About a hundred people lived in a very small mountain village. It was very {#blank#}1{#/blank#} from the other villages and towns. They had few {#blank#}2{#/blank#} and none of them left the village. Of course there was neither electricity(电) nor gas(煤气) there.

    Once a writer{#blank#}3{#/blank#} the village. The backwardness(落后) of the village surprised him. He decided {#blank#}4{#/blank#} about it to the world. So he took the oldest villager to London. The old man told all about his home and village to the people. Several months {#blank#}5{#/blank#} he returned. All the villagers went to see him and asked him how he had enjoyed {#blank#}6{#/blank#} in the city.

    “Everything is {#blank#}7{#/blank#} in London,” the old man said, “I've {#blank#}8{#/blank#} to many good places and eaten all kinds of nice food and other things. But the trouble was I could not {#blank#}9{#/blank#} at night. ”

    “What happened to you?” his wife asked.

    “The{#blank#}10{#/blank#}was on in my bedroom all the time.”

    “Why not blow it out, then?”

    “I tried, but it was inside a little glass bottle.”

    The post office has plenty of work to do. It deals with thousands of letters every day. Let's follow a letter all the way across America.

    Julie lives in New York. She wrote a letter to Dave in Oregon. Julie put the letter in the mailbox on Monday night. On Tuesday morning, a truck {#blank#}1{#/blank#} at the mailbox. The postman put the letters into a large bag and took the bag to a post office in New York.

    On Tuesday afternoon the letters were sorted(分类) . Post codes were used to sort the mail. A machine {#blank#}2{#/blank#} a letter and held it. A worker read the post code.

Then the worker pushed five buttons on another machine in one second. After that, the machine put the letter in a box. By Tuesday night the box was on a truck. The truck went to the airport. An airplane {#blank#}3{#/blank#} for Oregon on Wednesday morning.

    Julie's letter went on the airplane.

    By noon the letters were in an airport in Oregon. Mail trucks then took them to post offices. One of these was in Dave's town. On Wednesday night people in Dave's town sorted the letters by street {#blank#}4{#/blank#}.

    On Tuesday morning the postman for Main Street picked up his pile of letters.

    He sorted all of them by street number before {#blank#}5{#/blank#}. The people at 1 Main Street got their mail first. Dave lived at 221 Main Street. He got his letter before lunch.

There are many wetlands (湿地) in China ‒ and some of them have become the world's important wetlands. The Chinese Yellow Sea Wetlands are {#blank#}1{#/blank#} them. They are in Yancheng, Jiangsu Province. They are {#blank#}2{#/blank#} to many different kinds of animals. The world's {#blank#}3{#/blank#} Milu deer nature reserve (自然保护区) is on these wetlands. More than 700 Milu deer live there. There are not many red-crowned cranes (丹顶鹤) {#blank#}4{#/blank#} in the world, but every winter, you can see some in the red-crowned crane nature reserve in the Yellow Sea Wetlands.

    The {#blank#}5{#/blank#} in the wetlands is neither too high nor too low. There is  {#blank#}6{#/blank#} rain and sunshine, too. They are a good place for wildlife. But offering food and shelter for special kinds of animals is not the  {#blank#}7{#/blank#} reason we need to protect wetlands. Wetlands are important {#blank#}8{#/blank#} they also prevent floods. But some people want to {#blank#}9{#/blank#} the wetlands to make more space for farms and less space for wildlife.

    More people are beginning to realize the {#blank#}10{#/blank#} of wetlands and wildlife. Every year, on Feb 2, many activities are held to teach people about the wetlands.