The Vikings, whose ancestors came from Scandinavia, were the first Europeans     1    (reach) America. They had lived in many places of northern Europe. In 982 AD, a man     2    (call) Eric the Red was forced to leave Iceland because of a murder, for     3    he got into trouble. Eric discovered Greenland and persuaded some people     4    (settle) in Greenland. Eric set sail again, but only half of the ships made     5    to Greenland this time.

Later a man, Biarni set sail from Iceland in search     6     Eris’s party. But he     7    (blow) off course and found himself in an unknown land, from where he     8    (eventual) reached Greenland.

In the year 1002, Leif, Eric the Red’s son, followed Biarni’s directions and sailed to     9    is believed to be the coast of present-day Canada. He also discovered Newfoundland. Actually, Eric the Red and Leif’s     10    (deed) are the first records we have of Europeans sailing to the Americas.

2 . In 1590, the GLOBE was built using wood from an earlier theatre, which had been built by Richard Burbage's father, James Burbage, in Shoreditch in 1576. The first performance for which a firm record remains was Jonson's Every Man out of His Humour—with its fist scene welcoming the "gracious and kind spectator""- at the end of the ear.

On 29h June 1613, the GLOBE Theatre went up in flames during a performance of Henry VII. A theatrical gun, set off during the performance, misfired, burning the wooden beams and straws. According to one of the few surviving documents of the event, no one was hurt except a man whose burning breeches (炮后膛) were put out with a bottle of beer. It was rebuilt in the following year.

Like all he other theatres in London, the GLOBE was closed down by the Puritns in 1642. It was pulled down in 1644, or slightly later — the commonly cited document dating the act to 15 April 1644 has been identified as false-to make room for other buildings. A modern reconstruction of the theatre, named "Shakespeare's GLOBE", opened in 1997, with a production of Henry V. It is an academic approximation of the original design, based on available evidence of the 1599 and 1614 buildings, and is located about 750 feet (230m)from the site of the original theatre.

3 . A fresh and gentle wind on your face, soft sand under your feet and blue waters as far as the eye can see. Is there any other Olympic sport that is played in such pleasant conditions as beach volleyball？

“I’ve gone to a lot of beautiful places, and met a lot of beautiful people. That wouldn’t have happened if I had been playing another sport.” said Randy Stoklos, America’s most famous beach volleyball player.

The sport began as a four-a-side game on beaches in Southern California in the 1920s. The first recorded two-man game took place there in 1930, and the first tournament (锦标赛) was held in Los Angeles 18 years later. The winners were awarded a case of Pepsi. In the 1950s, women started playing and the sport soon spread to Europe and South America. Yet at that time, beach volleyball was more an entertainment show than a sport, with beauty contests included. The Association of Volleyball Professionals was founded in 1983 and beach volleyball developed into a fast, athletic sport. Its world-wide popularity won beach volleyball a place at the 1996 Olympics in Atalanta, where 24 male teams and 16 female teams took part. At present, the US and Brazil are the best in the world at beach volleyball.

The game came to China in the early 1990s and there have been national tournaments since 1994. It became an official event at the Eighth National Games in 1997. China’s You Wenhui and Wang Lu finished ninth in the women’s beach volleyball world championships in Brazil.

As the name suggests, Sichuan Hot Pot was born in Sichuan Province,     1     is known for its     2    (prefer) for spicy food. This mouth-burning and tongue-numbing hot pot has been gaining a large amount of attention in recent years in foreign countries.

The     3    (common) accepted theory traces the Sichuan Hot Pot back to early 20 century when the port workers and fishermen who worked and lived along the Yangtze River could not afford     4    (eat) the regular cuts of meat so they figured out a way to cook cheap meats and offal(内脏)     5     boiling them in a pot of extremely spicy soup. The use of spicy soup was first     6    (intend) to cover the taste from the offal. However, after some     7    (adjust) of fragrant spices, this one pot meal became a popular dish in Sichuan region.

After years of continuous development, eating Sichuan Hot Pot today is no longer     8     the poor like. Offal still remains as classic hot pot ingredients, but high quality meats and seafood ingredients are also common on the menu. Over the past years, the modern hot pot     9    (shape) into a complex meal that starts with sliced meat, offal, and seafood,     10    (follow) by vegetables and ends with noodles.

5 . The Winter Olympics is also called the White Olympics. At this time, many colorful stamps are published to mark the great Games. The first stamps marking the opening came out on January 25, 1932 in the United States for the 3rd White Olympics. From then on, publishing stamps during the White Olympics became a rule．

During the 4th Winter Olympic Games a group of stamps were published in Germany in November 1936. The five rings of Olympics were drawn on the front of the sportswear. It was the first time that the rings appeared on the stamps of the White Olympics．

In the 1950s, the stamps of this kind became more colorful. When the White Olympics came, the host countries as well as the non-host countries published stamps to mark those Games. China also published four stamps in February 1980, when the Chinese sportsmen began to take part in the White Olympics．

Japan is an Asian country that has ever held the White Olympics. Altogether 14,500 million stamps were sold to raise money for this sports meeting．

Different kinds of sports were drawn on these small stamps. People can enjoy the beauty of the wonderful movements of some sportsmen．

10 . The discovery of Liangzhu Culture

From December 1936 to March 1937, three archaeological diggings were carried out in the suburbs of Hangzhou,where loads of black ceramics and stoneware were brought to light.

Inspired by these relics, an archaeology lover named Shí Xingeng, who came from West Lake Museum in Hangzhou, wrote several detailed reports on the digging. However, he had to put his work aside when China started to fall into Japan's military aggression. Shi joined the resistance movement against Japanese invasion and died of disease in 1939. What passed away along with him during the war were many of Liangzhu's precious relics.

Fortunately, Shi's reports were finally published in Shanghai in 1938, which caught considerable attention of archaeological circles, In 1959,the name Liangzhu Culture was given to the independent regional culture by archaeologist Xia Nai. It represented an earlier civilization that had remained unknown to historians. The culture, as the radiocarbon dating applied to the relics proved, existed between 3,300 and 2,200 B.C.

It is commonly believed that the earliest known Chinese written language dates back to more than 3,000 year ago; when oracle bone script appeared in Shang Dynasty. But Liangzhu Culture might provide evidence of a written language that appeared in China at least 1,000 years ealiler.

In 2007, Liangzhu Ancient City was reported to be discovered in Hangzhou, where archaeological diggings revealed a large and early walled city in Chinese history. There were man-made hills and streams in the city area, which were very likely part of the early designed urban landscape. To protect the urban space which was formed by waterways and entrances both Inside and outside the city, a flood control system was connected to the river networks and 11 dams. In the fields outside the wall, archaeologists discovered rains of the residences, tombs, workshops, and docks with wooden boats.