A series of exhibitions, activities and forums helped promote Thursday’s International Chinese Language Day to a even     1     (broad) audience.    2     (mark) the 14th International Chinese Language Day,    3     falls on April 20, Cape Town in South Africa witnessed the opening of a special exhibition: The Way of Type—Modernization of Chinese Typography(活版印刷术). By showing the development     4     (start) from ceramic movable type(陶瓷活字), the exhibition gives visitors     5     overview of the general landscape of the modern development of Chinese characters.

This is just one of the celebrations held     6     (global) on Chinese Language Day. In the headquarters of UNESCO in Paris, the day was celebrated early on Tuesday with a singing performance in both Chinese and French by a performer     7     (dress)in qipao. The 2023 Chinese Language Day was celebrated under the theme of “Chinese Wisdom for a Green World” by the UN in the hope     8     contributing Chinese knowledge in green and sustainable development. This will also echo     9     (meeting)such as the Water Conference and the SDG Summit(峰会)that     10     (hold)by the UN throughout 2023.

3 . I decided to write about this moment in my life that really sticks in my mind. As I get older, I don’t want to ________ the details.

My fourteenth birthday was________. Since I’d been given a lot of ________ on other birthdays, there was nothing I really wanted for this birthday.

My dad came to me one evening and said, “We’ve been considering your birthday. Mom and I want to ________ something to you. You can have a big party, and we can invite all your friends, or... we have another ________!”

“Yes?” I asked ________. “What is it?”

“We can take the Queen Elizabeth and sail to England.”

I was shocked and ________. I’d never been outside New York, and England sounded far away. But after a second thought, I accepted the ________.

The Queen Elizabeth was the biggest ship I’d ever seen! The inside was even more ________! It had elevators, restaurants, places to play games, and a theater! I couldn’t really ________ that this multi-story ship was going to sail all the way across the Atlantic,________ it did! The voyage lasted six nights, and every night the captain put the ship’s clocks forward one hour. That way, no one ________ the five-hour time difference.

Day after day, I sat on the deck(甲板)________ to see a dolphin. After three days, I saw a ________ of dolphins! But what I remember most about my fourteenth birthday is that my parents gave me the gift of ________, which lasts for all my future birthdays.

4 . “Consumers complain that the modern tomato has little flavor. It’s like a water bomb,” said Sanwen Huang, who works at the Agricultural Genomics Institute at Shenzhen at the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences. “Tomato farmers care about yield, and the genetic variants related to yield are not related to tasty tomato favors.”

How can farmers ditch this unpleasant thing and recover the rich, sweet flavor of the tomato? To find out, Huang and colleagues investigated which genes are related to tomatoes’ taste. The scientists created a 100-person group that sampled 160 tomatoes based on sensory qualities. Based on the group’s feedback, the researchers identified dozens of chemical compounds (化合物) that could be related to the tomato’s taste. Using a statistical model that determined the concentration of various chemicals in the tomatoes, the scientists identified 33 most important flavor compounds. The researchers then measured the content of them in each of the tomatoes, and identified about 250 genetic loci (基因座) that controlled tomato flavor. This finding revealed the genetic basis of tomato flavor.

But the researchers also wanted to determine why store-bought tomatoes don’t taste good. It turns out that modern tomato varieties are selected according to qualities such as big size because buyers prefer large fruit, and firmness because it makes tomatoes easier to ship. Meanwhile, the quality of flavor has been ignored, said the researchers.

Volatiles (挥发性物质), in particular, are essential for good flavor. The removal of specific volatiles from tomatoes results in significant reduction in people’s liking. Moreover, refrigeration can change a tomato’s volatile compounds.

“But there is hope for a future filled with tasty, new varieties of store-bought tomatoes, as our results provide a road map for improvement of flavor. By working together, geneticists, biochemists, farmers and customers can provide better-flavored tomatoes for our society.” Huang said.

7 . Muhammad Ali was an all-time great boxer and entertainer. He was a three-time world ________ champion and an Olympic gold medallist. Later in life, he was ________ a United Nations Messenger of Peace, and awarded the United States Presidential Medal of Freedom.

He’s widely ________ today, but that wasn’t always true during his boxing career. Ali was a ________, capable, Black Muslim athlete who was ________ to speak his mind and stand up for his ideals. That made him very unpopular with a lot of people in 1960s America.

In 1966, Ali was at the height of his success as a ________. At the same time, the US was fighting a ________ in Vietnam. Ali was drafted (征兵), ________ he refused anyway. Thus, Ali was robbed of his heavyweight title, disqualified from fighting, and given a $10,000 ________ and a prison sentence.

Ali returned to boxing in 1971 and ________ his heavyweight title in 1974. After retiring in 1981, he ________ much of his time in supporting different causes. In 1984, he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s, and raised money for research into the ________. He traveled the world ________ food and medicine to poor countries. He also ________ his energies to many different charities, including the Special Olympics. Throughout his life, Ali set the standard for being true to yourself and ________ what you believe is right.

8 . You have two basic types of memory: short-term memory and long-term memory. Things you see or hear first enter your short-term memory. Very little of this information passes on into your long-term memory. Does this mean you have a bad memory? Not at all.

Your short-term memory has a certain job. Its job is to store information for a few seconds only. Your short-term memory is at work when you look up a phone number, call the number, and then forget it. You remembered the number just long enough to use it. Then it disappeared from your memory. That’s really a good thing. Imagine if your memory held every number, every face, and every word you ever knew!

However, some information is important to remember for a longer time. Then it must pass from short-term to long-term memory. Sometimes we tell ourselves to remember something. We might also practice it: “OK, don’t forget: 555-1212, 555-1212.” Usually, we don’t even think about it. Our brain makes the decision for us. It decides to store the information or let it go.

The brain seems to make the decision by asking two questions:

Does the information affect our emotions? That is, does it make us happy, sad, excited, or upset?

Does the information concern something we already know, so our brain can store it with something already there?

An answer of “Yes” means that the new information enters long-term memory. That means the brain creates new connections among brain cells.

Information disappears when connections among brain cells become weak. They get weak if time passes and the connections are not used. That’s why it is good to read your lecture notes soon after the class. To keep the memory of something strong, think of it often. For example, look at those lecture notes the next day. Look at them the day after that, too. Every time you think about something, the connections in the brain get stronger. Then it is easier to remember the information when you need it.

9 . A recent article in the New York Times, “The Extraordinary Science of Addictive Junk Food” by Michael Moss, showed how companies use science to design food that consumers will prefer. By adding more salt, sugar, and fat, food companies design food to make us want to eat more and more. Moss says people have an addiction to junk food because they are often powerless to resist it. This also happens to people who smoke or take drugs.

Today, one in five children in the United States is obese. Health professionals want to encourage healthier eating habits and remove childhood obesity. But this is a contentious (有争议的) issue. Some people believe that everyone should have enough self-control to choose what they eat, while others say that food companies should stop designing and advertising addictive food.

Moss’s article mentions how Kraft Lunchables were advertised on television to make kids feel as though they were in control of their food choices. The ads said, “All day, you gotta do what they say… But lunchtime is all yours.” Kraft, the company that owns Lunchables, sold the idea of power to kids, and it worked. Sales skyrocketed!

Children are an important target for companies producing junk food and soda. Children who eat and drink their products are more likely to buy these same products when they grow up to be adults.

Many people believe that rules should be enforced to protect children from unhealthy food advertisements. They argue that we should follow the lead of countries like Norway and Sweden, where it is illegal to advertise to children under the age of 12. However, companies that sell junk food believe these rules inconvenience consumers and target the snack food industry unfairly. Others say that advertisements are good because they teach children about new products and can help them become critical consumers — people who think carefully about the products they buy and use.