For centuries, elephants have played a big role in the world's economies, culture and religion. The African elephant used to be found all over Africa and the Asian elephant moved from Syria to China to Indonesia. Nowadays, elephants are found in small groups in the south of the Sahara Desert and scarcely in Southeast Asia, Sri Lanka and India.

    In the early twentieth century, there were close to ten million elephants, and now the elephant number is as low as 252,000 and expected to drop down to 160,000 by 2025. Between 2007 and 2014, the elephant population fell by at least 30%, or 144,000 elephants. As researchers have traveled over the African plains, they only spotted one herd of 36 elephants in an area like the size of Mexico. It is clear that these gentle mammals are disappearing right before our eyes.

    There are many reasons why the elephant population has been decreasing, one of which is their habitat. Humans are competing with elephants for living space, and as more and more humans clear the land that is being used by elephants, the elephants have less space. Elephant hunting or “poaching” has been a major factor for the disappearance of this species, and they are killed only for their valuable ivory tusks. Although the trade of tusks is illegal, it is still a common practice in many places.

    Often, all the local people living among elephants would be farmers, and found that they could make more money by selling the tusks of one elephant, than doing manual labor for twelve years. That alone makes it really hard to prevent them from killing the elephants.

    Some places such as Botswana, have put in extra effort to protect their wildlife from poachers by founding their Botswana Defense Force, which is made up of around 700 specially-trained soldiers that are stationed in 40 different areas. You may feel worried about the present situations elephants are in, but there are ways to help. To find out how you can help elephant conservation, adopt an elephant, or donate, click here.

    The bike-sharing companies that are powering a transportation revolution in China's urban centers are not like those in the rest of the world. Their bikes have no docking ports or assigned zones for parking. Instead, riders open their smartphone apps, hop on, and start riding. So easy!

    In 2015, Ofo, China's bike-share pioneer, launched its first fleet of bicycles in Beijing. The bikes' bright yellow frames were soon met by the orange-rimmed（镶边）, basket-equipped models launched by Mobike, Ofo's main competitor today. In little over a year, the two companies have had a huge impact on revitalizing (重振) cycling in China, particularly among young people.

    Ofo placed 1 million bicycles across 35 cities and registered 15 million users in its first years, while Mobike has now gained more than 10 million unique users and bicycles in 21 cities. Inspired by their success, at least 10 other companies have jumped into the market, launching their own app-powered, brightly colored bikes in quick succession. But Mobike and Ofo are far ahead of them.

    The two industry leaders each take a different marketing method to a similar product. The Mobike app uses GPS to display bikes' locations to users. They can use the map to reserve a bike and walk over to it. A scan of the bike's QR code (二维码) unlocks the bike, and when users manually（手动地） lock the bike at the end of their trip, the app records the trip's end and the bike will pop back up on the map as available. Equipped with this wireless technology, Mobikes cost between 1,000 and 3,000 yuan. Rides cost 1 yuan for an hour or a half hour, depending on whether a user chooses a “Lite” or regular bike, and the deposit (押金) required to the service is 299 yuan.

Ofo, meanwhile, is devoted not just to producing its own bikes, which have slim yellow bodies and cost about 250 yuan, but also to connecting existing bikes to its network—-- a philosophy that begins with the practice of 2000 bikes offered to a campus bike-share program. The 2000 bikes were the first generation of Ofo. Yet the majority of the company's bikes are currently ones that have been specially manufactured and fitted with their lock system. Unlike Mobike,Ofo bikes themselves are offline: their locations are tracked through users' cell phones. Users find a free bike, enter the license plate number into their app, and receive the bike unlock code. When they have reached their destination, they end the ride on the app and manually lock the bike. Rides cost 1 yuan for an hour and the deposit is 99 yuan.

From birth to death, the word kick has been given an important part in expressing human experience. The proud and happy mother feels the first signs of life kicking inside her body. And that same life——many years later—— comes to its end in a widely-used expression, to kick the bucket( 吊桶) . The expression to kick the bucket is almost 200 years old. One belief is that it started when an English stableman(马夫) killed himself by hanging while standing on a bucket. He put a rope around his neck and tied it to a beam(梁柱) in the ceiling, and then kicked the bucket away from under him.

    Another old expression that comes from England is to kick over the traces. Traces were the chains（链子） that held at horse or mule to a wagon(货运马车)or plow. Sometimes, an animal refused to obey and kicked over the traces.

    Kick around is an expression that is heard often in American English. A person who is kicked around is someone who is treated badly. Usually he is not really being kicked by somebody's foot. He is just not being treated with the respect that all of us want. A person who has kicked around for most of his life is someone who has spent his life moving from place to place. In this case, kicking around means moving often from one place to another. Kick around has another meaning when you use it with the word idea. When you kick around an idea, you are giving that idea some thought.

    There is no physical action when you kick a person upstairs, although the pain can be as strong .You kick a person upstairs by removing him from an important job and giving him a job that sounds more important, but really is not.

    Still another meaning of the word kick is to free oneself of a bad habit, such as smoking cigarettes. Health campaigns urge smokers to kick the habit.  

    Many wealthy and well­traveled people want a completely new experience, but they don't necessarily want to give up luxury (奢华的) accommodations and service. The following vacations could be best choices.

    Cruise down the Amazon River

    Aqua Expeditions takes up to 32 passengers at a time on guided journeys of three, four, or seven days down the Amazon River. Those adventurers see forests and waterfalls, visit local fish markets, and take canoe trips. They also take in wildlife such as capuchin monkeys and river dolphins.

    Go Glamping in Montana

The Resort at Paws Up located on a cattle ranch(牧场) is a standout in the type. The ranch rents homes with up to four bedrooms, but it's the luxury tents that offer closer communion with the outdoors. Tents are arranged into camps, each of which has a private chef and butler, the latter of whom helps build campfires and arrange daytime activities. Guests can participate in a cattle drive, go clay shooting, take a hot air balloon trip, or ride horses.

    Climb inside a Volcano in Iceland

    Iceland is famous for its volcanoes and has plenty of luxury hotel options. Thrill­seekers can actually go down into the dormant (休眠的), 700­foot­deep Thrihnukagigur, by using an open elevator. Take a helicopter if you want to skip the 2­mile hike to the volcano, and arrange a private tour to avoid crowds. And visitors traveling there can enjoy the luxury hotel such as the ION Luxury Adventure Hotel and the Hotel Rangá.

    The ocean is filled with eight million tons of rubbish—enough to fill five carrier bags for every foot of coastline on the planet. But a new invention could deal with this problem, one port at a time.

    A pair of surfers from Perth, Australia, has invented a "floating bin" that automatically draws rubbish floating on the water into it like a vacuum (真空) cleaner. While the invention may do little to battle against five giant "garbage islands" that flow around the world's  major ocean gyres (环流), it could stop waste from leaving harbours and marinas, for example. Peter Ceglinski and Andrew Turton said their device could spell the end of polluted seas.

    The concept is simple: A bucket connects to a water pump, drawing in any floating trash inside a removable net bag. There is also an optional oil-water separator system inside the pump. It can remove oil from the seawater before spitting it back into the ocean — pollution-free — through the other side of the pump.

    The water filtration (过滤) system is much like what you'd find in a fish tank, but it has the potential to clean up an entire ocean. The seabin can run 24/7, according to its website. And, amazingly, Peter and Andrew say they have never caught a fish or sea animal in their pumps in four years of testing.

    The Seabin Project aims to improve on the traditional and sometimes expensive — harbor cleaning methods of having a person physically remove trash from the water or sending boats equipped with nets to collect it. While it's not as extensive as 21-year-old Boyan Slat's plan to clean the entire Pacific Ocean in 10 years, starting in 2020, the seabin's creators said their device is something that harbors can start using to clean our oceans now.

    They're starting "close to the source of the problem in a controlled environment," Seabin's website states. "It's a big mission, but it can be done. In fact, we're doing it right now."

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