brave and keep trying. If something bad happens, don't give up. Close your eyes and tell yourself, "I can do it."

Jane Eyre

    Jane Eyre, a novel written by Charlotte Bronte, was published in 1847 in England. It is Charlotte Bronte's most famous book. Jane Eyre is a love story. It tells about a young and independent woman called Jane Eyre, who is brave enough to pursue her own love.

Uncle Tom's Cabin

    Uncle Tom's Cabin is an anti-slavery novel by American author Harriet Beecher Stowe. Published in 1852, the novel “helped lay the base for the Civil War”, according to Will Kaufman. When Abraham Lincoln met Stowe at the start of the Civil War, Lincoln declared, “So it is the little lady who started this great war.” The character of Uncle Tom in the novel is a longsuffering black slave. The sad novel exposes the reality of slavery.

Gone with the Wind

    Gone with the Wind is a novel by Margaret Mitchell in 1936. It tells the story of Scarlett O'Hara, and her adventures in the American South during the Civil War. She falls in love with Rhett Butler, a city gentleman. It is one of the most famous books of its time, and was made into a movie with the same name. The title took its name from the lines an Ernest Dowson poem: “I have forgotten much, Cynara! Gone with the wind.” (This line also appears in the book.) The book won the Pulitzer Prize on May 3,1937.

Rich Dad Poor Dad

    Rich Dad Poor Dad is a book by Robert Kiyosaki and Sharon Lechter. In the story, Robert's own father was the superintendent (厅长) of education in Hawaii and end up dying penniless. His best friend's father dropped out of school at age 13 and went on to become one of the wealthiest men in Hawaii. It advocates financial independence through investing, real estate (地产), owning businesses, and the use of finance protection tactics.

    On a Friday night, a poor young artist stood at the gate of the New York railway station, playing his violin. The music was so great that many people stopped to put some money into the hat of the young man.

    The next day, the young artist came to the same place, and put his hat on the ground gracefully. Different from the day before, he took out a large piece of paper and laid it under his hat. Then he began to play the violin. It sounded more pleasant than ever.

    Soon he was surrounded with people who were attracted by the words on that paper. It said, “Last night, a gentleman named George Sang put an important thing into my hat by mistake. Please come to claim (认领) it soon.”

    After about half an hour, a middle-aged man rushed through the crowd to the violinist and said, “Yes, it's you. I knew that you were an honest man and would certainly come here.” The young violinist asked calmly, “Are you Mr George Sang?” The man nodded. The violinist asked, “Did you lose something?”“It's a lottery ticket,” said the man. The violinist took out a lottery ticket on which George Sang's name was seen. “Is it?” he asked. George nodded and took the lottery ticket and kissed it, then danced with the violinist.

    The violinist was a student at an arts college and had planned to attend advanced studies in Vienna. Later his classmate asked the violinist, “At that time you needed money to pay the tuition and you had to play the violin in the railway station every day to make money. Why didn't you keep the lottery ticket for yourself?”

    The violinist said, “Although I don't have much money, I live happily. But if I lose honesty I won't be happy forever.” Through our lives, we can gain a lot and lose so much. But being honest should always be with us.

    My sister and I were flying by ourselves from our home in Kansas to a summer camp in Minnesota. Our plane had a two-hour stop at the airport in Omaha, Nebraska. A flight attendant took us to a souvenir shop, where a toy airplane looked just like the plane my sister and I were flying on. I really wanted that airplane. I had $10 and the plane cost $8. I had no idea what I needed to buy at camp, but I bought the plane anyway. When we reached the camp, I discovered that there were no showers! Instead, we bathed in a lake every night. I needed to buy special soap because the regular soap I brought had chemicals that could harm the fish. The special soap cost $4 at the camp store. However, I had only $2 left.

    What upset me was that I couldn't get clean without the soap, which was soon found by my teacher, Sally. I had to tell her that I had spent most of my money on a toy airplane. She laughed and explained to me that a budget was necessary and it was a plan for spending money to help make sure you set aside enough for things you need, like soap, before you buy fun things, like toys.

    Sally gave me one of her extra(额外的) bottles of special soap. When I returned home, I decided to budget. I spent several weeks writing down everything I bought, just to get an idea of how I was already spending my money. Then I made my first weekly budget. My budget wasn't always the same each week. For some weeks, I would have more in my “Money In” account because I did some jobs around the house. Once summer vacation started, I didn't need to buy school lunches, so I had extra money to go to the neighborhood swimming pool or to give to the town animal shelter.

    Budgeting was hard, sometimes. Whatever week it was, I always made sure that “Money In” equaled “Save and Spend.” That's called making ends meet, and it's how you make sure that the money you have will always be enough to cover your plans to spend and save.

    The British are known for their sense of humour. However, it is often difficult for foreigners to understand their jokes. The main point to remember is that the British often use understatement.

    Understatement means saying less than you think or feel. For example, if someone gets very wet in a shower of rain, he might say, "It's a little damp (潮湿的) outside." Or, if someone is very impolite and shouts at another person, someone else might say, "She isn't exactly friendly." Understatement is often used in unpleasant situation or to make another person look silly. Understatement plays an important part in British humour.

    Another key to understanding British humour is that the British like to make fun of themselves as well as others. They often laugh about the silly and unpleasant things that happen to our everyday life when someone accidentally falls over in the street. They also like to make jokes about people from different classes of society. They like to make jokes about their accents, the way they dress and the way they behave. What's more, the British love to watch comedies about people who do not know how to behave in society. The comedy series Mr. Bean is a good example of this kind of humour. Mr. Bean is the character created by British actor Rowan Atkinson in 1990.

    Mr. Bean doesn't talk often, and instead he uses his body movements and facial expressions to make people laugh. Perhaps what makes Mr. Bean so funny is that he does things that adults in the real world cannot do. Mr. Bean is popular in many countries around the world because you do not have to speak English to understand the humour. Because of this, many people have become familiar with the British sense of humour.

    Teenagers who talk on the cell phone a lot, and hold their phones up to their right ears, score worse on one type of memory test. That's the finding of a new study. That memory impairment might be one side effect of the radiation (放射线) that phones use to keep us connected while we're on the go.

    Nearly 700 Swiss teens took part in a test of figural memory. This type helps us remember abstract (抽象的) symbols and shapes, explains Milena Foerster. The teens took memory tests twice, one year apart. Each time, they had one minute to remember 13 pairs of abstract shapes. Then they were shown one item from each pair and asked to match it with one of the five choices. The study volunteers also took a test of verbal memory. That's the ability to remember words. The two memory tests are part of an intelligence test. The researchers also surveyed the teens on how they use cell phones. And they got call records from phone companies. The researchers used those records to figure out how long the teens were using their phones. This allowed the researchers to work out how big a radiation exposure (接触) each person could have got while talking.

    A phone user's exposure to the radiation can differ widely. Some teens talk on their phones more than others. People also hold their phones differently. If the phone is close to the ear, more radiation may enter the body, Foerster notes. Even the type of network signal that a phone uses can matter. Much of Switzerland was using an older "second-generation" type of cell phone networks, the study reports. Many phone carriers (通讯公司) have moved away from such networks. And more companies plan to update their networks within the next few years.

    The teens' scores in the figural memory tests were roughly the same from one year to the next. But those who normally held their phones near the right ears, and who were also exposed to higher levels of radiation, scored a little bit worse after a year. No group of teens showed big changes on the verbal memory test. Why might one type of memory be linked to cell phone use, but not another? Foerster thinks it could have to do with where different memory centers sit in the brain. The site that deals with the ability to remember shapes is near the right ear.