Every evening at six o'clock an old man goes to a restaurant near his house. He eats dinner. After dinner, he drinks coffee and talks to the people at the restaurant.

    The old man's name is Bill. Bill eats at the restaurant every evening because he is lonely. His wife died and he has no children.

    Every evening the same waitress(女服务员)brings Bill to his dinner. Her name is Cara. She is 17 years old. Cara is kind to Bill. She knows he is lonely, so she talks to him. If Bill is late for dinner, she calls him on the telephone. “Are you OK?” she asks him.

    One evening Bill doesn't come to the restaurant. Cara calls him, but he doesn't answer the phone. Cara calls the police. “Please go to Bill's house.” Cara tells the police. Later the police call Cara at the restaurant. “Bill died in his sleep,” the police tell her. Bill was 82 years old.

    A week later, a man comes to the restaurant. “I have something for Cara,” the man says. The man gives Cara a check(支票) for $500000. The money is from Bill.

“This money is for me? From Bill?” Cara asks the man.

    “Yes,” the man answers.

    “But…why?” Cara asks the man.

    “Bill liked you,” the man says. “You were kind to him”

    For all his life，my grandfather has lived in the Valley of Koi．A rushing river and the Eagle Mountain divide the valley into two．They keep the villagers safe from wolves．The soil is so rich that our crops seem to grow well by themselves，and even the precious （珍贵的） fire flowers can be found here．

    Although life in the valley was good，my grandfather still worried about his people．The mountain and river kept danger out，but they also kept us far away from the world．"We must find a way to reach out to other villages，"Grandfather said，"to trade，exchange stories and make friends．If we do not，Koi will one day disappear．"

    One day，grandfather saw a spider （蜘蛛） in his garden．He bent down to look more closely and saw it building a web between two grasses．Suddenly，Grandfather knew what the people of Koi must do．

    Many villagers were skeptical ． "It comes easily to the spider，but it is so difficult for humans，"they didn't believe it possible．"We cannot fly through the air like a spider．And what would happen if strangers learned where the fire flowers grew？"

    "If I were a fire flower，I would rather be picked from the earth and loved than left alone and unseen，"Grandfather said．Some of the villagers agreed．After that，the strongest men and women of Koi began to work．Finally，the bridge was finished!My grandfather was the first Koi villager ever to stand on the far bank of the river．When he reached the other side，a stranger came to greet him friendly with a precious ice flower as a gift to share with us．

    Our village is still small and quiet，but we are no longer shut away from the world．Next spring，I'm going to walk through the mountain to enjoy the ice flowers，I would also like to meet more strangers from other places and share them fire flowers of Koi．

    On Miriam's 9th birthday two years ago, her aunt, who lives in Kenya（肯尼亚）, gave money to a group that cares for elephants to celebrate Miriam's birthday. Then Miriam and her mother visited Africa to learn how the group was helping elephants. Later, Miriam fell in love with the animals and wanted to help save them.

    A few months after visiting Africa, Miriam watched How I Became an Elephant, a film about the mistreatment of elephants in Thailand, and a young girl's effort to save them. Miriam decided she wanted to raise money to save elephants.

    Last year, Miriam created a program called They Deserve（应得） to Be Free after seeing how young elephants are abused in Thailand. She learned how people take a baby elephant, don't give it food or water for days and beat it hard. "It made me really sad. I need to do something useful." Miriam said.

    Miriam is working to make money for Elephant Nature Park in Thailand. She asked her friends to give money to the park rather than giving her birthday gifts.

    She recently joined about 12 other students in an art center. They made elephants from clay and decorated（装饰） them. Then she created a plan to sell clay elephants.

    Kate, Miriam's art teacher, opened her art studio（工作室） to Miriam and her friends on weekends so they could make clay elephants. She even gave them the clay." It's great to see a young student wanting to spend her time on something meaningful. This is what we should all work towards," Kate said.

    Miriam says she has sold 180 clay elephants worth 2, 000 dollars, and all of that money has been sent to Elephant Nature Park in Thailand.

    A few years ago national attention was fixed on a deep, dark cave in the mountains near where I live now. A team had entered the cave to do some research. Although every precaution had been taken to make it safe, one young man was separated from the team and lost in the depths of the cave.

    For several days a rescue team worked around the clock, searching almost everywhere in the underground cave. With each passing hour chance of finding the young man inside the cave became smaller, and people had a lot of guesses. Perhaps he had simply run away. Or maybe he had stumbled out some other entrance and was now lost in the mountains. Or perhaps he was already... well, nobody wanted to say it. But everybody thought it. Everybody, that is, except the young man's parents.

    "That wasn't a choice in our opinion," the young man's mother said." Finally we would find him—safe and alive. We were certain of that."

    There was little reason to those who were familiar with the cave said it had been completely searched-several times. Common sense suggested that time was running out and that other choices needed to be considered—like when to say "enough".

    But like Kris Kringle says in his famous book A Miracle on 34th Street, "Faith is believing in something even when common sense tells you not to do." And the young man's parents had faith. They wouldn't give up, and they wouldn't let anyone else give up, either. And sure enough, the young man was found—hungry, thirst and afraid, but healthy.

    How did the young man manage to stay a live in the cave?

    "I've never stopped believing that someone would find me," said the young man.

    Zheng He, the Columbus of the East, was an amazing man.

    He was born in 1371 and, 11 years later, was caught by the army of a rich young man called Zhu Di and made to work for him. Over time the rich man saw that Zheng He was very clever and strong and they became close friends. In 1403 Zhu Di was made the King of China and he asked Zheng He to join his new government.

    The King wanted to learn more about the world and show other countries his power. He ordered many new ships to be built and made Zheng He their leader. Between 1405 and 1433, Zheng He led seven sea trips to different parts of the world. He certainly travelled to India, Africa and the Middle East. A few people think his ships may have even reached South America and Australia.

    Each trip lasted between two and four years and it is believed he sailed more than 50 000 kms during the years of his travels. With 28 000 men and over 300 ships, such as boats for food, water and even soldiers' horses, Zheng He led a fleet whose size would not be equaled by Europeans for over 500 years.

    On these trips he brought with him many Chinese goods like silk and medicine to give to foreign kings or to sell for local goods. He returned from each trip with boats filled with expensive things such as gold and jewellery, foreign guests and strange animals like a giraffe.

    It is a pity that we may never learn everything about Zheng He's travels. After he died in 1433, the new king, who believed these trips were unlucky and too expensive, had them stopped and he burned almost all the books about Zheng He's travels. It is only in the last 50 years that historians have begun to carefully study the adventures of the great Zheng He.