Nowadays people are making themselves beautiful in Korean ways.

     “Thank goodness you have double eyelids(双眼皮). Your parents will save a lot of money.” said a family friend when I was five years old. Double eyelids, which almost all the white people have, are rare among Northeast Asians. Only 25% of South Koreans are born with double eyelids.

      I never quite understood how having double eyelids saved my parents money until this summer. When I came back to Seoul, everywhere I noticed cosmetic surgery clinics(整形诊所) and advertisements with South Korean women—tall, thin, with milky skin, long legs, nice big eyes and perfect noses. I found that South Korean beauty meant looking as “white” as possible.

      Cosmetic surgery has a kind of magical attraction(吸引) to women — the promise of beauty. Women are often sure that suffering is necessary and worthy in order to be beautiful. This suffering is not for nothing. It is believed that beauty leads to attracting a better-looking partner, which then leads to a better-looking child and a better life.

      Appearance is starting to be more important in work places. People with good appearance can have more chances .For example, my 29-year-old brother, who is slim and very tall, gets more job chances than his best friend, who is short and heavy, though both of them came from the same college, had the same good marks in their studies. In fact, many South Koreans believe that physical beauty equals happiness

     Life today has brought new problems. One of the biggest is pollution. Noise pollution makes us talk more loudly and become angry more easily. Water pollution makes our rivers and lakes very dirty. Air pollution is the most serious kind of pollution. Both water pollution and air pollution are not only dangerous to our health, but also dangerous to animals and plants.

     Many countries are making new laws to fight pollution. Factories must now clean their water before they throw it away. They can not let out dirty smoke into the air, either. More and more cars are now using a new kind of fuel(燃料) which does not pollute the air.

     Laws are not enough. We must all help. We can use paper bags, not plastic ones. We can keep old cans and plant flowers in them. Everybody must help to fight pollution because we can keep our country clean.

Information Card

    Katelyn Clarkson, an 11-year-old girl, loves baking(烘烤）very much. Three years ago, {#blank#}1{#/blank#} In her spare time, Katelyn often cooked cupcakes for her family and friends.

    A few months ago, Katelyn's teacher had a serious disease. Soon Katelyn had an idea of helping her teacher by selling cupcakes. Katelyn told the idea to her best friend Mattie who also loved baking cupcakes. {#blank#}2{#/blank#} They spent the whole afternoon making over 60 cupcakes and sold them to their friends and relatives. Their teacher was moved when she received money from the two little girls. Within days, the two girls got the idea of Cupcakes for a Cure. {#blank#}3{#/blank#} They were excited about their idea. Katelyn and Mattie later found they also needed someone to manage the money. They found Charlie. Charlie was happy to join them. He wrote down where the money was from and even set up a bank account(账户）. Also, Charlie made a website for their work. {#blank#}4{#/blank#} Of course, they made advertisements about their money-raising activities and called on people to join them.

    Last month, they held their first money-raising activity.  {#blank#}5{#/blank#} Katelyn and Mattie baked more than 300 cupcakes. All of them were sold during the two-hour activity.

    A study shows that one million lives might be saved each year if people wash their hands with soap often. It also says that hand-washing with soap could be one of the best ways to reduce diseases (减少疾病). Doctors say many diseases can be stopped from spreading by hand-washing, including the common cold, influenza (流感), hepatitis (肝炎), infectious diarrhea (腹泻) and so on.

    Doctors say that you are easy to catch a cold by touching your nose or eyes after someone nearby has sneezed (打喷嚏) or coughed. Another reason to catch a disease is to eat food prepared by someone whose hands are not clean.

    They also say that hand-washing is especially important before and after preparing food, before eating and after using the toilet, after touching the money and sneezing or coughing.

    The most helpful way is to wash them together while you are using soap and warm water. You don't have to use special soap. Be sure to wash all areas of the hands for about 10 to 15 seconds.

Basic Knowledge of Hand-washing

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