Every morning my father buys a newspaper on his way to work. Every evening my mother looks through magazines at home. And every night, I look at the posters with photos of David Beckham and Yao Ming on my bedroom wall before I go to sleep. {#blank#}1{#/blank#}

    Paper was first created about 2, 000 years ago, and has been made from silk, cotton, bamboo, and, since the 19th century, from wood. {#blank#}2{#/blank#}But in those days, books could only be produced one at a time by hand. As a result, they were expensive and rare. And because there weren't many books, few people learned to read.

    {#blank#}3{#/blank#}When printing was developed greatly at the beginning of the 11th century, books could be produced more quickly and cheaply. {#blank#}4{#/blank#}

    Today information can be received online, downloaded from the Internet rather than found in books, and information can be kept on CD-ROMs or machines such as MP3 players.

    Computers are already used in classrooms, and newspapers and magazines can already be read online. {#blank#}5{#/blank#}No, I don't think the poster about Yao Ming on my bedroom wall will ever be replaced by a two-metre-high computer!

    Bill and Cathy wanted to go on a holiday. They chose a place called Maldives（马尔代夫）. And they decided {#blank#}1{#/blank#} there for two weeks in spring，because the {#blank#}2{#/blank#} there was perfect at that time. They thought they would have a {#blank#}3{#/blank#} trip. But their tip was more like a nightmare（噩梦）!

    The plane {#blank#}4{#/blank#} off twelve hours later because of the bad weather. And they couldn't fly to Maldives {#blank#}5{#/blank#} there was a storm. They had to fly to the capital city instead. There they stayed in a small hotel near the airport.

    The hotel was next to the sea, {#blank#}6{#/blank#} the sea was so dirty that they couldn't swim in it. The food in the hotel was awful, too. For breakfast there {#blank#}7{#/blank#} only bread and milk! Because of the bad weather, they had to stay {#blank#}8{#/blank#} another night in the small hotel. And they had {#blank#}9{#/blank#} to do. It was so boring. {#blank#}10{#/blank#} , they arrived in Maldives three days later. And someone told them the weather there had been wonderful all the time!

    Gary and Gavin were twin brothers who worked in a store owned by their father. After the father had passed away, they took over the store. Everything went well until the day a twenty-dollar bill disappeared. Gary had left the bill on the cash register (收银台). But when he returned, the money was gone.

    Gary then asked his brother Gavin, "Did you see that twenty-dollar bill on the cash register?' Gavin said that he had not. But Gary did not let it go and kept asking. "Twenty-dollar bills can't walk away by themselves! Surely you must have seen it." "I said I didn't see it!" Gavin replied with anger.

    The quarrel divided the young men and they could no longer work together. Later, a wall was built in the center of the store. For twenty years, hostility (敌意) never ended.

    One day, a strange man came to the store. He walked in and asked Gary, "How long have you been here?" Gary replied that he'd been there all his life. "Then you are the person I'm looking for," the man said. "Twenty years ago, I was totally broke and hungry. I entered this store from the back door and saw a twenty-dollar bill on the cash register. And I took it. All these years I haven't been able to forget that. I had to come back and apologize for that.

    The stranger felt shocked when seeing tears well up in the eyes of the middle-aged man in front of him. "Would you please go next door and tell the same story to the man in the store?" Gary asked. Then something surprised the stranger even more--after hearing his story, the two middle-aged men hugged each other and cried together in the front of the wall of the store.

    After twenty years, the wall that separated them finally came down.

    I remember the first time I got on a horse. I was two years old and we were watching a friend of the family ride. My mom agreed to let me take a short ride around the ground with the friend and that was it' I became crazy about having a horse. From then on, I drove my parents mad beg­ging for a horse. Whenever I saw a horse, I would beg even harder.

    When I was four years old, problems appeared in my life. I had Selective Mutism (选择性缄默症). This is an unusual childhood disorder (失调) in which children stop speaking in certain social situations, many times at around the age of four. I spoke to my parents as usual, my brother and certain other people, but was silent at school and in social situations. I went days, weeks, months without a sound at school. At most, I might very quietly speak to a friend.

    My parents looked for a cure. One psychologist (心理医生) had an idea. Having discussed his plan with my parents in advance, one day I was asked by the psychologist what I wanted more than anything in the world. He explained that I was going to be given a chance to work for what I wanted. I couldn't believe my good luck, but I could not answer. I just stood there. Finally, I was allowed to whisper (低声说) the answer in my mother's ear. "A horse," was all I could say.

    I was to get a little horse, but before we could even start looking, I had to try to talk. I had a chart of weekly tasks I had to finish. I had to answer the phone five times every week, something I had never done before. I did everything that was asked of me and the day came when my parents found the perfect horse. His name was Sequoia, a strong little chestnut (栗子马). He was perfect, of course, and I fell in love immediately. It truly was a dream come true. When I was with Sequoia, I forgot all about my problems and felt strong and life.

    By connecting with them, I have learned to hug what I was once not able to do and I found my voice back.

Two men were travelling together through the forest on a lonely path. Before the travelling, they said they would help each other when there was danger. They had not gone far when a bear rushed towards them from some bushes.

One man was a good climber, and quickly climbed up a nearby tree. The other man tried to climb the tree but failed. Looking at his friend in the tree, he shouted loudly for help. The man in the tree was afraid that his friend under the tree would pull him down, so he didn't give his friend a hand.

The man under the tree, seeing that he had no chance alone against the bear, fell to the ground and pretended to be dead. The bear came nearer and nearer. It made his blood run cold.

The bear came to him, lowered its great head, smelled him all over and touched him with its nose. The bear thought the man was dead, so it went off into the forest again without hurting him. After the bear left, the other man came down from the tree, and smilingly asked his friend what the bear had said to him. "For I could see," he said, "that he put his mouth close to your ear."

"He told me to tell you," replied the other, "that you were a great coward(懦夫), and that it is dangerous to travel with a friend who leaves you behind when there is danger."