“Jamila, I just found one dollar sitting on the coffee table,” said Mrs. Johnson. “Is that your money?”

    Jamila looked up fromthe book she was reading. “Oops, it's mine. I emptied my jacket pockets before Ileft for basketball practice yesterday. I was running late, so I didn't have time to take it up to my room.”Jamila placed it quickly in the back of her book and went back to reading.

  “Jamila, you just put that money into the back of your book. I'm quite sure that you're not going to be able to find it when you need it.” her mother said. “You see, some of your money is in the pencil case on your desk. Some is in the glove hanging behind the door. I think you might also have a few dollars in your bag. You are such a careless girl.”

   “Mom. I'm too busy to take care of my money.”

     Mrs. Johnson smiled,“It looks like it's time for you to get your own bank account (账户).”

   “My own bank account?Is it necessary? Kids know little about it."Jamila replied.

    The next day, Mrs.Johnson took Jamila to a bank and opened an account for her. The banking mangerexplained how the money in the account would increase. “The longer the money staysin the account, the more it will earn(获利),” he added.

     Jamila was surprisedto learn that she could earn money just by keeping her money in a bank account.“I wish I had done this a long time ago.”

    A man got lost in a desert. He walked for two days but he still couldn't find his way out. Dying for water, he found an empty house in the desert. There was a water pump(水泵）in the house!

    The man was so happy that he ran to draw water. But no water how hard he tried, no matter came out.

    He was sitting sadly on the ground when he saw a little bottle with a cork in it. On the bottle, there was an old note saying: You must add the water into the pump before you can draw water! Don't forget to fill it with water again before you leave! The man took the cork out and found the bottle was full of water!

    If I'm selfish（自私的）, as long as I drink the water, I can go out of this room alive, he thought. If I do as the note says, I might die of thirst. Should I take the risk or not?

    At last, he decided to do as the note said and began to draw water. Sure enough, lots of water started coming out from the pump!

    After he drank enough, he filled the bottle with water and added his words after the note.

    “Believe me, do as the note tells you!” he wrote.

    An elephant and a monkey were arguing (争论).

    “Look, how big and strong I am!” The elephant said.

    The monkey didn't agree, “Look, how fast I can run and climb! Can you?”

    At last they asked a clever tiger, “Which is better—to be strong or to be quick?”

    The tiger said, “Go across the river and pick the fruit on that tree for me, then I can tell.”

    So they went to the river, but the water ran fast and the monkey was afraid.

    “Get on my back,” said the elephant proudly (自豪地), “I shall carry you.”

    Soon they crossed the river. There stood the tree. But the fruit was too high for the elephant to reach. He tried to pull the tree down, but failed.

    “Don't worry.” The monkey climbed quickly up the tree, and picked the fruit.

    Then they came back and gave the tiger the fruit. “Which is better — to be strong or to be quick?”

    The tiger smiled, “Both of you could not get the fruit alone. It took both the elephant's strength and the monkey's quickness to get it.”

    In 1909 an English newspaper offered £ 1,000 to the first man to fly across the English Channel in an aeroplane. Today, modern jets cross it in minutes. But at that time it still seemed a good distance. The race to win the money soon became a race between two men. Both were very colourful.

    One was Louis Bleriot. He owned a factory in France that made motor car lamps. He was already well known as a pilot because he had had accidents several times. Some people laughed at him. One man said, "He may not be the first to fly across the Channel but he will certainly be the first to die in an accident!" But Bleriot was really a good and brave pilot. He also had many good ideas about aeroplane design.

    The other man was Hubert Latham. He was half French and half English. He took up flying when his doctors told him he had only a year to live. "Oh, well," he said, "if I'm going to die soon, I think I shall have a dangerous and interesting life now." Latham was the first to try the flight across the Channel. Ten kilometres from the French coast, his plane had some trouble. It fell down into the water and began to sink under the water. A boat reached Latham just in time. He was sitting calmly on the wing and was coolly lighting a cigarette. Bleriot took off six days later. He flew into some very bad weather and very low cloud. He somehow got to the English side and landed in a farmer's field. When he did so, a customs (海关) officer rushed up to his plane. Planes have changed since then, but customs officers have not. "Have you anything to say?" The officer asked.

    One morning, I was driving my father-in-law to the airport when a plane flew silently over the road like a big bird, about to touch down at the airport.

    "It's magic," my father-in-law said. I looked at him, without knowing what was happening.

    He was a doctor who gave speeches at colleges and had visited more than 100 countries. He understood better than I why a plane can fly in the sky. It, really, wasn't magic. But now, I realize he was at least right in some way.

    Though flying might not be magic, it's certainly magical. What it brings to our real lives is something found in our dreams.

    But too often, we, especially I forget. I read a sentence a few months ago. It said, "You know you're growing-up when you no longer want a window seat."

    Too often in recent years, I've asked for a seat near the exit row, forgetting the wonders of traveling fast. But sometimes, when the Wi-Fi's not working or my computer has no power, I remember to look.

    I think of one time when I was leaving on a family vacation. Moments after take-off, I started working. But a passenger behind me wouldn't stop talking. "The clouds!" he kept saying, "Look at the clouds!"

I turned around, and saw two men, one who appeared to be in his seventies and the other much younger. The chat continued for 20 minutes until, not patiently, I raised my eyes from my computer screen and looked out of the window.

    The clouds!

    He was right. We were floating through big soft balls of cotton, each in different shapes. They seemed easy enough to touch. The afternoon sun provided all kinds of colors, all against a blue sky. I put away my computer and appreciated(欣赏)them for the rest of the flight.

    I don't remember the work I felt like I had to complete that afternoon. I've never forgotten those clouds.

    Zhao Muhe is a 105-year-old man from Taiwan. Praised by many people as an ideal role model, Zhao's motto is that it's never too late to learn. He is now auditing(旁听)classes at National Tsing Hua University in Taiwan as he prepares to earn a PhD.

    Zhao entered Open University of Kaohsiung in Taiwan in 1999.He went to school by bike every day, never missing a single class. He studied late into the night, and it only took Zhao four years to finish the 128 academic credits required to graduate, which he did at the age of 91.

    Several years later, Zhao decided to continue his studies. He passed the entrance examination for Nanhua University in Taiwan and got a master's degree two years later. The 98-year-old set a Guinness World Record as the oldest postgraduate in the world.

    In 2016, Zhao started classes at National Tsing Hua University. He lives alone on the fourth floor of an old apartment building. He does his own shopping, cooking and laundry, refusing other's help because he thinks it would make him feel old.

    Zhao was born in Shandong Province in 1912. Influenced by traditional Chinese culture, he studied at a private school and started to study calligraphy(书法)when he was 14.Years of practice made him a calligraphy master. Over the decades, he has donated plenty of money raised by calligraphy charities to people in need.

    Zhao held a calligraphy exhibition in Hong Kong in 2013, and also published an autobiography. As he couldn't use a computer at that time, the autobiography was written by others, based on Zhao's oral narration. After the book was written, Zhao decided that he should learn how to use the Internet. Now he can buy his own tickets online.