Pooja Dhingra is an Indian chef and businesswoman, the owner of macaroon bakery chain Le 15 Patisserie (西饼店) in Mumbai. She should have been a lawyer. But while studying 1 at university in Mumbai, she decided to 2 her major and do something more creative.

    Dhingra's father and her elder brother are both restaurant owners. Remembering helping her mother in the 3 during her childhood, she decided to work with food instead of legal cases. She 4 her parents to let her attend a hospitality (招待) and management course in Switzerland. Three years later, she went to Paris to learn the 5 of French baking. There her friends took her to one of the best macaroon shops. After just one 6, Dhingra determined that when she returned to Mumbai she would 7 her own shop, the first of its kind in India.

    After graduation, she started making macaroons in her parents' kitchen, 8 it was a complete failure. The hot and wet weather in Mumbai made it 9 to make delicious cakes. It took her around six months of research and 60 failed 10 to finally get a favorite recipe. Yet being both young and female 11 she faced extra challenges. “The biggest problem was to get people to take you 12,” she says. “For example, if I had to buy machinery, I would have to ask my father to make these calls for me.”

    Dhingra eventually opened her first shop in 2010. To 13 sales in a city where very few people knew what a macaroon was, Dhingra gave away some 14 macaroons to customers, which made her cakes popular immediately. She continued 15 new recipes. “Once you know basic techniques, inventing recipes is very 16,” she said. “All you need is an open 17. I get a lot of my ideas and 18 from basic things around me.”

    Dhingra is the author of a best-selling cookery book, The Big Book of Treats. She also started running classes on how to make macaroons and other cakes. In 2016, Dhingra 19 her business, opening a new location called Le 15 Café. Today, as a professional baker, Dhingra 20 up one of India's finest patisseries .

    My wife Pat and I were having drinks outside our home, The weather was unusually1for March in Mississippi, There was barely any breeze, After we finished the second cup, flashes of2danced across the sky. When the first drops of rain drove us3 the phone rang.Pat's face4on that gray and hot day. It was our son, David, a helicopter pilot who5in the US Air Force in South Korea. David intended to sound6but we recognized the sign of homesickness from his voice7the power of conversation made us feel8until a crash shook the windows.

    David wondered what it was,“Just thunder,”Pat said.

    There were several seconds of silence,“David”,I asked, “are yo9there?”

    “Yes…apart from the two of you, do you know what else I10most? Thunder, We have rain, wind, and11here, but it never thunders, Remember? Dad, when I was a kid, you laughed me out of fear of thunder? I wish I were there to12with you now.”

    “Yes…”I said, trying to13my tears, On hanging up the phone, I told Pat,“I'm going to record our son some 14”“Bob, the neighbors will think you're crazy.”

    “David won't,” I said and went outside with a recorder, Later I15the tape to David with a single line:A16gift.

    David called again, “Dad,”he said,“you won't believe that some friends and I had a thunder party where we realized we were listening to the sounds of 17 Thanks, Dad! It was really a special present,” While David was in Korea, we found ourselves 18thunderstorms.19feeling blue, we regarded the thunder as special which let us know that wherever we might be, we were 20together as a family.

    I had just arrived in this Asian country for a one-year teaching position. One day, I took the subway to visit some ancient palaces and temples in the downtown. The following account of what happened to me has taught me much about culture 1.

    Since all the 2 were taken, I stood. Suddenly, I felt someone pulling on my bag. 3 I probably was in someone's way, I moved over slightly. But in one quick motion(动作), I felt my bag removed from my back, and in a flash it was 4. I turned around to see who the thief was. I looked at the people standing behind me, but didn't see my bag or any 5. My heart sank and I began to 6.

    I glanced around the car only to find directly across from me was an elderly lady, and sitting on her lap was my 7. I tried to get it back from her lap. But as I began to 8 it up, she quickly grabbed(抓住) it back and held onto it. I looked around at the people standing beside me, and those sitting beside her, but no one took any 9 of the situation. Trying not to cause a(an) 10, I tried to negotiate through gestures. I used my hands as best as I could, but she 11 my requests for my bag and pointed to my back. She picked up my bag, showing how 12 it was. I finally began to understand. She was holding my bag to13 me.

    At the next stop, a middle-aged woman got on the crowded subway. Another elderly woman sitting down took her bag, 14 it on her lap. They didn't talk; 15 this older woman was more than pleased to sit with this stranger's bag on her lap throughout her journey.

    As the subway pulled into the main downtown station and I was getting ready to get off, the woman 16 handed me back my bag. But 17 I had a chance to thank her, she had disappeared into the crowd.

    Sadly, this considerate custom was more 18 to me than if I had been robbed. Everyone back home had heard of being robbed—that was 19 city behavior—but having a stranger hold onto someone's bag out of 20, in a city of twelve million people—that was truly unusual.

    There is something graceful about a well-made hurricane lamp, especially the antique ones. Mom had affection for them.

    I can remember 1 through countless flea markets for hurricane lamps, which are 2to keep their light lit through the 3of moments. Mom tried hard to buy the lamps in 4, as her favorite of all the lamps had no mate.

    The spring after Mom's first 5 with cancer, we went to a local craft fair to pass the time, to keep 6. We were still waiting to hear from the doctors on the 7 of her follow-up tests.8 to search something for my mom, I bounded ahead of her and baby brother as they 9 along the tables. I didn't 10 far before something caught my eye. Standing proud on the display table sat a lamp.

    I was excited, as I 11back through the crowd to my mom. "Mom! You have to see something!" I shouted. "12. I think I'm going to get these lamps. What do you think?" She 13so I could see them but I didn't even look at them. "You've got to see what I found first," I 14her through the fair. When she saw the lamp, she picked up the lamp 15, running her fingers over the bowl, over the hurricane glass, and 16 it closely. "See this?" She pointed at a very small mark in the glass. "The one at home has the same mark." She smiled. It was the first time I had seen her 17 smile since the doctors first found the cancer.

    When the lamp 18 in our house, next to its mate, she cried. She went to light the lamps and sit on their glow until she could sleep. Years later, I understood her 19 for those lamps, through the darkest moments of her life. Mom was my hurricane lamp. She was inextinguishable (永不熄灭的)—through the darkest moments. She lit my way without 20. She still does.

    In the depths of my memory, many things I did with my father still live. These things come to represent, in fact, what I call 1 and love.

    I don't remember my father ever getting into a swimming pool. But he did 2 the water. Any kind of 3 ride seemed to give him pleasure. 4 he loved to fish; sometimes he took me along.

    But I never really liked being on the water the way my father did. I liked being  5 the water, moving through it, 6 it all around me. I was not a strong 7, or one who learned to swim early, for I had my 8 . But I loved being in the swimming pool close to my father's office and 9 those summer days with my father, who 10 come by on a break. I needed him to see what I could do. My father would stand there in his suit, the 11 person not in swimsuit.

    After swimming, I would go 12 his office and sit on the wooden chair in front of his big desk, where he let me 13 anything I found in his top desk drawer. Sometimes, if I was left alone at his desk 14 he worked in the lab, an assistant or a student might come in and tell me perhaps I shouldn't be playing with his 15. But my father always 16 and said easily, "Oh, no, it's 17." Sometimes he handed me coins and told me to get 18 an ice cream…

    A poet once said, "We look at life once, in childhood; the rest is 19." And I think it is not only what we "look at once, in childhood" that determines our memories, but 20, in that childhood, look at us.

    It's been a long time since I wrote a creative essay. Recently, with lots of time and lack of inspiration, I accepted a 1 to teach creative nonfiction. 2 I couldn't get myself to write my own stories. I could require that my students tell theirs.

    "You're going to be 3 a journal in this class." I said. "And I want you to tell your stories like they matter."

    "Why do they matter?" a boy named Michael asked. "I mean, who 4 about our stories?"

    No one said a wont. Perhaps they were just tired from their 5 lives. Many worked full-time while in school full-time. Most might not have the faintest 6 that their stories did matter. They didn't even know that their stories were stories — as beautiful and hard — as their own lives.

    7, I looked at Michael. "They matter because they do." I said. "Because you're here and you can tell them. Stories allow us to make 8 of what we're 9. When you 10 your experience into a story, it becomes yours and not just something that 11 to you."

    Michael didn't look 12 , but he didn't challenge me either.

    Later, Michael wrote about how he grew up in one of the worst neighborhoods in Boston and how his high school teacher, who saw his 13, helped him fill out a college application.

    I 14 Michael to read his essay out loud. After he finished, the class went so 15 that we could hear the sound of each other's breath. I looked at Michael and saw a softening and 16 in his eyes.

    After a moment, I said, "That's 17 you tell your stories." That night, I picked up my journal from where it 18, dusty and 19. For the first time in months. I had 20 to write.