1 . Time talks. It speaks more plainly than words. Time communicates in many ways.

Consider the different parts of the day, for example. The time of the day when something is done can give a special meaning to the event. It is not customary to telephone someone every early in the morning. If you telephone him early in the day, the time of the call shows that the matter is very important and requires immediate attention. If someone receives a call during sleeping hours, he assumes it is a matter of life or death. The time chosen for the call communicates its importance.

In social life, time plays a very important part. In the United States, guests tend to feel they are not highly regarded if the invitation to a dinner party is extended only three or four days before the party date. But this is not true in all countries. In other areas of the world, it may be considered foolish to make an appointment too far in advance because plans which are made for a date more than a week away tend to be forgotten.

The meaning of time differs in different parts of the world. Thus, misunderstandings often arise between people from cultures that treat time differently. Promptness(准时) is valued highly in American life, for example. If people are not prompt, they may be regarded as impolite or not fully responsible. In the U.S., no one would think of keeping a business partner waiting for an hour; it would be too impolite. A person who is five minutes late is expected to make a short apology.

This way of treating time is quite different from that of several other cultures. This helps to explain the unfortunate experience of a certain agriculturist from the United States, assigned to duty in another country. After a long delay, the agriculturist was finally agreed an appointment with the Minister of Agriculture. Arriving a little before the appointed hour, the agriculturist waited. The hour came and passed. At this point he suggested to the secretary that perhaps the minister did not know he was waiting in the outer office. This gave him the feeling of having done something to solve the problem, but he had not. Twenty minutes passed, then thirty, then forty-five. To an American, that is the beginning of the “insult period”. No matter what is said in apology, there is little that can remove the damage done by an hour’s wait in an outer office. Yet in the country where this story took place, a forty-five-minute waiting period was not unusual.

In the West, particularly in the United States, people tend to think of time as something fixed in nature. As a rule, Americans think of time as a road stretching into the future, along which one progresses. The road has many sections, which are to be kept separate— “one thing at a time”. People who cannot plan events are not highly regarded. Thus, an American may feel angry when he has made an appointment with someone and then finds a lot of other things happening at the same time.

Since time has such different meanings in different cultures, communication is often difficult. We will understand each other a little better if we can keep this fact in mind.

1. According to the passage, an announcement broadcast during class must be very important   because ________．

A．it is a customary time to make.	B．it makes everyone surprised.
C．it requires immediate attention.	D．it speaks more plainly than words.

2. The author mentions an agriculturist’s experience in order to show ________．

A．the value of promptness for Americans.

B．the cultural differences in treating time.

C．the bad manners of the Minister of Agriculture.

D．the importance of time in different parts of the day.

3. The underlined word “insult” in Paragraph5 probably means ________．

A．boring.	B．patient.
C．shameful.	D．hopeless.

4. We can learn from the passage that people will understand better if ________．

A．they are concerned with the value of time.

B．they know how to communicate with each other.

C．they escape dealing with many things at one appointed time.

D．they keep in mind that different cultures treat time differently.

2 . 阅读下列短文，根据短文内容填空。在未给提示词的空白处仅填写1个适当的单词，在给出提示词的空白处用括号内所给词的正确形式填空。

China is well known as the Kingdom of Bamboo. Bamboo culture has already been rooted     1     Chinese minds through the long history. To the Chinese people, bamboo is the symbol of virtue,     2     (reflect) people’s soul and emotion. Bamboo has the title of “the gentleman of plants”.     3     (it) deep root symbolizes determination and its straight and hollow pole represents straightness and modesty. Bamboo culture always     4     (play) a positive role in encouraging Chinese people to hold on when facing tough situations.