Paper-making is a reflection of ancient Chinese wisdom,     1     (regard) as one of the Four Great Inventions of China. Among various types of paper in China, Xuan paper, traditionally handmade in Xuancheng, Anhui province, is famous for its close association    2    Chinese calligraphy and ink paintings.

The     3    (early) mention of Xuan paper is in On Famous Paintings Through History, a book by a scholar from the Tang Dynasty. It listed many characteristics of Xuan paper, like its stability, its durability and its    4    (resist) to insects. Yet     5    positioned it as an ideal medium for calligraphy and painting is its capacity to display various ink shades. Such are the features of the Xuan paper    6    it has gained favor among artists and calligraphers across generations.

With the growing popularity of Xuan paper in recent years, the industry has expanded     7    (dramatic) in Anhui. Last year, large quantities of Xuan paper, to be precise, about 500 metric tons,     8    (produce) in Xuancheng,     9     engaged more than 30, 000 local people in the industry. Currently, the local government is building a Xuan paper cultural park and a Xuan paper town    10     (develop) cultural tourism.

As centuries pass,     1     (historian) are still able to remember the achievements attained by the first emperor of unified China. We have to acknowledge that the successes QinShi Huang had were     2     (last) and helpful for the future of China.

When Qin Shi Huang first came into power in 220 BCE, China     3    (divide) into many kingdoms. In order to unify China, he launched a war    4     the other six major kingdoms. By 221 BCE, he was able to unify China under his rule.

Qin Shi Huang had    5    profound impact on China’s culture. He helped dig canals and build roads    6     (facilitate) travel. He started the national road system and created fast roads. He was    7     (extreme) influential in China’s government. Qin declared that the round coin with a square-shaped hole in the center as the currency of China. He named it ban-liang coin. The first emperor was able to create a unified measuring standard for weight, volume and     8     (long).

He asked his Prime Minister, Li Si, to unify the eight calligraphic (书写的) styles     9     were promoted in other states and absorb some     10     (simplify) characters to create the standardized Qin. This was China’s first thorough character standardization movement led by the central government, and the uniform calligraphic style had great significance in pushing forward the development of Chinese characters.

In China, the use and cultivation (种植) of green tea goes back thousands of years. While there is no precise way to know     1    (exact) when green tea was first cultivated, the following is     2    we know from historical records.

Legend assigns the discovery of tea to mythological emperor Shennong, who is said     3    (discover) tea in the 28th century BC. Shennong was sitting under a tea tree boiling a pot of water to drink. Some     4    (leaf) fell from the tree into the boiling water, creating the first ever pot of tea. During the Han Dynasty, written records referred     5    the cultivation of green tea. However, this wasn`t green tea for drinking     6    for medical purposes. The Tang Dynasty     7    (consider) by most to be the golden age of Chinese arts and culture. It was during this time that green tea became a popular drink and an important part of     8    (tradition) Chinese culture.

    9    first written account of tea culture, Cha jing or The Classic of Tea, was published by Lu Yu. This short but comprehensive work,     10    (cover) ten chapters, discusses everything from the mythological of tea, history, cultivation, preparation to tea culture.

Many people around the world may know that paper is one of the Four Great Inventions of ancient Chinese civilization,    1    few would know that more than 1,500 years ago, ancient Chinese craftsmen invented a new type of paper,    2    was called Xuan paper and used mainly for writing and painting.

Xuan paper was first made in ancient Xuan Prefecture, now    3    (know) as Jingxian County in Anhui Province. The traditional process of making Xuan paper is    4     (extreme) demanding and involves over 100 steps. The whole process can take as long as two years    5    (complete), and the skills have been passed down for    6    (generation).

Xuan paper is highly water absorbent, making it a perfect medium for conveying artistic effect in both Chinese calligraphy and ink wash painting. In addition, Xuan paper    7    (design) to be able to last for more than 1,000 years and still keep the freshness of the ink and color on it.

Today in Jingxian County, there    8     (be) many Xuan paper factories and workshops, where the paper is still made by master craftsmen using traditional techniques. And because of    9    (it) long history and the essential role it has played     10    the culture of Chinese painting and calligraphy, Xuan paper was included on the first list of China’s national intangible cultural heritages(非物质文化遗产)in 2006.

Today, most of the world’s money is made up of paper. However, the idea of paper money first     1     ( start ) in China. For much of Chinese history,     2     was considered as money were small coins with holes in the middle. These coins were put on a piece of string, 100 coins to a bunch.     3     ( normal ), ten bunches were kept on     4     same string, which could be very heavy to carry around. Since even 1,000 coins were not really worth that much, business deals of any     5     ( important ) could require many strings of coins-even whole rooms of them.

To solve this problem,     6     ( begin ) around the late 8th and early 9th centuries, businessmen would deposit their coins with someone, who would give     7     ( they ) a piece of paper called feiqian, or “ flying money ”. Then when the businessmen did business, he could use that paper instead     8     having to carry a truckload of coins around. In 812, three departments of the Tang government began using paper receipts for large deals where a lot of coins would have to     9     ( carry ) over a long distance. This was not money in the modern sense, as it could only be used     10     ( pick ) up coins at the end of the trip. This finally led to the printing of paper money as we know it today by the early 11th century.

The story of coffee often begins with a shepherd     1     (name) Kaldi in 9^th century Ethiopia. While out in the fields, Kaldi saw his goats eating the berries from a small bush, then running and leaping about. Out of     2     (curious), he tried the berries and felt the invigorating effects for     3     (he). He took some of the fruits with him and shared them with the     4     (member) of a monastery nearby. And by the 1400s, coffee was being traded throughout the Arabian Peninsula.

Coffee reached Europe in the late 16^th century through trade. Coffee was introduced into Italy first. Coffee really became popular in Europe in the 17^th century, and the coffee houses opened across Europe.     5     first coffeehouse in England opened in Oxford in 1651 and by the late 17^th century there were many coffeehouses in English towns     6     merchants and professional men met to drink cups of coffee, read newspapers and chat.

In the Americas, coffee was introduced during colonization, first as an imported good, then as a cultivated crop throughout Central America. The cultivation of coffee in Americas, like other cash crops, resulted     7     the displacement of native peoples and    8     (develop) of large – scale plantations using native people as a labor source. In the 19^th century, Brazil became the world’s     9     (large) coffee producer, a title it     10     (maintain) ever since. Coffee remains a major good produced in Central and South America to this day.