Have you ever asked yourself why people often have trouble     1     (learn) English? I hadn’t, until one day my five-year-old son asked me whether there     2     (be) ham in a hamburger. There isn’t. This     3     (sudden) made me realize that there’s no egg in eggplant either. Neither is there pine nor apple in pineapple. This got me thinking how English can be     4     crazy language to learn.

    5     example, when we are traveling we say that we are in the car or the taxi, but on the train or bus! While we are doing all this traveling, we can get seasick at sea, but we don’t get homesick when we get back home.

Even the     6     (small) words in the world can be     7     (puzzle). When you see the capitalized “WHO” in a medical report, do you read it as the “who” in “Who’s that”? You also have to wonder at the unique madness of a language in     8     a house can burn up as it burns down.

English     9     (invent) by people, not computers, and it reflects the creativity of the human race. That is why when I wind up my watch, it starts,     10     when I wind up this passage, it ends.

Unlike some other European languages, English is a little tricky(棘手的) when it comes to writing. How a word     1     (pronounce) and how it is actually spelt can be very different     2     (thing). Take two simple verbs like ''have'' and ''save''. Shouldn't they be pronounced the same? Why do ''sir'', ''her'' and ''fur'' all rhyme, but ''fork'' and ''work'' don't ?

Imagine, then, a situation     3     two words are spelt and pronounced exactly the same way, but have     4     (complete) different meanings. Welcome to the world of homonyme(同形同音异义词). Take the word ''fair'' for example — it can be a kind of event or an adjective to describe the colour of your hair.

So how do you know which     5     (mean) someone is referring to? — You don't, except by the context. Obviously, if someone asks you to ''give     6     (they) a hand'', they don’t want you to remove what is     7     the end of your arm.

Sometimes even the context doesn't help much — the result can be     8     (amuse). These sentences play with the double meaning of a noun:

I used to be a banker,     9     I lost interest.

A small boy swallowed some coins and had to go to hospital. When his grandmother phoned     10     (ask) how he was, the nurse said, ''No change yet. ''

''Waiter, will the bread be long? '' ''No, sir. It's round. ''

English is a language     1    (speak) all around the world. There are more than 40 countries     2    most of the people speak English. What's more, the number of people who learn English     3    (be) more than 750 million. Everywhere in the world children go to school     4    (learn) English. Most people learn English for five or six years at high school. In China, most students learn English at school     5    a foreign language.

In only fifty years, English     6    (develop) into the language most     7    (wide) used in the world. English is the working language of most international     8    (organize), International trade and tourism. Businessmen and tourists often come to China without being able to speak Chinese. Chinese businessmen, taxi drivers and students talk with them using English. You can listen to English songs through the Internet. With so many people     9    (communicate) in English every day, it will become more and more important to have     10    good knowledge of English.