2 . You may think that an underground town with 3,500 residents is something out of a science fiction film. You may not believe that such a town has shops, car parks, hotels, restaurants, cafes, swimming pools, churches, galleries, museums, cinemas, a golf course and much more. We Coober Pedy in Australia’s Outback is just such a place. Although film makers sometimes use the town as a spot for science-fiction films, it is a real community full of people who enjoy living underground.

The name Coober Pedy comes from the Aboriginal (土著的) phrase kupa piti which means ‘white man in a hole’. Miners and their families choose to live like this, hoping to get rich looking for the precious stones that Australia is famous for — opals. Living underground is the only way to shelter from the sandstorms and the high temperatures above ground, where it can be up to 50 degrees C (122F). Deep down in the town far below the desert surface, the temperature is between 19 and 20 degrees C and life is cool.

Mary Deane believes that it’s the possibility of being poor one day and rich the next that makes Coober Pedy so addictive. She and her husband Jim are among the lucky ones. They live in a luxurious home, built with money from the opals Jim has found. “Whenever people hear we live underground, they always imagine a dusty cave,” says Mary, “but they are amazed when they sit in my spotless clean kitchen eating home-made apple pie. Everyone loves our pine furniture and I have every electrical appliance money can buy in here. Whatever I need I can have and whenever I·need more space we just dig out a few more rooms! I love my home.”

However, not everything is perfect in Coober Pedy. Mary has a tiny garden that she is very proud of, but the grass is not real. Plant life is rare. Water is also five times more expensive than overground residents pay. Recycling is a way of life, so Jim usually washes his car with bath water and they have a special system to re-use the water from the dishwasher and washing machine. “We must be very careful about how we use water,” he says, “it’s not quite as precious as the opals, but it’s still very scarce!”

1. What can be learned from the passage about Coobor Pody?

A．It was originally built for science-fiction films.

B．It provides residents with recreational facilities.

C．It is losing its appeal to young people in Australia.

D．It was designed by Aboriginals who used to live there.

2. Why do miners and their families choose to live in Coober Pedy?

A．To save money and get rich one day.

B．To make it possible to produce opals.

C．To keep away from the modern way of life.

D．To escape from the terrible weather conditions.

3. According to Mary Deane, one of the problems that living in Coober Pedy has is that             .

A．they have to be economical with water

B．they have to spend more money on food

C．they cannot use some electrical appliances

D．they cannot grow plants in the garden

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

A．Coober Pedy: Based on Recycling

B．An Unimaginable Film

C．Underground Mining

D．Life Down Under

3 . Directions: Complete the following passage by using the words in the box. Each word can only be used once. Note that there is one word more than you need.

A. monumental       B. violated       C. aroused       D. drawn       E. divorced       F. luxurious G. existing       H. appealing       I. approved       J. bronze       K. surpassed

Many people honor Guan Yu (or Guan Gong), a hero during the Three Kingdoms period. But recently, a statue of the ancient general has     1     criticism from authorities and the public.

In October, the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development said on its website that the construction of the Guan Yu statue in Jingzhou, Hubei province,     2     local regulations.

The     3     statue, built in a Guan Yu-themed park, covers an area of 152, 000 square meters and weights more than 5, 000 tons. At about 58 meters tall, the statue     4     the 24-meter limit on structures in local areas, according to CCTV News.

Even the cost of building the statue, about 170 million yuan, far exceeds the     5     budget. Worse, the park promoted the structure as the world's tallest     6     statue to attract tourists, but has only brought a revenue of less than 13 million yuan in the past four years. China Daily reported.

Due to recent media reports, the issue caught the public's attention and     7     criticism for its waste of resources. Also, there are concerns over its safety risks and legality.

On Nov 17, the local authorities responded that experts have been organized to make a plan to relocate the statue. This announcement once again stirred discussion online.

Many asked to keep the statue, considering the cost and effort that had gone into the project. One internet user commented that “relocation would cost a lot of money. Why not just keep it and explore further development using     8     resources?” Still others questioned why there was no supervision from local authorities since the beginning of construction to ensure that rules were being followed.

According to Hui Ming, from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, this should be a lesson for local decision-makers. Before going about building statues, there should be adequate research and work. Also, public money and resources should not be wasted in this fashion.

This is not the only case of such a/an     9     landmark. The Shuisi Tower project in Dushan county, Guizhou province, was also criticized by the MOHURD as a “cultural landmark” that was built indiscriminately (盲目地) and     10     from reality, and could damage the natural landscape.

Limit size of structures

The MOHURD has issued a notice on strengthening the management of large-scale urban statue construction, which says that large statues with a height of more than 10 meters or a width of more than 30 meters must be managed as important urban construction projects.

To protect historical and traditional buildings, the MOHURD announced in April that urban architectures cannot be built taller than 500 meters unless their plans are approved.

4 . 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.

A trail of hot springs dot the northern Kapong District. For tree worshipers, it's a site best described as awesome. Visitors can enjoy the ancient hot springs,     1     (understand) their therapeutic properties from knowledge     2     (pass) down from one generation to another. Rain, drizzle and cloudy skies are typical in Phang Nga, making secluded places even more mesmerizing in scenery.

Visit Phang Nga for a few days and you will immediately realise that once     3     (overlook) things turn out to be hidden gems and one     4     have planned for more time to enjoy them all. The ever-famous Phang Nga bay is in fact best seen not from the middle of the bay, but instead from the     5     (elevate) shores of Samed Nang Chee. You can’t pick the best weather,     6     even on partly cloudy days, the magnificent natural limestone structures of the bay is simply spectacular.

If you've heard about the trading routes of the Thai south and the Malay peninsula, you will notice a remnant of this direct link between Phuket (普吉) and Phang Nga (攀牙).     7     the major trading hub of Phang Nga in the old days, the district of Takua Pa boasts a small but untainted stretch of an old Sino-English community. These original century-old shophouses are “so authentic” here a local told me, it can overwhelm Phuket people with nostalgia.

However, the town centre of Phang Nga is not Takua Pa, though. The story has it     8     back in 1809, the Siam-Burmese wars drove people down to Phang Nga bay，hence the new settlement that has now become the province's municipal seat. It's still small in size, but with newer natural charms. Mountains     9     (surround) Phang Nga with the most magnificent limestone peaks     10     create wonderfully amazing signature views. Driving through the town's small parallel streets and looking up, one can only marvel at Mother Nature. Perpetual rain and misty mornings to virtual greenness --- Phang Nga people will ensure you get all that.

5 . If we are observant(善于观察的), we can find that most of the flowers in nature are red, orange and yellow. If we have seen a black flower, it is a chance in a million. People have made census (统计) to colors of more than four thousand kinds of flowers and discovered that only eight of them are black. Why are black flowers so rare?

As we know, sunlight is formed by seven different kinds of colored light. The wave length of each light changes, so the quantity of heat in each light changes, too. Flowers, especially their petals (花瓣) , are very weak and easy to the harm caused by high temperature. Black flowers can take in all the light waves, which cause the flowers to dry up in a high temperature. So the black flowers can hardly continue their lives. While red flowers, orange flowers and yellow ones can protect themselves from sunlight by reflecting（反射） the red light, orange light and yellow light, each of which has a large quantity of heat.

That is why red, orange and yellow flowers are very common in nature while black flowers are so unusual.

1. It is a chance in a million” means______.

A．something common

B．something lucky

C．something extremely rare

D．something impossible

2. Sunlight is formed by _____.

A．many different kinds of colored light

B．three different kinds of colored light—red, orange and yellow

C．seven different kinds of colored light

D．four thousand kinds of colored light

3. Black flowers are so rare because ______.

A．they are so weak that it’s difficult for them to grow up

B．there are actually no black flowers in the world

C．the petals of black flowers are very delicate（易碎的）

D．they can take in the light of all wave length which make the flowers dry up because of   high temperature.

4. Which of the following statements is NOT true?

A．Red, orange and yellow flowers can absorb the light of all wave lengths.

B．People have found that only a few kinds of flowers are black.

C．Most of the flowers are resistant（有抵抗力的） to high temperature owing to their bright colors.

D．The black flowers cannot protect themselves from sunlight.

6 . Mapping Antarctica

Antarctica was on the map long before anyone ever laid eyes on it. Nearly 2,400 years ago, ancient Greek philosophers such as Aristotle believed that a great continent must exist at the bottom of the world. They though it was needed to balance out the continents at the top of the world. In the 1500s, mapmakers often included a fanciful continent they referred to as Terra Incognita(Latin for “unknown land”) at the bottom of their maps. But it was not until the 1800s -----after explorers had sighted and set foot on Antarctica----- that mapmakers got down to the business of really mapping the continent, which is one—and—a –half times rhe size of the U.S..

While the coastline could be mapped by ships sailing around the continent, it took airplanes—and later, satellites---to chart Antarctica’s vast interior(内陆). That job continues today. And it is a job that still require a mapmaker, or cartographer, to put on boots and head out into the wild.

Cole Kelleher is familiar with that. He is a cartographer with the Polar Geospatial Center(PGC), which is based at the University of Minnesota and has a staff at McMurdo Station. PGC teamed up with Google to use the company’s Trekker technology to capture images of Antarctica for the Internet giant’s popular feature, Street View. A Trekker camera, which is the size of a basketball, is set about two feet above a backpack. The camera records image in all directions. “It weighs about 50 pounds. I was out for two and a half days, hiking 10 to 12 hours each day,” says Kelleher. It was hard work, but really an incredible experience.” According to Kelleher there are plans to use the technology to create educational apps for museums.

The PGC staff at McMurdo Station provides highly specialized mapmaking services for the U.S. Antarctic Program. For one project, Kelleher used satellite images to map huge cracks in the ice. That helped a team of researchers know whether they could safely approach their field camp on snowmobiles. Another recent project was to help recover a giant, high—tech helium(氦气) balloon used to carry scientific instruments high into the atmosphere. These balloons are launched in Antarctica because there is no danger that they will hurt anyone when they fall back down to Earth. Using satellite images, Kelleher and colleagues created maps of where the balloon could be found.

Antarctica may no longer be Terra Incognita, but it still holds countless mysteries. Cartographers and the maps they make will continue to be essential in helping scientists unlock those secrets.

1. From the passage, we can infer that Antarctica was on the map in the 1500s when________.

A．mapmakers knew it was much larger than the U.S.

B．Aristotle named the continent Terra Incognita

C．no one had ever seen or been to the continent

D．it was such an interesting continent as was often referred to

2. Which of the following statements is NOT true according to the passage?

A．It needs much work for the mapmakers to head out into the wild.

B．The interior can only be mapped by planes and satellites.

C．It is relatively easy to map Antarctica’s coastline by ship.

D．Antarctic is a vast but still mysterious continent.

3. The Polar Geospatial Center (PGC) works with Google initially_________.

A．to capture images of Antarctica for Street View

B．to test the company’s Trekker technology

C．to create educational apps for museums

D．to hike for an incredible experience

4. The fourth paragraph mainly talks about _______.

A．satellite images which are used to map huge cracks in the ice

B．a high-tech helium balloon for carrying scientific instruments

C．how to safely approach the researcher’s field camp and the balloon

D．the specialized mapmaking services provided by the PGC staff