1 . It was the first time I had noticed him properly. Before this, Jack had just been a friendly young man provided by the hotel to accompany me on trips to the wildlife park nearby. But then he caught my attention by asking me to shut up.

“It’s just a garden spider. Don’t cry!” he said, looking at the creature with more love than I could gather for most humans. I had indeed cried-I was in the front seat of a jeep and the spider was on my leg.

“I don’t care what it is. Make it go away!” I said. I wanted him to pick the thing up and throw it out of the jeep right at that moment. He did something quite else.

He pushed his leg towards mine and held out the cloth of his trousers to gently let the spider go onto his own leg. He then drove on, as if nothing had happened. The spider climbed a little bit and then just stopped on his knee. I sat there staring at the spider for any sudden movement.

I was frightened that the man was completely at ease with a spider dangerously quiet on his knee. About 15 minutes later, he pushed his knee forward to the dashboard and the spider immediately climbed off his knee and on to the jeep. “The poor thing had been trying to get off me,” he said. “I only noticed now that it was trying to reach the dashboard, so I helped it along.”

I wondered then about this man, who thought about the spider with such kindness... Where and when did I lose my empathy towards the unfamiliar? Now, when faced with a row of ants on the staircase, my first reaction is no longer to attack them. The ants were already wise, but thanks to Jack, I learnt to live with the not so beautiful bits of nature.

It is known to all that exercise has a range of health benefits. The fact is the     1    (inspire) behind some people’s assumption that if some exercise is good, more is always better. So they tend     2     (exercise) for a long time without stopping. For example, some people run for several hours at a time and some work out for hours at the weekend to make up     3     their lack of exercise during the weekdays.     4    , these may become a serious health risk. Recently, several surveys     5     (make) to know that over 80% of people got injured when doing exercises. Actually, aerobic routines     6     last over 100 minutes have a certain health risk. On the other hand, they should not be     7     (short) than 10 minutes. If you do exercise for only a few minutes, you may not be working out long enough to see any benefits from it. When doing exercise, 30 to 60 minutes     8     (seem) enough for the daily aim. This will prevent you from     9     (get) hurt. Moreover, it will ensure that the exercise you do can     10     (positive) affect your physical health.

5 . The whale, as big as a locomotive(火车头) jumped out of the water, spinning(旋转) as though for joy, before jumping back under the waves. We watched the scene(场景) silently in astonishment, never having been so close to such a huge, fast-moving creature. It seemed almost possible to count the small shellfish on the whale’s skin.

In early December, gray whales, blue whales, and others had just started heading around the tip of Baja California, Mexico, moving as a community from the Pacific Ocean to the Sea of Cortez. It’s in that protected waterway that pregnant whales give birth to their babies. Other whale babies, born the year before, could be seen sailing behind. All whale babies get two trips like this with their mom before they’re ready to start having babies of their own and making the journey on their own.

We’re in one of several small powerboats, sent out by Scuba Caribe, which carries on such tours in Cabo San Lucas. The whales seemed to be, at times, less than 100 feet from our boat when they rushed out of the water. At other times, they would get much closer and swim beside the boat.

“What if one lands on us?” a woman next to me wondered. Fernando Del Toro, the Destination Manager of Scuba Caribe said, “We haven’t had any incident (事件) of whales jumping over our boats as we always keep our distance. We’re sure they themselves are probably careful not to crash into boats. Such an accident would probably also cause them much harm.”

“Everyone can enjoy this magical trip,” said Del Toro. “However, we do not recommend(推荐) it for kids under 5 years old,” he added.

Though conditions on the water vary, our trip was wonderful. Even when the boat sped up to catch up with the whales, there was little need to “hang on”, and some of us remained standing throughout most of the trip. Still, you may want to pack medicine for those who might get seasick while bouncing(颠簸行进) along the waves.

7 . Football is, I suppose, the most popular game in England: one has only to go to one of the important matches to see this. Rich and poor, young and old, one can see them all there, shouting and cheering for one side or the other.

One of the most surprising things about football in England to a stranger is the great knowledge of the game which even the smallest boy seems to have. He can tell you the names of the players in most of the important teams. He has photographs of them and knows the results of a large number of matches. He will tell you who he expects will win , and his opinion is usually as valuable as that of men three or four times his age.

Most schools in England take football seriously — much more seriously than nearly all European schools, where lessons are all-important, and games are left for private arrangements. In England, it is believed that education is not only a matter of filling a boy’s mind with facts in a classroom education also means character training. One of the best ways of training character is by means of games, especially team games, where the boy has to learn to work with others for his team, instead of working selfishly for himself alone. The school therefore arranges games and matches for its pupils. Football is a good team game, it is good exercise for the body, it needs skill and a quick brain, it is popular and it is cheap. As a result, it is the school's favorite game in the winter.

9 . When we think of bicycles, we think of fun and the outdoors. Bicycles give riders the freedom to explore and enjoy the environment and its surroundings.     1    

Most people know that riding bicycles is environmentally friendly.     2     If you are riding a bike, you are helping to reduce air and noise pollution.

Bikes are becoming more and more popular across the world. In fact, they are becoming more than just a fun pastime (娱乐).     3     For many people around the world, access to markets and schools would not be accessible without a bike.

    4     Some cities, such as Paris and Barcelona, have not only built bicycle lanes but also have introduced a system of renting bikes. You can rent, or use a bicycle in one area of the city and drop it off in another area of the city. Paris now has thousands of bikes for public use, with bicycle stations located throughout the city.

Some South American cities, such as Bogota in Colombia, have a weekly car-free day.     5     On these days, the traffic-related air pollution from old buses and trucks is greatly reduced.

It seems that the bike is a force for good, providing solutions for cleaner cities without leaving a serious environmental footprint.

The young artist and potter Allan had a wife and two fine sons. One night, his elder son developed a severe stomachache. Neither Allan nor his wife took the condition very     1     (serious), but the boy died suddenly that night.

Knowing the death could     2     (avoid) if he had only realized the seriousness of the situation, he always felt he was guilty. Worse still, his wife left him a short time later,     3     (leave) him alone with his 6-year-old younger son. Unable to stand the hurt and pain, he turned to alcohol and became     4     alcoholic.

As the alcoholism progressed, Allan began to lose everything he possessed and finally died alone in a small bar. Hearing of his death, I thought, “    5     a complete failure!”

As time went by, I began to revalue my     6     (early) rough judgement. I knew Allan’s now adult son, Ernie, one of the kindest and most caring men I’ve ever known. I hadn’t heard him talk much about his father. One day, I worked up my courage to ask him what     7     earth his father had done so that he became such a special person. Ernie said quietly, “As a child until I left home at 18, Allan came into my room every night,     8     (give) me a kiss and said, ‘Love you, son.’”

Tears came to my eyes as I realized that I had been a fool to judge Allan as a failure. He had not left many material     9     (possess) behind. But he had been a kind loving father,     10     left behind his best love.