He was an old manwho fished alone in a small boat on the sea and he had gone eighty-four days now without taking a fish. In the first forty days a boy had been with him. But after forty days without a fish, the boy's parents had told him that the old man was now salao, which is the worst form of unlucky, and the boy had gone with another boat which caught three good fish the first week. It made the boy sad to see the old man come in each day with his boat empty. The sail looked like the flag of failure forever.

      The old man was thin with deep wrinkles (皱纹) in the back of his neck. His face was terribly brown because of the strong sunlight on the sea every day and his hands had the deep scars (伤疤) from dealing with heavy fish on the lines. But none of these scars were fresh. Everything about him was old except his eyes and they were the same color as the sea and were cheerful.

      “Santiago,” the boy said to him as they climbed the bank from the sea. “I could go with you again. We've made some money.”

        The old man had taught the boy to fish and the boy loved him.

      “No,” the old man said. “You're with a lucky boat. Stay with them.”

      “But remember how you went eighty-seven days without fish and then we caught big ones every day for three weeks.”

      “I remember,” the old man said.

     “It was papa who made me leave. I am a boy and I must follow him.”

     “I know,” the old man said. “It is quite normal.”

       "He hasn't mush faith(信心)"                       

     “No,” the old man said. “But we have. Haven't we?”

     “Yes,” the boy said. “Can I offer you a beer on the Terrace?”

    “Why not?” the old man said “Between fishermen.”

    A girl who graduated from a world famous university wanted to do translation work for authority leaders. She was so happy when she entered the British Embassy (大使馆). She thought it was the greatest happiness in her life as many graduates wanted to get that job and she was one of the few people who got it!

   But when she started her new job, she realized that it was just a job of answering calls and recording staff members'arriving and leaving times. It was supposed to have no future. For some time, she felt disappointed and didn't know what to do. However, she didn't want to give up this job. She thought about it for one or two days and finally she decided that she would try her best to do this job. From then on, she learnt to appreciate her own job. She wrote down the names and phone numbers of the staff members on a notebook so that she could remember them. She found great pleasure in dealing with the daily chores. When a phone call came in, she picked up the phone as soon as possible. When someone asked her about who was not in the office, she would give the right name and even the time when he or she left. Nobody could do that except her.

   Her excellent work received praise not only from the embassy's members, but also from people in the local government. A leader of a famous company in Britain was deeply impressed by her, so he invited her to work for him. After that she became the leader's personal translator and she was appreciated by the foreigners.

   We cannot choose our destiny(命运), but we can choose the attitude with which we face our life. Maybe the attitude could change our destiny.

    Today I went to Sam's school in the UK. It was really different from my school in China.

    Girls wore grey skirts and white shirts, boys wore grey trousers, and everyone wore the school tie.

    Some of Sam's lessons were a bit strange for me. We were reading Shakespeare in the English lesson, and there were quite some old words like “thou” and “thee” to mean “you”. In history we studied 20th Century China. It was strange hearing a foreign side of history—and hearing English people trying to say all our Chinese names!

    Classes were also a lot more relaxing than in China. Teachers were called “sir” or “miss”, everyone shouted answers and raised their hands in classes. It was more like a debate than a class. A bell rang at the end of each lesson and everyone jumped up to go to the next class.

    At break we bought potato chips and cookies in the dining room. Lunch was later than in China at 1 o'clock. We had big plates of pie with carrots. For dessert there was hot sweet rice called rice pudding.

    It was good that I'd had an excellent lunch, because at Sam's school, Monday afternoons are taken up with sports.

    I played my first game of netball—a bit like basketball, but with some differences. Fortunately(幸运的是), I'd had a quick look in the rule book before I tried to join in the game.

Some people just cannot decide what to do all by themselves. They often ask for the advice of their friends. But they never do as their friends have said. My friend Jack is such a person, and he is always asking me for help. I try to help him as well as I can. But he never listens to me. Yesterday I tried a new way to make him take my advice. It worked. “Look,” he said, showing me a letter. “What do you think I should do?” The letter told him that there was a good job for him. It seemed to be a good chance for a young artist. His teacher would send him to Australia to work. The job would pay very well, and he would be able to travel and visit many interesting places. “What do you think of this, Rose?” he asked. “If I take the job, I will have to stay in Australia for two years. I may stay a bit longer. But it would be a wonderful time for me. Should I go. Rose?”

    “Don't go,” I told him, “You'll suffer a lot there.” “Don't go?” he looked surprised at my answer. As you have probably known, Jack went. I wonder whether he found that I really wanted him to take the job.