Ireland has had a very difficult history. The problems started in the 16th century when English rulers tried to conquer (征服) Ireland. For hundreds of years, the Irish people fought against the English. Finally, in 1921, the British government was forced to give independence to the south of Ireland. The result is that today there are two "Irelands". Northern Ireland, in the north, is part of the United Kingdom. The Republic of Ireland, in the south, is an independent country.

    In the 1840s, the main crop, potatoes, was affected by disease and about 750,000 people died of hunger. This, and a shortage (短缺) of work, forced many people to leave Ireland and live in the USA, the UK, Australia and Canada. As a result of these problems, the population fell from 8.2 million in 1841 to 6.6 million in 1851.

    For many years, the majority of Irish people earned their living as farmers. Today, many people still work on the land but more and more people are moving to the cities to work in factories and offices. Life in the cities is very different from life in the countryside, where things move at a quieter and slower pace.

    The Irish are famous for being warm-hearted and friendly. Oscar Wilde, a famous Irish writer, once said that the Irish were “the greatest talkers since the Greeks”. Since independence, Ireland has revived (复兴) its own culture of music, language, literature and singing. Different areas have different styles of old Irish songs which are sung without instruments. Other kinds of Irish music use many different instruments such as the violin, whistles, etc.

    Could a cave be the place of buried treasure in a small village in Marajgushu, near Navasha, Kenya? A rumor of treasure has some villagers dreaming of wealth, while ohters see it as a cheat. It's said that in the 1800s a white man left treasure inside the caves.

    This system of caves has become the center of excitement in the village. It is unclear where the rumor came from, but some local people believe white settlers hid gold and other precious metals in the cave before leavign the area, many years ago.

    Local villager Edward Maina says the rumors have brought a lot of treasure hunters flooding into town to dig in the caves. Villages say original treasure seekers entered the cave nearly two months ago before being arrested by police. Local governmetns closed up the entrance, but they broke back in.

    While neither gold nor silver has been found yet, the cave does guard another important resource: water. Many depend on a natural spring coming from the cave and local officials, among them Ward Councilor Gaka Mwaniki, worry the digging could affect or dirty the supply.

    “There's nothing. We've seen ourselves there's nothing in those caves. The cave is natural. It's the water table that they're affecting” says Mwaniki.

    Local resident James Mbugua Njenga wants the situation brought under control. “If at all there's treasure inside there, let the government come and dig and protect the water table,”says Njenga.

    It might be true. It might be a cheat. Whatever the case, treasure hunters continue to be attracted to the mystery of the caves.

    I just celebrated my 95th birthday last week, and people always ask me about my secret. Of course, it's important to eat right and exercise, but that's not much of a secret. I actually have quite a few friends over the age of 90, and we all say the same thing: laughter. Are we telling jokes all the time? Not necessarily. Are we watching funny movies around the clock? Of course not. Do we take the time to laugh at ourselves and generally try to keep things light as much as we can? Certainly. One of the best ways to make sure you laugh every day is to be around children or pets because they just can't help being funny! And what about those polite little laughs when your neighbor tells a joke that isn't really funny, but you laugh anyway? Those are fine, but the ones where you laugh with your whole body and mind are the ones where you end up tired and out of breath, where everyone around you starts laughing, too. My “senior” friends and I even came up with a nice round number: For each full “belly laugh” you have, you'll live one extra hour in your lifetime. Now that might not sound like much, but if you have one every day, you'll live an extra three or four years. I try to have between five and ten of those laughs every day, and so should you.

Recess (课间休息) time has been dropping for many children in America. This drop began the same year the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) was passed. The law aimed to make American education system more internationally competitive by introducing achievement goals for schools. And the goals are gauged (评定) by standardized tests in reading and math. If schools missed their achievement goals, they could be in trouble, including loss of funding.

It's no surprise that teachers have felt the pressure to make sure students perform well on standardized tests. When educators are facing pay cuts, loss of funding to their school and perhaps even the loss of their jobs, it's no wonder that they started questioning if recess was a waste of time. This pressure to bring even more learning into the school day is especially felt by underperforming, low-income schools that are already short of funding.

It may seem strange to send kids out to play when they're falling below state standards, but getting outside for unstructured (散乱的) play may be more helpful than keeping kids in the classroom all day.

"Moving, running and playing outdoors freely have great influence on children. These activities play a role in children's abilities to focus and control themselves throughout the day," Marie Conti says, a famous educator of early childhood education. The mind cannot be educated without using the body. Learning is a whole of thinking and moving," she added.

Recess time makes it possible for children to learn something they can't get in class. Asking other kids to play, explaining the rules of a complex game and ending arguments are all important life lessons that children can only learn if they're given time to play. When something unhappy happens, children can find a way to get back to having fun themselves.

The physical activities kids take part in during recess can also reduce stress levels and allow children to feel more relaxed. In an education system that. Continues to place higher expectations on children to perform to a certain standard, less stress is just what the doctor ordered.

Everyone gets anxious when the world takes an uncertain turn. And often, we treat that anxiety with a little panic buying.

A study published last year in the Journal of Consumer Research found that people buy things in troubled times as a means of keeping control over their lives. The researchers noted that utility items — specifically, cleaning products — tend to move most quickly from store shelves. The hoarding (囤积) of toilet paper, as perhaps the most fundamental cleaning product, may represent our most fundamental fears. An invisible enemy moves slowly and quietly towards us. We need to hold on to something in uncertain times. Maybe a hoard of toilet paper brings promises.

The thing is, it's not actually going anywhere. For all the sharp words and even sharper elbows thrown around by the crazy toilet paper shoppers, they seem to be missing one essential fact: There is no toilet paper shortage.

As The New York Times points out, shop owners that see their shelves emptied often fill up the shelves again in a day, often in just a few hours.

"You are not using more of it. You are just filling up your closet with it," Jeff Anderson, president of paper product manufacturer Precision Paper Converters, tells the Times.

The thing is, the toilet paper-obsessed shoppers have been infected with something many times more contagious (感染性的) than any coronavirus: fear.

"People are social creatures. We look to each other for cues for what is safe and what is dangerous," Steven Taylor, a clinical psychologist at the University of British Columbia, tells Fox News. "And when you see someone in the store panic-buying, that can cause a fear contagion effect. People become anxious ahead of the actual infection. They haven't thought about the bigger picture, like what are the consequences of hoarding toilet paper."

Kelli Boehle says her son Nik was an amazing and caring person. Nik was diagnosed(诊断) with cancer in 2008 when he was 17. He passed away in 2012. But Nik's kindness and generosity have lived on long after his death.

After he was diagnosed and started treatment, Nik was granted (给予) a wish experience from the Make-A-Wish Foundation. "For just this period of time, we didn't think about cancer, "Kelli Boehle said. "All we thought about was enjoying our time together."

In 2009, Nik met another young man Nate, who was also going through cancer treatment. He'd been diagnosed a month after turning 18, and Nik learned he was too old to qualify for a wish. The night before Nik passed away, he asked his mother to help ensure that young adults fighting cancer could have their wishes come true too. 

"It was like a seed he planted that just wouldn't stop coming into my mind, " she said. In 2012, Kelli Boehle started Nik's Wish. The nonprofit grants wishes to young adults between the ages of 18 and 24 who are battling cancer. Nate was the organization's first wish recipient. "It's meant to bring them joy and know that they're loved and that we're fighting for them, too, "Kelli Boehle said. 

Recently, 19-year-old Jordan Morrow received her wish to attend a Taylor Swift concert as part of a trip to Los Angeles. For Morrow, who has spent the last year battling brain cancer, going to the concert has done more than lift her spirits. "I think it's something to get me through whatever comes my way, "she said. "And I'm thankful for Nik's Wish for that. "

In the 11 years since Nik passed away, the organization has granted more than 300 wishes across more than 30 states. In the beginning, Kelli Boehle says she wasn't sure she could be a wish maker and work closely with the young adults. But now, it's her favorite thing to do.