El Nifio, a Spanish term for “the Christ child", was named by South American fishermen who noticed that the global weather pattern, which happens every two to seven years, reduced the amount of fishes caught around Christmas. El Nifio sees warm water, collected over several years in the western Pacific, flow back eastwards when winds that normally blow westwards weaken, or sometimes the other way round.

        The weather effects, both good and bad, are felt in many places. Rich countries gain more from powerful Nifio, on balance, than they lose. A study found that a strong Nifio in 1997 helped American's economy grow by $15 billion, partly because of better agricultural harvest, farmers in the Midwest gained from extra rain. The total rise in agricultural incomes in rich countries is greater than the fall in poor ones.

          But in Indonesia extremely dry forests are in flames. A multi-year drought (干旱）in south-east Brazil is becoming worse. Though heavy rains brought about by El Nino may relieve the drought in California, they are likely to cause surface flooding and other disasters.

The most recent powerful Nino, in 1997-98, killed around 21,000 people and caused damage worth $36 billion around the globe. But such Ninos come with months of warning, and so much is known about how they happen that governments can prepare. According to the Overseas Development Institute(ODI), however, just 12% of disaster-relief funding in the past two decades has gone on reducing risks in advance, rather than recovery and rebuilding afterwards.This is despite evidence that a dollar spent on risk-reduction saves at least two on reconstruction.

Simple improvements to infrastructure (基础设施）can reduce the spread of disease. Better sewers (下水道）make it less likely that heavy rain is followed by an outbreak of the disease of bad stomach. Stronger bridges mean villages are less likely to be left without food and medicine after floods. According to a paper in 2011 by Mr. Hsiang and co-authors, civil conflict is related to El Nino's harmful effects—and the poorer the country, the stronger the link. Though the relationship may not be causal, helping divided communities to prepare for disasters would at least reduce the risk that those disasters are followed by killing and wounding people. Since the poorest are least likely to make up for their losses from disasters linked to El Nino, reducing their losses needs to be the priority.

    The iPhone, the iPad: each of Apple's products sounds cool and has become a fad(一时的风尚). Apple has cleverly taken advantage of the power of the letter “i” --and many other brands are following suit. The BBC's iPlayer--which allows Web users to watch TV programs on the Internet--used the title in 2008. A lovely bear--popular in the US and UK--that plays music and video is called “iTeddy”. A slimmed-down version(简装本) of London's Independent newspaper was started last week under the name “i”.

    In general, single-letter prefixes(前缀) have been popular since the 1990s, when terms such as e-mail and e-commerce(电子商务) first came into use.

    Most “I” products are targeted at(针对) young people and considering the major readers of Independent's “I”, it's no surprise that they've selected this fashionable name.

    But it's hard to see what's so special about the letter “i”. Why not use “a”, “b”, or “c” instead? According to Tony Thorne, head of the Language Center at King's College, London, “i” works because its meaning has become ambiguous. When Apple uses “i”, no one knows whether it means Internet, information, individual or interactive, Thorne told BBC Magazines. “Even when Apple created the iPod, it seems it didn't have one clear definition(定义),” he says.

    “However, thanks to Apple, the term is now connected with portability (轻便).” adds Thorne.

    Clearly the letter “i” also agrees with the idea that the Western World is centered on the individual. Each person believes they have their own needs, and we love personalized products for this reason.

    Along with “Google” and “blog”, readers of BBC Magazines voted “I” as one of the top 20 words that have come to define the last decade(十年).

    But as history shows, people grow tired of fads. From the 1900s to 1990s, products with “2000” in their names became fashionable as the year was connected with all things advanced and modern. However, as we entered the new century, the fashion disappeared.

    Welcome to SummerCamps.com; find and book the very best summer camps. Your children are precious so we offer the highest quality of camps that will meet each child's needs and interests.

    Catalina Sea Camp

    Sea Camp offers three one-week sessions to boys and girls aged 8-13 and two three-week sessions to teens aged 12-17. Our hand-picked instructors create an atmosphere of fun and excitement while leading campers to a host of ocean adventures, marine(海洋的) biology, and social summer camp activities.

    Address: Toyon Way, San Bruno, California 94066

    Phone: 800-645-1423

    Camp Cayuga

    Camp Cayuga is a private summer camp for children aged 6 to 16. The camp is on a 350-acre land in the Pocono Mountains of Northeast Pennsylvania, just outside the village of Honesdale. It's a 3-hour drive from New York City and Philadelphia.

    Address: 321 Niles Pond Road-Suite ISC, Honesdale, Pennsylvania 18431

    Phone: 908-470-1224

    Camp Rockmont

    Camp Rockmont is a Christian summer camp for boys, aged 6-16, in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina. Rockmont's duty of developing boys into healthy young men is accomplished through age-appropriate skills, activities, and challenges that help campers to know themselves better.

    Address: 375 Lake Eden Road， Black Mountain, North Carolina 28711

    Phone: 828-686-3885

    Primitive Pursuits Overnight Camps

    Primitive Pursuits Overnight Camps offer week-long Summer Adventure Overnight Camps in New York's Finger Lakes to your children aged 11-15. Campers experience a week of nature-based skills training, inspiring challenges, and fun activities under the guidance of skilled instructors.

    Address: 611 County Rd 13, Van Etten, New York 14889

    Phone: 607-272-2292

Black Box Thinking

—By Matthew Syed

    This book is a new approach to high performance, a means of finding all edge in a complex and fast-changing world. It is not just about sport, but has powerful implications for business and politics, as well as parents and students, in other words, all of us. Drawing on a dizzying series of case studies and real-world examples, together with cutting-edge research on small gains, creativity and courage, Matthew Syed tells the inside story of how success really happens—and how we cannot grow unless we are prepared to learn from our mistakes.

Map Stories

—By Francisca Matteoli

    In the book, the author tells 20 surprising stories on the geography of the world and, using beautiful maps from all countries and times, she explains the birth of the most magical places on Earth. The book is a journey through space and time, and a lesson about the world as it is and our place in it.

Making it up as I Go Along

—By Marian Keyes

    It is a funny look at the absurdity of modern life and recognizes that we are all clearly making it up as we go along. It includes Keyes, guide to breaking up you're your hairdresser, and her warning about the dangers of fake tan（古铜色）.And there is some secret truth about writers, or at least about Keyes.

Mog and Me and Other Stories

—By Judith Kerr

    Judith Kerr was born on June 14, 1923 in Berlin but escaped from Hitler's Germany with her parents and brother in 1933 when she was nine years old. Judith went to 11 different schools and worked with the Red Cross during the war. For the past 30 years, she's worked as an author and illustrator of children's books. Come and play with everyone's favorite family pet, in this huge board book collection of stories especially for younger readers.

    If you are in charge of a project, the key to success is getting everyone to want to help you. As a director, I point, I suggest, I gently push the actors in the direction I want them to go. In the 1986 movie, "Nothing in Common", Jackie Gleason's character, Max Basner, gets fired from his job as a clothing salesman. The scene, shot on a boat, shows Max's despair about being out of work. I was looking for some gesture that would allow Max to show his feelings.

    Jackie had far more experience at everything than I did, and at first I was frightened. What could I possibly tell "The Great One" about acting? Out of fear I decided to direct by suggestion, and I sat down with Gleason to talk about the scene. "So Max is sad, right?" I said.

    Gleason nodded.

    "And he's probably still carrying his pens with his name on them—the ones he used to hand out to his customers, right?"

    Gleason nodded.

    "So what would you want to do with the pens after you were fired?"

    He was silent for a moment. "Why don't I throw them overboard?"

    I stood up and turned towards the crew. "Hey, everybody, Jackie has a wonderful idea. Let's shoot it."

    After filming the scene, Gleason called me over and said with a smile. "Garry, what kind of wonderful idea am I going to have tomorrow?"

    You and your team can discover the answers to problems together. When there are no prizes or gold stars for those who get the solution first, you'll all benefit when everything turns out right.

Most of Bangladesh is at or below sea level. Rising seawater linked to climate change has severely affected the country. High water from storms in coastal areas also adds salt to soil. The land is becoming salty. Crops are less productive and many areas of cropland in the country are becoming unfit for farming. These are big problems for the small country. More than 155 million people live in Bangladesh. Growing crops is the most common way Bangladeshis support themselves.

To find a way out，farmers in the country are learning to grow vegetables in so-called "vertical gardens". The soil in these gardens is better because heavy rains have removed much of the salt.

A vertical garden is easy to make. Villagers fill containers with good soil and natural fertilizers. They put the containers on bricks so they are off the ground. They add pieces of the bricks to the soil to help water flow and drain (排水).

The farmers cut small holes into the sides of the containers. This permits vegetables with short roots a place to grow. Vegetables with long roots grow on top of the container. One bag of soil can produce up to eight kilograms of vegetables in one season.

The farmers also grow vegetables in containers made from large, thin pieces of plastic supported by bamboo. This "vertical tower" measures more than a meter wide. Each of these towers can produce more than 100 kilograms of vegetables. It costs about $12—$13 to build.