As more and more people speak the global languages of English, Chinese, Spanish, and Arabic, other languages are rapidly disappearing. In fact, half of the 6，000～7，000 languages spoken around the world today will likely die out by the next century, according to the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).

    In an effort to prevent language loss, scholars from a number of organizations—UNESCO and National Geographic among them—have for many years been documenting dying languages and the cultures they reflect.

    Mark Turin, a scientist at the Macmillan Centre, Yale University, who specializes in the languages and  oral traditions of the Himalayas, is following in that tradition. His recently published book, AGrammarofThangmiwithanEthnolinguisticIntroductiontotheSpeakersandTheirCulture, grows out of his experience living, working, and raising a family in a village in Nepal.

    Documenting the Thangmi language and culture is just a starting point for Turin, who seeks to include other languages and oral traditions across the Himalayan reaches of India, Nepal, Bhutan, and China. But he is not content to simply record these voices before they disappear without record.

    At the University of Cambridge Turin discovered a wealth of important materials—including photographs, films, tape recordings, and field notes—which had remained unstudied and were badly in need of care and protection.

    Now, through the two organizations that he has founded —the Digital Himalaya Project and the World Oral Literature Project—Turin has started a campaign to make such documents, found in libraries and stores around the world, available not just to scholars but to the younger generations of communities from whom the materials were originally collected. Thanks to digital technology and the widely available Internet, Turin notes, the endangered languages can be saved and reconnected with speech communities.

    Learning to speak English well may be the best thing you can do to improve your life. That's right. If you can communicate in English, you can do the following things:

    Contact (联系) people from all over the world. Talk about your ideas and opinions on Internet discussion groups. Send e-mails to interesting people. Learn about their life and culture.

    Travel more easily. Communicate with people wherever you go—English is spoken in more than 100 countries. Ask directions, have a conversation, or ask for help. Maybe English will save your life some day!

    Push your career forward. If you want a good job in business, technology, or science, get out of that armchair and start learning English now! If you already have a good job, start learning before you lose it! Knowing English will let you do the following things:

    Put “excellent knowledge of English” on your CV (履历). Get your dream job, and earn more money.

    Gain technical knowledge. English is the language of technology, especially high technology like computer science, and medicine. If you're going to read about technology, you'll probably have to do it in English.

    Be a world-class businessman or woman. It's simple. International business is done in English. And all business today is international. So if you want to play, you have to know English—to contact other business people, go to conferences, and read international business newspapers and magazines, ect.

    Become a better scientist. Contact scientists from other countries, go to international conferences, and visit research centers abroad. Learn about new scientific discoveries by reading papers, books, and magazines.

    Use your computer more effectively. Most computer applications are in English, so you will understand them better—and become a better employee.

    Why is pink or purple a color for girls and blue or brown for boys?

    The answer depends largely on cultural values as well as personal experiences. To the Egyptians, green was a color that represented the hope and joy of spring, while for Muslims, it means heaven. Red is a symbol of good luck in many cultures. In China, children are given money in a red envelope to bring good fortune in the New Year. For many nations, blue is a symbol of protection and religious beliefs. Greek people often wear a blue necklace hoping to protect themselves against evils(灾祸).

    People's choice of colors is also influenced by their bodies' reactions toward them. Green is said to be the most restful color. It has the ability to reduce pain and relax people both mentally and physically. People who work in green environments have been found to have fewer stomachaches.

    Red can cause a person's blood pressure to rise and increase people's appetites(食欲). Many decorators will include different shades of red in the restaurant. Similarly, many commercial websites will have a red “Buy Now” button because red is a color that easily catches a person's eye.

    Blue is another calming color. Unlike red, blue can cause people to lose appetite. So if you want to eat less, some suggest that eating from blue plates can help.

    The next time you are deciding on what to wear or what color to decorate your room, think about the color carefully.

    Mew Zealand's chief conservation (环保)officer，Lou Sanson, caused an argument in October suggesting that it should be time to start charging tourists for entering national parks. New Zealanders are keen fans of these parks. Many would be annoyed at having to pay. But many also worry about the incoming foreign tourists who have been seeking the same fun.

    In 2016 New Zealand hosted 3.5m tourists from overseas; by 2022 more than 4.5m are expected every year—about the same as the country's population. Tourism has become the biggest export. The national parks, which make up about one-third of the country, are a huge draw. About half of the foreign tourists visit one. They are keen to experience the natural beauty promised by the country's “100% Pure New Zealand” advertising campaign (and shown off in the film adaptations of “The Lord of the Rings” and “The Hobbit”，which were shot in New Zealand's breath-taking wilderness).

    But for every happy foreign couple posing for a selfie next to a tuatara (楔齿蜥)there is a NewZealander who remembers the way things used to be-when you could walk the tracks without running into crowds at every clearing. Many locals now wonder why their taxes, as they see it, are paying for someone else's holiday. Mr. Sanson would seem to agree. Entry fees could be used to upgrade facilities such as car parks and trails. A charge could also help reduce numbers at some of the popular locations by making it cheaper to use lesser-known, but no less beautiful, trails far away from home.

    Some are not so sure it would work. Hugh Logan, a former chief of conservation for the government who now runs a mountain climbing club, worries it would cost too much to employ staff to take money from hikers at entrances. It would also be difficult to prevent tourists from entering the parks without paying.

    Some argue that it would be easier to charge visitors a “conservation tax” when they enter the The Green Party the third-largest in parliament says that adding around NZ$18($12.50)is still acceptable to foreign tourists. But some travel companies don't quite agree with the idea. They note that tourists already contribute around NZ $l.l bn through the country's 15% sales fetter, such firms say, to use foreign tourists' contribution to this tax for the protection of the parks.

    Among the fiercest critics of a charge are those who point out that free access to wilderness areas is an important principle for New Zealanders, It is documented in a National Parks Act (法案) which inspires almost constitution-like devotion among the country's nature-lovers. Mr. Sans on has a rocky path ahead.

From rolling hills to mountain ranges, views make any road trip memorable, but for blin d passengers this is part of the experience they miss. Motor company Ford tries to change that. It teamed up with GTB Rom a and AedoProject—to develop a technology that will give those unfortunate passengers a way to feel nature's beauty through their car windows.

The prototype (原型) of the smart car window has a device with an outside-facing camera. With just a press of a button, the system takes a picture of the current view. The colorful picture is then turned into an image with different shades of grey through, LED lights, which vibrates (震动) differently. As the finger passes over different regions of the image, its shaking movements provide feedback through the sense of touch to the person using it. The smart window also comes with a voice assistant that uses AI to identify the scene and help the passengers get information on what they're seeing.

"As the prototype started taking shape, we realized we were giving birth to a completely new language that would give blind people a new chance to visualize and experience traveling," Federico Russo.-one director of GTBRoma, said. "When the idea was at its first stage, we looked for suppliers all around the world to make it come to life." He believes the technology can be employed not just in cars. "It could be introduced into schools and in stitutions for blind people as a tool that could be used in multiple ways."

The technology may show up in a Ford autonomous vehicle. It's known that the company is testing their technology and future business model and struggling to figure out how an autonomous vehicle gives different passengers the details needed to get from one destination to another. It's unclear when this technology will be made available. However, the idea of building something for the less advanced is indeed a kind and influential action.