1 . Last June, my sister, Katy, graduated from high school. I didn’t think much about it then because I was ____ a great summer holiday. But when the ____ came to an end, I started to ____ that soon my sister would be off to college. 

At the end of August, my ____ drove to my grandparents’ house near Katy’s ____. The next day we ____ to the campus and helped arrange all her things. After getting everything ____ and chatting with her roommates for a while, we headed for our car. We all stood there ____ and kissing her, telling her how much we ____ her and wishing her luck. I looked at my mom and saw her starting to cry. 

As we were pulling out of the parking lot, we ____ our arms to say the last goodbye to her. I would have never ____ that I was going to feel that sad. I was ____ to accept the fact that I wouldn’t be seeing my sister. I was once ____ that I would jump with joy the day Katy left for college, but deep down I knew I would ____ miss her. 

Even now, I miss her and have to keep ____ myself that she is not around. The Internet and telephone are ready for us to communicate. I’m more than delighted that I can talk to her online or on the phone. 

So, to all those little brothers and sisters, treasure the time you have with your siblings (兄弟姐妹). They may be a pain sometimes but once they’re gone, you’ll almost wish you had that pain back.

2 . I’d never been to the Day of the Dead before. As my dad and I looked around for seats, I _______ Marco, my best friend, hurrying toward us. “Hi, Mr. O’kane,” he _______ my dad. Then he turned to me and said, “Nate! Will you help me?” 

“Whatever you need,” I said.

Marco threw me parts of a _______: Mexican sandals (凉鞋), a straw hat, a cane (手杖), a gray wig, and an “old man” mask (面具). “My cousin couldn’t _______!” Marco’s voice rang with worry. 

“It’s part of a traditional dance,” he said,“and we should wear the costume.”

“You expect me to dance? ” I _______. “I don’t want to dance!” 

Marco smiled. “It’ll be fun. And hurry! We’re going to be _______.”  

“We’re going to do a lot of stomping (跺脚). Slow at first. Keep one hand _______ on your back, like an old man with an ache,” added Marco. 

The speakers _______: “Ladies and gentlemen, it’s time for TheDanceoftheLittleOldMen!” 

“Be quick,” Marco _______ to me to follow his lead. 

We all began stomping slowly to music. I could only see ________ the small holes of the mask. I continued to stomp, trying to ________ what to do. I leaned on my cane and kept a hand low on my back. After a few minutes of dancing like that, my back ________ started to ache. 

The music ________. And we stomped quickly. Performing with Mexican sandals was ________ and inconvenient. People laughed as we hopped and kicked, but after a moment the laughter turned into cheers. 

Marco gave me a thumbs⁃up. As the audience clapped for our group, I said to him happily, “You were right. That was ________.”

3 . I met Daisy Banks on the way to Maghar. She was walking down the road with her white stick, and I saw her walking toward a muddy _______. If she continued, she might _______ into the water. Not wanting this to happen, I stopped my _______ and called out, “There’s a hole in front of you, Daisy. If it’s all right with you, I’ll _______ you to your place.”  

She happily _______. I took her bag so that she could climb on my motorbike. We talked about her_______and I discovered she was on the way to her school.  

Daisy had called me a couple of times since our chance _______. However, I had been unable to meet her _______ my busy schedules. Finally, we _______ at the Mahdu Mall. We talked about a range of issues, and I came to________ that Daisy possessed knowledge which would challenge that of many ________ fit people.  

Although she has a mother and three brothers, Daisy has been ________ on her own for the past years. She cooks for herself and washes her own clothes while ________ to teach every morning at Maghar Primary School. While doing her ________,she tries to remember people, places, and things in order to manage her daily life. She is a(n) ________ person, telling me that she made the decision to live alone after her brothers said they would take turns to look after her each month. Daisy felt this would hurt her. I really admire her confidence and the way she carries herself in her life.

4 . Chloe Smith is a girl aged 6 from Atlanta, Georgia. One day, while taking a walk with her father near their home, she________something shiny under a pile of rubbish. She picked up the ________ to take home, as she often did on her treasure-hunting walks. Chloe was later ________ to discover she had found a stolen Olympic gold medal.

The medal belongs to former canoeist (划艇运动员) Joe Jacobi, who won gold while ________ for Team USA in the 1992 Barcelona Olympic games. The medal, along with other personal belongings, was ________ in May of 2016 when someone broke into Jacobi’s can. Though police managed to ________ some of his stolen items, they hadn’t been able to find his ________ Olympic medal. It may have been lost forever, if not for a 6-year-old girl’s treasure-hunting ________ .

Chloe’s dad had seen Jacobi’s story on the news, and ________ realized it was his stolen property. He found Jacobi’s email and sent him pictures of the treasure. After________ the medal, Jacobi was astonished, just speechless.

Chloe was ________ to give it back after speaking with Jacobi on the phone. ________, Jacobi promised to speak to her class when school begins again this fall. The ________ of this little girl reuniting an Olympian with his beloved possession is ________ . When we talk about character and doing the ________ thing, Chloe represents the Olympic values in every sense of the word.

5 . Gurnah, growing up in Zanzibar, an island off the coast of Tanzania, was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature on Thursday.

He is the first Black writer _________ the prize since Toni Morrison in 1993, and some observers saw his _________ as a long delayed corrective (矫正)after years of European and American Nobel laureates (获得者). In his 10 novels, Gurnah has often explored the _________ of exile(流放), identity and belonging. They _________“Memory of Departure” “Pilgrims Way” and “Dottie,” which all deal with the immigrant(移民)experience in Britain.

Gurnah’s first language is Swahili, but he _________ English as his literary language. He drew on the imagery and stories from the Quran, _________ from Arabic and Persian poetry, particularly “The Arabian Nights.” The news of Gumah’s Nobel _________ by fellow novelists and academics who have long argued that his _________ deserve a wider audience.

Gurnah was born in Zanzibar, which is now _________ of Tanzania, in 1948. Then, in 1964, he fled to England. __________ , poor, homesick, he began to write scraps(片段)in his diary, then __________ entries, then stories about other people. In his 20s, he started __________ fiction. Then he finished his first novel, “Memory of Departure,” about a young man who flees a failed uprising, at the same time he was writing his Ph. D. dissertation(论文). __________, he became a professor of English.

Though Gurnah hasn’t lived in Tanzania since he was a __________, his homeland always inspires him of his imagination. __________, he said “my homeland always asserts myself in my imagination, even when I deliberately try to set my stories elsewhere”.

6 . Volunteers in New York call on people to donate their used iPads to help poor patients keep in touch with their families online.

Some people with COVID-19 died alone in hospital physically _________ from their friends and family, which is a heartbreaking situation. This terrible reality _________ on a group of volunteers. Their goal is to connect patients with family members who are unable to be present ___________ hospital restrictions (限制) on visitors. They plan to collect used iPads from across the country and donate them to _________ in communities where the need is extremely _________. Nicolas Heller, a 31-year-old volunteer, said thousands of people had_________ from the disease in isolation (隔离) without the comforting words or _________ from a loved one. Heller is collecting used iPads for patients who do not _________ smart phones capable of video chatting.

By Friday morning, the volunteer group had _________ 375 used iPads from donors (捐赠者) nationwide. So far, 300 of the iPads have been __________ donated to Brooklyn’s University Hospital of Brooklyn. The volunteers were amazed by the donors’ __________. What the volunteers are doing is __________ people’s iPads that are not used anymore to help those patients in hospitals. These iPads can __________ medical staff to communicate with patients from outside of the room, decreasing their __________ of being exposed to the virus.

No one is an island. __________, we can make the world warmer.

7 . Several years ago I went on a trip alone to Mozambique. Our bus broke down by the side of the road. There was certainly nothing in the way of _________ or campsites or any kind of place to sleep. I _________ I’d just have to bed down on the roadside like others. But I was pretty _________ at the idea. Most everyone else was traveling with their families or other _________, and here I was, a very young woman, alone, with pale white skin that just screamed out “I’m a foreigner and do not _________ here.” Besides I spoke Portuguese reasonably _________ but not any of the local dialects, which _________ my difficulty.

I was trying to work out what to do when I _________ one of the women passengers I’d been chatting with _________ to me. “Come with me,” she said. I was then taken to the nearby village, where she lived. She and her large family __________ me that night. We had chips and matapa, a delicious Mozambican dish. Her kids laughed and circled around and were __________ to have a visit from a real white person. I couldn’t __________ a lot of the conversation, because only the woman spoke Portuguese, but I felt so __________ despite my foreignness.

This kind-hearted woman accommodated (提供住宿) a __________ a night spent shaking in __________ and hunger by the side of the road.

8 . When I was living in New York, I decided it was time to get my middle-aged self back in shape. The gym near my house was tiny. I was the weakest person there and I felt _________ as I did my pull-ups (引体向上). However, nobody really seemed to _________ me.

One day I was on the assisted pull-up machine when a huge guy walked up to me and _________, “Why are you always doing assisted pull-ups?” I looked at him, embarrassed, searching for a(n) _________.“Because I can’t do real ones,” I finally _________. “Yes, you can. You are strong,” he smiled. “Get over here, and I’ll _________ you.” We walked over to the “real” pull-up bar, and he _________ how to do it. He told me, “_________ practicing and by the end of the month, you will be _________ to knock out four or five.”   

After that day, I started to love going there. I was __________ the weakest one there. But I could do pull-ups: First two, then nine. When I stopped __________ looking foolish, I started asking others questions.

There were __________ everywhere in that gym, once I was willing to ask for __________. By the time I left New York, I could complete 10 pull-ups and I had been certified as a personal __________, so I could teach other women what I’d __________ in that gym.

9 . I started cooking when I was thirteen. Both of my parents worked, so I was usually _______ after school. One day, my parents forgot to _______ dinner before they went to work. As we were short of money, eating out was beyond _______. So I decided to be the _______ of the day.

A few moments later, I _______ to cook fried rice, the best option out of _______ resources, including my cooking knowledge. After _______ a pan on the stove and turning on the heat, it soon began to sizzle. I was so hungry that I _______ and threw everything into the pan all together. In went rice, pieces of meat and vegetables. Little did I know that the _______ of ingredients (原料) was crucial in cooking. I ________ waited for the meat to be thoroughly cooked, but other ingredients were ________. At first, I mistook it as steam from cooking, but I soon ________ something went horribly wrong when smoke ________ to fill the kitchen.

Later that day, my mother told me, “You cannot rush yourself when cooking.” Rather, I should take steps, turning to the basics, such as learning about the ingredients and ________ the recipe.

I’ve learned that the first ________ seems hard but we should just start and let the journey teach us.

10 . My grandfather died in 1970, leaving my grandmother living in their old house alone. Shortly after that, we went to the animal shelter and picked out a little dog to accompany Grandma. The dog was named Penny.

Grandma and Penny quickly became very attached (喜爱的) to each other, and that attachment grew much _________as the years passed—they became very _________. When Grandma went to _________, Penny walked along and lay _________ her until she woke up. As Penny aged, she could no longer jump up on the _________ to lie next to Grandma, so she lay on the blanket beside the bed. Grandma never went anywhere without her partner by her side.

The time came when both my grandmother and Penny were becoming _________.Grandma had been sent to hospital several times, and Penny couldn’t _________ around very well. When Grandma was in hospital, Penny would sit at the window _________ out for the car bringing Grandma home and would _________ wait at the door when Grandma came through. Each homecoming was a great meeting again between the two.

On Christmas Day in 1985, Grandma was again taken to the hospital. Penny, __________, sat at the window watching out for the car bringing Grandma home. Two mornings later, I __________ she couldn’t stand and wouldn’t eat. Later, she had difficulty in breathing. I quickly __________ her to the hospital where Grandma stayed to let her see her __________ for the last time. There, as soon as Penny saw Grandma, Penny’s eyes brightened suddenly and then slowly __________. Grandma left this world several hours later.

After fifteen years of loving friendship, Grandma and Penny passed away on the same day. God had it all worked out — Penny was waiting at the door to __________ her when Grandma came home.