Translation

Translation

Cixi was utterly fearful of foreigners just as she was extremely arrogant toward her own countrymen. She stopped for a long time in Henan and halted in Baoding for quite a few days before finally arriving in Beijing. It was said that an amusing episode took place during this long and drawn-out journey. When a local official offered a monkey to her as a gift, she was so pleased that she ordered a yellow mandarin jacket to the monkey. Later, she was told that some officials were complaining that people were considered less worthy than a monkey, then she realized that her order had been indeed a litter too whimsical. So she gave another order granting each of the escorting officials a yellow mandarin jacket. Upon the receipt of such an unusual favor, the officials did not know whether they should thank Cixi or rather the monkey for it.

慈禧对外国人万分惧怕，正像她对国人无比傲慢一样。她在河南停留了很长一段时间，到了保定又逗留多日，好不容易才回到北京。据说，在这漫长的旅途中还发生了一件趣事。一位官员送给慈禧一只猴子，她颇为高兴，竟让人给那只猴子穿黄马褂。后来得知有的官员发出了“人不如猴”的感慨，慈禧才发现自己的决定有些荒唐，于是又命令给随行官员每人一件黄马褂。得知如此殊荣之后，大家真不知道该感谢慈禧还是感谢那只猴子。

Mandarin, the official language of China, is suddenly hot in American schools. As China becomes the world’s leading economy in this century, both public and pr ivate schools are scrambling to add Mandarin to their roster of foreign languages or expand Chinese language programs already in place. By some estimates, as many as 50,000 children nationwide are taking Mandarin in school. The device to develop Chinese-language programs has met some difficulties. A shortage of trained, credentialed teachers has made it difficult for some schools to join the race. When schools need to employ teachers, they often recruit them from China, which is hidden trouble for a culture clash.

中国的官方语言普通话在美国的学校中突然热起来。由于中国经济在本世纪的领先地位，美国的公立和私立学校纷纷在外语教学中加入汉语这一科，或将已有的汉语教学项目进行扩展。据统计，在美国的学校中，有5万名孩子在学习汉语。推动汉语项目的发展不是没有遇到困难。由于缺乏受过专业训练、持有证书的教师，一些学校很难加入汉语教学的竞争。当学校聘用教师时，它们通常直接从中国将他们招来，这种方式为文化冲突埋下了隐患。

The word-famous Silk Road is a series of routes that connect the East and the West. The Silk Road extends more than 6,000 kilometers and gets its name from ancient China’s silk trade. The trade on the Silk Road has played a very important role in the development of civilizations in China, South Asia, Europe and the Middle East. It was through the Silk Road that the four great inventions of ancient China—papermaking, gunpowder, compass and printing—had been introduced to other parts of the world. Similarly, China’s silk, tea and porcelain had also been spread all over the world through it. The exchange of material culture is bilateral. Europe, in return, had exported various commodities and plants through the Silk Road, meeting the need of Chinese market.

闻名于世的丝绸之路是一系列连接东西方的路线。丝绸之路延伸6000多公里，得名于古代中国的丝绸贸易。丝绸之路上的贸易在中国、南亚、欧洲和中东文明发展中发挥了重要作用。