My parents grew up during the Depression(大萧条) attending small country churches. At the close of Christmas Eve services, each child was given a brown paper bag containing an apple, an orange, nuts and several chocolates.

Years later, whenever Dad recalled that tradition, his eyes shone reliving the memory. My mother didn’t share his enthusiasm. She always said the chocolates tasted cheap and old.

Cheap chocolates or not, the paper bags with goodies were an event. Gifts of any sort during the Depression were rare, especially in large farm families with seven children.

When our children were young and we were home for Christmas one year, Mom and Dad gave each of the grandkids a brown paper bag holding an apple, an orange, nuts and several chocolates. When we finished the 8-hour drive home after the holiday, there was a message waiting on the phone when we walked in the door. “Your ungrateful kids left their apples and oranges in the back of our refrigerator. No more fruit for them!” Grandpa and Grandma were joking, of course, but still there was a degree of disrespect in the kids leaving behind thoughtfully chosen gifts.

But the paper bag didn’t have a context for our children. They had never known fruit to be a scarcity(缺乏). They didn’t appreciate the gift because they had never experienced the need the gift was meant to fill.

The same is true of Christmas today. We don’t appreciate the true gift of the season because we don’t understand the need the gift was given to fill.

It’s not like we don’t know we have needs. We know them, all right—patience, love, self-control, strength, courage, faithfulness, forgiveness—it’s just that we have become experts at numbing(使麻木) ourselves to our needs.

The true gift of the season is a perfect fit for our every need. When a gift like apples and oranges fits a need, there is a cheerful satisfaction. When the gift of a Christmas tree fits a need, there is the joy of Christmas.

Chinese culture values family bonds very much. Family members don't just gather during the holidays .In fact they often live under one roof all year round. 【小题1】. Families in the East and West are very different from each other.

In most East Asian cultures, extended families are common. 【小题2】 According to the

In many Western countries, most families are nuclear families （小家庭）. These are solely made up of children and their parents.

Additionally, the duties parents have toward their children can also differ.【小题3】.

It's normal for parents to pay for their children's college, help them find a job, or buy them an apartment. Chinese adults also follow their parents' opinions when making major life decisions, more often than not.

In most Western countries, however, kids usually move out of the house after they turn 18.

【小题4】. Also, if they choose to keep living with their parents after becoming an adult, it can be seen by some as a failure on their part.

While the East cares more about close family bonds, the West values privacy and independence. 【小题5】. Families will always be a source of love, warmth, and care for people around the world.

Dressed in a white gown with pens in his pocket, 53-year-old Diarra Boubacar was welcomed by the Traditional Chinese Medicine Hospital in the Xindu district of Chengdu, Sichuan, as a specially invited expert.

Boubacar grew up in a small town in south-central Mali, a country in West Africa, which finds it challenging to provide affordable healthcare to its 19 million people.

Boubacar first came to China in 1984 on a student exchange program majoring in Chinese language and culture at Beijing Language and Culture University. After the two-year course, he decided to study traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) at Guangzhou University of Chinese Medicine.

Since TCM is also related to Chinese history and culture, students have to study ancient Chinese literature as most of the medical texts were written in ancient Chinese characters. “That’s a subject even the Chinese find difficult; so think of me, a foreigner!” he said.

What inspired him to continue were the similarities between TCM and traditional African medicine, such as using certain herbs to treat the same diseases and letting out blood.

However, the greatest challenge for him was to convince people that even though he was a foreigner, he could still treat them effectively with TCM.

In 1997, he became the first foreigner to receive a doctoral (博士的) degree in acupuncture (针灸) from Chengdu University of TCM.

Besides his work in a private hospital, Boubacar has also been helping patients in remote villages in Sichuan and Yunnan provinces. A major part of his work was treating leprosy (麻风病) patients.

Due to his work in the community, Boubacar is also known as the “African Norman

“I want to build not only a hospital but also an educational center where people can come and learn about Chinese medicine,” he said. After 10 years, his dream is becoming a reality.

“If they learn TCM, they will be able to treat people in Africa in a very cheap and effective way,” said Boubacar.