1 . Apartment owners cash in on upcoming holiday trips

The National Day holiday is around the corner, and those making last-minute plans to travel at that time are busy booking _______ hotel rooms in popular tourist destinations.

In a bid to cash in on this rush for rooms, social media users are _______ platforms with offers of apartments for _______ just for the holiday week, at prices that are a part of what is being _______ by hotels, many of which are sold out.

Unlike hotels, those renting out their homes are not charging anything _______ for cleaning the apartment while it is _______, no contract or deal needs to be signed and the ID information of the renters is not _______ required.

Meanwhile, some netizens have expressed _______ over this trend of renting out personal apartments.

“It is so unsafe. What if the people install a camera in your home or make it a complete mess,” one asked while _______ on a post seeking tenants(房客). Another said, “Won’t you be afraid of people opening your computer and checking what’s inside?”

Experts said this novel way of sharing one’s home not only means extra earnings for the homeowners, but also improves the ________ of the cities. However, they also warned that there are risks involved.

Fu Jian, a lawyer at Henan Zejin Law Firm, said that as there is no written ________ being signed between homeowners and renters, and the ID information is not ________, it would be very difficult for the owner to safeguard his or her rights should an argument ________.

Moreover, if there is a theft or an accident involving the guests during their stay in the apartment, the owner will more or less be held ________, he said.

He advised owners to be aware of the rules and regulations before renting out their apartments, and added that renters should also choose ________ to avoid unnecessary risks.

2 . Social media has made it very easy to change your appearance using filters (滤镜). They may come in _______ when you desperately need to record a video but not in a good state. But there has been a lot of talk around the _______ of filters and unrealistic expectations _______ on women.

One woman has taken the responsibility to _______ the filters to prove that, while she is beautiful, her face doesn’t _______ look the way it does with the filter on. Katia starts off the 20-second video clip using the infamous Bold Glamour filter. It’s the filter that has people questioning their _______ of their own faces because the contrast is so _______. But Katia doesn’t _______ with one filter. She puts on another and makes sure she emphasizes the use of a ring light. After turning the ring light and the filters off, the woman _______ her makeup, revealing an inflamed and imperfect face.

People flocked to the ________ to thank her for exposing the truth behind filters. “You’re beautiful and this message is so important. Thanks for the ________,” one person wrote. “In real life, we all have ________. As a mature woman, I appreciate your ________.” another said.

Social media can really do harm to people’s self esteem, especially when they’re ________ themselves to something that’s not real. Messages like the one Katia shared can help pull back the ________ on the reality of social media.

3 . There is growing interest in East Japan Railway Co. ltd, one of the six companies, created out of the privatized national railway system. In an industry lacking exciting growth ________, its plan to use real-estate assets in and around train stations ________ is drawing interest.

In a plan called “Station Renaissance” that it ________ in November, JR East said that it would ________ using its commercial spaces for shops and restaurants, extending them to ________ more suitable for the information age. It wants train stations as pick-up ________ for such goods as books, flowers and groceries ________ over the Inter. In a country where city ________ depend heavily on trains ________ commuting, about 16 million people a day go to its train stations anyway, the company ________. So, picking up commodities at train stations ________ consumers extra travel and missed home deliveries. JR East already has been using its station ________ stores for this purpose, but it plans to create ________ spaces for the delivery of Inter goods.

The company also plans to introduce ________ cards—known in Japan as IC cards because they use integrated circuit for ________ information ________ train tickets and muter passes ________ the magic ones used today, integrating them into a/an ________ pass. This will save the company money, because ________ for IC cards are much less expensive than magic systems. Increased use of IC cards should also ________ the space needed for ticket vending.

5 . Today’s youth will drive tomorrow’s growth. Young people have always confused their elders. Today’s youngsters are no different. They have thin wallets but ________ tastes. They long for authenticity while being constantly immersed in an artificial digital world. They ________ convenience and abundance. As they start spending in earnest, brands are trying to understand what these walking paradoxes (悖论) ________ and how they shop. The answers will define the next era of consumerism.

A good place to start analyzing the psyche of young consumer is to consider the ________ that has shaped them. At one end of the scale, today’s 30-somethings came of age in the midst of the global financial crisis of 2007-2009. Their younger peers were slightly ________, beginning their careers in years when tightening labour markets had pushed up wages until the covid-19 pandemic turned many of their lives upside down.

These two big ________ have contributed to pessimism among the young people who experienced them. A study found a widespread ________ among Gen Zs that they would be able to afford to retire. Less than half believed they would ever own a home.

In many ways youngsters’ shopping habits, like their lives, are defined by the “________ economy”. The popularity of social media means there are many new ways of attracting consumers’ eyeballs. Most young shoppers never knew a world without smartphones. More than two-thirds of 18- to 34-year-old Americans spend four hours or more on their devices each day.

These “always-on purchasers” often avoid a weekly shop so that they can have quicker ________ of everything from fashion to furniture. They like subscriptions, often favoring shared access to products over outright ownership, which has ________ online-rental sites and streaming services.

The internet has also changed how the young discover brands. Print, billboard or TV advertising has ________ social media. Instagram and TikTok are where the young look for inspiration, particularly for goods where ________ matter, such as beauty, fashion, and sportswear. ________ physical shops are not entirely out of favor. They can be successful as long as the experience feels personal and, ideally, integrates virtual and physical worlds.

How the young shop is clearly shifting. What they buy, too, is changing. What older generations consider optional, such as wellness and luxury, has become ________ for the young.

More broadly, young consumers claim to be more ________ than previous generations. Some of these values are centered around identity (race, gender and so on). Others stem from things the young care about, such as climate change.

6 . One of the first things that happens when you publicly declare yourself a feminist is that you start getting asked a lot of questions. If you’re anything like me, these probes into your_________ beliefs will leave you a mumbling mess. I have read enough books and academic essays on feminism to _________ a fairly substantial library, and yet as soon as I’m asked to sum it up I started sweating and string together a few _________ sentences before loudly shouting ‘because Beyonce’ and running to get another drink.

To save you from this _________ fate I have put together a collection of the feminist comebacks I wish I’d thought of in the moment. Rip out this page, keep it in your pocket and whip it out next time you’re stuck with a drunk man at a party. Because it will come into _________.

WHAT EVEN IS ‘FEMINISM?’

Great question! It’s actually something I’m really passionate about. Feminism is a centuries-old social movement fighting for the_________ of the sexes. Inter-sectional feminists believe that all people are _________ to the same rights, and they fight to end all discrimination based on gender, sexual orientation, skin colour, ethnicity, religion or lifestyle.

THIS FEMINISM IS POLITICAL _________ GONE MAD! CAN’T YOU TAKE A JOKE?

Great question! Thanks for checking! You’re mistaken. I love jokes. I’ve got one for you ...

Knock, knock!

Who’s there?

Annie.

Annie who?

Annie thing you can do I can do for 18.4% less pay!

Ha, ha, ha. But, jokes aside, political correctness gets a bad rap (恶评), but all it really _________ is minority groups asking that they not feel marginalized and hurt by everyday conversation or the media. I love comedy - in fact it is one of my favourite things. But I’m afraid that jokes that offend women, people of colour, disabled people, trans people or others in the LGBTQ community just aren’t _________ to me at all. Let’s chat when you come up with some better material, preferably something that doesn’t offend my friends!

I’M A MAN AND SOMETIMES I FEEL LIKE ALL THIS FEMINISM IS MAN-HATING. CAN MEN BE FEMINISTS?

Great questions! I’m sorry that a(n) _________ of the feminist movement in the mainstream media has led you to feel this way. Of course men can be feminists.

The sad fact is that we’ve all been socialized from birth to accept sexism as a part of life and, as a result, women can actually be just as _________ as men. Institutionalized sexism hurts men as well as women. It tells men that they aren’t allowed to show _________, that they have to be successful and powerful in order to succeed, and that they aren’t allowed to like the colour pink!

Feminism is the fight to _________ all these things and also to ensure that women are given fundamental human rights like education and reproductive freedom. Feminists truly believe that if we lived in a world without gender-based oppression, we’d all be so much happier. So even if you’re only joining for purely_________ reasons, we’d love to have you as a part of the gang!

Quoted from Scarlett Curtis’ Feminists Don’t Wear Pink and Other Lies

7 . The picture of miseries and sufferings of the Black woman in America may appear, perhaps darker and more depressing than Dante’s (但丁) description of Hell because in the history of human race, the Black woman in America has suffered the most. A close and critical _______ of the history of the Black woman’s life and condition since her arrival in a strange land will unfold very well the long story of her pain and sorrow_______ her mutilated (被切断的) soul. Since her arrival on the foreign shore, the Black woman has been facing the worst kind of ______ and oppression. As a Black she has had to endure all the horrors of slavery and has been the _______ of continually inhumane treatment in all kinds of work, _______ the lowest place on the wage scale and restricted to the lowest-status and the most uncreative jobs. Since times of slavery, Black womanhood has been destroyed, twisted and abused with racial and inhuman _______ by black men and white men and women. In the process, they have lost their genuine “self”, and have developed a(n) ______ in themselves — though as black women, they see themselves with the eyes of white men and women and black men. This has ultimately been responsible for the destruction of their self-confidence and the feeling of being human. They ______ themselves as masters’ belongings.

As a mother she has seen her children sold into slavery. She has seen them left at home without attention while she _______ to the needs of the children of the ruling class. She has seen her children suffer from drug addiction, the _______ of decent education and experience attacks by a racist society, and _______ the prisons of this nation. In addition, besides suffering the common fate of all oppressed people, the African-American women continue to _______ the oppression of woman by men, which existed for long. In the home she becomes “the slave of a slave”. Men may be cruelly treated and subjected to all sorts of dehumanizing treatment on the part of the ruling class. _______, at least they can take out their frustration on someone else, their women.

Thus feminism in America means much more than what it stands for in other European countries, chiefly because it has different role and meaning _______ the Black women. If a feminist is commonly defined as one who is involved in transforming and _______ familiar realities, then Black women are innate (天生的) feminists. Black women writing exhibits and constructs a Black women’s literary tradition that is inherently feminist. Barbara Smith, an influential Black feminist critic, states that the ability of Black women to survive in the face of White America exhibits an innate feminist potential.

10 . History suggests that societies generally overestimate the short-term implications of new technologies while underestimating longer-term ones. Current experience with artificial intelligence — the technology enabled by machine-learning — suggests we are getting it ______ this time. There’s too much talk about the potential “______ risk” to humanity posed by AI, and too little about our experience of it so far and corporate plans for exploiting the technology.

Although AI has been hiding in plain sight for a decade, it took most people by surprise. The appearance of ChatGPT last November signaled that the world had discovered a powerful new technology. Not for nothing is this new “generative AI” called “______”: it provides the base on which the next wave of digital innovation will be built.

It is also transformational in innumerable ways: it weakens centuries-old conceptions of intellectual property, ______, and it has the potential radically to increase productivity, reshape industries, change the nature of some kinds of work and so on. On top of that, though, it also raises troubling questions about the ______ of humans and their capabilities.

The continuing dispute between the Hollywood studios and screenwriters’ and actors’ unions perfectly illustrates the ______ of the challenges posed by AI. Both groups are up in arms about the way online streaming has reduced their earnings. But the writers also fear their role will be ______ simply to rewriting AI-generated scripts; and actors are concerned that detailed digital scanning ______ by new movie contracts will allow studios to create persuasive deepfakes of them that studios will be able to own and use “for the rest of eternity (永久), in any project they want, with no permission and no compensation”.

So the key question for democracies is: how can we ensure AI is used for human flourishing ______ corporate gain? On this question, the news from ______ is not good. A recent study by two renowned economists, Daron Acemoglu and Simon Johnson, of 1,000 years of technological progress shows that although some benefits have usually trickled (流) down to the ______, the rewards have — with one exception — invariably gone to those who own and control the technology.

The “______” was a period in which democracies fostered countervailing powers (抵消力量) — civil-society organisations, free media, activists, trade unions and other progressive, technically informed institutions that supplied a steady flow of ideas about how technology could be repurposed for ______ rather than exclusively for private profit. This is the lesson from history that societies confronted by the AI challenge need to relearn.

There are some signs that governments may finally have realized the problem. The EU, for example, has an ambitious and far-reaching AI Act that is making its way through the union’s processes. In the US, the Biden administration recently published a “Blueprint for an AI Bill of Rights”, which looks impressive but is ______ just a list of aspirations that some of the big tech companies claim to share.

It’s a start — provided governments don’t forget that leaving the implementation of powerful new technologies solely to corporations is always a(n) ______ idea.