A French woman has been charged with murdering eight newborn babies and her husband with hiding the bodies after skeletal remains were found in a village.

VOICE ONE:
Welcome to THIS IS AMERICA in VOA Special English. I’m Steve Ember.
VOICE TWO:
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And I’m Shirley Griffith. This week on our program, we find out how some people will be welcoming two thousand ten.
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VOICE ONE:
So what do Americans do New Year’s Eve? Hillary Huesman is from South Carolina.
HILLARY HUESMAN: “I get dressed up. I look to go out. I’m usually single, and that is usually not a problem. This year I’m still making my plans. I haven’t quite confirmed them yet, but probably a hotel ballroom-type scenario, black-tie event.”
At a black-tie event, the men dress in tuxedos or dark suits and the women wear fancy dresses.
Hotels in many cities have special deals for New Year’s Eve: dinner, Champagne and a party. Then people get a room for the night. That way, no one has to worry about drinking and driving home.
VOICE TWO:
On New Year’s Eve, some communities in the United States hold what are called First Night celebrations. These are events where no alcohol is served. The celebrations include things like music performances, art displays and fireworks.
Boston, Massachusetts, held the first First Night celebration in nineteen seventy-six. Since then the idea has spread internationally.
VOICE ONE:
Some people might not have firm plans yet for New Year’s Eve, but others know exactly what they will be doing. Joe is a twenty-one year old student at the University of Virginia.
JOE: “I don’t really do a whole lot. I normally just spend time with family, go out to eat, hang out, wait for the ball to drop on TV.”
Joe is talking about America’s best known celebration on New Year’s Eve. Hundreds of thousands of people crowd into Times Square in New York. They count down the final seconds to midnight as they watch a brightly lit ball slide down a pole on top of a tall building.
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The first New Year’s Eve ball drop in Times Square took place more than a century ago. The ball was made of iron and wood and it was lit with one hundred lights. Today the ball is larger and covered in more than two thousand crystals.
VOICE TWO:
Two other traditions for welcoming the New Year are a midnight kiss and an attempt to sing a song that almost no one knows.
“Auld Lang Syne,” by the eighteenth century Scottish poet Robert Burns, is a song about friends and remembering times long ago.
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A new year is a good time to start fresh — and, for some people, a time to seek good fortune in the year ahead.
In the American South, for example, people might prepare a dish known as “Hoppin’ John.” They make it with black-eyed peas and ingredients like bacon, rice and vegetables. Eating it at the New Year is thought to bring good luck.
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VOICE ONE:
On New Year’s Day, some families in the United States invite friends and relatives to an open house. Jill Cooper from Santa Fe, New Mexico, gave us a description.
JILL COOPER: “They’re family parties, big open house-y kind of parties with lots of cookies — too many cookies –and punch and eggnog. And houses are decorated, and you see your friends and you bop from party to party.”
But that is not all she and her family like to do to celebrate the New Year.
JILL COOPER: “We try to do something outside ’cause we live in Santa Fe and we live right in the mountains. Everybody wants to go for a wonderful hike and start off with fresh air and all the things we’re going to have in our lives the whole next year. And then we drop in on parties.”
VOICE TWO:
Some families like to take it easy on January first and enjoy a quiet day of rest. Twenty year old Malia is from Virginia.
MALIA: “I usually sleep in because we stay up late on New Year’s Eve. And my family, we usually eat the leftovers of the desserts that we make for New Year’s, or New Year’s Eve and stuff, so. But, just relax, mainly.”
But New Year’s Day is anything but a day of rest for John Worster (WOO-ster), who lives in Idaho.
JOHN WORSTER: “I offer Catholic Mass, ’cause I’m a Catholic priest by profession, and so it is actually the feast day of Mary, Mother of God. And so we begin our Catholic way of understanding new year by just thanking God for Jesus’ mother, Mary. On New Year’s Day, after church we’ll go out and sit in the goose pit and do some hunting for Canada geese and also ducks.”
VOICE ONE:
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On New Year’s morning, millions of television viewers watch the Tournament of Roses Parade in Pasadena, California. The parade includes marching bands and horseback riders. But the parade is most famous for its motorized floats. They come in all shapes and sizes, but they are all covered with flowers.
In Southern California, the weather on New Year’s Day might be cold. But the skies are usually sunny and dry, even as other parts of the country might experience snowstorms.
A local group created the Tournament of Roses festival in Pasadena in eighteen ninety. The festival later expanded to include the parade and a big game in college football.
The champion teams from two college athletic conferences play in the Rose Bowl Stadium. This Friday, the Buckeyes of Ohio State University will play the University of Oregon Ducks.
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VOICE TWO:
Will you be making any New Year’s resolutions? Hillary Huesman from South Carolina has a few in mind.
HILLARY HUESMAN: “I’d like to solidify my romantic relationship, lose twenty-eight pounds. I’d like to travel a lot more in twenty-ten. Two thousand nine was a long year — struggled financially, like most of America. So I’m looking for prosperity in twenty-ten.”
VOICE ONE:
Malia from Virginia does not make too many resolutions. She says she does not want to disappoint herself when she fails to keep them. Joe, the University of Virginia student, is of a similar mind.
JOE: “I’m not a believer in resolutions for New Year’s. I think that resolutions come when they need to throughout the year, when you decide that someone needs a change.”
VOICE TWO:
What about John Worster, the Catholic priest?
JOHN WORSTER: “I make a New Year’s resolution every year and usually by the third or fourth of January it’s already been broken, so…(Laughs).
REPORTER: “What kind of resolutions are those?”
JOHN WORSTER: “Oh, usually to lead a healthier lifestyle by eating better food and not drinking so much, so … (Laughs)”
VOICE ONE:
Jamar Negron, a high school student from New Jersey, has a few resolutions for two thousand ten:
JAMAR NEGRON: “I’m a fencer, so my New Year’s resolution is just to become better at fencing. And better in the general sense: become better in schoolwork, become a better person, become a better writer — become as best as I can be in all aspects of my life.”
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VOICE TWO:
Holiday planning can be difficult when business has to come before pleasure.
We did interviews near the Capitol building here in Washington. One of the people we met happened to be the wife of a newly elected senator. Jill Cooper is married to Tom Udall, a Democrat from New Mexico who entered the Senate this past January.
When we talked to her earlier this month, their plans for the New Year were still open.
JILL COOPER: “There was a chance that we would go on a trip to India and Afghanistan, but apparently we’re not doing that. Since he’s in the Senate and we don’t know what’s going to happen with the health care bill, he may not even be home. If we’re home, we’ll probably have dinner with friends.”
VOICE ONE:
We give the last word to Jamar, the high school student from New Jersey, and his hopes for two thousand ten.
JAMAR NEGRON: “Prosperity. Strength. Confidence. Equality. Good fortune. Goodwill. That everything will work out for the better. That I’ll leave no stone unturned, and that I’m able to go to sleep at night with no regrets at what I’ve done.”
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VOICE TWO:
Our program was written by Nancy Steinbach and Mario Ritter and produced by Caty Weaver. Tell us your resolutions and hopes for two thousand ten, and what you will be doing New Year’s Eve. Post your comments at voaspecialenglish.com — where you can also find transcripts, MP3s and podcasts of our programs. I’m Shirley Griffith.
VOICE ONE:
And I’m Steve Ember. We wish you all happiness and good fortune in the New Year, and hope will join us again next time for THIS IS AMERICA in VOA Special English.

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Welcome to THE MAKING OF A NATION — American history in VOA Special English.
President Abraham Lincoln led the Union of northern states in four years of civil war against the southern Confederacy. But he did not live to see the end of the war. He did not live to see the nation re-united. He was assassinated in April of eighteen sixty-five.
This week in our series, Shep O’Neal and Maurice Joyce tell what happened after Lincoln died.
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Almost immediately, officials began planning details of the president’s funeral. They asked Missus Lincoln where she wanted her husband buried. At first, she said Chicago. That was where the Lincolns were going to live after they left the White House.
Then she said the Capitol building in Washington. A tomb had been built there for America’s first President, George Washington. But it had never been used.
Finally, she remembered a country cemetery they had visited. At the time, her husband had said: “When I am gone, lay my remains in some quiet place like this.” So Missus Lincoln decided that the president’s final resting place would be in the quiet, beautiful Oak Ridge Cemetery outside their home town of Springfield, Illinois.
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For several days after Lincoln’s assassination, his body lay in the East Room of the White House. The room was open to the public all day. Next, the body was taken to the Capitol building. Again, the public could come to say goodbye. Then the body was put on a special train for the trip back to Illinois.
Four years earlier, President-elect Lincoln had traveled by train from Illinois to Washington. He stopped to make speeches in cities along the way. Now, on this sad return trip, the train stopped at those same cities:  Baltimore. Philadelphia. New York. Cleveland. Indianapolis. Chicago.
VOICE ONE:
In every town, people lined the railroad. They stood silently, with tears in their eyes, as the train moved slowly past. Farmers working in the fields saw the train and dropped to their knees in prayer. For the wise man who had led the Union through four years of bloody civil war — Father Abraham — was dead.
Churches throughout the country held memorial services. Ministers told their people that God had taken Lincoln because the president had completed the job God had given him. He had brought peace to the Union, and freedom to all men.
VOICE TWO:
The final service was at the cemetery outside Springfield. It ended with the words from Lincoln’s second inaugural speech.
“With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right — as God gives us to see the right — let us strive on to finish the work we are in. Let us heal the nation’s wounds. Let us do all possible to get and keep a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.”
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While the nation mourned Lincoln’s death, federal officials investigated his assassination. The man who had shot Lincoln in Ford’s Theater was an actor, John Wilkes Booth. He had fled the theater after the murder. The government offered a reward of one hundred thousand dollars to anyone who captured Booth and his helpers.
The investigation produced the names of several people who were friends of Booth. One was John Surratt. Like Booth, he supported the southern Confederacy during the Civil War. Another was David Herold, a young man who worked in a store in Washington. Others were George Atzerodt, Lewis Paine, Sam Arnold, and Michael O’Laughlin.
Most of these men had stayed at a house owned by John Surratt’s mother, Mary.
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One by one, in the days following Lincoln’s death, these people were arrested. Anyone else who might have had a part in the plot was seized. Soon, hundreds of suspects were being held in jails in and around Washington.
At the end of a week, only two of the plotters were still free: David Herold and John Wilkes Booth.
Booth broke his leg when he jumped from the presidential box to the stage at Ford’s Theater. A few hours later, he and Herold stopped at the home of a Doctor Samuel Mudd. They reportedly gave the doctor false names. They asked him to fix Booth’s broken leg.
Doctor Mudd agreed. And he let the two men sleep at his home. Federal troops chasing the assassins arrested the doctor. They accused him of being part of the plot.
VOICE ONE:
John Wilkes Booth and David Herold ran and hid for six days. They crossed the Potomac River from Maryland into Virginia. Finally, twelve days after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, soldiers found the two men. They were hiding in a tobacco barn near the town of Port Royal.
Herold agreed to surrender. He came out of the barn with his hands in the air. He shouted again and again that he was innocent.
Booth refused to come out. The soldiers set fire to the barn.
VOICE TWO:
The fire forced Booth to move close to the door. The soldiers could see him now. He was aiming a gun at them. The soldiers had been ordered to capture Booth alive. But one of them raised his gun and shot Booth in the neck.
The actor fell. Some of the soldiers ran to the burning barn and pulled him out. They carried him to a nearby house. He died two hours later.
VOICE ONE:
John Wilkes Booth carried a notebook. He wrote in it every day. On the day Lincoln was killed, he wrote: “For six months we had worked to kidnap Lincoln. But with the Confederacy being almost lost, something decisive and great must be done. I struck boldly.”
Booth described how and why he had shot the president. “Our country,” Booth wrote, “owed all her troubles to him. And God simply made me the instrument of his punishment.”
Booth’s body was returned to Washington. Men who knew him confirmed that it was the body of John Wilkes Booth. The body was buried under the stone floor of the Washington prison. A few years later, his family received permission to move the body to a cemetery in the city of Baltimore.
VOICE TWO:
Evidence showed that only a few people were actually involved in the plot against the president. Most had agreed to work with Booth because they believed he planned to kidnap Lincoln, not kill him.
Of the hundreds of persons arrested, only eight were brought to trial. The secretary of war decided that they would be tried by a military court. He argued that Lincoln had been commander-in-chief of all military forces and had been murdered during wartime.
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The trial began almost two months after the assassination. The prisoners seemed in poor condition. All wore heavy chains on their arms and legs. And the men had been forced to wear thick cloths over their heads. Officials said the cloths were necessary to prevent them from talking to each other.
The secretary of war announced that the prisoners could not meet privately with their defense lawyers. They could meet only in the courtroom. Guards could hear everything they said.
One of the defense lawyers recognized that the job was hopeless. He said the trial was a contest between the defense lawyers and the whole United States. There was no question, he said, what the military court’s decision would be.
VOICE TWO:
The government tried to prove that Lincoln’s assassination was a Confederate plot. Witnesses told how Confederate supporters reportedly planned to cause trouble in the North. But none could prove that Confederate President Jefferson Davis — or any other southern leader — played a part in Booth’s plot to kill Lincoln.
Four hundred witnesses appeared. Many of the important ones had been arrested as suspects. They agreed to give evidence if the government dropped the charges against them.
For six weeks, the court heard evidence against the eight prisoners. The prisoners themselves could say nothing. They could only listen.
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In late June, eighteen sixty-five, the trial of Abraham Lincoln’s assassins ended. The military officers serving as judges met secretly for two days. Then they announced their decision.
All eight prisoners were found guilty. One received a prison sentence of six years. Three were sentenced to life in prison. Four were sentenced to die.
Defense lawyers appealed for mercy. The appeal was rejected. On July seventh, David Herold, Lewis Paine, George Atzerodt and Mary Surratt were hanged for the murder of Abraham Lincoln.
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ANNOUNCER:
Our program was written by Frank Beardsley. The narrators were Shep O’Neal and Maurice Joyce. You can find transcripts, MP3s and podcasts of our programs, along with historical images, at voaspecialenglish.com. And you can follow us on Twitter at VOA Learning English. Join us again next week for THE MAKING OF A NATION — an American history series in VOA Special English.
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This is program #118 of THE MAKING OF A NATION

This is the VOA Special English Development Report. <!– IMAGE –>The
World Health Organization is using a new combination of drugs to treat human
African trypanosomiasis disease, also known as sleeping sickness.  The drugs nifurtimox and eflornithine will be given
out in Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo.Officials from the Drugs for Neglected Diseases Initiative
say the new treatment has fewer side effects. 
It is also more effective and less costly than the drugs traditionally
used.  In addition, the new treatment
reduces the number of injections needed. And it shortens the amount of time
patients must spend in the hospital.Sleeping sickness threatens millions of
people in thirty-six countries in Africa. 
Most live in poor rural areas. The disease is caused by the trypanosoma
parasite.  It is spread to humans through
the bite of infected tsetse flies.Common signs of sleeping sickness include fever, headaches,
extreme tiredness and pain in the muscles and joints. Early identification of
the disease may be difficult because many infected people do not show any
immediate symptoms.Over
time, the parasites invade the central nervous system. The disease causes sleep
disorders, mental confusion, personality changes, speech problems, seizures and
coma. If left untreated, sleeping sickness kills.The World Health Organization estimates that about
sixty thousand people are currently infected with the disease. It develops in two
different forms. Trypanosoma gambiense is responsible for ninety percent of the
reported cases of sleeping sickness. People infected with this form may develop
the disease over many years without any major symptoms. The disease develops
more quickly over a few weeks or months in people infected with trypanosoma
rhodesiense.Until now the drug melarsoprol was used to treat
patients in the advanced stage of sleeping sickness.But
the drug requires many painful injections several times a day for several
weeks. It also causes bad side effects, some of which can be deadly.In
Uganda, a new study has confirmed earlier research linking the spread of sleeping
sickness to infected farm animals.  The writers
of the study have called for stronger rules requiring cattle to be treated
before being sold at market.  The study was
published in the Public Library of Science.And
that's the VOA Special English Development Report, written by June Simms. I'm Steve
Ember.

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AA: I’m Avi Arditti with Rosanne Skirble, and this week on Wordmaster: English teacher Lida Baker suggests five resolutions for people who want to improve their English in the New Year.LIDA BAKER: “My first resolution that I would recommend people make is to spend a certain amount of time listening to English — and it can be five minutes a day or it can be 10 minutes a week or it can be whatever suits a person’s work schedule, life schedule or whatever. But it’s really important to set goals and to stick to them. And it would be very helpful if people had Internet access to do this, because what I’m going to recommend is listening to sites that have scripts included. “RS: “What do you do if you don’t have access to a computer, how can you listen better?LIDA BAKER: “Well, almost everyone all over the world has access to pop music. And one of my resolutions would be to spend time listening to English music. The advantage of listening to music is that it’s a really wonderful way to work on your pronunciation, because you get a feeling for the stress and the rhythm of the language when you’re singing. And also music is full of idioms, so it’s a terrific way to learn colloquial vocabulary and to work on your pronunciation. And a third advantage of listening to music is that it’s really easy to remember.”So for people who have access only to a radio, even they can do something to improve their English just by listening to pop music. And I might add, if you do have access to the Internet, there are lots of Internet sites that will give you the lyrics to pop songs. Do a search, type ‘music’ or ’songs’ plus ‘lyrics,’ and you’ll find sites where you can type in the name of the song and it will give you the lyrics to the song.RS: “So spend a little bit more time listening, or have a goal for listening. Listen to English music. What else?”LIDA BAKER: “Something else I tell my students, and they’re always surprised when I tell them this, is read children’s books.”AA: “That makes sense, though.”LIDA BAKER: “Yeah. Why do you say that?”RS: “Well, few words.”AA: “It’s simpler.”RS: “Direct, simple. Lots of pictures.”LIDA BAKER: “There you go.”RS: “That puts it in a context.”LIDA BAKER: “There you go. And the other thing is, you can find children’s books at all levels. If you were a total beginner in English, you start with books that have just a few words on the page and lots of pictures, and you can work your way up to books that have relatively speaking more text and fewer illustrations. But again, children’s books are very motivating. To this day I enjoy reading the books that I read to my daughter when she was a little girl.”AA: “So now we’ve got the listening to the radio, listening to music, going online and looking for scripts of programs to go with the audio, reading children’s books. What’s your next resolution?”LIDA BAKER: “Learn a new word every day. And if you don’t have time to do it every day, do it every other day. Again, pick a realistic goal. Choose your word, look up the meaning, but then don’t stop there. Look at the examples in the dictionary for how the word is used. Is it used as a noun? Is it a verb? Is it used to talk about people? If it’s an adjective, does it have a positive meaning or a negative meaning? So look for what’s called the connotation of the word. And then, when you’re sitting in your car, or you’re walking to the bus stop or sitting on the bus, practice. Put the word into your own sentences. Think of ways that you could use that word.”And so now we come to our last resolution, which in a way is the most difficult one, because my last resolution would be, even if it’s only very occasionally, talk to native speakers every chance you get.”RS: Lida Baker teaches English and writes textbooks in Los Angeles, California.AA: That’s all for Wordmaster this week. Our e-mail address is word@voanews.com. And Internet users can read and listen to all of our segments at voanews.com/wordmaster.RS: With Avi Arditti, I’m Rosanne Skirble.

Efforts are underway to recover thousands of barrels with hazardous chemicals floating down a Chinese river towards Russia.

The month-long heat-wave being experienced in Russia has caused destructive forest fires that have burnt down hundreds of homes in the country’s center. At least 30 people have been killed.

Eyewitnesses have been sharing their video on the Internet of the deadly wildfires. This one was shot by a group of men trying to escape from a burning village in the Nizhny Novgorod region using the only paved road.

By
2010-07-31T19:03:41Z
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama has a warning for Republicans who denounce the federal deficit but reject proposals to cut it….

North Korea's foreign minister met his Myanmar counterpart during a trip to the country, Pyongyang media reported yesterday; in a visit likely to be watched by Western nations fearful the two regimes …