There are many differences between country life and city life in many ways. One person even does different things in the two places.

    Julia lived in the countryside, but one year she decided to visit the capital city to do some shopping and to see the sights. She stayed at a hotel near the central market. She had seldom been to the city before, and was very excited about what she would find.

    On the first morning of her visit, as she walked from the hotel to the market, she passed a beggar(乞丐). He was holding up a notice, which said, “Blind from birth. Please give generously(慷慨地).”

    Julia felt sorry for the blind beggar and she bent down and put a dollar coin into his bowl. “Thank you.” he said.

    The same thing happened again the following day.

    On the third day, however, Julia did not have a dollar coin. She had only fifty cents, so she dropped this into the beggar's bowl.

    “What have I done wrong?” the beggar said, “Why are you so stingy today? ”

    Julia was very surprised at what the beggar said. “How do you know I haven't given you a dollar?” she said, “If you're blind you can't know what coin I put into your bowl.”

    “Ah, ” explained the beggar, “The truth is that I'm not blind. I'm just looking after this place for the regular beggar while he's on holiday.”

    “On holiday?” Julia said, “And what exactly does your blind friend do on holiday?”

    “He goes into the countryside,” the man said, “and takes photographs. He's a very good photographer.”

    In business, there's a speed difference: It's the difference between how important a firm's leaders say speed is to their competitive strategy and how fast the company actually moves. The difference is important regardless of industry and company size. Companies fearful of losing their competitive advantage spend much time and money looking for ways to pick up the speed.

In our study of 343 businesses, the companies that chose to go, go, go to try to gain an edge ended up with lower sales and operating incomes than those that paused at key moments to make sure they were on the right track. What's more, the firms that “slowed down to speed up” improved their top and bottom lines, averaging 40% higher sales and 52% higher operating incomes over a three-year period.

    How did they disobey the laws of business physics, taking more time than competitors yet performing better? They thought differently about what “slower” and “faster” mean. Firms sometimes fail to understand the difference between operational speed (moving quickly) and strategic speed (reducing the time it takes to deliver value). Simply increasing the speed of production, for example, may be one way to try to reduce the speed difference. But that often leads to reduced value over time, in the form of lower-quality products and services.

    In our study, higher-companies with strategic speed always made changes when necessary. They became more open to ideas and discussion. They encouraged new ways of thinking. And they allowed time to look back and learn. By contrast, performance suffered at firms that moved fast all the time, paid too much attention to improving efficiency, stuck to tested methods, didn't develop team spirit among their employees, and had little time thinking about changes.

    Strategic speed serves as a kind of leadership. Teams that regularly take time to get things right, rather than plough ahead full bore, are more successful in meeting their business goals. That kind of strategy must come from the top.

    Dogs are likely to have complex emotions such as jealousy(嫉妒)and pride, according to a new scientific research.

    Dogs feel very jealous when they find that they are unfairly treated. And they do not like seeing their owners being kind to other creatures, especially other dogs. They often react negatively(消极地)when their owners bring home new pets, the research found. “Dogs show a strong aversion to unfair treatment,” Dr. Friederike Range of the Vienna University said.

    At first, people believed most animals lack(缺少)the “sense of self” , which is needed to experience so-called secondary emotions such as jealousy, embarrassment or guilt. These emotions are more complex than feelings such as anger or joy.

    Besides dogs research, another research includes cows, horse, cats and sheep, and all the results have shown that animals are far more self-aware than we thought.

    Dr Paul Morris, a psychologist at the University of Portsmouth who studies animal emotions, told The Sunday Times, “We are learning that dogs, horses, and perhaps many other species are far more emotionally complex than we ever realized. They can suffer simple forms of many emotions we once thought only primates (灵长类) could experience. ”

    In research among dog owners, Dr Morris found almost all of them reported jealous behavior by their pets. The dog often tried to keep their owner away from a new lover in the early days of a relationship.

    Behavioral experts suggest that owners should keep a close relationship with the dog as usual when a new pet or child comes along in order to prevent jealous activity from the dog such as interruptions with barking.

    Health experts are calling for action to increase cancer care and control in the developing world. A medical research paper says cancer was once thought of as a problem mostly in the developed world. But now cancer is a leading cause of death and disability in poor countries as well. Experts from Harvard University and other organizations urge the international community to fight cancer actively, saying it should be fought in the way HIV/AIDS has been fought in Africa.

    Cancer kills more than 7.5 million people a year worldwide. Almost two thirds are in low-income and middle-income countries.

They discover cancer kills more people in developing countries than AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria combined. But the world spends only 5% of its cancer resources in those countries.

    Felicia Knaul from Harvard Medical School was one of the writers of the paper. She was in Mexico when she was found to have breast cancer. She received treatment there and her experience showed her the sharp difference between the rich and the poor in treating breast cancer.

    Felicia Knaul says, “And we are seeing how this is attacking young women. It's the number two cause of death in Mexico of women thirty to fifty-four. All over the developing world, it's the number one cancer-related death among young women. I think we have to again say that there is much more we could do about it than we are doing about it. ”

    Professor Knaul met community health workers during her work in developing countries. They were an important part of efforts to reduce deaths from the cancer. They were able to persuade people to get tested to prevent the illness. The experts say cancer care does not have to be costly. For example, patients can be treated with lower-cost drugs.

    Several years ago, my parents, my wife, my son and I ate at one of those restaurants where the menu is written on a blackboard. After a wonderful dinner, the waiter set the check in the middle of the table. That's when it happened：my father did not reach for the check.

    Conversation continued. Finally I realized that I should pick up the check! After hundreds of restaurant meals with my parents, after a lifetime of thinking of my father as the one with dollars, it had all changed. I reached for the check, and my view of myself suddenly changed. I was an adult. I was no longer a kid (child).

Some people mark off (区分) their lives in years, I measure mine in small events. I didn't become a young man at a particular age, like 16, but rather when a kid who wandered in the streets called me "mister". These events in my life are called "milestones"(里程碑).

    There have been other milestones. The cops (policemen) of my youth always seemed big, even huge, and of course they were older than I was. Then one day they were suddenly neither. The day came when I suddenly realized that all the football players in the game I was watching were younger than I was. They were just big kids. With that milestone gone was the dream that someday, maybe I, too, could be a football player. Without ever having reached the hill, I was over it.

    I never thought that I would fall asleep in front of the TV set as my father did. Now it's what I do best. I never thought that I would go to the beach and not swim, yet I spent all of August at the shore and never once went into the ocean. I never thought that I would appreciate opera, but now the combination of voice and orchestra attracts me. I never thought that I would prefer to stay home in the evenings, but now I find myself passing up parties. I used to think that people who watched birds were strange, but this summer I found myself watching them, and maybe I'll get a book on the subject. I feel a strong desire for a religious belief that I never thought I'd want, feel close to my ancestors long gone, and echo my father in arguments with my son. I'll still lose….

    One day I bought a house. One day－What a day!－I became a father, and not too long after that I picked up the check for my own father. I thought then it was a milestone for me. One day, when I was a little older, I realized it was one for him too, another milestone．

    Have you ever had one of those days when all you wanted to do was read an emotionally powerful story that would cause you to tears? Most of us tend to be attracted by stories that reach us on multiple levels, including sadness. There are plenty of books that make you cry (and sometimes laugh) and that you can really sink your teeth into. Here are four of them.

    ⒈The Kite Runner

    This realistic and moving description of life in Afghanistan accounts for the people who were badly affected by the Taliban. You'll cry as you get to know the familial relationships and cruelty involved, but you'll also get a sense of hope as you quickly read through this appealing novel.

    ⒉The Book Thief

    Let's put it this way: Death itself is the narrator. The story is about a young girl named Liesel who has to live with foster parents during World War II. On the way to her new home, her brother dies, setting the gloomy tone for the story. There is hope, however, when Liesel discovers her love for reading and makes a relationship with a young Jewish man she helps hide from the Nazis.

    ⒊The Fault in Our Stars

    This is probably the most likely book on the list to make you cry, as it records the experiences of teens who are dying from cancer and living their last days in love. Their lifestyle is tragic and disturbing at the same time, as we watch their health worsen. The real tragedy is the love story between the main characters, who know that their romance is fruitless.

    ⒋A Child Called “It”

    Easily one of the saddest stories of abuse in recent decades, A Child Called It is based on the true story of Dave Pelzer, a boy from California who suffered at the hands of his cruel family. The tears will come from both sadness and the inspiration tied to Dave's fight for survival in an environment where he is believed worthless.