Chinese President Xi Jinping stressed Wednesday that the socialist path China has followed is "correct," and it is the choice of the “history and people.”

    Citing(引用) the remarkable achievements China has made over the past 37 years when it initiated the reform and opening-up policy, Xi noted that it only took several decades for China to complete the journey the developed countries have gone through for centuries.

    “That fully shows that the Chinese people are following a correct path,” the president said while addressing a banquet hosted by Lord Mayor of the City of London Alan Yarrow on Wednesday evening.

    Meanwhile, he pledged that China will stay committed to a peaceful development path and does not accept the logic that a country will seek hegemony(霸权，领导权) once it gets strong.

    “No one and nothing — in any reason — can influence China's determination and will to pursue the path of peaceful development,” he said.

    In his speech, the president also explained in detail about the development of friendly relations between China and Britain, citing tea culture, literature, movies, TV dramas, football and cultural exchanges.

    He specifically referred to Shakespeare's influence on him by sharing the story of his youth time in the countryside, when he was deeply attracted by the master's works.

    “The China-Britain friendship has been deeply rooted in the hearts of our two peoples. And there is a solid foundation in public opinion and in society for the two countries to grow long-term relations,” he added.

The history of Australian Rules Football

    Australian Rules Football is called by many nicknames. Lovers of the game just call it "football" or "footy." When contrasted with other forms of football, it is called "Aussie Rules" or "AFL". AFL stands for Australian Football League, which is the most prestigious league in Australia.

    Australia Rules Football was created by Tom Wills in 1858. He wanted to create a sport that would keep cricket players fit through the winter. He began by writing a letter that explained his purpose to a sports magazine. It also called for the creation of a football club. In 1858, Wills and others played an experimental match that was the first game of Australian football. But few details about this match have survived.

    On August 7, 1858, two important events for the game occurred. The Melbourne Football Club was founded. It was one of the world's first football clubs in any code. Also, a famous match between Melbourne Grammar School and Scotch College was played. It was umpired(仲裁)by Tom Wills. A second day of play took place on August 21, and then there was a third and final day on September4. The two schools have competed every year since.

    The game is played between two teams of 18 players on an oval that can also be used for cricket. These playing fields can be up to 185m long. This is almost four times the size of fields used in other forms of football.

    A point called "a behind" is scored when the ball goes across the line and between a goal post and a behind post. A behind point is also scored if the ball is touched by any body part of either team's member as it passes between the goal posts. A goal is worth six points, and a behind is worth one point.

Martin Luther King Jr. Day events around Tampa Bay

    Plant City Martin Luther King Jr. Weekend

    Plant City celebrates the holiday for three days with opening ceremonies, a photo display, a street festival, a parade and a battle of the bands competition on Saturday; and a leadership breakfast and gospel festival on Sunday. Food and drinks are free Martin Luther King Jr. Recreation Center (Plant City), 1601 E Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd. , Plant City. (813) 757-9195. 10 a. m.-10 p. m. Saturday, 7:30 a. m. -4 p. m. Sunday.

    Martin Luther King Jr. Day Tarpon Springs

    A community parade lines up at the corner of Levis Avenue and Tarpon Avenue and ends in Dorsett Park with a festival featuring performances by church choirs, mime teams and dance groups. Free. Dorsett Park, 500 E Harrison St. , Tarpon Springs (727) 798-5718 11 a. m. Saturday.

    Martin Luther King Jr. Celebration Day Unity Breakfast

    Enjoy breakfast, entertainment and readings of the winning student essays about social development. A march to a festival in Pioneer Park follows. Free. Martin Luther King Jr. Recreation Center, 550 Laura Lane, Dunedin. (727) 738-2920. 8:30 a. m.-10 a. m. Saturday.

    Martin Luther King Jr. Day of Service

    Meet at the park for opening ceremonies and a breakfast snack before departing to participate in various community service projects. Then, return to the park for an appreciation lunch. Free. Tomlinson Park, 1820 55th St S, Gulfport. (727) 893-1118. 8 a. m.-12: 30 p. m. Saturday.

    Great Ex Martin Luther King Jr. Day

    Children can make necklaces that represent Martin Luther King Jr. 's ideas and design a paper doll for an "I Have A Dream" doll chain throughout the museum. Included with admission: $10, $ 9 seniors, 1 and younger free Great Explorations Children's Museum, 1925 Fourth St. N, St. Petersburg. (727) 821-8992. 10 a. m.-3 p. m. Monday.

    Why elephants rarely get cancer is a mystery that has confused scientists for decades. A study was led by researchers at Huntsman Cancer Institute (HCI) at the University of Utah and Arizona State University, including researchers from the Ringling Bros. Center for Elephant Conservation may have found the answer. According to the results, elephants have 38 additional modified copies of a gene (基因) that encodes p53, a well-defined tumor (肿瘤) suppressor, as compared to humans, who have only two. Further, elephants may have a more powerful mechanism for killing damaged cells that are at risk for becoming cancerous. In isolated elephant cells, this activity is doubled compared to healthy human cells, and five times that of cells from patients with Li-Fraumeni Syndrome, who have only one working copy of p53 and more than a 90 percent lifetime cancer risk in children and adults. The results suggest extra p53 could explain elephants' increased resistance to cancer.

    "Nature has already figured out how to prevent cancer. It's up to us to learn how different animals overcome the problem so we can adapt those strategies to prevent cancer in people," says co-senior author Joshua Schiffman, M.D., pediatric oncologist (肿瘤学家) at Huntsman Cancer Institute, University of Utah School of Medicine, and Primary Children's Hospital.

    According to Schiffman, elephants have long been considered a walking problem. Because they have 100 times as many cells as people, they should be 100 times more likely to have a cell slip into a cancerous state and cause the disease over their long life span of 50 to 70 years. And yet it's believed that elephants get cancer less often, a theory confirmed in this study. Analysis of a large database of elephant deaths estimates a cancer death rate of less than 5 percent compared to 11 to 25 percent in people.

    China and India are leaders in improving global(全球的) tree cover, a new study based on NASA research showed.

    They took a 31.8% part together of the total global new leaf area between 2000 and 2017. China played a major role, adding 25% to this increase, and India added 6.8%, followed by Canada and Russia. The study in the Nature Sustainability journal shows that more than 5.5 million square kilometers of green leaf area was added globally. Since 2000, there has been a five-percent increase in global green cover, it said.

    "The greening over the last twenty years shows an increase in leaf area on plants and trees which is as large as the area of the entire Amazon rainforest," Chi Chen, a Boston University researcher and lead of the study told Nature Sustainability. Large plantation activities to protect forests in China contributed nearly 42% to the country's green cover, and agriculture added another 32%. In India, 82% of the increase in leaf area was because of agriculture.

    "China and India take up one-third of the greening, but hold only nine percent of the planet's land area covered in green plants," Chi Chen told NASA Earth Observatory. "That is a surprising finding, considering the land degradation(退化) in countries with large populations."

    Boston University's research team first detected an increase in global green cover in the 1990s but were unsure about what contributed to the increase. Finally, with the help of NASA's Terra and Aqua satellites research, they managed to find out the increase in leaf cover from different areas and places.

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    The Botanical Garden started life as Skylands, a large area in the grand manner. It is famous for a 44-room Tudor Revival granite mansion(公馆)designed John Russel Pope. Skylands has 96 acres of formal and naturalized gardens and is surrounded by over 1,000 acres of meadows(草坪) and woodlands. Purchased by the State in 1966 and officially named as the New Jersey Botanical Garden in 1984, the gardens contain approximately 5,000 species and varieties of trees and flowers.

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