Though chopsticks are used in many Asian countries, they have their beginning in China. Chinese history says that the Chinese had chopsticks as far as the Xia Dynasty(朝代)(about 4, 00 years ago). In the Spring and Autumn Period(时期) copper and iron chopsticks appeared. With the Han Dynasty lacquered(上漆) chopsticks came, followed by gold and silver chopsticks still later. Today we have chopsticks made of plastics. The most expensive are made of part of tusks of elephants and hard green stone.

    Chopsticks tell Chinese tradition in their way. In ancient (古代的) times the rich used hard green stone or gold chop-sticks to show their wealth(富有). In history many kings used silver chopsticks to take their food to see if it was poisonous(有毒的). It was said that if it was, the silver chopsticks would turn colour. Chopsticks are traditionally given to a daughter when she marries to show that they should have a son very soon, for “Chopsticks” in Chinese is pronounced like “quick a son”!

    Tianzhu chopsticks from Hangzhou, wooden chopsticks from Shanyang of Shanxi Province, and Beijing's chopsticks are well-known.

    Many westerners, businessmen, tourists put aside(一边) their knives and forks in favour(爱好) of chopsticks in China. Chopsticks appeared in the old Chinese story: an old man teaches his sons a lesson by showing how he could easily break a single chopstick but not a number of them. In China, chopsticks are connected with good luck. So on the country's New Year's Eve many families will lay out new chopsticks at dinners as a way of making requests for luck.

    China is a great country with the largest population in the world. In order to solve the population problem, our government carried out one﹣child policy （政 策）before. When it is carried out for some time, many people not only see its advantages but also disadvantages.

    From 2016, two﹣child policy is put into effect. In my opinion, two﹣child policy is good. First of all, two﹣child policy is the gift for some only child. For some families, maybe the parents are only child and they also can have only child. Besides the loneliness of their child, when their child grows up and they grow older, their child marry an only child girl, the burden（负担）on their child and his wife is too heavy. Their child and his wife have to take care of two couples. Usually, a young couple looking after an old couple is a little difficult. But if their parents have two children, they can share the burden of taking care of their parents. It would be much better. Secondly, two﹣child policy can guarantee （保证） the number of Chinese population.

    All in all, one﹣child policy has been out of date. And two﹣child policy is needed and necessary. It can solve the problems of nowadays （现在）and the future.

    February 14th, Valentine's Day, is a complicated but interesting occasion. First of all, Valentine's Day is not a holiday from work. No one gets a day off. In many countries it is observed by sending cards to your friends and candies or flowers to your husband or wife if you're married, or to your boyfriend or girlfriend if you're not married. In Japan, some girls even give their fathers chocolates.

    Why is this holiday for people in love called Valentine's Day?

    One explanation comes from a Christian man whose name was something like "Valentine". He lived at a time when the Roman Emperor refused to allow any Roman soldiers to get married for any reason. Many couples came to Valentine to be married. So he would secretly marry them in a Christian ceremony. He was discovered and put in prison by the Emperor. One tradition says that he wrote notes to his friends by marking on leaves and then throwing them out of the window of his prison. The leaves were shaped like a heart. Valentine was killed on February 14th and Valentine's Day recalls his tragic death.

    On Valentine's Day, American elementary school children make or buy Valentine cards, write the name of a classmate on them, and take them to school and put them in a special Valentine's Day box. And then on that day the box is opened, the cards are taken out and given out.

Do you wonder what your work environment will be in 10 years? Imagine you walk into your office, with the temperature just right. You sit down and begin a nice day. This is the kind of smart office that engineers are trying to make. It uses technology to help workers perform at their best while at work.

Sitting in front of a desk for too long can be bad for your health. For example, it can cause back and waist (腰) pain. Sanon, a company in Zhejiang, built UP7 to help solve this. As a smart lifting desk, UP7 can tell how long a user has been sitting in the chair. When it reaches the time set by the user, it will "tell" the user to stop working by either shaking the table or sending messages to the user's phone.

The company also designed a type of smart chair to match with the table. "The chair is so comfortable. It can adjust the arms and height according to your body shape," a user in Zhejiang posted on platforms. In smart offices, you probably won't use paper notebooks. Instead, you can try electronic paper books to put every work document online. N10, created by Hanvon Technology in Beijing, is a new "notebook" like this. It uses a screen that doesn't produce much light. Users write on it with an electronic pen.

"It truly feels like reading and writing on real paper, completely meeting my office needs," a user Mr. Lin said to People's Daily. "Notes recorded can be easily organized, searched and stored. You usually need several paper notebooks to do what the electronic notebook does."

Are you looking forward to working in such a comfortable and friendly work environment in the future?