Moments before I could lift my case to put it in the plane's overhead locker ahead of our recent holiday to Europe, my father gently urged me to stop. He held the thick handles of the case and lifted it with his thin arms, pushing it into place with a sigh. “You should relax and be the lady, and let me do the heavy tasks,” he said seriously. “In the future, someone special will come into your life and take over such tasks from me, but that will never happen if you do everything yourself.”

    I was stunned into silence. This was not the father I remembered from childhood, who trained me to study hard at school, asked me to earn my own pocket money as a teenager at a local coffee shop, and even taught me household chores so that my life alone in London wouldn't turn into a mess. But then, eight years after I left home and started a new life in the UK, I realized for the first time that my dad still has expectations for me to be like a princess and to stay dependent and delicate, which were considered necessary qualities of women in traditional China.

    Well, that came a little late. Little did Dad know that over the three years of my university life, I moved flats five times all by myself, dragging suitcases of books and clothes, and waiting for the taxi in the rain while holding tight onto cardboard boxes. Meanwhile, living in the UK – a country currently led by a female prime minister – I have never thought there is anything girls cannot do. Most of my female friends are professionals working in the City of London, and after work, we frequently go down to the pub for a drink, just like the guys do – something my mother never did.

    I wondered how I might make Dad understand the new world his little girl has entered. Perhaps one day, he will realize the “someone special” in my life will appreciate my confidence and independence above dependence, and admit that times have changed.

    Gregory Kloehn digs through dustbins every day, but not for the reason that most people would think. He isn't homeless. In fact he is trying to help the homeless.

    Gregory began his life as a sculptor. But he often felt that his sculpture (雕塑) which just stood in rich people's houses for years, lacked a meaningful purpose. So in 2015 he decided to put his artistic energies into creating homes to sell—not ordinary homes but small structures built entirely from recycled materials.

    The thought of creating homes for the homeless didn't come to him until the year 2017, when a homeless couple asked him for a tarp (防水布). Instead of a tarp, Gregory offered them something better: a small home with a water tank, a kitchen and a tap for waste. They were so grateful that Gregory decided to focus his efforts on helping house the homeless population in his city. And soon his "Homeless Homes Project" was started.

    Before starting a new home, Gregory goes hunting for materials by digging through dustbins. Everything he finds is usable—refrigerator doors become house doors; washing machine doors often serve as windows, and the tops of cars become strong roofs. He put wheels at the bottom for users to move their homes around easily. Each home takes two to three days to make.

    So far Gregory has donated dozens of homes to the city's most needy. While his small low- cost mobile homes are not the final solution to the problem of homelessness, they are really practical and do provide a warm and safe place for the homeless to stay in. They are simply a way for one man to do something nice for those in need of some help.

    Gregory has written a book titled Homeless Architecture, where he explains techniques to build those homes and he is now working on weekend workshops. "A lot of people who hear about what I'm doing want to get involved," he said. "Maybe we can meet someplace and put a couple of homes together."

    The McDonnells lived in a small brick house in Larchmont, a suburb of New York City. Jim was foreman of mail carriers at the post office where he had worked for 25 years. Married in 1960, he and Anne were childless.

    On the evening of the eleventh anniversary of their marriage, carrying out the garbage, Jim McDonnell slipped on ice­coated steps, and struck his head. A few days later, driving to work, he lost control of the car, hit a telephone pole, and banged his forehead against the windshield. The following day he fell off the stairs, and again he banged his head. Found unconscious, he was hospitalized for three days with a cerebral concussion(脑震荡). One day in the same month, Jim borrowed a friend's station wagon and drove to Kennedy Airport to pick up Anne's brother and family. When he returned the borrowed car at 10 p.m., he was unaware that the wallet containing his identification had slipped out of his pocket onto the floor of the station wagon. After that, he was never seen again.

    So what really happened to Anne's husband? During his walk home, Jim had indeed blacked out(昏厥), losing all ability to remember who he was and where he lived. What happened then is unclear. The next thing he knew was that he was in downtown Philadelphia, a city he had never visited before. Seeing signs advertising the services of a James Peters, a real estate broker, Jim adopted James Peters as his own name. He had no past; his only reality was the present. James Peters got a Social Security card, which could be obtained at that time without showing a birth certificate, and took a job in a health club. He next worked at a cancer research institute, cleaning out animal cages. He also got a night shift job at the P&P luncheonette, where he became well known for his omelets, as well as his courtesy and good humor.

    About a month before Christmas 1985, colleagues noticed that Jim had grown unusually quiet and depressed. Something seemed to be turning in his mind. On December 22, Jim had fallen and banged his head. The next day at work he seemed distracted, and late that afternoon he had fallen again, striking his head. On December 24, he awoke feeling confused, yet delighted. After almost 15 years, he knew who he was! He was James A. McDonnell, Jr., of Larchmont, New York. His wife's name was Anne.

    Anne had just returned home from Christmas Mass, where she lit candles and prayed for Jim. A light snow was falling, and she was in a hurry to leave for Christmas dinner at her sister's before the roads grew slick. Then the doorbell rang. "Oh my," she thought, "this is not a good time for a visitor." Anne opened the door — and saw a man with a full white beard. Immediately she recognized Jim. She couldn't speak.

    To Jim, Anne looked a little older, but prettier too. His heart overflowed.

    "Hello, Anne," he said.

    One of the most famous buildings in the United States is Carnegie Hall, the home of classical and popular music concerts in New York. Carnegie Hall is known not just for its beauty and history, but also for its amazing sound. It has been said that the hall itself is an instrument. It takes the music and makes it larger than life.

    Carnegie Hall is named after Andrew Carnegie, who paid for its construction. Construction on Carnegie Hall began in 1890 and the official opening night was on May 5, 1891.

    The hall was owned by the Carnegie family until 1924 when it was sold to Robert E. Simon. The building became very old and in 1960, the new owner made plans to destroy it and build an office block. Isaac Stem led a group of people who fought to save Carnegie Hall and finally, the city of New York bought it for $5 million. It was then fixed up between 1983 and 1995.

    Advertisements and stories in newspapers about how Carnegie Hall needed help to recover its history led people to send in old concert programmes and information from all over the world. Over 12,000 concert programmes were received and with these it was possible to make a proper record of Carnegie Hall's concert history.

    Carnegie Hall is actually made up of several different halls, but the Main Hall, now called the Isaac Stern Hall, is the most famous. The hall itself can hold an audience of 2,804 in five levels of seating.

    Because the best and most famous musicians of all time have played at Carnegie Hall, it is the dream of most musicians who want to be great to play there. This has led to a very old joke which is now part of Carnegie Hall's history. Question: "How do I get to Carnegie Hall?" Answer: "Practise, practise, practise."

    From ancient stories to modern researches, the label（标签）attached to being left-handed is undeniable. Left-handed people, or "lefties" as they are often called, are generally believed to be good at art — Leonardo da Vinci, Picasso and Michelangelo are all left-handed.

    Our brain is divided into two parts: the left hemisphere(大脑半球)and the right hemisphere. The left hemisphere, linked to logic and analysis, is responsible for the right side of the body. The right hemisphere, linked to creativity and imagination, controls the left side of the body. So, people tend to believe lefties are controlled by the right side of the brain, and are more creative than right-handers. Some also think that lefties may not be as good as right-handers in mathematics and problem-solving skills.

    However; a recent study carried out by scientists from the University of Liverpool in the UK and the University of Milan in Italy proved this theory wrong. The study involved(涉及)more than 2,300 students in Italy aged between 6 and 17 years old. They were asked to complete several mathematical tasks of different levels. It turned out the left-handers outperformed the others when the tasks involved difficult problem-solving. This pattern was particularly clear in male adolescents. However; when it came to simple arithmetic, there was no difference between left-handers and right-handers.

    It was also discovered that those who are "severely" right-handed performed less well in all the experiments compared to "medium" right-handers and left-handers.

    "Taken together, these findings show that handedness does influence abilities to some degree," the study's authors wrote. However, "handedness is just an indirect expression of brain function," wrote psychology professor Giovanni Sala from the University of Liverpool in the UK, the lead author of the study. Sala also noted that only one third of people with a highly-developed right side of the brain are left-handed. It means that there are lots of right-handed people with a similar brain function as left-handers.

    When a rather dirty, poorly dressed person kneels at your feet and puts out his hands to beg for a few coins, do you hurry on, not knowing what to do, or do you feel sad and hurriedly hand over some money? What should our attitude to beggars be? There can be no question that the world is full of terribly sad stories. It must be terrible to have no idea where our next meal is going to come from. It seems cruel not to give some money to beggars.

    Certainly, most of the world's great religions (宗教) order us to be open-hearted and share what we have with those less fortunate than ourselves. But has the world changed? Maybe what was morally (道德方面) right in the old days, when one knew exactly who in the village had suffered misfortune and needed help, is no longer the best idea. Quite a few people will not give to beggars. Let us look at their arguments.

    First, some believe that many city beggars dress up on purpose to look pitiable and actually make a good living from begging. Giving to beggars only encourages this sort of evil (恶行). Secondly, there is the worry that the money you give will be spent on beer, wine or drugs. Thirdly, there is the opinion that there is no real excuse for begging. One might be poor, but that is no reason for losing one's sense of pride and self-dependence.

    Related to this is the opinion that the problem should be dealt with by the government rather than ordinary people. Some people think beggars should go to the local government department and receive help.

    It is hard to come to any final conclusion; there are various cases and we must deal with them differently. A few coins can save a life in some situations, and even if the money is wasted, that does not take away the moral goodness of the giver.