When you travel in other countries, you'll have to get yourself well prepared to ensure your safety and handle emergencies.

Before you leave, you'd better:

1). Take out medical insurance policy and learn what the plan covers and whether departure or return to the hometown is covered. Figure out payment choices, such as whether you have to speak directly with the insurance company, before or after treatment, whether you have to pay first and get compensation later.

2). Keep up to date on all required vaccinations (接种疫苗) .

3). Learn about the city or area where you are going to travel. Know how to say street names and landmarks in the local language. Figure out unique climate issues such as altitude, seasonal changes, potentially risky animals and insects.

4). Visit some local hospitals and write down addresses in the local language along with emergency entrance locations; do the same for dental/pediatric (小儿科的) services. Get first aid equipment with necessary medications. Take enough prescribed medication from the home country.

5). Carry a card or note written in both English and the local language listing your emergency contact numbers, name, basic medical information such as blood type and allergies (过敏) .

6). Ensure a reliable means of communication is available and carry an extra phone battery and a charger. Ensure that housemaids, drivers, office assistants, those who work or travel know how to call for medical assistance since they may be the only ones available in an emergency.

7). Make sure to bring all documents and visas along with you. Plan your journey carefully and carry copies of documents (ID, insurance policy records, medical records) and keep in a place where someone else could access them in an emergency.

    HEARST CASTL, CA

    Hearst Castle is open for tours daily, except Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year's Day.

    Tour A -- The Grand Rooms

    View the ground floor rooms of La Casa Grande where Mr. Hearst's guests met their host and were entertained during their stay. See the Assembly Room, where guests met for cocktails, the Refectory, where meals were served, the Morning Room, Billiard Theater. Your knowledgeable guide will bring this big house to life sharing stories about Mr. Hearst, his many guests, and the art collection it contains.

    Prices: Adults: $25.00; Children: $12.00.

    Tour B – The Upstairs Suites (套房)

    This tour features rooms on the upper floors of Casa Grande. Travel through guest suites on your way to the Library where Mr. Hearst housed a collection of 2,000-year-old Greek pots.

    Visit Mr. Hearst's private third floor suite including his bedroom and private study where he held business meetings. Learn about the genius of architect Julia Morgan and the way she put Mr. Hearst's art collection into the design.

    Prices: Adults: $20.00; Children: $10.00.

    Tour C – Evening Tour

    This tour allows visitors to experience the Castle at night as a visitor to the Castle in the 1930s might have. It features highlights from the experience, Upper Floors of Casa Grande, and Garden tours.

    Evening tours are offered on most Fridays and Saturdays during March – May & October – December.

    Prices: Adults: $36.00; Children: $18.00.

    Tour D – Accessible Holiday Twilight

    This tour is wheelchair accessible. Visitors who have difficulty climbing stairs, or who cannot stand or walk for extended period, may also benefit from this tour. Accessible transportation is provided from the Visitor Center to all areas of the Holiday at Hearst Castle tour. Call 866-712-2286 for additional information.

    Prices: Adults: $30.00; Children: $18.00.

    Want to see 16 sunrises in one day? Float in zero gravity? Be one of the few to have gazed upon our home planet from space? In just four years' time, and for an astronomical $9.5 million dollars, it's claimed you can.

    What's being billed as the world's first luxury space hotel, Aurora Station, was announced Thursday at the Space 2.0 Summit in San Jose, California. Developed by US-based space technology start-up Orion Span, the fully modular space station will host six people at a time, including two crew members, for 12-day trips of space travel. It plans to welcome its first guests in 2022.

    “Our goal is to make space accessible to all,” Frank Bunger, CEO and founder of Orion Span, said in a statement. “Upon launch, Aurora Station goes into service immediately, bringing travelers into space quickly and at a lower price point than ever seen before.” While a $10 million trip is outside the budget of most people's two-week vacations, Orion Span claims to offer a real astronaut experience.

    During their 12-day adventure, the super-rich travelers will fly at a height of 200 miles above the Earth's surface in Low Earth Orbit, or LEP, where they will see incredible views of the blue planet. The hotel will orbit Earth every 90 minutes, which means guests will see around 16 sunrises and sunsets every 24 hours.

    Activities on board include taking part in research experiments such as growing food while in orbit--which guests can take home for a super-smug souvenir—and soaring over their hometown. Guests can have live video chats with their less-fortunate loved ones back home via high-speed wireless Internet access and, upon return to Earth, will be greeted with a specially arranged hero's welcome. While enjoying the thrills of zero gravity, the travelers will be able to float freely through the hotel, taking in views of the northern and southern Aurora from the station's windows.

    DepositsHYPERLINK “https://www.orionspan.com/aurora-station-reservations”（订金）are already being a HYPERLINK“http://www.orisonspan.com/aurora-station-reservations”cHYPERLINK“http://www.orionspan.com/aurora-station-reservations” cepted for future stays on the space hotel. The $80,000 is fully returnable, should applicants find themselves unable to rise to the full $9.5 million. Travelers will complete a three-month Orion Span Astronaut Certification (OSAC) program before takeoff. Orion Span has a team of space industry veterans who together have more than 140 years of human space experience.

    Diet Coke, diet Pepsi, diet pills, no-fat diet, vegetable diet… We are surrounded by the word "diet" everywhere we look and listen. We have so easily been attracted by the promise and potential of diet products that we have stopped thinking about what diet products are doing to us. We are paying for products that harm us psychologically and physically.

    Diet products significantly weaken us psychologically. On one level, we are not allowing our brain to admit that our weight problems lie not in actually losing the weight, but in controlling the consumption of fatty, high-calorie, unhealthy foods. Diet products allow us to jump over the thinking stage and go straight for the scale(秤)instead. All we have to do is to swallow or recognize the word "diet" in food labels.

    On another level, diet products have greater psychological effects. Every time we have a zero-calorie drink, we are telling ourselves without our awareness that we don't have to work to get results. Diet products make people believe that gain comes without pain, and that life can be without resistance and struggle.

    The danger of diet products lies not only in the psychological effects they have on us, but also in the physical harm that they cause. Diet foods can indirectly harm our bodies because consuming them instead of healthy foods means we are preventing our bodies from having basic nutrients. Diet foods and diet pills contain zero calorie only because the diet industry has created chemicals to produce these wonder products. Diet products may not be nutritional, and the chemicals that go into diet products are potentially dangerous.

    Now that we are aware of the effects that diet products have on us, it is time to seriously think about buying them. Losing weight lies in the power of minds, not in the power of chemicals. Once we realize this, we will be much better able to resist diet products, and therefore prevent the psychological harm that comes from using them.

    The British are known for their sense of humor. However, it is often difficult for foreigners to understand their jokes. The main point to remember is that the British often use understatement.

    Understatement means saying less than you think or feel. For example, if someone gets very wet in a shower of rain, he might say, "It's a little damp (潮湿的) outside." Or, if someone is very impolite and shouts at another person, someone else might say, "She isn't exactly friendly." Understatement is often used in unpleasant situation or to make another person look silly. Understatement plays an important part in British humor.

    Another key to understanding British humor is that the British like to make fun of themselves as well as others. They often laugh about the silly and unpleasant things that happen to our everyday life when someone accidentally falls over in the street. They also like to make jokes about people from different classes of society. They like to make jokes about their accents, the way they dress and the way they behave. What's more, the British love to watch comedies (喜剧) about people who do not know how to behave in society. The comedies series Mr. Bean is a good example of this kind of humor.

    Mr. Bean is the character created by British actor Rowan Atkinson in 1990. Mr. Bean doesn't talk often, and instead he uses his body movement and facial expressions to make people laugh. Perhaps what makes Mr. Bean so funny is that he does things that adults in the real world cannot do. Mr. Bean is popular in many countries around the world because you do not have to speak English to understand the humor. Because of this, many people have become familiar with the British sense of humor.

    Many of us know about Russia's Lake Baikal from our textbooks, or by listening to Chinese singer Li Jian's hit song, Lie Baikal. But over the past decade, the world's deepest freshwater lake has been in the spotlight for an extreme sport.

    Each March since 2005, about 150 people from around the world sign up for the Baikal Ice Marathon. They come to explore the lake's breathtaking beauty and challenge themselves in unpredictable conditions. The 26-mile (41.84-kilometers) journey starts on the lake's eastern shore. In March, the ice is a meter thick and iron-hard. Runners cross this frozen surface, finishing on the western side of the lake.

    Known as the "blue eye of Siberia", Lake Baikal has exceptionally clear waters. This means its ice is almost perfectly transparent (透明的). "Seen from above, a runner on the ice looks as if he or she were jogging through space." The New York Times noted.

    The landscape might be beautiful, but it's also harsh. Strong winds blast (侵袭) across the lake and frostbite can occur within half an hour. Runners say the cold climate is what draws them. They want to test their limits.

    "When you are in such an environment, you don't have cars around you, and you don't have the noise around. I think these extreme races allow you to be alone with nature." Alicja Barahona, a 64-year-old runner from the US, told ABC news.

    The location offers some strange and unique characteristics for this marathon. The finishing line is visible from the start, but the endless white offers no progress markers. The race also ends with little fanfare (隆重的欢迎). Tourists crowding the ice are mostly addicted to snapping selfies (自拍) and just ignore the runners.

    For some runners, the absence of spectators makes the race more challenging, because it's lonely. They must fight with themselves. "You are alone on Baikal. It is your race. You are alone with yourself. All you need to do is to defeat yourself." Veronique Messina, a French runner, told the Telegraph.