1 . The Slow Death of Spain’s Menú del Día

Food is at the heart of Spanish culture. From social life to business deals, everything revolves around food---above all, lunch. How did Mariano Rajoy, then prime minister, react in 2018 when faced with an unprecedented (前所未有的) vote of no confidence? He went to lunch ... for eight hours.

The three-course menú del día (menu of the day) has been the cornerstone of Spanish food and social life for generations.     1     Now, though, their existence is partly threatened by changing working hours.

The fixed-price menú del día as we now know it was first introduced in the mid-1960s as the “tourist menu,” which helped to ensure that an affordable meal would be within the financial reach of all Spaniards.     2     These family-run restaurants soon became a fixture for millions of Spaniards who had long days, typically working from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. and 4 p.m. to 7:30 p.m., but who couldn’t go home for lunch.

But now working life has changed. Fewer people split the workday with a two-hour break for lunch. “People are realizing that an hour is long enough for lunch,” says José Luis Casero. Furthermore, a decreasing percentage of Spaniards have full-time jobs. Trade unions (工会) estimate 33 percent of jobs that have been created since 2012 are temporary. New professions such as delivery riders do not receive paid lunch breaks. Throughout many Spanish cities today, what may have once been restaurants serving menú del día have already been reborn as kebab (烤肉串) shops or, in more touristy areas, tapas bars (西班牙小食吧).     3    

These days, the tradition only continues to endure in small numbers of restaurants in Spain. Just around the corner from city hall and with mayor Ada Colau being one of its regulars, Cervantes has been a family-run restaurant since the early 1980s. It is now managed by the Esteve sisters: Glòria, Cristina and Gemma. The C13 menú of classic Spanish dishes is chalked up on a board.     4    

“I cook more or less what my mother cooked,” says Glòria. “I know what I know and people like that. It’s all homemade.” “All kinds of people eat here, from officials to builders,” adds Gemma. “There’re people who come to Cervantes for the first time and say: ‘Wow, I didn’t know this sort of place still existed.’ ‘Well,’ I say, ‘we’ve always been here.’”

A．It changes with the seasons, but only slightly.

B．They are less likely to honor the menú tradition.

C．They often make just enough to maintain the families that run them.

D．People see changes in a place like this as an attack on their lifestyle.

E．All of these types of restaurants had to offer at least one of these on its menus until the law was changed in 2010.

F．Consequently, the restaurants serving these menus — generally low on aesthetics (美观性) and high on value for money — have been a feature of the urban landscape.

2 . Bitcoin and other so-called cryptocurrencies （加密货币）have been all over the news lately. Apparently, the idea of money that's not tied to a specific bank—or a specific country—is appealing to many. But it's worth remembering that the banking system that we now all live with is just that： A modern invention. Not so long ago, money was almost always created and used locally, and bartering was common. （In fact, it still is common among many online local networks, like the Buy Nothing Project.）.

In the past, money's makeup varied from place to place, depending on what was considered valuable there. So while some of the world's first coins were made from a naturally occurring hybrid of gold and silver called electrum （银金矿），objects other than coins have served as currency, including beads, ivory, livestock, and cowrie shells. In West Africa, bracelets of bronze or copper were used as cash, especially if the transaction was associated with the slave trade there. Throughout the colonial period, tobacco was used to replace coins or paper bills in Virginia, Maryland and North Carolina, even though it was used elsewhere in the colonies and extensively throughout Europe and the U. K.

Today, on an island in the Pacific, a specific type of shell still serves as currency—and some people there are even hoarding（贮存）it, just like Bitcoin moguls, convinced that one day, it will make them wealthy beyond imagination. On Malaita, the most-populated island that's part of the Solomon Islands, shells are accepted at most places in exchange for goods.

"How much tuna（金枪鱼）you can get for your shells depends on their color and shape," Mary Bruno, a shop owner from the small town of Auki, on Malaita, told Vice. "One strip of darker shells might get you about two cans of smaller tuna, but the red ones are worth more. For the red ones, one strip might get enough tuna to feed a big family for a long time."

Just like a mint that creates coins, there's only one place on the island where the shells, which are polished and strung together to form 3-foot-long ropes, are made. The strips of red, white, and black shells all come from Langa Langa Lagoon, where artificial islands were long-ago built by locals to escape from the island-dwelling cannibals. Once marooned（困住）out on their islands, locals needed a currency to use among themselves, and so the shell currency was born.

Using shells for money was common throughout the Pacific islands as late as the early 1900s, but Malaita is unique in that they are still used today. And just like cryptocurrencies, there are those who think the islanders are smart to invest in this type of money, which is reported to have risen in value over the last three decades. It might seem strange to hoard a bunch of processed, strung-together shells, but what is a pile of dollars? Just a specially printed piece of paper and hemp that we've assigned value to—and probably less durable over time than those shells.

1. According to the passage, which of the following is TRUE?

A．Money was created and was widely used in the world.

B．Tobacco was used as coins or paper bills in American in the past.

C．The ingredients of world’s first coins may be the combination of gold and silver.

D．Using shells for money has been out of date in the world.

2. The word "mint" in paragraph 5 is closest in the meaning to     .

A．a kind of money that can exchange

B．the leaves of a mint plant used fresh or candied

C．a place to produce and polish shells

D．a factory that produces currency

3. What's opinion of the author towards shells for money?

A．Reasonable.	B．Imaginary.
C．Convenient.	D．Inventive.

4. Which of the following might be the best title of the passage?

A．The History of Bitcoin

B．Shells Still Money

C．The Currency Is of Great Use

D．Some Shells

3 . 阅读下面短文，在空白处填入1个适当的单词或括号内单词的正确形式。

A comprehensive study of 4,500 children conducted by the National Institutes of Health in 2018 shows that children who spent more than seven hours a day staring at screens showed evidence of premature thinning of their brain's cortex一the outer layer that processes sensory information. "We don't know if it     1     (cause) by the screen time. We don't know yet if it's a bad thing. It won't be until we follow them over time     2     we will see if there are outcomes that are associated with the differences that we're seeing in this single snapshot, Dr. Gaya Dowling. ^uWhat we can say is that this is     3    the brains look like of kids who spend a lot of time on screens. And it's not just one pattern."

The problem isn't just screens     4    , but also the way screens tempt kids (and adults) away from something far more important: physical activity. More than 23 percent of adults and 80 percent of adolescents don't get enough physical activity, and according to a 2019 report from the World Health Organization (WHO) , these patterns of activity and rest arise     5    habits we develop early in life. ^uWhat we really need to do is     6     (bring) back play for children," says Dr. Juana Willumsen, a WHO specialist in childhood obesity and physical activity, in a statement about new WHO guidelines issued in April 2019. “ This is about making the shift from sedentary time to playtime, while       7     (protect) sleep. Of course, children aren't completely to blame for their screen addiction.

Sometimes, the parents     8    complain about the role of screens in family life are just as guilty of spending too much time in front of one. A 2016 study       9     (conduct) by Common Sense Media found that parents spend up to nine hours a day in front of screens, mostly not for work-related reasons. While 78 percent of parents said they believed they were good screen time role models, the study found a disconnect between their behavior and their perception of their behavior. Parents need to limit screen time for themselves and especially for their kids一       10     it means playing the bad guy. Our mental and physical health depends on it.

4 . Studies show that older people tend to remember the positive things in life rather than the negative things, while younger people remember the positive and negative equally well. The dominant psychological theory to explain this is that older people are aware of their limited time left, so they _______ positive emotional experiences. But about a decade ago, I worked with biologist Robert Trivers on his idea that there was a(n) _______ basis for older people's increased positive outlook. Our research took us in the fascinating direction of exploring how the body _______ its energy.

When our _______ needed more energy than usual perhaps while being chased by a tiger, they had to get that energy from somewhere in the body. Could they borrow it from the brain? That organ uses 20 percent of our metabolic output, whether we are solving math problems or watching television reruns. Due to this constant energy requirement, borrowing energy from the brain when our need _______ the available supply is not an option. Perhaps we could borrow energy from our muscles. Because we use far more muscle energy when we are active than when at rest, _______, we could borrow energy when we are sitting. But the problem is that most of the energy-demanding emergencies of our ancestors _______ a muscular response. There was no way to borrow energy from our muscles during an emergency because relaxing when a tiger showed up was not a(n) _______ response. This brings us to our immune system, which, when _______ protects us from many illnesses and diseases. Like the brain, the immune system works at great metabolic cost, but largely in the __________of keeping us healthy in the future. We have an enormous number of immune cells coursing through our body, a(n) __________ break from production is fine. So, when our body needs extra energy, one of the places it goes is our immune function. When you’re being chased by a tiger, you don’t need to waste energy making immune cells to fight off tomorrow’s cold. What you need is to __________ all available energy resources to your legs, with the hope that you will live to experience another cough or sneeze.

__________, our immune system evolved to run in maximum amounts when we’re happy, but to slow down dramatically when we’re not. With this background in mind, Trivers supposed that older people evolved a strategy of turning this relationship on its head, becoming more __________ the positive things in life in an effort to enhance their immune functioning. This was helped along by their knowing much more about the world than younger adults, so they can deal with some of the __________ things in life more easily.

1.

A．switch

B．energize

C．prioritize

D．undergo

2.

A．regular

B．evolutionary

C．solid

D．fundamental

3.

A．uses

B．squeezes

C．spreads

D．classifies

4.

A．bodies

B．generations

C．ancestors

D．seniors

5.

A．surpasses

B．meets

C．responds

D．requires

6.

A．at random

B．in principle

C．at times

D．in case

7.

A．rejected

B．neglected

C．expected

D．required

8.

A．objective

B．effective

C．emergent

D．negative

9.

A．vulnerable

B．efficient

C．defensive

D．strong

10.

A．service

B．basis

C．search

D．shift

11.

A．momentary

B．voluntary

C．energetic

D．intensive

12.

A．submit

B．activate

C．shift

D．accumulate

13.

A．In the meantime

B．On the contrary

C．In the end

D．As a result

14.

A．addicted to

B．free of

C．focused on

D．enthusiastic about

15.

A．emotional

B．crucial

C．unforgettable

D．depressing

5 . Face shape lets AI spot rare disorders

People with genetic syndromes sometimes have revealing facial features but using them to make a quick and cheap diagnosis can be _______ given there are hundreds of possible conditions they may have. A new neural network that analyses photographs of faces can help doctors _______ the possibilities.

Yaron Gurovich at biotechnology firm FDNA in Boston and his team built neural network to look at the overall impression of faces and _______ a list of the 10 genetic syndromes a person is most likely to have.

They _______ the neural network, called DeepGestalt,on17,000 images correctly labelled to match more than 200 genetic syndromes. The team then asked the Al to _______ potential genetic disorders from a further 502 photos of people with such conditions. It included the correct answer among its list of 10 responses 91 per cent of the time.

Gurovich and his team also _______ the neural network’s ability to distinguish between the different genetic mutations(变异) that can lead to the same syndrome. They used photographs of people with Noonan syndrome, which can result from mutations in any one of five genes. DeepGestalt correctly identified the genetic source of the physical appearance 64 per cent of the time. It’s clearly not _______ but it’s still much better than humans are at trying to do this.

As the system makes its assessments, the facial regions that were most helpful in the determination are _______ and made available for doctors to view. This helps them to understand the relationships between genetic make-up and physical appearance.

The fact that the diagnosis is based on a simple photograph raises questions about_______. If faces can reveal details about genetics, then employers and insurance providers could, in principle, secretly use such techniques to ________ against people who have a high probability of having certain disorders. ________, Gurovich says the tool will only be available for use by clinicians.

This technique could bring________ to those who have genetic syndromes. The real value here is that for some of these ultra-rare diseases, the ________ of diagnosis can be many, many years. This kind of technology can help narrow down the search space and then ________ the diagnosis through checking genetic markers. For some diseases, it will cut down the time to diagnosis dramatically. For others, it could perhaps add means of finding other people with the disease and, ________ help find new treatments or cures.

1.

A．convincing

B．tricky

C．reliable

D．feasible

2.

A．bring about

B．result from

C．narrow down

D．rule out

3.

A．return

B．input

C．top

D．feed

4.

A．based

B．imposed

C．focused

D．trained

5.

A．identify

B．distinguish

C．shift

D．cure

6.

A．tested

B．demonstrated

C．recognized

D．acquired

7.

A．acceptable

B．perfect

C．reliable

D．workable

8.

A．covered

B．excluded

C．highlighted

D．supervised

9.

A．objectivity

B．accuracy

C．credibility

D．privacy

10.

A．discriminate

B．fight

C．argue

D．vote

11.

A．Furthermore

B．Therefore

C．Otherwise

D．However

12.

A．challenges

B．benefits

C．damages

D．concerns

13.

A．treatment

B．response

C．remedy

D．process

14.

A．replied

B．confirmed

C．eliminated

D．addressed

15.

A．by contrast

B．in turn

C．in addition

D．on the contrary

6 . Directions: Read the following passage. Summarize the main idea and the main point(s) of the passage in no more than 60 words. Use your own wors as far as possible.

Pedestrians only

The concept of traffic-free shopping areas goes back a long time. During the Middle Ages, traffic-free shopping areas were built to allow people to shop in comfort and, more importantly, safety. The modern, traffic-free shopping street was born in Europe in the 1960s, when both city populations and car ownership increased rapidly. Dirty exhaust fumes from cars and the risks involved in crossing the road were beginning to make shopping an unpleasant and dangerous experience. Many believed the time was right for experimenting with car-free streets, and shopping areas seemed the best place to start.

At first, there was resistance from shopkeepers. They believed that such a move would be bad for business. They argued that people would avoid streets if they were unable to get to them in their cars. When the first streets in Europe were closed to traffic, there were even noisy demonstrations, as many shopkeepers predicted they would lose customers.

However, research carried out afterwards in several European cities revealed some unexpected statistics. In Munich, Cologne and Hamburg, visitors to shopping areas increased by 50 percent. On Copenhagen’s main shopping street, shopkeepers reported sales increases of 25-40 percent. Shopkeepers in Minneapolis, USA, were so impressed when they learnt this that they even offered to pay for the construction and maintenance costs of their own traffic-free streets.

With the arrival of the traffic-free shopping street, many shops, especially those selling things like clothes, food and smaller luxury items, prospered. Unfortunately, it wasn’t good news for everyone, as shops selling furniture and larger electrical appliances actually saw their sales drop. Many of these were forced to move elsewhere, away from the city centre. Today they are a common feature on the outskirts of towns and cities, often situated in out-of-town retail zones with their own car parks and other local facilities.

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

7 . On Aug 29, 1988, the University of Wisconsin-Madison juniors Tim Keck and Christopher Johnson published the first-ever issue of The Onion. The two founders claimed it was the US’ “finest news source”.

Nearly thirty years later, the news outlet has become one of the most _______ media presences in the US. But don’t expect _______ and timeliness from it, because The Onion, which is now a website, only publishes fake news, or news satire. Its aim is to make readers _______, and perhaps make them see things from a different angle.

The Onion’s articles comment on current events both real and fictional. Using a traditional newspaper layout, it _______ traditional newspapers with stories, editorials, op-ed pieces, and street-talk interviews.

Its humor often depends on presenting ordinary, everyday events as _______. Stories with headlines such as “Area man knows all the shortcut keys”, or “Area man too poor to afford movers, too old to get help from his friends” are good _______. “You know somebody like that,” Will Tracy, The Onion’s editor-in-chief, told the NPR in an interview. Their stories are presented “in that sort of news voice which _______ them to a certain level of importance that they don’t actually deserve.

_______ The Onion is most famous for its political reporting. An article in New Republic magazine says The Onion is the US’ “best op-ed page”, because it has “an ability to _______ locate and address a problem with an economy of words”. For example, when George W. Bush became the US president in 2001, The Onion published a satire piece predicting massive debt and a huge boost in military spending. The article ________a speech Bush delivered to the public; its headline said it all: “Bush: ‘Our long national nightmare of peace and prosperity is finally over’.”

While traditional media outlets are ________ when reporting on sensitive topics such as religion and race, Tracy says nothing is off limits for The Onion, “no matter how uncomfortable they may make some readers.”

But editors at The Onion do tread a fine line (如履薄冰), as Tracy explains: “What you have to be really careful about is what the target of the joke is. If the target of the joke is wrong, if you’re targeting the victim or someone who doesn’t ________ our anger, then it doesn’t feel right and it also doesn’t feel funny.” The Onion caused public ________when earlier this year, it tried to make fun of a 9-year-old Oscar-nominated actress by using highly offensive language. It later apologized.

For those unfamiliar with the concept of fake news stories, their satire and humor can easily be ________. The Onion published a fake poll last year announcing that rural white Americans had a more favorable opinion of Iran’s then-president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, than of Barack Obama. An Iranian state news agency covered this as ________ news. The news agency immediately became an international laughing stock.

1.

A．established

B．progressive

C．reliable

D．authoritative

2.

A．comprehensiveness

B．accuracy

C．uniqueness

D．complexity

3.

A．motivated

B．entertained

C．awakened

D．informed

4.

A．makes improvements of

B．makes use of

C．makes fun of

D．makes sense of

5.

A．newsworthy

B．trustworthy

C．creditworthy

D．praiseworthy

6.

A．materials

B．instructions

C．opinions

D．examples

7.

A．exposes

B．commits

C．attaches

D．elevates

8.

A．But

B．Moreover

C．Instead

D．Therefore

9.

A．elegantly

B．intensively

C．earnestly

D．instantly

10.

A．criticized

B．invented

C．carried

D．reviewed

11.

A．considerate

B．inefficient

C．imprecise

D．cautious

12.

A．value

B．tolerate

C．deserve

D．comprehend

13.

A．alarm

B．doubt

C．confusion

D．anger

14.

A．missed

B．removed

C．accused

D．imitated

15.

A．inspiring

B．remarkable

C．misleading

D．real

8 . Directions: After reading the passage below, fill in the blanks to make the passage coherent and grammatically correct. For the blanks with a given word, fill in each blank with the proper form of the given word; for the other blanks, use one word that best fits each blank.

Black Mamba a Legend That Will Never Die

It’s hard to believe Kobe is gone.

The NBA superstar,     1     great talent and win-at-all-costs spirit made him one of the most distinguished athletes in history, was the rare celebrity who didn’t need a last name.

Still youthful at 41, Bryant — who died in a helicopter crash on January 26 in California — looked     2     he could suit up any minute and drop 30 points on a rival(竞争对手) NBA team. It doesn’t seem that long ago that he was scoring 60 points in his final NBA game.

With a highly decorated career spanning 20 years — all with the Lakers — Bryant is all but     3     (assure) of being a first-ballot inductee (第一候选人) into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, alongside Tim Duncan and Kevin Garnett, later this year.

Bryant,     4     18-time All-Star, was famous for his astonishing scoring ability and his championship pedigree (总冠军血统). He teamed up with fellow All-Star Shaquille O’Neal     5     (win) three consecutive NBA titles from 2000 to 2002, and later won two more rings, in 2009 and 2010.

Known as the “Black Mamba”, Bryant finished his career with 33,643 points in the regular season, which put him at No. 3 among NBA’s scoring leaders, behind only Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (38,387) and Karl Malone (36,928)     6     LeBron James surpassed him just one day before Bryant’s untimely death.

“Kobe was so much more than an athlete. He was a family man, which was     7     we had most in common. Whenever we got together, I would hug his kids and he would embrace     8    .” O’Neal wrote on Twitter.

“Kobe was one of the most extraordinary players in the history of our game with accomplishments that are truly legendary(传奇般的),” NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said in a statement. “But he     9     (remember) most for inspiring people around the world to pick up a basketball and compete     10     the very best of their ability.”

9 . When the Chinese government first sent students to America in the late 19^th century, it could not decide whether their goal should be to acquire specific technical knowledge or to _______ new ways of thinking. More than a century later, a third of a million Chinese students are enrolled at American schools and universities. Yet folks back home remain _______ about what an American degree means.

Attending an American university is a good career move. It is also _______ as a soft option for well-off kids, scared of the gaokao, China’s brutal university-entrance exams. Yet many bright Chinese youngsters explain the appeal of an American education in a remarkably _______ fashion. One place to hear such dreams is an English-language debating tournament in the central city of Wuhan. It follows a(n) _______ popular at high schools across America, known as “Public Forum Debate”.

At first sight, the event bears the stamp of _______. It uses the classrooms at a bilingual private boarding school in Wuhan with its own golf course and an ice-hockey team coached by imported Russians. But the debate is not for big-city _______. It is run by the National High School Debate League of China, which _______ contests in dozens of Chinese cities each year. This one has _______ pupils, aged 13-18, from nine cities. Many will never study overseas.

The proposition is: “Countries should give ________ to climate-change adaptation over alleviation.” An early round is won by a pair of 17-year-old girls who attend the international section of a state-run high school in Shenyang. In confident, rapid-fire English the duo argue that climate change should be treated with realism. The pair also had speeches arguing the opposite ready, in case the coin-toss had gone ________.

Unlike America, where debating clubs are ________ by shouty, self-assured boys, most contestants in the Chinese league are girls. Of its 20 highest-ranked debaters, 16 are female. In a society that is still ________-centered, the chance to argue forcefully and be applauded for it has a rare appeal, suggests Liam Mather, the league’s executive director. The winners in Wuhan are Joyce Yi and Erica Chen, from a state school in the southern boomtown of Shenzhen. Their swaggering first-round performance leaves two ________ boys open-mouthed like fish. Ms Chen initially ________ debating in English because “I’m kind of an argumentative person.” Then she realized the subtle effects of having to research both sides of an argument. Chinese education emphasizes one correct answer to a question, she says.

1.

A．absorb

B．apply

C．practice

D．spread

2.

A．assured

B．disturbed

C．divided

D．suspended

3.

A．blamed

B．punished

C．scorned

D．warned

4.

A．idealistic

B．practical

C．realistic

D．variable

5.

A．access

B．format

C．path

D．recipe

6.

A．challenge

B．democracy

C．economy

D．privilege

7.

A．amateurs

B．elites

C．inhabitants

D．migrants

8.

A．enters

B．exposes

C．issues

D．stages

9.

A．converted

B．convinced

C．drawn

D．withdrawn

10.

A．emergency

B．guarantee

C．priority

D．sympathy

11.

A．in the way

B．its own way

C．the other way

D．under way

12.

A．advocated

B．dominated

C．monitored

D．presented

13.

A．exam

B．male

C．money

D．power

14.

A．illiterate

B．ill-prepared

C．unexpected

D．unpredictable

15.

A．dreaded

B．fancied

C．ignored

D．tolerated

10 . Directions: After reading the passage below, choose the best answers from the six statements according to what you have just read.

Your Incredible Brain

Physicist Emerson Pugh once said that if the human brain were so simple that we could understand it, we would be so simple that we couldn’t. Thankfully, the complexity of brain is so great that we are not simple and neither, therefore, is the task of understanding it.

    1     Our latest attempt to count them suggests there are 75 different types in the neocortex alone, the area responsible for our most advanced thoughts and behaviors.

That isn’t to say our efforts to explore the brain’s mysteries are in vain. Despite Pugh’s observation, we are always learning more and more about how a 1.5-kilogram lump of tissue that flutters and crackles inside our skull can come up with our most elaborate ― behaviors.     2    

Breakthroughs in the understanding of how our brain stitch (缝合) together our sense of reality are redefining what it means to be conscious. They are also highlighting the persistent power of the mind, even in the cases in which our bodies hide all signs of awareness.

We don’t appear to be heading towards a world of jars full of brains, bodies thrown away, just yet though.     3     Gut thinking is not just a clever turn of phrase: microbes in our intestines (肠道) affect our risk for neurological conditions, and can influence our mood and mental health.

And when it comes to preventing cognitive decline, physical activity is crucial. Still, let’s not reject a sci-fi future entirely ― we know, for instance, that magnetic stimulation can have many uses, from treating depression to supercharging our brain’s processing power, effectively making us smarter.

The human brain has many more revelations in store, and they may require us to rethink old ideas or correct our assumptions.     4     After all, between our ears lies the most complex object in the known universe.

A．But that should come as no surprise.

B．Our brain-body connection has never been so strong.

C．Pugh’s claim appears to be widely challenged among scientific circles.

D．Yet each new insight raises more questions, while it also casts age-old problems in a new light.

E．We seem to have a long way to go before we will be able to shed any further light on the structure of the brain.

F．However, it can feel like an amazing achievement to establish even basic facts, such as how many different kinds of brain cells we have.