1 . 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.

Round table

The most affectionate memory of my childhood is about     1     round table.

When I was still little, my entire family would reunite on almost every traditional festival to have dinner. While the grown-ups were discussing about something     2     our comprehension, we kids would be scuttling around or even crouching under the table to play hide and seek.

When I got a bit older, my aunt brought back her boyfriend, a tall and shy man, and my grandma joyfully added another seat to the round table. It seemed a little bit     3     (crowded), but we all felt closer to this new family member.

When I was 12, my grandpa passed away because of cancer, but when the entire family reunite once again, his chair, his bowl and his chopsticks remain the same.     4     his seat was empty, it felt like that he had never left us.

We all have a table like this in our homes, which is a symbol of the reunion of our families,     5     (represent) our sentiment and attachment to our families. As a matter of fact, in China, almost everything can be solved over a round table. The marriage vows between a loving couple, the mourning of the deceased, the negotiations between business partners and a state banquet to another president from another country     6     all happen on a same round table. So I started to wonder     7     is this round table to us and its true significance starts to unfold in front of me.

The food on the table may change with time; the people sitting beside it may come and go; the reasons why we come together may be various, but the sensation behind it remains, year after year, the same.

Every year, an annual epic migration takes place in China. Hundreds of people, men and women, young and old, the rich and the poor, the dead and the alive, will find a way to go back home and go to the round table     8     (reunite) with their families.

The power that drives him to do so has been a power that has been sustaining Chinese civilization for thousands of years. And the lives of us, or even the history of our nation have been the stories of looking for a running to the round table     9     we belong. The round table     10     (be) a symbol of the Chinese sensation. It was. It is. And it will always be.