You may get the idea once or twice a year. You come home on a hot summer day, hoping to have a cool bath, and find out there is no water. Then you see how important water is in your everyday life. However, in many parts of the world, water is not just about one's everyday needs.

    In countries like Tanzania, water is hard to get, and the job of collecting water falls on women's shoulders. Girls are often kept home from school to collect water while their brothers stay at school studying. More time spent collecting water means less time for learning. For these girls, "Knowledge is power" is not just words; it is a sad fact in real life. With less time spent at school, their chances of getting well-paid jobs are small. And they often have no voice in important matters, like who to marry. These girls are often married into poor families. They have little money or knowledge to take care of their children, so the children often die young. For the baby girls who are lucky enough to live, their life may still center around "water," just like it did for their mothers.

    The best time to collect green leaves is early in the leafing season but not so early．The months of June and July provide the best leaf samples（样品），but you can find great leaf samples throughout the summer．To make a fall color collection，you have to collect the leaves in autumn．

    I have seen many beautiful fall color collections．

    When you choose leaves for your samples，try to choose leaves of about the same size and shape on the tree．Make sure you collect the entire（完整的） leaves．

    Remember，some leaves have only one blade（叶片） or leaflet（小叶）．Some leaves have a few or many leaflets．You must know these two kinds of leaves．Good leaf collections contain the entire leaves．

    You should dry the collected leaves carefully before putting them in a leaf press（压）．When you collect leaves in the field，you can put them between the pages of book to protect them．And then，press them as soon as possible before you take them from this book．Finally，you should write down each leaf's name and put them in a leaf press．

    Today is December 15, 2030. Influenced by the launch of the first manned mission to Mars next month, you will most likely get a gift card for a space trip.

    The interest in trips, 100km above the surface of the Earth, has grown steadily since such a trip began. However, the market has grown much larger this year since the official announcement of the Mars mission. More low - cost spacelines have entered the market and you can now find flights for such a trip for as low as $3,495.It's very reasonable.

    Space tourism( 旅游业，观光业) is one of the markets that have developed fast during the last decade, with the opening of the Starbright Hotel on the moon as well as the low orbital hotels that started accepting guests. However, accommodation in space is still expensive for the average household, so the suborbital (亚轨道的) flights with thirty - minute weightlessness during the three - hour flight will for some time be the most popular trip.

    However, the spacelines might in the future face fierce competition between space elevators (太空升降舱), like the one that is projected to start construction within two years. Once it is fully functional, it will start to ship cargo to space. But it will accept passengers as soon as possible to get back the large investment. Even if the elevator becomes successful, it will take several years before there are more elevators in the world to get in the competition for space traffic with the spacelines.

    Those who are looking for a little bit of adventure and have extra money to spend may want to consider a suborbital flight in space. While a suborbital flight may not be the space mission that you have always dreamed of, it will give you the rare opportunity to see what our planet looks like in a high - altitude flight outside our atmosl3here. So before you enjoy a trip by elevator to space, enjoy a suborbital flight first.

    I am a little lion. My name is Nancy. I have a big head. I'm yellow. But my favorite colour is green. I like living in the forest. I like to eat little animals. But I live in the zoo now. I don't like the zoo. I get up in the cage（笼子） in the morning. I have breakfast, lunch and dinner in the cage. I go to bed in the cage in the evening, too. People watch me every day. Some boys hit（打） me with stones（石头）. I don't like them. They are not my friends. I can't go out. I want to go back to my friends in the forest. I want to live with them.