I'm Yu Fei. I come from No. 1 Junior High School in Ji'nan. It is {#blank#}1{#/blank#} beautiful. My friend Xiaoli is in this school Xiaoli is of medium {#blank#}2{#/blank#}. She has {#blank#}3{#/blank#} hair, a long face, a small mouth and big {#blank#}4{#/blank#}. She is thirteen. She is in Class Five, Grade Seven. She is a good student, and she is good at painting pictures. She hopes to be an {#blank#}5{#/blank#} when she grows up. She has two good {#blank#}6{#/blank#} in her school. They are Lucy and Lily. They are {#blank#}7{#/blank#}. They are twins. They are fourteen They have big noses and big eyes, and they are very {#blank#}8{#/blank#} and thin. Lucy, Lily and Xiaoli are in the {#blank#}9{#/blank#} class. Mrs. Smith is {#blank#}10{#/blank#} English teacher. She is friendly to them and often helps them.

Give water, save lives

A bottle of water may not seem like much to you, but thousands of bottles will be of great help for people who live in drought-hit(遭受旱灾) areas in China.

Since last autumn, there has been very little rain in Southwest China. Some places, especially in Yunnan, Guangxi, Sichuan, Guizhou, have experienced a serious drought. Crops (庄稼) died, the land cracked(裂开), and wells (井) and rivers dried up. More than 20 million people are having difficulty in finding safe drinking water.

After learning about the drought, many people around the country helped by giving water, money and other things.

Last week, every member of the Communist Youth League (共青团员) and Young Pioneers(少先队员) were encouraged to give one bottle of water to the drought-hit areas. Students in primary schools and middle schools quickly joined the activity. In Yuhua Primary School in Xi' an, 900 students bought over 1,000 bottles of water with their pocket money. They also wrote their wishes on the bottles.

The serious drought has also made students realize the importance of saving water. Students from Nanshan Middle School in Huizhou, Guangdong went on the street to tell people to take part in water-saving activities.

"I've heard that some children in drought-hit areas don't have enough drinking water. They have to drink muddy ( 含有泥土的 ) water. I feel really sad about that," said one student. "I decide to take a shower twice a week instead of every day to save water," he said.

Have you ever had lucid (清醒的) dreams? Recent studies suggest that the number of people having them is on the rise. Someone having a lucid dream realizes they are dreaming and may from then on" direct" the action, or they may simply " watch" the dream unfold. The sense of awareness (知道) makes it different from a dream that is simply very lively and true to life. And although the description may seem strange, the process is far from alien to many of us.

Studies suggest that the number of people in the Western world experiencing lucid dreams, which happen once in a while, has risen by between 10 and 40 per cent since the 1980s. Today, they are so common that about one in eight of us will have one in our lives. But still, little is known about what causes them or what is behind the rise.

Research carried out at the respected Harvard University in the US shows that the brain is working hard during lucid dreams. In fact, the level of the mental (精神

的) activity in some parts of the brain is similar to that of a person who is awake. Lucid dreamers seem to share certain personal characters. For example, in general they are quite creative. They are also good at digging deep into problems and going out of their way to solve them. Furthermore, they always believe in personal responsibility rather than letting society carry the can.

Our nightmares (噩梦) may show our waking worries, with the five most common ones-- falling, being run after, feeling disabled, being late and the death of a loved one. Men are more likely to have nightmares about fights or being fired while hair and tooth loss appear more in women's nightmares-perhaps showing worries about losing their looks. Research has also found that women have more nightmares than men. Their dreams are also scarier and more unforgettable.

One Thursday afternoon, when I was in Grade 7, a new boy came into my classroom. He was short and thin. He walked up to the teacher and told her, very seriously, that he was new. His name was Christian. He sat down, took a look at me, and then looked away. I didn't think he was very nice and I was sure he wasn't the type I would like to become friends with.

During that year, I didn't talk to him much, but he smiled at me when our eyes met, always shyly. He never ate lunch with anybody, and he never talked to anybody but me.

But one day I joined those unkind kids who were making fun of him. We made fun of him though I thought it was wrong. 

"Haven't you got any friends? " a kid asked Christian, who had walked past us alone, head down.  "No, he hasn't got any friends. He's too stupid and shy. " I said. Then Christian looked up at me with the saddest dog eyes I had ever seen. I felt very sorry at that moment.

That night, I couldn't sleep because I couldn't get Christian's face out of my mind. In the weeks that followed, he never met my eyes in class and never smiled at me. It was really hard for me to decide to write him a note asking him to forgive（原谅）me. But I thought I should. 

The next day in class, I wrote him a note telling him how sorry I felt. About five minutes later, I turned and saw tears in his eyes. "You will never realize (意识到) what your apology（道歉）has meant to me, Jimmy, "he said to me. "I hope we can become friends. "

We had lunch together that noon and we had the best talk I had ever had. Over the years at high school, we were close friends.

When I think back, I realize that, if I had not apologized, I would never have known what a lovely person Christian was.

Apologies can really change your life, so never miss the chance to tell somebody you are sorry.

Tigers are fierce animals. They are the bosses of the Asian jungles with their cleverness，quickness and strength. A pussycat，on the other hand

As a mother，the Chinese﹣American writer Amy Chua is definitely a tiger. Her book，Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother （虎妈战歌） tells of the strict upbringing she gave her two children. She thinks that being  strict is the only way to d {#blank#}1{#/blank#} a child's potential and to make them strong，i{#blank#}2{#/blank#} and successful. Her kids were not allowed to watch TV or play video games. They were not allowed to "hang out" with other kids after school. They had to be the top students in their classes. And they had to p{#blank#}3{#/blank#} the piano and violin for hours every day. As a result，her kids became successful. She admits this caused a lot of tears and anger but she has few regrets （后悔）. 

Chua says，like her，most A{#blank#}4{#/blank#} mothers are tigers because they believe their children can a{#blank#}5{#/blank#} a lot if they're pushed hard enough. She says American mothers are really cats. They care more about their children's self﹣esteem （自尊）. They don't want to push their kids too hard for fear of hurting their feelings. W{#blank#}6{#/blank#} soft words and understanding，they encourage their children to find their own path. 

So，is a tiger mom better than a pussycat? Perhaps it depends on the differences between Asian and Western cultures. It may also depend on the child himself. Some kids need to be pushed w{#blank#}7{#/blank#} others respond to a gentler hand. 

To growl or to purr? There is no easy answer. 

Cai Xuzhe dreamed of flying high when he was young. He was a new face on the Shenzhou-14 team. He spent 12 years as an astronaut（宇航员） getting ready for his first trip to space.

"I am happy and proud but feel more about my duty（责任）," Cai told reporters. Cai and other two team members, Chen Dong and Liu Yang, left the earth on board the Shenzhou-14 spaceship in June of 2022, for a six - month stay in space. They finished the work of building the Tiangong space station.

Cai was born in 1976 in the countryside of Shenzhou City, Hebei Province. He showed interest in planes as a child. When he heard a plane flying past, he ran out and looked at it till it flew away.

Cai went to an Air Force flight college（空军飞行学院）. After finishing college, he began to work at an airport. The airport was in poor condition. However, he studied and trained his flying skills there carefully. InMay 2010, Cai became a Chinese astronaut and underwent（接受） hard training. He did best in his training and finally became a Shenzhou-14 team member. He tried his best to make his dream come true.