China and Western countries may have different cultural beliefs about certain animals, but when it comes to pigs, we have somehow reached an agreement—that pigs are ugly, lazy, stupid and shameless.

    Just look at the idioms and phrases in our languages. In Chinese, we have the likes of "Boiling a dead pig" and "A pig looking in the mirror is still a pig". And in English, there are expressions such as "eating like a pig" and "sweating like a pig". None of them are exactly praise.

    But truth is that pigs do have some fine qualities. And maybe there's no better time to clear their names than now, with the arrival of Year of the Pig on Chinese Spring Festival.

    For starters, science had proved that pigs aren't stupid at all. According to a paper published last year in the International Journal of Comparative Psychology, pigs are "mentally and socially similar to dogs and chimpanzees(黑猩猩)". By training, pigs can learn some skills, such as dancing and swimming. They like to play. They have good long-term memories. And they can tell between who treat them well and those who don't.

    There are popular pig characters in cartoons too. In the UK cartoon series Peppa Pig, the four members of the cartoon's pig family teach children from all over the world about love, friendship, and the value of family. And in China, the adventures of McDull, a piglet who works hard toward his dreams even though he keeps failing, have been recounted in films since 2001. "People care too much about the immediate results, but McDull is slow and patient, and not afraid of repeating failure," said McDull's creator Brain Tse. "He has a heart of gold."

    Perhaps these are the qualities of pigs to keep in heart when we celebrate the New Year—their wisdom, cuteness, patience and bravery.

Riding a bike on the street, you might hear some people {#blank#}1{#/blank#} (speak) Chinese aloud. Turning to the right, you see a Sichuan-Style restaurant. After walking into a store {#blank#}2{#/blank#} (sell). But you're not in China—you're in Britain. Chinese products have almost {#blank#}3{#/blank#} (reach) all parts of the world.

Chinese food has been enjoyed in Western countries for {#blank#}4{#/blank#} long time. To meet local {#blank#}5{#/blank#} (people) tastes, Chinese restaurants have made some changes to the dishes. Chinese like to eat meat with the bone (骨头), but people here don't. So Chinese restaurants provide big pieces of meat {#blank#}6{#/blank#} bones.

"Some Chinese brands are also becoming more popular. In many cities in Europe, stores sell TCL televisions, Haier fridges and Lenovo computers."

In the past, most western people thought Chinese {#blank#}7{#/blank#} (product) were cheap and unreliable (不可靠的). But things have changed {#blank#}8{#/blank#} (great). "Made in China" has become cool and more people believe in Chinese brands. For example, Huawei smartphones sold {#blank#}9{#/blank#} (good) than Apple for the first time in June and July. "They are beautiful and offer some functions {#blank#}10{#/blank#} American phones don't have." CNN once said.

Every morning，many people in China do tai chi. It is popular with women and men. Tai chi is a kind of good exercise for old people. (A)它对身心都有好处。It is healthy and relaxing. Tai chi is from China. It is hundreds of years old. Tai chi is a "soft" martial art (武术). It is slow and calm (平静的). 

There are also "hard" martial arts. Shaolin kung fu，for example，which has a history of over 1，500 years，is a "hard" martial art. It is fast and dangerous (危险的). You have to be very healthy and strong to do "hard" martial arts. 

In Beijing，Master Li is teaching Shaolin kung fu to thirty young students. Three of the students come from abroad (国外). "Shaolin kung fu is difficult，" said Master Li. "(B)You have to practice every move many times. "

Sports like football and basketball are also popular in China. But martial arts like tai chi and kung fu are part of Chinese culture (文化) and history. 

Except Pluto, there 1 eight planets in the solar system now, including Earth. By the distance from the Sun from close 2 far, they are Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. Pluto used to be known as the 3 planet in our solar system, and the furthest planet from the Sun. Pluto 4 in 1930, and was named by an eleven-year-old girl from England. Pluto is only half as 5 as the United States. This planet takes 248 earth years 6 around the sun. It means we need 6.5 earth days to 7 a day on Pluto. Pluto is about 40 times farther from the Sun than Earth is. Pluto is in an area of space called the Kuiper Belt 8 has thousands of small, icy objects. The temperature on Pluto is 9 low that Earth air would turn into ice soon. The gravity on Pluto is less strong than 10 on Earth. So fat persons may prefer to move there, they would weigh much less on Pluto.

The following is a discussion from Mr. Knowall's BBS. The topic of the discussion is about the ways of students' keeping their private (秘密的) things.