Topic Reading-Vol.4826-7/11/2025

Dear MEL Topic Readers, 

The self-drive tuk-tuks transforming travel in Sri Lanka

A tuk-tuk is a three-wheeled taxi popular in Southeast and South Asia, especially in Thailand and India. Tuk-tuks are widely used as taxis in urban areas as a conventional and economical transport for residents and tourists. In those places, thanks to the smartphone map, motorcycle rental is becoming popular among foreign tourists. Then what about renting a tuk-tuk? It allows you to travel and stop wherever and whenever you want for yourself, and maybe your travel companion. Such a service became available in Sri Lanka. Just like renting your spare room or apartment, some tuk-tuk owners are renting their three-wheel vehicles when they aren’t in use. You’ll need an international driving permit for booking, so that the renter can organize a local driving permit. Once you book a tuk-tuk online like a car rental, your tuk-tuk will come to your hotel. After getting a brief driving lesson, off you go!  

You may be hailed by other tourists for a ride, too. What an extraordinary experience!

Read the article about how this new service emerged in Sri Lanka.

https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20250618-drive-your-own-tuk-tuk-in-sri-lanka

Topic Reading-Vol.4825-7/10/2025

Dear MEL Topic Readers, 

She left her home in California to live on a cruise ship for 15 years

Villa Vie Odyssey is a 24,000-ton, 200-meter-long residential cruise ship where people can live aboard and travel around the world. Unlike ordinary cruise ships that sail passengers for days, weeks, or months, she accommodates just hundreds of “residents” who purchased their cabins and take them to various destinations around the world for as long as 15 years. The residents purchase their cabin like a condominium and then pay monthly fees for food and drinks, Wi-Fi, medical visits, weekly housekeeping, and bi-weekly laundry service. They can enjoy a continuous 3.5-year journey around the world while engaging with the other 500 or so residents on board. Some residents stay on the ship just for months, while others intend to live on board until the end of the voyage. Once onboard, you can enjoy watching the ocean and sky, feeling the ocean breeze, and bathing in the sunlight on the deck while checking what the next stop will be like. It may be more vibrant and entertaining than living alone in a house or a quiet care home on the ground. Also, if you are a remote worker, living on a residential cruise ship is just like renting a private, full-service office at sea. Since housing prices have soared in major markets, buying a cabin on a residential cruise ship might be a good option.

Read the article and learn about what life is like on a residential cruise ship for years.

https://edition.cnn.com/2025/06/26/travel/villa-vie-odyssey-cruise-ship-15-years

Topic Reading-Vol.4824-7/9/2025

Dear MEL Topic Readers, 

BMI is B-A-D, a new study suggests. Here’s a better way to measure weight

Body Mass Index (BMI) is a value from the mass and height of a person, which is defined as the body mass divided by the square of the body height, and is expressed in units of kg/m². A BMI between 25 and 29.9 is considered overweight, and a BMI greater than 30 is considered obese. However, since BMI doesn’t account for body composition, like muscle, fat, or bone. So, someone with a high percentage of body fat could have the same BMI as a person whose height and weight are the same but very muscular. Also, BMI neither distinguishes between fat around organs and under the skin nor age, sex, or ethnicity. In order to provide person-specific health advice, Bioelectrical Impedance Analysis (BIA) measures the individual’s body fat, lean muscle, and water weight by using undetectable electric currents. With such information, medical or health experts can give more specific, tailor-made suggestions to improve your health.

Read the article and learn how BIA works to measure your body composition.

https://edition.cnn.com/2025/06/24/health/bmi-versus-body-fat-wellness

Topic Reading-Vol.4823-7/8/2025

Dear MEL Topic Readers, 

Will a dice-playing robot eventually make you tea and do your dishes?

For many years, robots have been working in factories to do tasks programmed, such as attaching parts, drilling holes, and moving things. Recently, robots have been used in warehouses and distribution centers to load and unload trucks, move pallets, and pick and pack items. Some of them use sensors, AI, and machine learning to adapt to changing environments and requirements. Robots with embodied AI can see, sense, recognize things around them, and act accordingly to changing situations. Then, how soon will we see robots at home to do or help with household chores, look after babies, or assist seniors? Since home environments vary widely and change quickly, it is difficult to collect enough data to pretrain robots to perform tasks in such dynamic environments that people live in. However, even though today’s AI robots are still years away from being able to perform household tasks as flexibly and safely as required, they can learn quickly and better in the coming years. Imagine that AI robots were newborns. It would be faster for them to become capable of performing household tasks than human newborns.

Read the article and think when AI robots will be sold at home appliance stores.

https://edition.cnn.com/business/alpha-bot-humanoid-robots-china-embodied-ai-hnk-spc

Topic Reading-Vol.4822-7/7/2025

Dear MEL Topic Readers, 

How China made electric vehicles mainstream

China is the world’s largest automobile and EV country. Over 30 million new cars were sold in 2024 alone, more than the combined sales of the US and Europe. Among the new cars sold that year, over six million were battery-only vehicles (BEVs) and around 4.5 million were plug-in hybrid vehicles (PHVs). Combined, about 10 million electric vehicles, more than the EV sales in all the other countries combined. While other developed countries are seeing slower EV sales in recent years, China’s EV sales are growing fast. In fact, German, US, and Japanese automakers have somehow slowed down their EV sales projections. How has China become the leading EV country in the world? The price is one thing. The price tags of entry-level EVs are as low as those of conventional gasoline-powered vehicles. Also, government subsidies and incentives for EV and battery manufacturers and charging stations are quite substantial. In addition, registration and running costs are both much cheaper for EVs than those of conventional vehicles. Government’s strategies, commitment, incentives, and subsidies are all there in China to develop the industry in just a decade or so. The fast-growing industry is facing an overcapacity problem.

Read the article and learn about how China has become the leader in EV sales.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c2d5ld8y8pwo

Topic Reading-Vol.4821-7/6/2025

Dear MEL Topic Readers, 

North Korea just opened a beach resort for 20,000 people. But who will visit?

Started in 1998, North Korea allowed South Korean tourists to visit Mount Kumgang, a 1,638- high mountain on the east coast of the country. Hundreds of thousands of tourists visited there each year until it was closed in 2008 when a South Korean tourist was shot in a restricted military zone. Last month, the secretive authoritarian country opened a new beach resort, the Wonsan-Kalma Coastal Tourist Zone, that is designed to welcome foreign visitors. The supreme leader Kim Jong-Un himself appeared at the inauguration event with his family and cut the ribbon. The Russian ambassador and staff also attended the ceremony to show their friendship with one of their remaining few allies. Though the resort is intended to earn foreign currencies, only a limited number of Russian tour groups are granted permission to visit the beach resort at the moment. Even though this newly opened resort looks no different from other beach resorts in the world, curious travellers might be interested in spending time and enjoying the services in one of the most secretive countries in the world.

Read the article and think if you’re interested in visiting North Korea’s beach resort.

https://edition.cnn.com/2025/06/26/travel/north-korea-kalma-beach-resort-tourism-intl-hnk

Topic Reading-Vol.4820-7/5/2025

Dear MEL Topic Readers,

More than a third of this country’s population has applied to relocate

Located about midway between Australia and Hawaii, Tuvalu is an island country in the Polynesian subregion of the Pacific Ocean. Around 10,000 people live in the land areas of only 26 km² on three reef islands and six atolls. Tuvalu’s average elevation is just two meters above sea level, and the highest elevation is only 4.6 meters. As sea level rises, the island nation is predicted to become uninhabitable by the end of the century. When Australia opened a window for Tuvalians to apply for 280 permanent residency visas in June, over 4,000 Tuvalians applied for the visa scheme. The winners will be chosen by a random ballot in the next six months. Tuvalu is now trying to recreate everything they have, land, history, culture, and governmental functions, into a digital space. Also, Australia has committed to recognizing Tuvalu as an independent sovereign country even after its land disappears into the sea. But will all the residents be relocated to other places in time? There are other low-lying places in the world whose residents will also need to be relocated.

Read the article and learn how desperate Tuvaluans are to move to higher lands.

https://edition.cnn.com/2025/06/27/australia/tuvalu-relocation-visa-australia-climate-intl-hnk