A: I think Taiwan’s “keep trash off the ground” program is pretty good. Before, everyone used to put their garbage in collection points. Even though garbage trucks would come and take it away, the places the rubbish was sitting were dirty, and they stank.
B: But the current system can be rather inconvenient, too. You have to be home when the garbage truck comes so that you can throw the trash out. What if you are at work when it does?
A: If your apartment building has security guards, they will take the trash out for you. You put the rubbish in a wheelie bin on the first floor, and when the time comes the guards will take it out.
Photo: Tung Chen-kuo, Liberty Times 照片:自由時報記者佟振國
B: In the apartment I was in when I was living abroad, there was a small garbage chute door set into the wall on each floor. When you opened it up you would place your garbage bag inside and then close it, and it would tumble down a chute to a wheelie bin on the first floor.
A:我覺得台灣這個「垃圾不落地」政策還蠻好的,以前是大家把垃圾堆在一個定點,雖然垃圾車會來收,可是放垃圾的地方都會變得又髒又臭。
B: 可是這樣也很不方便,垃圾車來的時候你一定要在家才能倒,如果那時候要上班怎麼辦?
A: 如果是住有大樓管理員的公寓,他們會幫忙倒。你平常就把垃圾放到樓下的垃圾子母車裡,管理員到時候會把它拖出去。
B: 我在國外住的公寓,每層樓牆上有個小拉門,拉開後把包好的垃圾放進去,門一關,它就會沿著管道滾到樓下的垃圾子母車。
(Translated by Paul Cooper, Taipei Times/台北時報林俐凱 )
Audio recordings for Speak Up! dialogues will be suspended until further notice due to the pandemic.
South Korea’s famous kimchi is falling victim to climate change, with scientists, farmers and manufacturers saying the quality and quantity of the napa cabbage that is pickled to make the ubiquitous dish is suffering due to rising temperatures. Napa cabbage thrives in cooler climates, and is usually planted in mountainous regions where temperatures during the key growing summer season once rarely rose above 25 degrees Celsius. Studies show that warmer weather brought about by climate change is now threatening these crops, so much so that South Korea might not be able to grow napa cabbage one day due to the intensifying heat. “We
It’s widely recognized that there are far more right-handed people than left-handed people in the world. Being right-handed simply means preferring to use one’s right hand for tasks that involve only one hand, such as writing and eating. But have you ever wondered about the possible reasons behind the global dominance of the right hand over the left? As with many complex biological questions, multiple factors appear to be at play. First, one reason seems to be genetics. __1__ Therefore, the global dominance of right-handedness is something that has been passed down through many generations of humans. Next,
On blazing hot summer days, fresh ingredients and cool refreshments straight from a refrigerator feel like nothing short of a miracle. However, chilled foods didn’t begin with modern refrigerators. In fact, the origin of refrigeration precedes the invention of this now-indispensable appliance by centuries. Initially, the quest for refrigeration was motivated more by the desire to cool beverages than to preserve food. The ancient Greeks and Romans, for instance, used snow stored in insulated pits to chill wine. Around the fourth century BC, the Persians made a significant stride in refrigeration techniques when they devised the yakhchal. Fashioned from
Continued from yesterday(延續自昨日) https://www.taipeitimes.com/News/lang Finally, cultural influence also plays a role in which hand people prefer. Historically, items that require physical manipulation have been designed for right-handed use. For example, tools like scissors and musical instruments are often constructed with right-handers in mind, making it difficult for left-handers to use them. __4__ While these factors offer some explanation, they remain speculative. The precise reasons for the global prevalence of right-handed people continue to be debated. Nevertheless, left-handedness will remain a phenomenon of great curiosity among scientists and researchers for many years to come. 最後,文化影響也在人們偏好哪一隻手上扮演一角。歷史上,需要用到肢體操作的物品都被設計來供右手使用。舉例來說,像是剪刀、樂器等工具常常就是考慮到右撇子而打造的,造成左撇子難以使用這些工具。因此,許多天生就是左撇子的人可能就必須透過學習使用右手來適應。 雖然這些因素都提供了一些解釋,但它們仍是推測而已。全球右撇子如此普及,確切的原因仍持續被爭論著。不過,在未來的許多年裡,左撇子依然會是科學家和研究人員相當好奇的一個現象。 What Did You Learn? (A) Specifically, different areas of