Do you remember the first word that you spoke? If you can, you are unusual. Suppose what your life was like during the first few months. I'm sure that it took your most time to eat，sleep and cry. As you grew older you slept less. Your parents would spend more time playing with you and talking to you. You watched and listened. You got to know that people make some sounds to go with some things.

      Then you began to cry and to make sounds you heard. And little by little you could make right sound for one thing.

      Then you got to understand the secret of the language. It is that a certain sound means a certain thing. One sound could be as good as another. But it is not so good as a word if everybody doesn't agree on its meaning. Only when a group of people make and use the same set of sounds of things they can understand each other. Their own language comes into being.

      After you knew the “secret” you learned words. Some of the words meant things such as cars, books, birds and stores. Some of the words meant movements such as come, fly and swim. And other words express things such as “I would like to make friends with you.” This is language that people can communicate by the way of language. That is to say, languages mean communication.

    Winter solstice, as the name shows, means the coming of winter. As an important solar term in the traditional Chinese calendar, it is also a traditional holiday for Chinese, which is also called “冬节”， “长至节”，“亚岁”, etc. Generally, winter solstice occurs between December 21st and 23rd. According to the traditional Chinese calendar, five days constitutes a pentad and three pentads constitutes a solar term. One year is divided into twelve periods and twelve climates which are regarded as twenty-four solar terms. The Winter Solstice is one of twenty-four solar terms. On this day, in the Northern Hemisphere the period of daytime is the shortest of the year and the period of night is longest. . In Northern China during winter solstice there is a custom of eating dumplings.

    Do you have any foreign friends? Do you know their characteristics（特征）?

    The Germans are very quiet and they always keep calm. They don't like to speak more words. They look very serious. They like different kinds of amusements（娱乐）. The Germans are very hard－working. They like tidiness, especially the women, who always keep their home clean.

    In some ways, the Englishmen look the same as the Germans. They are very quiet and never talk too much with the strangers. They are really polite, so we often hear they say “Thank you.” Or “Sorry.” The gentlemen are also the Englishmen.

    The French's holidays are very long. They like traveling and usually spend their long time staying in other countries. The Frenchmen are more outgoing than the Germans. It is very easy to make friends with them.

    Compared to the Frenchmen, the Americans are more outgoing. And they are even opener than all of the Europeans（欧洲人）. They don't like to depend on others. So it is very common that the students do part-time jobs in their free time. And in Americans' eyes, success is an important part in their life.

    Although people everywhere seem to enjoy drinking coffee，they don't all have the same coffee culture. In Europe for example, coffee shops are common places for people to meet friends while they drink coffee. On the other hand, places like this were not as common in North America in the past. Instead, people in North America liked to drink coffee in their homes with friends. The coffee culture in the USA changed, when Starbucks (星巴克) coffee shops spread throughout the country．

    The first Starbucks coffee shop opened in 1971 in downtown Seattle, Washington，in the USA. It was a small coffee shop that cooked its own coffee beans. The coffee shop's business did well, and by 1981 there were three Starbucks stores in Seattle.

    Things really began to change for the company in 1981. That year, Howard Schultz met the three men who ran Starbucks. Schultz worked in New York for a company that made kitchen equipment (设备) . He noticed that Starbucks ordered a large number of special coffee makers, which caused his great interest. Schultz went to Seattle to see what Starbucks did. In 1982, the original Starbucks owners hired Schultz as the company's head of marketing (市场营销).

    In 1983, Schultz traveled to Italy. The special environment of the espresso (浓咖啡) bars there caught his eyes. Back in the USA, Schultz created an environment for Starbucks coffee shops that was comfortable and casual, and customers everywhere seemed to like it. Starbucks began opening more stores in the USA. Then the company opened coffee shops in other countries as well. Today, there are more than 16,000 Starbucks coffee shops all over the world.

    However，that does not mean Starbucks has not had problems. In fact, many Starbucks stores have closed over the past few years. On the one hand, this is because there were too many coffee shops competing (竞争) for business in one small area. On the other hand, stores in some countries closed because the coffee culture there did not match with the comfortable environment offered by Starbucks.

    Books are our best friends. They are very quiet, but we can always find both fun and knowledge once we open them. Here are two good books you can read during the holiday.

    The Little Prince(王子)

    French Writer: Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

    Both adults and children love this classic book. It is about the adventure of a young prince. It shows the importance of innocence(纯真), imagination and love.

    The little prince comes from planet B-612. In his eyes, adults are all very strange. Unlike them, he sees the essence(本质) of things. He cares more about a flower and a sheep than the "important" things of the adult world.

    The prince lives on his planet with a rose. He loves the rose very much. But he soon feels tired and leaves his planet. He meets many more strange adults on other planets.

    On Earth, he discovers interesting things such as a snake, other roses and a fox. The fox tells him a secret: Only the heart can discover the most important things. This helps the prince realize his love for the rose and he goes back to his planet.

    To Succeed on One's Own

    American Writer: Liu Yong

    Writer Liu Yong from Taiwan wrote this book for his daughter. It can help young people succeed.

    The book teaches you about student, how to use your free time and even what kind of clothes to wear. It answers many teenagers' most common questions. Liu uses his daughter's stories as examples to help readers understand the principles(原则).

    His book is far from boring. There are lively stories and dialogues, with objective analysis (客观分析), hope and confidence(信心) from a good father.