1 . The train was at a standstill, some twenty minutes outside Kolkata, when an unexpected stroke of luck presented Piya with an opportunity to go for a seat beside a window for some fresh air. She had been sitting in the stuffiest part of the train compartment, on the edge of a bench: now, moving to the open window, she saw that the train had stopped at a station called Champahati.

Looking over her shoulder, Piya spotted a tea-seller on the platform. Reaching through the bars of the window, she called him with a wave. She had never cared for the kind of chai, Indian tea, sold in Seattle, her hometown in the USA, but somehow, in the ten days she had spent in India she had developed an unexpected taste for milky, overboiled tea served in earthenware cups. There were no spices in it for one thing, and this was more to her taste than the chai at home.

She paid for her tea and was trying to get in the cup through the bars when the man in the seat opposite her own suddenly turned over a page, jolting her hand. She turned her wrist quickly enough to make sure that most of the tea spilled out of the window, but she could not prevent some from spilling over his papers.

“Oh, I’m so sorry!” Piya was very embarrassed: of everyone in the compartment, this was the last person she would have chosen to injure with her tea. She had noticed him while waiting on the platform in Kolkata and she had been struck by the self-satisfied tilt of his head and the way in which he stared at everyone around him, taking them in, sizing them up, sorting them all into their places.

“Here,” said Piya, producing a handful of tissues. “Let me help you clean up.”

“There’s nothing to be done,” he said testily (暴躁地). “These pages are ruined anyway.”

For a moment she considered pointing out that it was he who had knocked her hand. But all she could bring herself to say was, “I’m very sorry. I hope you’ll excuse me.”

“Do I really have a choice?” he said. “Does anyone have a choice when they’re dealing with Americans these days?”

Piya had no wish to get into an argument so she let this pass. Instead, she opened her eyes wide and, in an attempt to restore peace, came out with, “But how did you guess?”

“About what?”

“About my being American? You’re very observant.”

This seemed to do the trick. His shoulders relaxed as he leaned back in his seat. “I didn’t guess,” he said. “I knew.”

1. In the first paragraph, Piya was relieved when she got a window seat because it meant that_________.

A．there was more room for her luggage

B．she no longer had to suffer from a lack of air

C．there was less chance that she would miss her stop

D．she didn’t have to stand for the rest of the train journey

2. Piya found that the tea or chai she had drunk in India ________.

A．was disappointingly weak in taste	B．reminded her of her home in Seattle
C．would have tasted better if served fresh	D．was preferable to the chai she had had before

3. When Piya first saw the man she thought that ________.

A．he was someone who was observant of surroundings

B．he seemed to think he was better than other people

C．he had tried to keep his distance from his fellow passengers

D．he had been looking for someone he knew on the station platform

4. Piya asked “But how did you guess?” in order to _________.

A．find out what the man really thought about Americans

B．try to calm the situation down by starting a conversation

C．ensure the man realized that she had apologized

D．make sure the man knew he was being rude

2 . GuiltyPleasures? No Such Thing

We know them when we see them: The TV shows and movies we love, even though we just know they’re bad. The trashy books we simply can’t _________. The awful earworms we hate to love.

Yes, these are our guilty pleasures — what some people consider the _________ food in our media diets. But if we enjoy them, why should we feel _________? We should be free to enjoy whatever we like! And as it turns out, these so-called “guilty” pleasures can actually be good for us, so long as they’re enjoyed in _________.

Taking a mental break and enjoying something that doesn’t require intense intellectual _________ gets us out of problem-solving mode, said Robin Nabi, a professor of communication at the University of California, Santa Barbara, who specializes inmedia effects and emotion. It can also improve our ability to productively deal with stressors and help us _________ more positively with other people.

If that’s true, then why do guilty pleasures get such a bad _________? Well, it’s not the addiction itself, but the _________ we have when talking about them. However, according to experts like Dr. Nabi, feeling guilty about or disparaging (贬低) activities we enjoy can _________ the benefits they offer us while getting rid of self-imposedembarrassment about our interests can be empowering and enrich our social lives, which is why it’s time to __________ “guilty pleasure” from our list of shames.

One important value of a guilty pleasure is the __________ it can create between people. “These shows are out there for a reason — they’re resonating(令人产生共鸣). Nabi said. He added that the connections we make with others who share our interests in such things “is not to be __________.”

__________, talking about what we enjoy can ease any remaining guilt and makes it easier to discover more things that bring us pleasure. Being able to talk __________ about what we love is more than just a way to spend the time，since it encourages us to justify our needs and be our true self.

Still, it’s best to follow the age-old advice our parents taught us: Everything in moderation. Though guilt can enhance pleasure in some cases, it can also push us to indulge in __________ we feel guilty about in others.

1.

A．turn down

B．take in

C．tear apart

D．put down

2.

A．junk

B．sugary

C．spiritual

D．transformative

3.

A．relaxed

B．guilty

C．helpless

D．alert

4.

A．mass

B．moderation

C．minimum

D．depression

5.

A．focus

B．superiority

C．quality

D．development

6.

A．struggle

B．charge

C．engage

D．persevere

7.

A．breakup

B．principle

C．condition

D．reputation

8.

A．consciousness

B．obligation

C．attitudes

D．requirements

9.

A．switch

B．receive

C．claim

D．decrease

10.

A．remove

B．discourage

C．distinguish

D．prevent

11.

A．conflict

B．difference

C．exchange

D．bond

12.

A．established

B．underestimated

C．found

D．strengthened

13.

A．In addition

B．On the contrary

C．All in all

D．Therefore

14.

A．enthusiastically

B．casually

C．openly

D．politely

15.

A．theories

B．behaviors

C．problems

D．relationships

3 . Directions: Fill in each blank with a proper word chosen from the box. Each word can be used only once. Note that there is one word more than you need.

A. advances       B. automation C. combed   D. comprehensive E. filled F. generated   G. modest     H. prior     I. thinned     J. underlie     K. unearth

Does technology replace more jobs than it creates? What is the net balance between these two things? Until now, that has not been measured. But a new research project led by MIT economist David Autor has developed an answer, at least for U.S. history since 1940.The study uses new methods to examine how many jobs have been lost to machine     1    , and how many have been generated through “augmentation(增强),” in which technology creates new tasks. Overall, the study finds, and particularly since 1980, technology has replaced more U.S. jobs than it has     2    .

“There does appear to be a faster rate of automation, and a slower rate of augmentation, in the last four decades, from 1980 to the present, than in the four decades     3    ,” says Autor.However, that finding is only one of the study’s     4    .The researchers have also developed an entirely new method for studying the issue, based on an analysis of thousands of U.S.censusjob categories in relation to a(n)     5     look at the text of U.S. patents over the last century. That has allowed them, for the first time, toquantifythe effects of technology over both job loss and job creation.

The study finds that overall, about 60 percent of jobs in the U.S. represent new types of work, which have been created since 1940.To determine this, Autor and his colleagues     6     through about 35,000 job categories, tracking how they emerge over time. They also used natural language processing tools to analyze the text of every U.S. patent filed since 1920. That allowed them to     7     links between new technologies and their effects on employment.

From about 1940 through 1980, for instance, jobs like elevator operator and typesetter(排字工人) tended to get automated. But at the same time, more workers —    8     roles such as shipping and receiving clerks, buyers and department heads, and civil and space engineers.  From 1980 through 2018, the ranks of cabinetmakers and machinists, among others, have been     9     by automation, while industrial engineers, and operations and systems researchers and analysts, have enjoyed growth.

Ultimately, the research suggests that the negative effects of automation on employment were more than twice as great in the 1980-2018 period as in the 1940-1980 period.There was a more     10    , and positive, change in the effect of augmentation on employment in 1980-2018, as compared to 1940-1980.

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.

In the fall of 1903, O. Henry was living in a room at the small Hotel Marty in New YorkCity. He had published a few stories in local magazines, but was still relatively unknown when editors at the New York World newspaper sent a young reporter     1     (track) down this mysterious writer. By the next day, O. Henry had an agreement with the newspaper to write one story a week for the magazine section of their Sunday edition. The World had     2     (large) daily circulation in the world, and O. Henry’s stories about New York life became immensely popular. By the time he left the newspaper after less than three years, O. Henry     3     (establish) his reputation as a gifted storyteller and master of surprise endings.

O. Henry was the pen name used by William Sydney Porter, who was born in North P. Carolina. At the age of twenty, he moved to Texas,     4     he held a variety of jobs, eventually becoming a bank teller. He married and became a reporter and columnist for the Houston Post. After a few years, his wife     5     (diagnose) with a serious infectious disease, and he was accused of illegally taking the money of the bank where he worked. Some people have claimed     6     he was stealing money to help pay his wife’s medical bills. O. Henry fled to Central America, but his wife was too ill to accompany him. Months later,     7     her worsening condition, he returned and turned himself in to the police. His wife soon died, and O. Henry spent three years in prison in Ohio. It was during his time in prison that he began writing the stories that would make him famous. W. S. Porter emerged from prison     8     O. Henry.

In 1902, O. Henry moved to New York City and started trying to sell his stories. In a few years his luck changed for the better, and his position with the New York World helped make him a     9     (celebrate) author. He published more than three hundred stories and gained worldwide acclaim. O. Henry’s stories are known for their plot twists and surprise endings. In fact, O. Henry’s own life ended with a “twist”—his funeral was somehow scheduled in the same church at the same time as someone else’s wedding! The O. Henry Award     10     (honor) the authors of the best stories printed each year in American magazines.