NANJING, Nov. 4 (Xinhua) — Xi Jinping and Ma Ying-jeou will shake hands in their historic meeting scheduled in Singapore on Saturday, head of the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council said on Wednesday.

    The two-part meeting includes one session open to the media and another behind closed doors, said Zhang Zhijun, who is also head of the Taiwan Work Office of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, when interviewed at the Zijinshan Summit for Entrepreneurs across the Taiwan Strait.

    According to Zhang, Xi and Ma, as "leaders of the two sides" of the Taiwan Strait, will exchange views during the closed-door meeting.

    After the meeting, press conferences will be held by both sides. Later, the two leaders are expected to attend a dinner, said Zhang.

    Zhang said the meeting will lift cross-Strait communication to a new high.

    The landmark meeting is a breakthrough in face-to-face exchange and communication between the leaders across the Taiwan Strait after the relationship became strained following the events of 1949.

    Zhang said the meeting will improve mutual trust and allow for an exchange of opinions on handling the cross-Strait ties.

    In addition, the meeting will help strengthen the 1992 Consensus(共识), which was reached in talks between the two sides in 1992 and recognizes the one-China principle, and safeguards the peaceful development of cross-Strait ties, according to Zhang.

    Zhang added that the scheduled meeting will also benefit regional peace and stability.

    Also at Wednesday's summit, Chiang Pin-kung, former chairman of the Taiwan-based Straits Exchange Foundation, hailed the upcoming meeting between the two leaders as a milestone for cross-Strait ties.

    Chiang told the media that he believed the meeting will give a boost to the peaceful development of cross-Strait ties.

    'Kangaroo mothering' helps boost a child's health and intelligence

    “Kangaroo mothering”, the practice of continuous skin-to-skin contact with a newborn baby, results in healthier, more intelligent and successful children, a new study finds.

    A 20-year follow-up research found that those brought up in the kangaroo method scored higher in IQ tests and earned 53% more. They were also found to be less likely to have behavior problems than babies in a control group.

    Followers of the method nest their kids in a “kangaroo” position on their chest as soon as possible after birth. Both mother and baby are supposed to go home as quickly as possible.

    The technique is often used in cases of premature birth (早产). In such cases, the trained mother acts as the child's main source of stimulation (刺激) and food, in the form of breast feeding. Between 1993 and 1996, a group of more than 700 prematurely born babies in Columbia were, on the basis of random selection, placed either away from mother or were raised using the kangaroo method. Two decades later, a follow-up survey funded by the Canadian Government has shown that those who went through the latter method benefited by comparison.

    Published in the journal Paediatrics, the research shows that kangaroo mothering offered significant protection against early death, with a 3.5% death rate compared to a 7.7% rate in the control group. IQ test also showed a small but significant advantage of 3.5% compared to other infants. 

    Lead researcher Dr Nathalie Charpak, of the Kangaroo Foundation in Bogota, said the method has “significant, long-lasting social and behavioral protective effects”. “We firmly believe that this is a powerful, efficient, scientifically based healthcare intervention that can be used in all settings, from those with very restricted to unrestricted access to healthcare.”

    The study also found that, compared with babies in the control group, those raised in the kangaroo method went on to develop bigger brains, with significantly larger volumes of gray matter.

    A new research has discovered that meditation(冥想)and oxygen sport together reduce depression. The Rutgers University study found that this mind and body combination, done twice a week for only two months, reduced the symptoms of a group of students by 40 percent.

    “We are excited by the findings because we saw such a meaningful improvement in both clinically depressed and non-depressed students,” said lead author Dr. Brandon Alderman. “It is the first time that both of these two behavioral ways have been looked at together for dealing with depression.”

    Researchers believe the two activities have an interactive effect in combating depression. Alderman and Dr. Tracey Shors discovered that a combination of mental and physical training(MAP) enabled students with major depressive disorder not to let problems or negative thoughts defeat them.

    Rutgers researchers say those who participated in the study began with 30 minutes of focused attention meditation followed by 30 minutes of oxygen sport. They were told that if their thoughts drifted to the past or the future they should refocus on their breathing, which enabled those with depression to accept moment-to-moment changes in attention.

    Shors, who studies the production of new brain cells in the hippocampus—part of the brain involved in memory and learning—says scientists have shown in animal models that oxygen sport exercise keeps a large number of certain cells alive.

    The idea for the human intervention(干预)came from her laboratory studies, she says, with the main goal of helping individuals acquire new skills so that they can learn to recover from stressful life events.

    By learning to focus their attention and exercise, people who are fighting depression can acquire new learning skills that can help them process information and reduce the overwhelming recollection of memories from the past, Shors says.

    “We know these treatments can be practiced over a lifetime and that they will be affective in improving mental health,” said Alderman. “The good news is that this intervention can be practiced by anyone at any time and at no cost.”

    It was a normal school day for senior Solymar Solis until an unexpected visitor arrived. Her dad, Sgt. Carlos Solis Melendez, surprised her by coming home early from Kuwait and visiting her unannounced at Spring Valley High School in South Carolina.

    After serving in Kuwait for nine months, Melendez returned home a week earlier than his daughter expected. He held balloons and flowers in a classroom as he sat at a student's desk to blend in with the crowd. "It came across my mind like, ‘How is she going to react?" he recalled the heartwarming moment. "Is she going to be happy and run to me and hug me, or cry? That was all going on through my mind."

    As unsuspecting Solymar entered the classroom, she was soon overcome with emotion, immediately bursting into tears and covering her mouth. She didn't talk. She was just crying. She was overwhelmed with everything. She thought it was a dream.

    Melendez was a single parent so while he was deployed (调动), he got his sister to live with his daughter. When he was coming back and talking to his sister, both of them came to the conclusion that they should do something special for his daughter. Melendez and his sister got in touch with the school, and they planned this whole being-in-the-classroom thing, and it turned out perfect.

    The two are very much looking forward to some good daddy-daughter time now that he's home. "It means everything," Melendez said of being able to surprise his daughter this way. "After all the sacrifices she's made, she deserves all the special arrangements and special occasions and celebrations. I'll do anything for my daughter. I believe I'm doing good parenting."

    I first began experiencing depression (抑郁) at the age of 14 .At first depression would come and go, but later it became a continual part of my life.

    I was so strongly determined to find the way to overcome my depression that I tried everything from when I was in college, special teas, yoga (瑜伽), and advice given by doctors. However, I still felt I hadn't even come close to managing the problem.

    But one afternoon, I saw an article in a magazine that talked about how dogs were able to help people with depression. The next day, I decided to get a dog—a corgi (柯基犬).

    When I bought my little corgi, Buddy, home, I didn't realize how much he would change my life. One morning, I woke up with those familiar feelings again. I didn't want to get out of bed. I turned to pull the covers back over my head and give up. That's when I saw Buddy. He started jumping all over me, licking (舔) my face, letting me know that it was time to go outside. It was as if he were saying, "There's no time to be sad. The world is amazing!" And for the first time in my life, on a day when my depression were strong, I got out of bed. I put on my winter clothes and went for a walk in the snow with my new friend. I realized at that moment, walking down the street in winter, my life was changing. I really was a new person. This was my new beginning.

    It's been more than a year since that day, and I've never spent another morning unable to get out of bed. I've not cried myself to sleep or spent my days filled with fear and regret. Sure, I still have days when I feel sad or anxious. But with Buddy by my side, I've finally learned how to manage these feelings.

Grief ran through the first decade of my career. I photographed stories about terrible topics: immigration, conflict, war. On the cover of my notebook in 2019, I wrote, "Discover the joy again." It was intended to remind me to play more.

Sometimes I'd get a rare assignment where I could breathe — for example, photographing an article on tea for an airline magazine. I took the job hoping to make interesting, almost movie images, but at the end of the day, I found I'd made nothing of the sort. Packing up my camera, I felt like a failure.

On the drive back to the hotel, I noticed heavy steam rising from a building up ahead. Arriving at the scene, I opened the car door — and realized it was a tourist attraction traditionally pulled by a steam engine. Then, out of nowhere, a figure ran toward me. I picked up my camera and quickly made three pictures. One was out of focus. One was poorly composed. But one worked.

When I submitted my pictures to the editor for the tea article, this one wasn't chosen to be published, but I knew it meant something to me. I had been looking for good luck in my own life. This photograph symbolized exactly that.

I was 27 when I first traveled to India after the sudden passing of my father. Over many months, with my best friend, I traversed India with no phone, with limited Internet, and with healing as my compass. I climbed mountains, swam in the sea, and lived in relief entirely.

As I learned to travel to some of the world's cities with the largest population, I began to see life with more color and magic. I permitted myself to walk aimlessly, with no goal but to observe, and each moment became a dance. If this journey taught me anything, it's that what comes next will bring its own magic.