More and more young people from China begin to celebrate（庆祝）Father's Day. They send fathers present, or invite them for a nice dinner. But do you know how Father's Day started?

    While Mrs. Dodd, from America, was listening to a talk about Mother's Day in a church （教堂）in 1909, she had an ideas of having Father's Day to honor（纪念）her father, William Smart. Mr. Smart used to be a soldier(军人). His wife died when she gave birth to her sixth child. Mr. Smart had to raise his six children alone. They lived a hard life. After Mrs. Dodd grew up, she wanted to thank her father for what he had done for them. She wrote a letter to a church and asked for the third Sunday in June to be Father's Day. The church agreed with her.

The first Father's Day was celebrated on June 19th, 1910 in Washington. Children made special desserts and did other things to make their fathers happy.

    The American book Who Moved My Cheese has been a best seller all over the world. It teaches people how to face changes in their lives. It is just for teens. The book tells us that when facing change in our life, like a new school or new friends, don't be afraid. Use this change to make a better life.

    The book gives an example of a change at school. A school is changing from having two terms to three terms because there are too many students. Several teens are talking about this. Most of them are unhappy and worried. But Chris is not. He laughs and tells a story about two mice, two“little people”and some cheese.

    The four are in a maze(迷宫)looking for  The cheese. Here, cheese means some thing important in life. But they find the cheese is gone. The mice realize that they can't change what has happened and have to find more cheese. This means finding different dreams. The little people can't do this. They are afraid of change so they find no cheese.

    After Chris finishes the story, the friends understand one thing:to get more cheese, move in a new direction quickly. His friends understand how this can be used in the changes all teens face, such as doing well at school or feeling good about yourself.

    For most of people in the west，Valentine's Day(情人节) ends on February 15，but here in Japan it's not quite over until March 15.March 14—exactly one month after Valentine's Day—is White Day in Japan.

    To really understand what White Day is all about，you have to understand what Valentine's Day in Japan is like. Japanese Valentine's Day is all about men getting presents. Japanese women are usually too shy to show their love，though it might not be true today. Valentine's Day is a great chance to let women show their feelings. Men should return gifts to women on White Day.

    On both days，chocolate is the gift of choice. More often，the colour of the chocolate is white because of the name of the day. You can also buy flowers，candy，or cookies.

    Does it sound good to you? Don't get too excited when you get chocolate from Japanese girls! They give chocolate not only to their loved ones，but also to men such as bosses (老板) and male(男性的) friends.

    The Japanese first celebrated White Day in 1978.Now it is also celebrated in South Korea and Taiwan，China.

    What we have been aware of is that people from Italy speak Italian and people from Russia speak Russian. But have you ever wondered the reason why people speak Spanish in so many South American countries? Do you know why the brilliant footballers of Brazil speak Portuguese?

    And why is French the first language of some people in Canada? The answer is that all these countries belonged to European empires at one time. The next question is: How did these empires begin? To answer that question we have to probably go back to the 15'h and 16 centuries, the golden age of European explorers.

    Although this period is known as the golden age of European explorers, it was not the beginning of European exploration. As you probably know, Marco Polo travelled a long way to China at the end of the 13" century and some people say that the Vikings discovered America

    long before Columbus set sail in 1492. However, it is during this “golden" period that some famous voyages took place. Columbus' voyage to America is the best known voyage of exploration, but Ferdinand Magellan sailed round the world in this period, and Spanish explorers such as Central and Pizarro reached South America. Cortez defeated the Aztecs in what we now know as Mesico and Pizarro defeated the Incas in what we now know as Peru. The roots of the Spanish empire were established and that is why he Spanish language is so widely spoken in Central and South America today.