College junior Xiao Jiang, who is usually a mild-tempered girl, had a big fight with her parents recently.

She had asked them to pay for her cosmetic surgery in the coming summer vacation, for she believed with better looks came better chances of finding

a desirable job upon graduation. She had heard of stories of how a vacancy was quickly filled when a beautiful candidate turned up. However, Xiao Jiang’s parents were taken aback. They thought it insane for her to come up with such an idea. Hadn’t it

occurred to her that a company that hires people on account of good looks cannot be competitive in the long run? Affectionate as they were, Xiao Jiang’s parents refused her request. At first Xiao Jiang felt herself almost gone to pieces. However, after a long

talk with a school counsellor, she has come to know better: What counts/matters in the job market is knowledge and skill, not beautiful looks. Besides, she does not want to see her parents go broke because of her vanity. She has come to realize how silly

she had been.

In today’s society, the sense of security among the public seems to be on the decline. From ordinary farmhouses in rural areas to upscale residential communities in large cities, the common practice of leaving the door on the latch has become a thing of

the past, and in its place has emerged sophisticated anti-theft locks and smart electronic surveillance systems. It is against this background that a couple of Chinese providers of video surveillance products have sprung into existence. Statistics show that in

recent years these companies generated as much as billions of dollars in sales revenue. Their outstanding performance clearly demonstrates the huge market potential for security equipment products.However, huge market potential does not necessarily

stand for easy industry expansion, as these Chinese companies have come to realize. When they tried to enter overseas markets in 2019, they found substantial barriers standing in their way. A lack of patents held them back and overdependence on foreign

suppliers for microchips rendered them extremely vulnerable. These barriers, however, did not stop them from expansion. They invested heavily in research and development and gradually achieved self-reliance. With more and more components made by

themselves, chances are that these companies will become even more competitive in the future.

China has seen numerous changes over the past decades. One of the most striking in recent years is the way people make payments. Whether in big stores or on small markets, you will see a QR code displayed on the counter or stand. With a quick scan and a few

clicks on a smartphone, money is transferred from the buyer’s account to the seller’s. This mobile payment technology is now widely applied in business. Whether it’s buying grocery, purchasing car insurance, paying off bank loans, or paying overdue bills, you don’t

have to go to a bank to make the transaction. But not everyone is willing to discard the traditional way of payment. I, for one, am an exception. On the psychological side, I always feel afraid that a careless click might send the money into the wrong hands. On the

financial side, I fear I might lose the ability to bring my expenses under control and end up spending more than I can afford. I am used to getting by on a modest income. I will panic if I use up my salary before the next payday.

I acquired the habit of reading early in life. My mother, who once taught grade school, knows all too well that reading is not only a principal tool to boost academic performance but also plays a critical role in promoting a child’s intellectual growth. She used to read

to me before I could read on my own. As soon as I knew enough words, she assigned me a book to read every week. Before I proceeded to the next one, she would encourage me to summarize, in spoken or written words, what I had learned from it, and it was

through this practice that I expanded my knowledge of the world and perfected my language skills. For some time in my teens, I even harbored an ambition of becoming a professional writer. Over time, reading became not only a habit but a passion for me, so much

so that I ended up being a head librarian in the city library, working with and among books all day long.

The outcome of the winter campaign proved that the strategy adopted by our commander was correct. When our enemy assembled all their forces and took the gamble of pressing on all the way towards the east, he instructed us to bide our time and not to

engage the enemy. He predicted that with the coming of the severe winter and heavy snow, the enemy transportation vehicles would be slowed down and their equipment rendered useless. Sooner or later their supplies would run out. As it turned out, when the

temperature dropped to minus 20 degrees Celsius, the enemy soldiers, starved and frozen, could not pursue us any further. The freezing cold and heavy snow had taken their toll. Enemy soldiers limped their way through the snow and mud. It was then that our

commander ordered a counter-attack. The enemy were completely caught off guard. Severely weakened by the long march, they were unable to put up any resistance. To no one’s surprise, most enemy soldiers just threw down their arms. We won a decisive victory

that turned the tide of the war.

For thirty years now I have been studying my fellowmen. I do not know very much about them. I shrug my shoulders when people tell me that their first impressions of a person are always right. I think they must have small insight or great vanity. For my

own part I find that the longer I know people the more they puzzle me.These reflections have occurred to me because I read in this morning's paper that Edward Hyde Burton had died at Kobe. He was a merchant and he had been in business in Japan for

many years. I knew him very little, but he interested me because once he gave me a great surprise. Unless I had heard the story from his own lips, I should never have believed that he was capable of such an action. It was more startling because both in

appearance and manner he suggested a very definite type. Here if ever was a man all of a piece. He was a tiny little fellow, not much more than five feet four in height, and very slender, with white hair, a red face much wrinkled, and blue eyes. I suppose he

was about sixty when I knew him. He was always neatly and quietly dressed in accordance with his age and station.Though his offices were in Kobe, Burton often came down to Yokohama. I happened on one occasion to be spending a few days there,

waiting for a ship, and I was introduced to him at the British Club. We played bridge together. He played a good game and a generous one. He did not talk very much, either then or later when we were having drinks, but what he said was sensible. He had a

quiet, dry humour. He seemed to be popular at the club and afterwards, when he had gone, they described him as one of the best. It happened that we were both staying at the Grand Hotel and next day he asked me to dine with him. I met his wife, fat,

elderly, and smiling, and his two daughters. It was evidently a united and affectionate family. I think the chief thing that struck me about Burton was his kindliness. There was something very pleasing in his mild blue eyes. His voice was gentle; you could not

imagine that he could possibly raise it in anger; his smile was benign. Here was a man who attracted you because you felt in him a real love for his fellows. At the same time he liked his game of cards and his cocktail, he could tell with point a good and spicy

story, and in his youth he had been something of an athlete. He was a rich man and he had made every penny himself. I suppose one thing that made you like him was that he was so small and frail; he aroused your instincts of protection. You felt that he

could not bear to hurt a fly.

And it has taken over. If you work for a medium- to large-size company, chances are that you don't just wander in and out of work. You probably carry some kind of access card, electronic or otherwise, that allows you in and out of your place of work.
Maybe the security guard at the front desk knows your face and will wave you in most days, but the fact remains that the business you work for feels threatened enough to keep outsiders away via these "keys."It wasn't always like this. Even a decade ago,

most private businesses had a policy of free access. It simply didn't occur to managers that the proper thing to do was to distrust people.Look at the airports. Parents used to take children out to departure gates to watch planes land and take off. That's all

gone. Airports are no longer a place of education and fun; they are the most sophisticated o f security sites.With electronic X-ray equipment, we seem finally to have figured out a way to hold the terrorists, real and imagined, at bay; it was such a relief to

solve this problem that we did not think much about what such a state of affairs says about the quality of our lives. We now pass through these electronic friskers without so much as a sideways glance; the machines, and what they stand for, have won.

I’ve always been somebody who exerts a great deal of energy to get my realities to match my fantasies. I’m also pretty good at “getting by”—especially if you apply the increasingly common definition of the term, which has more to do with keeping up

appearances than with keeping things under control. So it wasn’t until recently that I realized I wasn’t having such a good time in New York anymore. Like a social smoker whose supposedly endearing desire to emulate Marlene Dietrich has landed her in a

cancer ward, I have recently woken up to the frightening fallout of my own romantic notions of life in the big city: I’m twenty-nine years old, and I am completely over my head in debt.

One way of summarizing the American position is to state that we value originality and independence more than the Chinese do. The contrast between our two cultures can also be seen in terms of the fears we both harbor. Chinese teachers are fearful

that if skills are not acquired early, they may never be acquired; there is, on the other hand, no comparable hurry to promote creativity. American educators fear that unless creativity has been acquired early, it may never emerge; on the other hand, skills

can be picked up later.

In 1812, Napoleon Bonaparte, Emperor of the French, led his Grand Army into Russia. He was prepared for the fierce resistance of the Russian people defending their homeland. He was prepared for the long march across Russian soil to Moscow. But

he was not prepared for the devastating enemy that met him there -- the raw, bitter, bleak Russian winter. In 1941, Adolf Hitler, leader of Nazi Germany, launched an attack against the Soviet Union, as Russia then was called. Hitler's military might was

unequaled. His war machine had mowed down resistance in most of Europe. Hitler expected a short campaign but, like Napoleon before him, was taught a painful lesson. The Russian winter again came to the aid of the Soviet soldiers.