Joseph Francis Charles Rock (1884–1962) was an Austrian-American explorer, botanist, and anthropologist(人类学家). For more than 25 years, he travelled extensively through Tibet and Yunnan, Gansu, and Sichuan provinces in China before finally leaving in 1949.

    In 1924, Harvard sent Joseph Francis Rock on a treasure hunt through China's southwestern provinces—the Wild West of their day. But gold and silver weren't his task: Rock, a distinguished botanist, sought only to fill his bags with all the seeds, saplings, and shrubs he could find. During his three-year expedition, he collected 20,000 specimens for the Arnold Arboretum(阿诺德植物园).

    Botany, though, was just one of Rock's strengths. As an ethnologist(民族学者), he took hundreds of photographs of the Naxi, a tribe in Yunnan province, recording their now-lost way of life for both Harvard and National Geographic, and took notes for an eventual 500-page dictionary of their language. His hand-drawn map of his travels through China's “Cho-Ni” territory, in the Harvard Map Collection, includes more than a thousand rivers, towns, and mountains indicated in both English and Chinese, and was so well made that the U.S. government used it to plan aerial missions in World War II.

    Scientist, linguist, cartographer, photographer, writer—Rock was not a wallflower in any sense. Arrogant and self-possessed, he would walk into a village or warlord's place “as if he owned the place,” said Lisa Pearson, the Arboretum's head librarian.

    In declaring his successful return under the headline “Seeking Strange Flowers, in the Far Reaches of the World,” the Boston Evening Transcript ran a large photo of the daring explorer wearing in a woolly coat and fox-skin hat. “In discussing his heroism including hair-raising escapes from death either from mountain slides, snow slides and robber armies, he waves the idea away as if it is of no importance.”

    The Arboretum and Rock parted ways after 1927, mainly because his trip cost Harvard a fortune—about $900,000 in today's dollars. Fortunately, many of his specimens, many of his amazing photos, and his great stories remain.

    Thirteen-year-old American Jessica Goldstone wants to be a fashion designer when she finishes school. She thinks her designs would be more exciting than clothes bought from stores. But until this month, Jessica has never touched a sewing machine(缝纫机).

    After her first class, Jessica and six other girls aged 9 to 13 said that sewing was fun, cool and challenging.

    These students at Fabrics' Sew Fun class show that the sewing machine is becoming popular again.

    “There have been a lot of teens getting excited about sewing,” said a sewing company worker Donna Smith. “Some of them come from the Project Runway TV show,” she said. This TV show is an exciting weekly contest to make a great fashion designer. Every week one contestant (参赛者) fails the test and has to leave the contest.

    The number of people who joined sewing class summer camps grew by 10 percent this year. That's good news for companies that make sewing machines and publish sewing magazines. The Singer Sewing Company sold nearly 3 million sewing machines in the United States last year. This is about twice as many as in 1999.

    Sewing machines have been around for more than 150 years, but they have changed a lot since your grandmother was a girl.

    Spencer Carmel started sewing lessons after getting a sewing machine for her 11^th birthday. She has sewn a lot by hand, but she wants to make more difficult things. Spencer's class recently made hats.

    Another member of the class, Kelsey Oen, 9 years old, needed time to get used to her machine, but soon she could use it well. By the end of the class, Kelsey was happy and wearing her new hat.

    In the home country, a common language gives you the ability to communicate easily with the people around you; and you learn something about your country's history, people's habits, likes and dislikes, customs and traditions. This understanding influences your own behavior, and what you expect of others.

    Living abroad, it doesn't take long to realize that many things don't "work" the same, especially when moving from "the West" to "the East". Besides a different language, each country has its own social system and laws and ways of solving problems. You will find some of them strange and alien. Sometimes you may feel uncomfortable because you realize that things are not the same as you think they are supposed to be. This is what has become known as "Culture Shock".

    Living in an environment with an unfamiliar(不熟悉的)culture can cause stress, anxiety or worse- mental or physical illness in some cases. Culture shock is the shock of experiencing an unknown or new culture. Cross-culture Adjustment is the period of anxiety, great pain and confusion suffered when entering a new culture. It can have effects on a person's emotions and behavior. You should learn to accept and try to be used to different situations. One thing is certain: it is far easier to accept the new order of things than to try to change it.

    Most Asian people can bear foreigners and accept their strange habits and behavior, not only because it might be to their benefit but out of natural politeness and restraint(克制)in front of others. Westerners should not make use of this. They must try to accept and obey local rules and rules of behavior.

    You must have heard of Mr. No Ears. This earless, one-eyed cat from Albufeira, Portugal, is a Facebook phenomenon and has his own book: Saudades Mr. No Ears. But for those of you who don't know him, here is his story.

    Often referred to as the “Lion King of Albufeira”, this adorable cat was the head of a eat colony in the region. Viewed from a distance, he appeared to be a king, sitting on a wall. On most days, this was usually where you would find Mr. No Ears, with the members of his colony scattered around on the walkway. At other times, he was jumping cliffs and running on the beach. No one knew on which day he was born, so his caretakers decided to celebrate his birthday on World Animal Day on October 4th.

    Although there were no ears, his hearing functioned well. One of his eyes was open and purulent (有脓的), with no sign of an eyeball…...Despite all of his problems, he was a strong-minded and happy cat. Some hotel owners found him annoying, ordering his caretakers to send him away so he wouldn't “upset tourists.” But there were just as many people who loved him to pieces, and once he got his own Facebook page, the entire world was at his paws.

    On the evening of 11 September 2015, Mr. No Ears was taken away against his will. Less than an hour later a request was made via a Facebook page asking for money, making false claims that he was “in pain” and “had bone cancer.” It was said that in an attempt to prove cancer which he did not have, Mr. No Ears suffered a heart attack. He then suffered organ damage, including his kidneys and liver. The taking-away of this much-loved cat from his home and family and the circumstances of his death were very emotive subjects, causing shockwaves throughout the animal-loving world.

    Thanks to Mr. No Ears, the Albufeirafs Peneco beach Colony became a household name and a “must see” on cat lovers, holiday choices. You will recognize Mr. No Ears' favorite seat under a palm tree because Mr. No Ears' love-lock is attached to it.

    The University of Birmingham is the first excellent UK Russell Group university to announce that it will accept the "Gaokao" exam for high­flying Chinese students wishing to join its undergraduate courses in 2019. High school students who complete the "National Higher Education Entrance Examination", or Gaokao, with top grades will be able to apply for direct entry onto Birmingham degree programmes without first completing a foundation year which is a routine for the freshman.

    Gaokao is usually taken by students in their last year of senior high school and, every year, each province in China sets the grades required to gain admission to its universities. It is usually held across China in early June. Students are tested in Chinese, Mathematics, a Foreign Language and social sciences or natural sciences.

    University of Birmingham Vice­Chancellor Professor Sir David Eastwood said: "The University of Birmingham has been challenging and developing great minds for more than a century. We welcome people from around the globe to study at Birmingham and Chinese students form an integral part of our education and research community. We are further opening access to Birmigham's wealth of education opportunities for the brightest and most dedicated Chinese students by accepting this strict and important qualification. I look forward to welcoming these high­flying students to the University of Birmingham."

    Gaokao is increasingly accepted by universities in Australia, the USA, Canada and mainland Europe. Birmingham will only be considering high quality students who achieve a minimum 80% Gaokao score and meet additional academic and English language requirements.

    Professor J on Frampton, Director of the University of Birmingham's China Institute said: "The University of Birmingham has a long history of educating students from China and one of our most famous graduates is Li Siguang­the founding father of Chinese geology. I am delighted that the University is now accepting the Gaokao. This gives the brightest and best Chinese students an opportunity to move straight into the first year of our undergraduate programmes and experience the benefits of studying at a global Top 100 university, such as Birmingham."

When it comes to sitting properly, we all know the correct way even if we don't do it to the letter. No crossed legs, bottoms touching the back of the chair and feet on the ground. But even if you're doing it right, sitting for long periods is shockingly bad for you. It has been described as the new smoking, linked to heart disease and even cancer. There is no doubt we should all try to do less of it. But perhaps we could also do it better.

A classic survey, published in 1953, described 100 different sitting postures adopted by 480 cultures around the world. Among the most common were sitting cross-legged, kneeling and the deep squat (深蹲), with feet flat on the ground and bottoms resting on or just above it. Even in Western cultures, these are preferred sitting positions among young children. But Westerners tend to prefer chair use from an early age, insisting children sit on seats in school.

One big problem with this desire for chairs is that they make sitting so, well, sedentary (久坐不动的). Consider the Hadza, a group of hunter-gatherer people in Tanzania. They spend around 9 hours a day sitting. However, they squat and sit on the ground in various positions, and this involves high levels of muscle activity. The supportive nature of chairs, with their high backs and armrests, removes this effort perhaps the reason that people love them.

So what's the best way to sit? Josette Bettany-SaItikov at Teesside University, UK has found that kneeling can help keep the spine in a better position as does squatting. We might also take inspiration from traditional cultures like the Hadza. "Use a variety of postures and preferably not just still postures but some which allow movement," says Bettany-Saltikov.

Bettany-Saltikov believes that we should be rethinking what it means to do a desk job. "We still need to design workplaces that enable people to be productive while being lightly active, like with under-table cycling or walking desks," she says. For now, if your job is sedentary, don't forget to stand up regularly and move around.