It's common 【小题1】 (see) a barista (咖啡师) create coffee art, but it's a whole different ballgame doing the same thing with tea. Han Zheming has managed to perfect the skill, 【小题2】 (create) tea art in cups, or dian cha in Chinese, 【小题3】 used to be a ritual (仪式) during the Song Dynasty (960-1279).

Over the past six years, the 40-year-old Shanghai resident 【小题4】 (use) tea and spoons to create different patterns based on ancient paintings.

"It's like adding bells and whistles to tea and giving people a 【小题5】 (strong) sense of occasion, so drinking tea is more fun," Han says. It's also his intention 【小题6】 (bring) the old ritual back to modern life and have more people appreciate its charm. Dian cha in modern brewing enhances the taste of tea,

Han says. "It is similar to the foam on top of a cup of coffee, except that it 【小题7】 (consist) of tea rather than milk."

Chinese tea culture started to enjoy 【小题8】 (popular) during the Tang Dynasty (618-907) and flourished throughout the Song Dynasty, when tea had become a necessity for almost everyone, from nobles and scholars to common people, just like other indispensable items, such as rice, oil and salt, as suggested by Song politician and thinker Wang Anshi.

"As well as the poems, calligraphy and paintings that 【小题9】 (create) back then, I want more people to understand the items 【小题10】 (use) by people to drink tea, and the reasons behind the ways they prepared tea," he says.

Dunhuang’s long and glorious history represents its significance 【小题1】 a center of cultural and commercial exchange. Boasting sites with UNESCO-protected heritage status, Dunhuang possesses various murals, 【小题2】 cover an astonishing area of 45, 000 square meters. The subjects of the Dunhuang murals vary from 【小题3】 (religion) stories to scenes of everyday life. These images are full of life, 【小题4】 (reflect) the confidence and optimism of people from that time. But in the Ming Dynasty, trade routes changed 【小题5】 Dunhuang was less prosperous than before. It 【小题6】 (gradual) faded from memory.

This century is bringing Dunhuang to life through the Belt and Road Initiative. Once again, Dunhuang 【小题7】 (become) a global crossroads since it hosted hundreds of 【小题8】 (represent) from 51 countries for the Silk Road International Cultural Expo in 2017. 【小题9】 (give) that the theme of the Expo was to promote cultural exchange and 【小题10】 (strong) mutual cooperation between the countries along the Silk Road, Dunhuang was the ideal place.

Shanghai’s past and present meet in Xintiandi. Just twenty years ago, Xintiandi was a 【小题1】 (crowd) old community of houses known as shikumen, which means “stone gate.” Shanghai’s first shikumen 【小题2】 (build) in the mid-nineteenth century to accommodate thousands of refugees.

Construction of shikumen continued during the 1900s. Some were smaller than the 【小题3】 (origin) shikumen, while others were larger. At one point, there were almost 9,000 shikumen in Shanghai, and they filled more than half of the city’s housing area. During the 1990s, developers began to pull down aging shikumen and replace them 【小题4】 modern skyscrapers. Before long, however, Shanghai’s residents began to realize that the 【小题5】 (remain) shikumen were an important part of the city’s heritage and needed 【小题6】 (preserve) and restored.

Today, restored shikumen are among the special features of Xintiandi. Their exteriors (外部) open into restaurants, art 【小题7】 (gallery), boutiques, bars and cafes, many of 【小题8】 are open until late at night. As a result, Xintiandi is one of Shanghai’s 【小题9】 (hot) nightlife destinations and a magnet for tourists. As photographer Guo Changyao comments, “In the 21^st century, 【小题10】 you don’t go to Xintiandi, then you haven’t seen Shanghai.”