It looked just like another aircraft from the outside. The pilot told his young passengers that it was built in 1964. But appearances were deceptive, and the 13 students from Europe and the USA who boarded the aircraft were in for the flight of their lives.
    Inside, the area that normally had seats had become a long white tunnel. Heavily padded (填塞) from floor to ceiling, it looked a bit strange. There were almost no windows, but lights along the padded walls illuminated it. Most of the seats had been taken out, apart from a few at the back where the young scientists quickly took their places with a look of fear.
    For 12 months, science students from across the continents had competed to win a place on the flight at the invitation of the European Space Agency. The challenge had been to suggest imaginative experiments to be conducted in weightless conditions.
    For the next two hours, the flight resembled that of an enormous bird which had lost its reason, shooting upwards towards the heavens before rushing towards Earth. The invention was to achieve weightlessness for a few seconds.
    The aircraft took off smoothly enough. But any feelings that I and the young scientists had that we were on anything like a scheduled passenger service were quickly dismissed when the pilot put the plane into a 45-degree climb which lasted around 20 seconds. Then the engines cut out and we became weightless. Everything became confused and left or right, up or down no longer had any meaning. After ten seconds of free-fall descent (下降) the pilot pulled the aircraft out of its nosedive. The return of gravity was less immediate than its loss, but was still sudden enough to ensure that some students came down with a bump.
    Each time the pilot cut the engines and we became weightless, a new team conducted its experiment. First it was the Dutch who wanted to discover how it is that cats always land on their feet. Then the German team who conducted a successful experiment on a traditional building method to see if it could be used for building a further space station. The Americans had an idea to create solar sails that could be used by satellites.
    After two hours of going up and down in the lane doing their experiments, the predominant feeling was one of excitement rather than sickness. Most of the students thought it was an unforgettable experience and one they would be keen to repeat.

    The smooth landing of the shuttle (航天飞机) Discovery ended a flight that was successful in almost every respect but one: the dislodging of a big chunk of foam, like the one that doomed the Columbia. This flight was supposed to vault the shuttle fleet back into space after a prolonged grounding for repairs. But given the repeat of the very problem that two years of retooling was supposed to resolve, the verdict is necessarily mixed. (1) Once again, the space agency has been forced to put off the flight until it can find a solution to the problem, and no one seems willing to guess how long that may take.
    The Discovery astronauts performed superbly during their two-week mission, and the shuttle looked better than ever in some respects. (2) Space officials were justifiably happy that so much had gone well, despite daily worries over possible risks. The flight clearly achieved its prime objectives.
    The astronauts transferred tons of cargo to the international space station, which has been limping along overhead with a reduced crew and limited supplies carried up on smaller Russian spacecraft. (3) They replaced a broken device, repaired another and carted away a load of rubbish that had been left on the station, showing the shuttle can bring full loads back down from space.
    This was the most scrutinized shuttle flight ever, with the vehicle undergoing close inspection while still in orbit.(4) New sensing and photographic to look for potentially dangerous damage to the sensitive external skin proved valuable. A new back flip maneuver allowed station astronauts to photograph the shuttle’s underbelly, and an extra-long robotic arm enabled astronauts to see parts of the shuttle that were previously out of sight.
    (5) The flood of images and the openness in discussing its uncertainties about potential hazards sometimes made it appear that the shuttle was about to fall apart. In the end the damage was clearly tolerable. A much-touted spacewalk to repair the shuttle’s skin—the first of its kind—moved an astronaut close enough to pluck out some protruding material with his hand. Preliminary evidence indicates that Discovery has far fewer nicks and gouges than shuttles on previous flights, perhaps showing that improvements to reduce the shedding of debris from the external fuel tank have had some success.

That's enough, kids

　　It was a lovely day at the park and Stella Bianchi was enjoying the sunshine with her two children when a young boy, aged about four, approached her two-year-old son and pushed him to the ground.
　　"I'd watched him for a little while and my son was the fourth or fifth child he'd shoved." she says, "I went over to them, picked up my son, turned to the boy and said, firmly,' No, we don't push.'" What happened next was unexpected.
　　"The boy's mother ran toward me from across the park." Stella says. "I thought she was coming over to apologise, but instead she started shouting at me for 'disciplining her child'. All I did was let him know his behaviour was unacceptable. Was I supposed to sit back while her kid did whatever he wanted, hurting other children in the process?"
　　Getting your own children to play nice is difficult enough. Dealing with other people's children has become a minefield
    In my house, jumping on the sofa is not allowed. In my sister's house it's encouraged. For her, it's about kids being kids: "If you can't do it at three, when can you do it?"
　　Each of these philosophies is valid and, it has to be said, my son loves visiting his aunt's house. But I find myself saying "no" a lot when her kids are over at mine. That's OK between sisters but becomes dangerous territory when you're talking to the children of friends or acquaintances.
　　"Kids aren't all raised the same." agrees Professor Naomi White of Monash University. "But there's still an idea that they're the property of the parents. We see our children as an extension of ourselves, so if you're saying that my child is behaving inappropriately, then that's somehow a criticism of me."
　　In those circumstances, it's difficult to know whether to approach the child directly or the parent first. There are two schools of thought.
　　"I'd go to the first." says Andrew Fuller, author of Tricky Kids ,"Usually a quiet reminder that ' we don't do that here' is enough. Kids have finely tuned antennae (直觉）for how to behave in different settings."
　　He points out that bringing it up with the parent first may make them feel neglectful, which could cause problems. Of course, approaching the child first can bring its own headaches, too.
　　This is why White recommends that you approach the parents first. "Raise your concerns with the parents if they're there and ask them to deal with it." she says.
　　Asked how to approach a parent in this situation, psychologist Meredith Fuller answers: "Explain your needs as well as stressing the importance of the friendship. Preface your remarks with something like:‘I know you'll think I'm silly but in my house I don't want...'"
　　When it comes to situations where you're caring for another child. White is straightforward: "Common sense must prevail. If things don't go well then have a chat."
　　There're a couple of new grey areas. Physical punishment, once accepted from any adult, is no longer appropriate. "Now you can't do it without feeling uneasy about it." White says.
　　Men might also feel uneasy about dealing with other people's children. "Men feel nervous," White says. "A new set of considerations has come to the fore as part of the debate about how we handle children."
　　For Andrew Fuller, the child-centric nature of our society has affected everyone. "The rules are different now from when today's parents were growing up," he says. "Adults are scared of saying, ' Don't swear ', or asking a child to stand up on a bus. They're worried that there will be conflict if they point these things out-either from older children, or their parents."
　　He sees it as a loss of the sense of common public good and public courtesy (礼貌), and says that adults suffer from it as much as children.
　　Meredith Fuller agrees, "A code of conduct is hard to create when you're living in a world in which everyone is exhausted from overwork and lack of sleep, and a world in which nice people are perceived to finish last."
　　"It's about what I'm doing and what I need," Andrew Fuller says. "The days when a kid came home from school and said, ' I got into trouble ', and dad said, ' You probably deserved it', are over. Now the parents are charging up to the school to have a go at teachers."
　　This jumping to our children's defence is part of what fuels the "walking on eggshells" feeling that surrounds our dealings with other people's children. You know that if you remonstrate (劝诫) with the child, you're going to have to deal with the parents. It's admirable to be protective of our kids, but is it good?
　　"Children have to learn to negotiate the world on their own, within reasonable boundaries," White says. "I suspect that it's only certain sectors of the population doing the running to the school-better0educated parents are probably more likely to be too involved."
　　White believes our notions of a more child-centred society should be challenged. "Today we have a situation where, in many families, both parents work, so the amount of time children get from parents has diminished," she says.
　　"Also, sometimes when we talk about being child-centred, it's a way of talking about treating our children like commodities (商品). We ' re centred on them but in ways that reflect positively on us. We treat them as objects whose appearance and achievements are something we can be proud or , rather than serve the best interests of the children."
　　One way over-worked, under-resourced parents show commitment to their children is to leap to their defence. Back at the park, Bianchi's intervention (干预）on her son’s behalf ended in an undignified exchange of insulting words with the other boy's mother.
　　As Bianchi approached the park bench where she ' d been sitting, other mums came up to her and congratulated her on taking a stand. "Apparently the boy had a longstanding reputation for had behaviour and his mum for even worse behaviour if he was challenged."
　　Andrew Fuller doesn't believe that we should be afraid of dealing with other people's kids. "Look at kids that aren't your own as a potential minefield." he says. He recommends that we don't stay silent over inappropriate behaviour, particularly with regular visitors.

Gmail (Google Email) Notice

Subject:  Your Gmail account has been inactive for a long time
From:    “The Gmail Team” gmail-noreply@gmail. com
Time :     2008-06-26 14: 12: 15
To:        wanghaiyan@ 163. com

Hi there,
    We’ve noticed that you haven’t used your Gmail account, wanghaiyan@gmail. com, for quite some time. In order to make Gmail better for our users, we’ve added a lot of things in the last few months and we hope you’ll want to start using your account again.
    Stop worrying about storage (存储量).Your account now has 5000 megabytes (兆字节）of free storage and our plan is to continue growing your storage by giving you more space as we are able.
    The Gmail interface (界面）is now available in 12 languages. If you don’t see the language you want on this list, look for it in the future because we’re going to keep adding more.
    We’re still working hard every day to build for you the best email service around. But to keep Gmail great for our users, we may have to close inactive accounts after 9 months. So, we hope you’ll give us another chance. To log in (登录) to your Gmail account，just visit: http://gmail. google. com.

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