Bill is an English boy. He is twelve. He lives in China with his family. There are four people in his family. They are his father Jack Cliton, his mother Catherine and his little sister Abby. He has a yellow dog. Its name is Barbi. His father is mending his bike. What is Bill doing? Ah, he is doing Chinese homework. He can't speak Chinese very well. But he loves Chinese very much. Bill's father works in middle school. He is an English teacher. His mother is in a TV factory. Bill and his sister go to the same school.

    The Chinese New Year is a very important holiday for the Chinese people. It falls on a different date each year and lasts 15 days. Days before the New Year, every family is busy giving its house a thorough cleaning. ~They decorate the doors and windows with paper-cuts and put lanterns around their houses. On the Eve, all the family members come together to have a big dinner. It is a feast. After dinner, it is time for the whole family to sit up for the night. They play card games or watch TV programs. Next morning, people all dress in their best clothes. Children greet their parents or grandparents and get their gifts of money in red envelops. Then the family start out to say greetings from door to door.

    A young boy was playing with a ball in the street. He kicked it too hard, and it broke the window of a house and fell inside. A lady came to the window with the ball and shouted at the young boy so the young boy ran away, but he still wanted his ball back. A few minutes later he returned and knocked, at the door of the house. When the lady answered it, he said, "My father's going to come and fix(修理) your window very soon.”

    After a few more minutes, a man came to the door with tools in his hands. So the lady let the boy take his ball away.

    When the man finished fixing the window, he said to the lady, "That will cost you ten dollars."

    "But aren't you the father of that young boy?" the woman asked. "Of course not," he answered, "Aren't you his mother?"