Every city, in fact, can be felt by its warmth-not in terms of its natural climate but its human touch.

    About twenty years ago, I arrived in Australia. Searching for a place in a map in the street, I was approached by an elderly man who asked “How are you? Are you lost? How can I help you?”, which really impressed and warmed me. Another time, as I was pushing my bike on the sidewalk one night, a young lady shouted to me: “Carry me please” and then jumped onto my bicycle. While we had a little chat, she got where she wanted and hopped off my bike with “Thanks, bye!” At that moment, I had a sense as much of pleasant surprise as of “being trusted”.

    Still in Australia, two of my friends decided to hitch（搭便车）their way to Sydney in order to save money. A young driver stopped, and luckily he was also going to Sydney, so he let them in and even allowed them to drive while he went to sleep on the back seat. About eight hours later, they arrived and he woke up. Saying thanks to each other, they went their separate ways.

    In my opinion, no matter how developed and advanced it is, if in general a place presents itself with a cold and indifferent（冷漠的）face to people, especially to strangers, even keeping them highly alert（警惕的）not to be cheated all the time, can perhaps hardly be classified as a land of civilization（文明）. In a sense, the attitude towards strangers that the people have in the city mirrors its warmth.

    A sense of humor is something highly valued. A person who has a great sense of humor is often considered to be happy and socially confident. However, humor is a double-edged sword. Sometimes it can damage self-respect and annoy others.

    People who use bonding humor tell jokes and generally lighten the mood. They're thought to be good at reducing the tension in uncomfortable situations. They often make fun of their common experiences, and sometimes they may even laugh off their own misfortunes. The basic message they deliver is: We're all alike, we find the same things funny, and we're all in this together.

    Put-down humor, on the other hand, is an aggressive type of humor used to criticize others through teasing. When it's aimed against politicians, as it often is, it's extremely funny and mostly harmless. But in the real world, it may have a harmful effect. An example of such humor is telling friends an embarrassing story about another friend. When challenged about their teasing, the put-down jokers might claim that they are "just kidding," thus allowing themselves to avoid responsibility. This type of humor, though considered by some people to be socially acceptable, may hurt the feelings of the one being teased and thus have a bad effect on personal relationships.

    Finally, in hate-me humor, the joker is the target of the joke for the amusement of others. This type of humor was used by comedians John Belushi and Chris Farley—both of whom suffered for their success in show business. A small amount of such humor is charming, but routinely offering oneself up to be embarrassed destroys one's self-esteem, and fosters depression and anxiety.

    So it seems that being funny isn't necessarily an indicator of good social skills and well-being. In certain cases, it may actually have a negative effect on interpersonal relationships.

    A few years ago, my wife, Sue had some serious health problems. She had suffered surgery after surgery and had also put on weight. Diets had not helped her and she suffered constantly from undiagnosed pain. One day the whole family sat down and drew up a “wish list”. To our surprise, one of Sue's items was to run in a marathon. Given her history and physical limitations, I thought her goal was completely unrealistic, but Sue became committed to it.

    She began by running very slowly and every day she ran just a little farther than she did the day before. Soon she could run three miles. Then five. Sue kept practicing and longed to run in the St. George Marathon in southern Utah.

    On the big day, I parked our van near the finish line, waiting for Sue. The rain was steady and the wind was cold. The marathon had started over five hours ago. The fast and strong competitors had finished already. Several cold and injured runners had been transported past me, and I began to panic. The image of Sue, alone and cold, off the road somewhere, made me sick with worry.

    Another hour passed and I spotted a small group running up. As they approached, I could see Sue, in the company of three others, and a woman in her twenties was near Sue. It was obvious that they had become friends during the race. I could see her begin to struggle. But when the finish line came into sight, she confidently even happily picked up her pace the last hundred yards to the finish line. Few people were left to congratulate my wife. They openly praised and embraced her, “She made us believe we could do it,” her new friend stated.

    From then on, she was carrying herself differently. Her head was more upright. Her shoulders were squared. Her walk had a new confidence. Her voice held a new, quiet dignity. It was not as if she had become someone new; it was more as if she had discovered a real self she had not known before. It was perseverance that made her realize she was an undiscovered masterpiece with a million things left to learn about herself. She truly liked her newly discovered self. So did I.

    Why Black Friday Shoppers Still Crowd Stores

    To many of us, the ideas of rushing out to a superstore the day after Thanksgiving is appealing. Why would anyone race to crowded stores when they could stay in with family, or watch college football? We can't say we know the answer for sure. But we do feel amazed at those who pour into stores looking for Black Friday bargains. Seemingly, nothing can stop them. Not the weather. Not the crowds. And not the fact that hurrying to a store in the age of instant e-commerce seems so…last century.

    To be sure, holiday shopping habits do appear to be shifting. The National Retail (零售) Federation has stopped breaking up its holiday sales numbers by whether they come from e-tail purchases or from physical stores. It's a pretty good sign that retailers don't want to bring further attention to the declining fortunes of brick-and-mortar stores.

    But there is no denying that people still love going to stores. Actual shopping in actual places remains an important part of the holiday ceremony for millions of Americans. To many, it's the difference between playing a sport and playing a video game. As commercial as stores may be, they are still places where actual human beings interact. In a store, the “courageous” shopper performs the approving act of finding a present. That item might be heavily promoted by the store, but it doesn't drop into one's cart. It is picked up and examined before a decision is made. Maybe it gets put back on the shelf when the shopper changes his or her mind. Maybe there is a conversation with a sales clerk. The process is not that different than it would have been decades ago.

    Online, the shopper has barely logged in before being faced with disturbing algorithmic (大数据的) suggestions based on earlier purchases. This hardly qualifies as shopping. This hardly qualifies as thinking.

    Perhaps we are reading too much into the Black Friday phenomenon. But we suspect one reason Black Friday remains is that it involves an act of resistance against the Internet age. That would hardly be unreasonable. There aren't many studies showing that time spent in stores is bad for one's health, while there are quite a few drawing a link between time spent online and depression. Perhaps the people crowding into stores aren't the crazy ones after all.

    Imagine a town with crosswalks but no pedestrians, cars and trucks but no drivers. Welcome to Mcity, a fake “city” built by researchers who are testing out the driverless cars of the future.

    The controlled test environment, which opened today (July 20, 2015) at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, covers 32 acres (the size of about 24 football fields) and contains all the trappings of a real suburb or small city. There is an entire network of roads lined with sidewalks, streetlights, stop signs and traffic signals. There's even a “downtown” area complete with fake buildings and outdoor dining areas.

    The idea behind Mcity is simple: test out new driverless car innovations in a human-free environment before these technologies are unleashed in the real world.

    "Mcity is a safe, controlled, and realistic environment where we are going to figure out how the incredible potential of connected and automated vehicles can be realized quickly, efficiently and safely," Peter Sweatman, director of the Mobility Transformation Center at U-M, said in a statement.

    The roads of Mcity are built to stand up to “rigorous, repeatable” testing, according to MTC officials. While Mcity drivers don't have to compete with real pedestrians, there will be one mechanical foot-traveler (a robot-like machine named Sebastian) that steps out into traffic to see whether the automated cars can hit the brakes in time. The fake city also features a traffic circle, a bridge, a tunnel, some unpaved roads, and even a four-lane highway with entrance and exit ramps, according to a report by Bloomberg Business.

    In addition to evaluating fully automated, or driverless cars, the researchers also hope to test out so-called connected vehicles within Mcity's limits. Connected cars can either communicate with one another (vehicle-to-vehicle control, or V2V) or with pieces of equipment, such as traffic lights, that are located near roadways (vehicle-to-infrastructure control, or V2I).

    Even the smallest details of Mcity have been planned out in advance to copy the conditions that connected and automated vehicles could face in the real world. For example, there are street signs covered up with graffiti, and faded yellow and white lane markings line the streets.

    Mcity is just one part of a much larger project that MTC and its partner organizations are establishing in an effort to get a whole fleet of connected and driverless cars on the road in Ann Arbor by 2021. In addition to the fake city, MTC is also continuing to launch connected and semi-autonomous(半自动) cars on real roadways. Eventually, the University of Michigan and the Michigan Department of Transportation said they hope to put 20,000 connected cars on the roads of southern Michigan.

    Four books that will inspire you to travel the world

    There's truly nothing like travel when it comes to gaining perspectives and exposing yourself to other cultures. To get you in the adventuring mood, we asked Amazon Senior Editor Chris Schlep to help you come up with a list of books that transport readers to another time and place. Below, see his list of four books that will inspire you to travel the world.

    ITALY: Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter

    This book by the popular author Jess Walter is a love story that begins on the Italian Coast in the early 60s and eventually concludes in contemporary Hollywood's screen. As the settings shift from Italy to Edinburgh and Los Angeles, you will find yourself longing to go as well. Buy it on Amazon. Price: $28.90

    SEATTLE: Where'd You Go, Bernadette by Maria Semple

    Maria Semple's first novel is not exactly a love story in Seattle, but if you read it, you just might want to come here to see if people are really as self­involved as the characters in her book. What really shines through is the strange storytelling and the laughs. Buy it on Amazon. Price: $26.60

    ENGLAND: Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel

    You can't travel to Thomas Cromwell's England without a time machine, but reading Mantel's prize­winning novel is the next best thing. It will make you long to see the ancient buildings and green grass of the English countryside, most of which are still there. Buy it on Amazon. Price: $25.10

    NANTUCKET: Here's to Us by Elin Hilderbrand

    Elin Hilderbrand has built a writing career out of writing about her hometown island of Nantucket. Her latest book is Here's to Us, which, perhaps not surprisingly, is a great beach book. Buy it on Amazon. Price: $30.80