1 . It is well known that as Christmas is coming，there are so many things to do. Besides buying presents，sending cards，and cleaning rooms，parents are still _______ with difficult jobs of hiding presents from curious young children. If the gifts are large，this is sometimes a real _______ .On Christmas Eve，young children are torn between the wish to go to bed early so that Father Christmas will bring their presents quickly and the wish to stay up late so that they will not _______ the fun. The wish for gifts usually proves     _______. But though children go to bed early，they often lie _______   for a long time，hoping to get a short look at Father Christmas.

Last Christmas，my wife and I _______ hid a few large presents in the storeroom. I _______   the moment when my son，Jimmy，would ask me where the new bike had come from，but   _______ he did not see it.

On Christmas Eve，it took the children hours to go to sleep. It must have been nearly _______ when my wife and I went quietly into their room and began ________ stockings. Then I took out the ________   from the storeroom and left it beside the Christmas tree. We knew we would not get much sleep that night，for the children were ________ to get up early. At about five o'clock the next morning，we were woken by loud sounds coming from the children’s ________ —they were shouting excitedly！Before I had time to get out of bed，young Jimmy came ________into our room on his new bike，and his sister，Mary，arrived. She dragged a large balloon behind her. Suddenly it burst. That woke us up ________ . The day had really begun with a bang!

2 . In Venice, it is not uncommon to see tourists carry suitcases through waist-high water, or sit at tables in Piazza San Marco in their swimsuits. Pictures of Venice in the most dramatic flooding are really _________.

We are used to thinking of Venice as a city in _________,a glorious relic (古迹)of human creativity that is about to _________any day and suddenly the end looks closer. However, as climate change makes extreme weather more _________, Venice looks less like a _________of the sea and more like an old survivor that can teach the rest of the world how to live with water.

People barely notice how _________the art treasures of Venice are kept on the upper floors of palaces and museums, even on a dry summer day. It is also _________to worry about all the art in churches because no other city has such a sharp _________of protecting itself from water.

In their art, the people of Venice are as happy on water as on _________. Vittore Carpaccio s painting Hunting on the Lagoon shows young Venetians standing easily _________ in low-sided boats to shoot arrows at water birds. In a Gentile Bellini's painting, priest(牧师)Swim in the canal searching for a lost relic. Titian portrays(描绘)a woman bathing in open water in his painting. Hunting and fishing, swimming and bathing, Venetians always know how to --_________water.

The palaces built in Venice are also good examples of the prevention of _________.Each has its living spaces on upper floors, often with a courtyard on the ground floor that _________   water instantly.

The danger of Venice is real and this treasury of civilization does need protecting. But it is not all bad news. Or ________,as the news gets worse for the entire planet, Venice has some lessons to teach about how to_________the sea.

3 . More than two decades after it went missing, a ceremonial crown has found its way home to Ethiopia. The country’s prime minister, Abiy Ahmed, expressed his _______ to the Dutch officials who helped with its_______ – and to the man who_______ it, Sirak Asfaw, who went to the Netherlands in the 1970s for political reasons.

Sirak played a big role in the_______ journey of the fancy crown. He used to host different people from Ethiopia in his Dutch house. In 1998, one of the_______ asked him to look after a crown. But after _______ it was of Ethiopian origin, he refused to give it back and _______ it should be sent back to Ethiopia.

However, he didn’t _______ the authorities in power in Ethiopia at the time so he kept it at home. “To_______ such a treasure then was very hard to do,” he said. “I ended up in such a(n)__________ situation, not knowing who to tell or what to do with this________ artwork.”

It was not until the reform-minded Abiy Ahmed took office in 2018 that Sirak________ decided to come forward. He________ Arthur Brand, a famous Dutch specialist in the recovery of stolen art, and     Brand, who has described the __________ as “one of the most exciting finds of my career,” then ________ Sirak to give it to local authorities.

So the________ reached out to the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the ministry helped them work out the________ of returning the artwork to Ethiopia – where it hadn’t been seen since early 1990s. ________, after 21 years hidden in a Dutch________, the crown is now back in Ethiopia. This is the amazing achievement of returning the treasure to its________ place.

4 . Once a year in the town of Wuzhen all the tourists can be audience members.

Picture an entire town turned into one grand immersive （沉浸式）_______: huge marionettes walking through a narrow, flagstone -paved lane, mother and daughter sitting _______ in a " paper boat that _______ along a river, young couples whispering under a night sky _______ up by bloomed kites.

No matter where you go in the town of Wuzhen, Zhejiang province, during its_______ theater festival you are likely to_______ performances --- and some in the unlikeliest of places, such as at the _______of an otherwise quiet square, under the roofs of a moss-carpeted dock, and even on rowing boats.

Even tourists_______of the festival will find themselves_______in plays, dance and music, everybody being ________ to wander the 1,300-year-old town's alleys, riverbanks and theater venues.

They can, for example, step into the “home” of the Italian director Eugenio Barba as he throws a "dinner party”. "This is a very________way of thinking theater, that the audience are my ________ to share a dinner, and food are sounds, ________ , words, poetry,” said Barba pleasingly, founder of the Odin Teatret of Denmark.

But those who wanted to watch The Tree were________to hand in their phones before performances. When the show began they sat ________ one another quietly, professionals and ________ alike, not knowing what the evening would bring.

What gradually________were various stories with a tree at their center. The performance immersed its audience in an overwhelming auditory（听觉的）and________head trip, or,________one viewer commented on the ________ site Douban, “the best nightmare I have ever had”.

5 . If you’re a fan of football, you might have wondered how it began. I went to Atherstone, a town in the heart of England, to see the _______ of the game. It takes place _______ on Shrove Tuesday, and if you had lived there eight hundred years ago, you would have _______ exactly the same game being played.

_______ the game, all the shopkeepers in the town’s main street, Long Street, _______ their shops to make way for the event. At half past two, sweets and coins were thrown out of the windows of Barclays Bank to local _______ waiting below. Like every year, they were given the day off school _______. After children moved back from the centre of the street, men and boys _______ instead. The crowd began a countdown. At three o'clock, a ball too heavy to kick very far was _______ from Barclays Bank too. For the next two hours, the ________ would be a moving mass of bodies, all fighting to ________ the ball.

The men who ________ are usually from Atherstone, or from nearby. Players often work ________, in family groups or pub connections, but there aren’t any official ________. The game itself has only two ________: play is limited to Long Street and participants are not allowed to ________ anyone. To begin with, the players were a little ________, but as the time progressed, things got serious. When the final whistle sounded at 5:00 pm, the winner, who had ________ to hold the ball until the end, was found from the bottom of a pile of men. After the fierce contest, his T-shirt had been completely ________. One player suffered a head injury and others had black eyes and slight injuries. ________, everyone was happy.

6 . I just marked my first Mid-Autumn Festival celebration in China._______a week after arriving for my graduate studies, I was kind of homesick—memories of past _______ back in Serbia with family and friends exchanging scenes in my mind. On the morning of Friday, September 13rd, the _______ on the campus was very cheerful. Chinese students explained to us the importance of the day as gifts of mooncakes were _______ . Then came the night. The full moon appeared: huge, _______ball high above the campus, and eyes looked at it with _______. Unlike previous nights, a cool breeze swept through the campus.With Serbian music playing on my headphones, I danced my way, _______ in the wind, and forgetting myself for a moment.

As I _______ back into my room, I was fascinated by the festival’s idea. My _______ mind pushed me online where I came across the poem Prelude (前奏) to Water Melody, by the well-known Chinese writer Su Dongpo. This poem concisely(精确地) seized what I was ________ . The message and the tone both resonated (共鸣) with my feelings. Writing to his family, Su wondered what time it was back at home. ________ the time differences between China and Serbia, I was constantly trying to ________ what time it was back at home.

Eventually, Su asked his family to join him in ________ the timeless perfection of a full moon in a ________ night.What a way to finish! I, too, was hoping that all was well with my family. Despite the distance and ________ that comes with not seeing or hearing from a loved one, we were all flourishing (繁盛的) under the watch of the ________ moon.

And while we may go away from home, as happens from time to time; the family remains the most important ________ to our productive existence. As the Chinese used the holiday to ________ with the loved ones, the Serbian community also got together, shared a meal and walked on the streets under the neon (霓虹灯) lights.

As I write this, a day after the Festival, I cannot help but look forward to the next. Thank my Chinese friends, whose________ made me and a crowd of other foreign students experience an ________Mid-Autumn Festival.

Americans prefer to try every way to have fun. For example, they drive their own cars, some even tow a small boat after vehicle. They start from Los Angeles, California under sun, _______ through four or five hundred miles to go to La Fulin, Colorado to spend weekends while Chinese people are still _______ with work, and have dinner at home together with families at weekends or _______ time watching TV.

The difference is mainly due to cultural customs and traditions _______ the two countries. It is said that Chinese people are living for others, while Americans are for _______. When Chinese people come to the United States, they fight for _______ first, and then desperately make money after they are recognized by others. It seems that, the purpose to earn money is not to enjoy life, _______ for their following generations sons and daughters and even grandchildren. Chinese people prefer to save money _______ emergency, such as illness. Although Chinese people with _______ in the United States don’t need to worry about their own social welfare and health insurance, they work still very hard, as they hope that they can ________ more money.

Chinese people’s interest is in the amount on the passbook(存折), so they spend ________ money usually.

Most of Chinese are very thrifty(节约的), and they are ________ to spend money, but there are exceptions. They are willing to spend money on their ________. Many Chinese people think that, they endure(容忍) many ________, so they wish that their children could live much better. Therefore, in the United States elementary schools, you can see that those who ________ the best clothes , with more pocket money are Chinese students. In contrast, American children dress very simply, with just a little pocket money.

________ Chinese, Americans believe in living for themselves. They do everything for their own. ________, they earn money to enjoy a ________ life, and pursue a higher quality of life. As for their own parents or children, they think that parents have their own pension and social welfare, and children should live a(n) ________ life when they are 18’ years old. So they could boldly spend money on themselves. ________, Americans save little money. In the street, it is easy for Chinese to take out 300-400 dollars, but it is hard to say for Americans.

8 . April Fool’s Day is a western festival. No one _______ exactly when and how April Fool’s Day began.

However, there are some stories about _______ it came into being. One story _______like this: in the sixteenth-century France, the start of the new year was on April first. It was celebrated _______much the same way _______it is today with parties and dancing into the late hours of the night. Then in 1562, Pope (教皇) Gregory introduced a new calendar (日历) for the Christian world, and the new year fell on January first. There were some people, _______, who hadn’t heard or didn’t believe the _______in the date, so they _______to celebrate New Year’s Day on April first. _______played tricks on them and called them “April fools”. They tried to make them believe that something false was ________. In France today, April first is called “April Fish”. French children fool their friends by taping a paper fish to their friends’ ________. When the “young fool” ________this trick, the prankster (恶作剧者) shouts “April Fish!”

Today Americans play small tricks on friends and strangers alike on the first of April. One ________trick on April Fool’s Day is ________to a friend’s shoe and saying, “Your shoelace is united (开了).” School children might tell a classmate that school has been canceled. ________the trick is, if you fail for the joke the prankster shouts “April Fool!”

In Britain today, on the first of April, even ________newspapers, radio and TV programs tell big lies. You ________read a science ________showing that doctors have found a way to cure AIDS, ________you would probably listen to a piece of news about an UFO________on an island.

9 . Every year the United Sates exports "cultural products" to the rest of the world while it only imports similar products from other countries equal to about one percent of the amount exported. Movies, for example, are one such_______. The movie industry in countries like England and Italy is almost completely_______on American exports. Both countries report that 85% to 95% of all movie tickets sold each year are for movies produced in the United States. Millions of people worldwide buy American pop, rap, and rock music. Billions of people drink Coca-Cola and eat McDonald's hamburgers. American software_______the computer market.

Can all of the above products be called "cultural", however? That depends on how one_______culture. Most people _______culture into two forms: "high" culture and "low" culture. High culture is the kind produced by writers and_______. It is more concerned with stimulating thought in the people who view or use it and does not_______care how marketable people find it Low culture,_______ is viewed as a product usually for entertainment and is only as good as how well it sells. Because it is_______by masses of people, this type of culture can also be called "mass culture". The________between low and high culture are not very clear.

Pierre Guerlain, a professor of English and American Studies in France, points out that when a cultural product is imported, the product cannot cover the existing culture, thus________it. The imported product is changed to adapt to the local context. Anyone who believes that a society which imports American products of mass culture will become a ________of America is being naive(幼稚的).

America may seem to have the strongest hand in exporting cultural products, but there is a boomerang(相反的) ________for being more of an exporter than importer. Because Europeans and Japanese import so many cultural products from the United States, they know a lot more about American culture________than Americans know about European or Japanese culture. It is a definite advantage for the Europeans and Japanese to be bilingual as well as bicultural. These countries can use their knowledge of American society and________to increase their chances of success in the American market

10 . When I was young, I never had a special Christmas gift that I dreamed of and was crazy about. I know I _______ a lot of great Christmas presents as I grew up. Chatty Cathy, Baby Thumbelina, Little Miss No Name…I just don't remember _______ them. Although my parents had their financial _______, they always made Christmas special for their four children. Dad worked a(n) _______ job as a referee in high school basketball games to _______ a little more cash, and Mum was the queen of bargain shopping. The gifts _______ have been inexpensive, but there was more than enough under the tree.

Stored in happy memories are the family _______: helping Mum and Dad drag the Christmas decorations out of the attic, going with Dad to _______ the tree from the Kiwanis, and decorating the tree _______ strings of blue lights and Christmas lasting days and days and days. The piles of ________ under our tree wrapped in newspaper are more memorable than ________ was wrapped. The act itself of unwrapping and ________ seeing what was beneath the newspaper was ________ and memorable. But the most clear are the images of smiles, the sounds of ________, not the images of toys or clothes.

It's the ________ of Christmas. The best moments, the happy moments were not the gifts,________ the togetherness, the love of family. Even in the occasional quarrels of brothers and sisters, even in the ________ of late nights, even in the sometime stress of it all.

Christmas should not ________ on what's on our gift lists. For it's not about what gifts we ________ or receive, but about what we do, what we experience.

Those are the happy moments that ________.