(Written by Zhaoxian, a teenager in Beijing)

          My mother and I went to my aunt's home last weekend.  She's my mother's older sister and there are three other members in her family: my uncle, my cousin, and their dog named Dick.  He's a lovely spaniel with a shining coat of yellow fur.  A small dog, he has a pair of beautiful eyes - black and very shiny.

          He uses his eyes to get what he wants.  When I'm eating, he's always hungry, too, so he pleads with me lovingly through those eyes.  If he finds that I'm not paying attention to him, he'll try to engage me with a yip, and if I turn my head toward him, he'll come toward me happily.

          After smelling my shoes and trying to lick my feet, he'll put his front paws in my lap and sway his tail enthusiastically.  He looks at me with his mouth open and his red tongue hanging out.  Somehow he knows that I won't be able to refuse his request if he stares right in my eyes without blinking, and he always wins.  "Here you are, puppy", I say softly, having no choice.

          Dick is a wonderful dog, but his memory isn't very good.  He often makes the same mistakes no matter how often we try to teach him.  "Don't bark at night", we say, "You shouldn't urinate on the floor", and "You should be quiet when we're eating."  Those are some of the rules.  We've been teaching him for months, and the only one he's learned is the one about urinating.

          While we were talking in the living room during the visit, Dick wandered into the bedroom and came out with a CD in his mouth.  My mom saw him and shouted that he was eating a CD, and my uncle and cousin ran to get it from him.  Dick saw them coming and quickly hid himself in his favorite hiding place under the bed.

          When my uncle stooped to get him, he went out the other side, but my cousin was there and grabbed his hind legs.  He continued to hold the CD firmly in his mouth until my uncle wrestled it away from him saying, "I've told you many, many times:  you're not to eat a CD!"

          Dick stared at us blankly - as if nothing had happened - and then shook his body to rearrange his fur.

          With the excitement over, we all came out of the bedroom and my uncle cleaned the CD and put it on a bureau so that it would be out of reach. 

          That evening during dinner we all heard Dick yelping in the bedroom and everything stopped as we looked in that direction.  A few seconds later, Dick emerged slowly.  He was holding the CD in his mouth excitedly, his tail wagging frenziedly while he swung his small rump happily.

          What could we do, but remove it once again.  No one thought of punishing him as he was so happy.

          Maybe he's the smart one in the family.

          He's certainly a wonderful dog.         

(Written by Hu Ao in Shanghai)

          The longer I live, the more I realize the impact that failure has had on my life.

          Failures, to me, are more important than successes.  Although the latter bring pleasure, the feeling lasts only a short time while failures tend to affect my whole life, and that, I hope, will be a very long time.

          Failing to measure up doesn't make me happy or satisfied, and that's exactly the impetus I need; it makes me want to change, to make my life better.  I learn through my mistakes, analyze what went wrong, and work on improving my skills.

          Failure has taught me some of the steps I must take to become better, a more easy-going person.

          When I was in primary school, I always became arrogant when I knew the answers before the others, and my attitude made the others hate me.  Later - when I'd failed an examination and needed their help - they refused to have anything to do with me.

          I was very unhappy about being shunned and asked my grandmother why it had happened.  She told me quietly, "My boy, people may not remember exactly what you've done or what you've said, but they will always remember how you made them feel.  You are a smart boy, but you must have done some wrong things in your classes.  Think about that and do what you  should do."

          "But I don't know what I did that was wrong", I said without thinking.

          Grandma didn't respond immediately, but after a few minutes, she stood up and took a tape recorder from a bookshelf.  "Take this to class tomorrow", she said, "It will tell you what you should do."

          I knew she was very serious and nodded my head, wiping the teams from my face.

          The following day, I hid the small tape recorder in my book bag when I went to school, and it recorded everything that happened.  When the classes were over, I rushed from the classroom and at the corner of the schoolyard I pressed the key.

          It was shocking to hear some of the things I had said.  I could hardly believe that I was the boy who had said them, and I sat on the ground with my head dropping between my knees.  I hated what I'd done and knew what I should do.

          On the days that followed, I apologized to each of my classmates and began the process of changing my attitude toward others.  That wasn't easy for a 12-year-old boy.

          Failures are very valuable lessons in life.  We can't change our past.  We can't suddenly develop a talent if it's not basically there.  We have to accept that some things can't be changed.  However, we can benefit through experiencing failure if we study its causes, make the necessary changes, and then try again.