1 . I began to grow up that winter night when my parents and I were returning from my aunt’s house, and my mother said that we might soon be leaving for America. We were on the bus then. I was crying, and some people on the bus were turning around to look at me. I remember that I could not bear the thought of never hearing again the radio program for school children to which I listened every morning.
I do not remember myself crying for this reason again. In fact, I think I cried very little when I was saying goodbye to my friends and relatives. When we were leaving I thought about all the places I was going to see—the strange and magical places I had known only from books and pictures. The country I was leaving and never to come back was hardly in my head then.
The four years that followed taught me the importance of optimism(乐观), but the idea did not come to me at once. For the first two years in New York I was really lost—having to study in three schools as a result of family moves. I did not quite know what I was or what I should be. Mother remarried, and things became even more complex for me. Some time passed before my stepfather(继父)and I got used to each other. I was often sad, and saw no end to “the hard times.”
My responsibilities in the family increased a lot since I knew English better than everyone else at home. I wrote letters, filled out forms, translated at interviews with immigration officers(移民局官员), took my grandparents to the doctor and translated there, and even discussed telephone bills with company representatives.
From my experiences I have learned one important rule: Almost all common troubles go away at last! Something good is certain to happen in the end when you do not give up, and just wait a little! I believe that my life will turn out all right, even though it will not be that easy.
1. How did the author get to know America?A.From radio programs | B.From books and pictures |
C.From her mother | D.From her relatives |
A.often lost her way | B.did not think about her future |
C.studied in three different schools | D.got on well with her stepfather |
A.She worked as a translator. | B.She attended a lot of job interviews. |
C.She paid telephone bills for her family. | D.She helped her family with her English. |
A.her future will be free from troubles | B.it is difficult to learn to become patient |
C.there are more good things than bad things | D.good things will happen if one keeps trying |
2 . I had a picnic one day with my sister. We both like to ride her motorcycle and that day we rode it to the nearest park. We bought some coffee and cakes, and then we enjoyed our food. Within a few hours, the sky changed and looked ready for a heavy rain. We packed everything and were ready to go. My sister, who was sitting on a bench suddenly was very still and couldn't talk to me.She couldn't move. Her eyes were rolling and she was about to lose consciousness(知觉). I held her in my arms and asked if she wanted to rest. She didn’t answer and only said“Sorry.”
It started to rain and I didn't know what to do. She was fighting to stay aware but her skin was pale and her eyes were acting strangely. Suddenly, from nowhere, a woman on a bicycle appeared. wearing a raincoat." She isn't looking good. Do you want me to call an ambulance(救护车)?”“Yes, please,yes!”I begged.
She did. Struggling with the rain, she managed to call some policemen, who quickly helped me carry my sister to a safer place. The ambulance arrived and we went to a hospital where she was treated in time and she came to life the next morning after some rest and medical help.
An interesting fact was that I guessed the woman in the raincoat was a doctor or a nurse. I later learned from one of the police officers who told me: “No.She was an ordinary person who took some courses on emergency situations(紧急情况).”
I am so grateful that she appeared exactly at the moment I don’t know why or how .I didn’t even get the chance to say thanks to her.
1. What happened when the author and her sister were ready to go?A.They had a fight. | B.The sister fell ill suddenly. |
C.They were caught in the rain. | D.They had difficulty packing things. |
A.By giving first aid to her sister. | B.By protecting her sister from the rain. |
C.By carrying her sister to the hospital | D.By asking for emergency medical help |
A.To keep order in the park. |
B.To send the sick girl to hospital. |
C.To carry the sick girl to a safer place quickly. |
D.To carry the sick girl onto the ambulance. |
A.Thankful | B.Friendly |
C.Doubtful | D.Admirable |
3 . A Take a view, the Landscape(风景)Photographer of the Year Award, was the idea of Charlie Waite, one of today’s most respected landscape photographers.Each year, the high standard of entries has shown that the Awards are the perfect platform to showcase the very best photography of the British landscape.Take a view is a desirable annual competition for photographers from all comers of the UK and beyond.
Mike Shepherd(2011) Skiddaw in Winter Cumbria, England | It was an extremely cold winter’s evening and freezing fog hung in the air. I climbed to the top of a small rise and realised that the mist was little more than a few feet deep, and though it was only a short climb, I found myself completely above it and looking at a wonderfully clear view of Skiddaw with the sun setting in the west. I used classical techniques, translated from my college days spent in the darkroom into Photoshop, to achieve the black—and—white image(图像). |
Timothy Smith(2014) Macclesfield Forest Cheshire, England | I was back in my home town of Macclesfield to take some winter images. Walking up a path through the forest towards Shutlingsloe. a local high point, I came across a small clearing and immediately noticed the dead yellow grasses set against the fresh snow. The small pine added to the interest and I placed it centrally to take the view from the foreground right through into the forest. |
A.Writers. | B.Photographers. | C.Painters. | D.Tourists. |
A.They are winter images. |
B.They are in black and white. |
C.They show mountainous scenes. |
D.They focus on snow—covered forests. |
A.In a history book. | B.In a novel. | C.In an art magazine. | D.In a biography. |
4 . By day, Robert Titterton is a lawyer. In his spare time though he goes on stage beside pianist Maria Raspopova — not as a musician but as her page turner. “I’m not a trained musician, but I’ve learnt to read music so I can help Maria in her performance.”
Mr Titterton is chairman of the Omega Ensemble but has been the group’s official page turner for the past four years. His job is to sit beside the pianist and turn the pages of the score so the musician doesn’t have to break the flow of sound by doing it themselves. He said he became just as nervous as those playing instruments on stage.
“A lot of skills are needed for the job. You have to make sure you don’t turn two pages at once and make sure you find the repeats in the music when you have to go back to the right spot.” Mr Titterton explained.
Being a page turner requires plenty of practice. Some pieces of music can go for 40 minutes and require up to 50 page turns, including back turns for repeat passages. Silent onstage communication is key, and each pianist has their own style of “nodding” to indicate a page turn which they need to practise with their page turner.
But like all performances, there are moments when things go wrong. “I was turning the page to get ready for the next page, but the draft wind from the turn caused the spare pages to fall off the stand,” Mr Titterton said, “Luckily I was able to catch them and put them back.”
Most page turners are piano students or up-and-coming concert pianists, although Ms Raspopova has once asked her husband to help her out on stage.
“My husband is the worst page turner,” she laughed. “He’s interested in the music, feeling every note, and I have to say: ‘Turn, turn!’ Robert is the best page turner I’ve had in my entire life.”
1. What should Titterton be able to do to be a page turner?A.Read music. | B.Play the piano. |
C.Sing songs. | D.Fix the instruments. |
A.Boring. | B.Well-paid. |
C.Demanding. | D.Dangerous. |
A.Counting the pages. | B.Recognizing the “nodding”. |
C.Catching falling objects. | D.Performing in his own style. |
A.He has very poor eyesight. | B.He ignores the audience. |
C.He has no interest in music. | D.He forgets to do his job. |
5 . Wildlife experts are reporting increasing numbers of Atlantic blue fin tuna(蓝鳍金枪鱼)in the Atlantic Ocean. Atlantic blue fins are highly prized by the fishing industry. The fish can weigh up to 454 kilograms. Its meat is often used in sushi products sold at Japanese restaurants.
But the Atlantic blue fin has been a concern for wildlife experts. The species was listed as endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.
Improved law enforcement appears to be helping the Atlantic blue fin recover after years of overfishing. The popular fish all but disappeared from the Gulf of Maine about 10 years ago. This year, fishers set a record by catching 30 Atlantic blue fins. One of the fish weighed 363 kilograms.
International regulators have eased the catch limits for U. S. fishermen this year, increasing the quotas (限额)by more than 180,000 kilograms. But environmental groups warn increasing the new limits will undo years of wildlife protection efforts.
Scientists have been unable to determine whether or not the Atlantic blue fin population has recovered, so any decrease in the population now is bad for fishermen in the long term.
Blue fin has been at the center of a long battle between the fishing industry and environmentalists. Fishermen can make large amounts of money from a single fish. Environmentalists seek to protect the Atlantic blue fin. Yet many consumers are willing to pay high prices to eat them.
Walt Golet, a professor of marine biology at the University of Maine, says “Probably no other fish has been more politicized than the Atlantic blue fin tuna. From an environmental point of view it's always … Let's try to back off a little bit and make sure that we always have enough fish, and on the other side, we have individuals and organizations that they're making a living out of that fish and that's kind of where the assessment and management come into play. It's kind of balancing all of those opinions and viewpoints.”
1. What do we know about the Atlantic blue fin?A.It is a treasure in fishing industry. |
B.Its meat is sold well in Japan. |
C.It is an endangered species. |
D.It has recovered after 10 years of overfishing. |
A.Ban. | B.Ruin. | C.Undertake. | D.Disapprove. |
A.Helpful. | B.Hopeless. | C.Successful. | D.Unfavorable. |
A.The environmental point of view should be respected. |
B.The battle between experts and fishermen will last forever. |
C.The balance between all those opinions should be achieved. |
D.Individuals and organizations have the right to catch fish. |
6 . What do you think of 80s pop music? Do the names George Michael, Madonna and Michael Jackson sound familiar? Well, these are just some of the names that were well-known in the music scene of the 80s and early 90s. The 80s pop music scene was an important step to the popularity (普及) of present-day music. A new wave in the music scene was introduced, which made such music styles as punk rock, rap music and the MTV popular. Although it was an end to the old 60s and 70s styles, it was also the beginning of something big. The popularity of music videos meant that artists now replaced their guitar-based music with visual displays. A new wave of artists came on the scene and the entire industry developed quickly.
The most famous 80s pop music video is Michael Jackson’s Thriller. Introduced in 1982, few people can forget the video not only because of its never-be-foreseen images, but also because of the popularity it received. Think of how 80s pop music changed the lives of people who grew up in the 80s. Ask a young man today to tell you the names of the “New Kids on the Block” and he will start talking about the neighbor kids who just moved in. These are not the answers you might have heard in the 80s. Though today’s young men do not recognize how cool 80s pop music was, most people will always remember it for what it was and these are happy memories they will always love.
Some of the 80s pop music legends (传奇人物) include Madonna, U2, AeroSmith and of course the King of Pop Michael Jackson. Let’s not forget Prince, Tina Turner, Phil Collins and Motown’s Lionel Ritchie. Some of these musicians played music that has stood the test of time. Undoubtedly, the 80s pop music scene will live on for many more years to come.
1. What is the text mainly about?A.The characters of 80s pop music. | B.What made 80s pop music popular. |
C.80s pop music’s steps to popularity. | D.The effects of 80s pop music. |
A.guitar-based music | B.the MTV | C.rap music | D.punk rock |
A.it changed the lives of people | B.he sang it in a special style |
C.it was made into a music video | D.it left people with happy memories |
A.80s pop music is and will remain popular | B.80s pop music has many faults |
C.80s pop music is now out of date | D.we shouldn’t forget the great musicians of the 80s |
7 . As more and more people speak the global language of English, Chinese, Spanish, and Arabic, other languages are rapidly disappearing. In fact, half of the 6,000-7,000 languages spoken around the world today will be likely to die out by the next century, according the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).
In an effort to prevent language loss, scholars from a number of organizations — UNESCO and National Geographic among them — have for many years been documenting dying languages and the cultures they reflect.
Mark Turin, a scientist at the Macmillan Center, Yale University, who specializes in the languages and oral traditions of the Himalayas, is following in that tradition. His recently published book, A Grammar of Thangmi and Their Culture, grows out of his experience living, working, and raising a family in a village in Nepal.
Documenting the Thangmi language and culture is just a starting point for Turin, who seeks to include other languages and oral traditions across the Himalayan reaches of India, Nepal, Bhutan, and China. But he is not content to simply record these voices before they disappear without record.
At the University of Cambridge Turin discovered a wealth of important materials —including photographs, films, tape recordings, and field notes — which had remained unstudied and were badly in need of care and protection. Now, through the two organizations that he has founded — the Digital Himalaya Project and the World Oral Literature Project — Turin has started a campaign to make such documents, found in libraries and stores around the world, available not just to schools but to the younger generations of communities from whom the materials were originally collected. Thanks to digital technology and the widely available Internet, Turin notes, the endangered languages can be saved and reconnected with speech communities.
1. Many scholars are making efforts to ________.A.promote global languages | B.rescue disappearing languages |
C.search for languages communities | D.set up language research organizations |
A.having detailed records of the languages | B.writing books on language users |
C.telling stories about language speakers | D.living with the native speakers |
A.The cultural studies in India. | B.The documents available at Yale. |
C.His language research in Bhutan. | D.His personal experience in Nepal. |
A.Write, sell and donate. | B.Record, repair and reward. |
C.Collect, protect and reconnect. | D.Design, experiment and report. |
8 . An advance in electronic publishing could make the e-book you are reading seem as dated as a silent film. Publishers hope to explore the growing success of e-books by releasing versions with added soundtracks(电影配音)and musical accompaniments.
The noises in the first multimedia books — released in Britain on Friday - include rain hitting a window in a Sherlock Holmes tale. When the plot of a book reaches the most exciting part, background scores will create tension.
Supporters argue that sound effects are the next logical development for e-books and will add excitement for younger readers. Critics, however, will argue that the noise will ruin the simple pleasure of having the imagination stimulated by reading.
Caroline Michel, chief executive of the literary agency, said the new generation of computer- literate readers was used to multiple sensory input. She said, “Young people have split computer screens where they may be watching television and replying to an email at the same time. If that's what the market wants then we should respond to the market.”
Book track's sound effects work by estimating the user's reading speed. Each lime you turn a page, the software reassesses where you have reached in the text and times the sounds to switch on accordingly. If the soundtrack becomes out of synch (同步),a click on any word will reset it.
Some authors fear that a soundtrack could destroy the peace and quiet of libraries and ruin the pleasure, of reading. David Nicholls, author of Our Day, the bestseller now released as a film, said, “This sounds like the opposite of reading. I have enough trouble reading an e-book because I'm constantly distracted by emails.
Stuart MacBride, the crime writer whose novel Shatter the Bones was an e-book bestseller, sells 18% of his books as electronic downloads. He said, “If I'm reading, I will do the noise in my head. I don’t need someone to tell me what lea cups clinking sounds like. That would irritate (激怒)me.”
1. What do publishers expect an e-book soundtrack to do?A.Help to release an e-book as a film. | B.Help readers improve reading speed. |
C.Add tension at a book's exciting point. | D.Get readers familiar with the background. |
A.Mr. Darcy. | B.Caroline Michel. |
C.David Nicholls. | D.Stuart MacBride. |
A.He was a person who was easy to get angry. |
B.He knew a great deal about tea and tea culture. |
C.Eighty-two percent of his books described crime. |
D.He imagined sounds related to the story when reading. |
A.Opinions about e-books with soundtracks. |
B.Response to the need of the book market. |
C.Reasons for traditional e-books becoming outdated. |
D.Suggestions on encouraging readers’ imagination. |
9 . Having worked for more than a decade in finance in the oil industry in Canada, Tori Fahey found herself wanting more from life. But it wasn't through desperation that her circumstances changed: “I didn't get fed up and storm off, nothing like that; it was curiosity about other interests and wanting to experience something new.”
Fahey left her job and completed an MBA before setting up a move to New York to begin a degree. However, the opportunity of an open year between the MBA and the degree came up, and as a keen touring cyclist, Fahey realised that a much dreamed-about adventure was now becoming a possibility: "The ride in Africa had been on my fantasy list. It was a moment when I realised that I could do anything, so I should."
Fahey rode across Africa, a 7,500-mile trip that took four months. The whole experience had a life-changing impact. Fahey said: “Bicycles provide a literal freedom. You don't allow yourself to feel like that in everyday life because there are so many distractions. But when you' re out on the bike and there's nothing else, you' re really free to experience what life is.”
Post-degree, Fahey worked on projects with the UNDP(United Nations Development Project) in Montenegro with the aim of bringing investment to rural communities.
It was while working on these projects that the seeds were sown for the next new investment. “It was through my trip across Africa that I discovered pannier and rack systems inconvenient and I was never going to use them again.” Little did she know this would lead her to start up her own company.
In 2013, Apidura was born, producing storage solutions for people looking to travel the world by bike, race across continents and carry all they need to do so. It's now a successful global brand, but Fahey remains reflective about what else the company can do for people.
1. Why did Fahey leave her job in Canada?A.She was bored with the job. | B.She was disappointed with life. |
C.She wanted to add new dimensions to her life. | D.She found it hard to adjust to the circumstances. |
A.Demanding. | B.Liberating. | C.Eventful. | D.Dangerous. |
A.To encourage bicycle traveling. | B.To make her investment profitable. |
C.To help cyclists carry traveling stuff. | D.To increase the pleasure of riding bikes. |
A.A tough path to fame. | B.An adventure across Africa. |
C.The benefits of green travelling. | D.The story behind the birth of Apidura. |
10 . How to Make Sure You Enjoy Your Trip
A trip is a planned destination where one arranges in advance, and the main purpose is to search for adventure and to create an unforgettable moment.
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●Pack necessities. Bring what you need. Trips are short journeys. Pack only the things you need.
●Be safe. To be cautious is smart. No matter what you are up to, surfing or snowboarding, it is important to wear protective equipment when necessary. Don't be stubborn and put yourself in harm.
●Travel with an open mind. You may see delays, a different culture, lifestyle, food, and even a shortage of cash sometimes-this is all what travel is about-experiencing things with a new perspective.
●Save the memory.
A.Once you expect to experience new things |
B.Get prepared for bad weather |
C.You can bring your own food |
D.Seize(抓住)the moment by taking pictures |
E.If you have too many things in your package |
F.Plan it well |
G.Here are the steps on how to make sure your trip is enjoyable |