One midnight, a little girl woke up to pass water. She by herself got up and down her bed, walked to the bedroom door and opened it. She looked outside and walked back, for it was so dark in the hall that she feared.
Her mother said, “Don't be afraid, honey. Take courage!”
“What's courage?” she asked, running to her mother's bed.
“Courage is the brave breath,” her mother answered.
“Mum, do you have courage?”
“Certainly.”
The girl held out her little hands, saying, “Mum, blow some of your breath of courage to me.”
After her mother blew out two mouthfuls of breath into her little cold hands, the little girl clenched her fists(握拳) nervously, afraid that the “breath of courage” would run away. Then with her fists clenched, she walked out of the bedroom towards the bathroom with nothing to fear.
Her mother said to herself, “It will be nice if someone can blow some kind of ‘breath' to me. Then I can hold it in my hands too when I feel terrified or lost.”
In fact, mostly, what we are terrified of is nothing but the fear in our mind. Who we should defeat(战胜) is nobody but ourselves.

    His name was Fleming, and he was a poor Scottish farmer. One day late in the afternoon, while working to support his family, he heard a cry for help coming from a nearby pond(池塘). He dropped his tools and ran to the pond. There, up to his neck in the water, was a terrified boy, crying and struggling to free himself. Obviously the boy did not know how to swim. Fleming jumped into the pond and quickly swam toward the boy. He saved the boy who could have been a terrible death.

    The next day, a very cool carriage pulled up to the Scotsman's house. A well-dressed noble man stepped out and introduced himself as the father of the boy Fleming saved the day before.

   “I want to repay you,” said the nobleman. “You saved my son's life.”

   “No, I can't accept any payment for what I did,” the Scottish farmer replied, waving off the offer.

    At that moment, the farmer's own son came to the door of the farm house, confused by who was visiting them.

  “Is that your son?” the nobleman asked.

  “Yes,” the farmer replied proudly.

  “I'll make you a deal. Let me take him with me. I promise you that I will give him a good education. If the boy is anything like his father, he'll grow up to be a man you can be proud of.”

    And he did. In time, Fleming's son graduated from St. Mary's Hospital Medical School in London and went on to become a famous doctor.

    Years later, the nobleman's son became seriously ill. Who saved him? The farmer's son did.

    It's important to help people no matter how successful you are in life. You never know when you are going to be the one who needs the help.

    Although people everywhere seem to enjoy drinking coffee, they don't all have the same coffee culture. In Europe for example, coffee shops are common places for people to meet friends and to talk while they drink coffee. On the other hand, places like this were not as common in North America in the past. Instead, people in North America liked to drink coffee in their homes with friends. The coffee culture in the USA changed when Starbucks coffee shops spread across the country.

    The first Starbucks coffee shop opened in 1971 in downtown Seattle, Washington, in the USA. It was a small coffee shop that cooked its own coffee beans. The coffee shop's business did well, and by 1981 there were three Starbucks stores in Seattle.

    Things really began to change for the company in 1981.That year, Howard Schultz met the three men who ran Starbucks. Schultz worked in New York for a company that made kitchen equipment（设备）. He noticed that Starbucks ordered a large number of special coffee makers, which caused his great interest. Schultz went to Seattle to see what Starbucks did. In 1982, the original Starbucks owners hired （雇佣）Schultz as the company's head of marketing(市场营销).

    In 1983, Schultz traveled to Italy. The special environment of the espresso（浓 咖啡） bars there caught his eyes. Back in the USA, Schultz created an environment for Starbucks coffee shops that was comfortable and casual, and customers everywhere seemed to like it. Starbucks began opening more stores across the USA. Then the company opened coffee shops in other countries as well. Today, there are more than 16,000 Starbucks coffee shops all over the world.

    However, that does not mean Starbucks has not had problems. In fact, many Starbucks stores have closed over the past few years. On the one hand, this is because there were too many coffee shops competing for business in one small area. On the other hand, stores in some countries closed because the coffee culture there did not match with the “feel the same everywhere” environment offered by Starbucks.

D

    Life of Pi（少年派的奇幻河流）is to become the first 3D film to open the New York film festival. This year's New York film festival runs from September 28 to October 14.

    The director of this movie is Ang Lee, an American Chinese. The movie speaks of the relationship between humans and nature. Indian boy Priscine Patel is troubled by his first name. And his classmates laugh at him. So he decides to change his name to "Pi".

    Pi's father has a zoo and he decides to move to Canada. The family, together with all the zoo animals, sail across the pacific（太平洋）. One day, a huge storm hits the ship. The next morning, Pi finds his family have sunk（沉没）with the ship. He is the only person still alive. He finds himself on a lifeboat with several animals, one of which is a tiger called Richard Parker. Soon, all the animals are killed by the tiger. And Pi is left alone with the tiger.

    As the tiger becomes hungry, Pi starts to fish to feed him. If not, he himself will become the food. The boy and the tiger develop an amazing relationship on the sea. Although he feels hopeless, Pi never gives up. After 227 days, the lifeboat finally lands on a beach in Mexico, but Richard Parker runs away into the forest. The ship company finds Pi and asks him what happened. Pi tells them about Richard Parker, but the company doesn't believe him. Pi then tells another story in which is no tiger.

    Is there really another story? If so, which one is true? Maybe you will have your answer after watching the Life of Pi.

    A beautiful and very successful actress played the lead role in a new musical show. Her home was in the countryside, but she did not want to go back there every night, so she bought an expensive house in the centre of the city, she got some beautiful furniture(家具) and had a man to paint the rooms in new colours.

    It was very difficult to get tickets for her show, because everybody wanted to see it. So she decided to give the painter two of the best seats. She hoped that this would make him work better for her. He took the tickets without saying anything, and she heard no more about them until the end of the month, when she got the painter's bill (帐单). At the bottom of it were these words: “Four hours watching Miss Hall sing and dance : 3 pounds,” with this note: “ After 5 p.m. I get 15 shillings (先令) an hour instead of 10 shillings.”

    It was Mother's Day. Chatham was driving his new blue car and enjoying the beauty of nature. A flower shop by the road came into his eyes. So he stopped his car and took a look at some of the flowers. Just then he found a small, cute girl standing next to the shop. She was counting the money in her hand. It seemed that she was a little unhappy.

    He went up to her and asked, "Can I help you?"

    "I want to buy some red flowers for my mother. But I have only eighty rupees(卢比)," said the girl.

    Chatham smiled and asked her to take him to the shop. He bought a big bouquet(花束)for her and said, "I can take you to your mother." The girl was very happy.

    Finally they got to a grave. "Thank you, Uncle." Then she ran to the grave and put the roses in front of it.

    Chatham stood there without words in a minute. He then made a U-turn(掉头)and drove back to the same flower shop. He picked some pink roses and drove down two hundred miles to meet his old mother.

    His mother was happy to see him. But she said, "Why do you drive down all the way? You could talk to me over the phone. "

    He just kissed his mother and said, "Happy Mother's Day!"