1 . I didn’t realize it, but during that short walk home I had lost a whole lot of weight and my eyes had grown dull and colorless. When my mom saw me she screamed out in surprise. Staring at me in disbelief, she asked, “Are you Fugui?”

Looking at my mom, I forced a smile and nodded my head. Shocked, she uttered something else, but I was no longer paying attention to her. I pushed the door open and went into my room. Jiazhen, in the middle of combing her hair, was also taken back when she saw me. She gazed at me with her mouth gaping. As soon as I thought of how I had beaten her when she came to persuade me to go home the night before, I fell to the ground and, kneeling before her, muttered, “Jiazhen, I’m finished.”

After speaking those words I began to cry out loud. Jiazhen rushed over to help me up, but being pregnant with Youqing, how could she support me? She called my mom over, and the two of them pulled me onto the bed. I looked like a corpse. They were scared to death and began patting me on the shoulder and rocking my head.

My mother appeared dumbstruck; she stared at me with a look of intensity and asked, “What did you say?”

“I’ve lost everything,” I repeated.

The look on my face convinced her. My mother sat down on the floor and, wiping her tears, said, “If the upper beam is no straight, the lower ones will not go straight either.”

Even then my mother still loved me. She didn’t blame me. Instead she blamed my father.

Jiazhen also cried. She patted me on the shoulder and tried to console me. “As long as you don’t gamble anymore, everything will be all right.”

I had nothing left. Even if I had wanted to gamble, I wouldn’t have had any money to stake a bet. I heard Dad in the next room shooting off his foul mouth. He still didn’t know that he was penniless — he was simply annoyed at being disturbed by the two women crying. As soon as she heard my father’s voice, Mom stopped crying. She stood up and walked out, with Jiazhen following her. I knew that they were going into my father’s room, and after a while I heard my dad begin screaming, “Bastard!”

It was just then that my daughter, Fengxia, pushed the door open and came in. She closed the door and in a shrill voice said, “Dad, hurry up and hide! Grandpa’s going to beat you.”

I just stared at her without moving a muscle. She then came over and tried pulling me away by the hand; when I wouldn’t budge she began to cry. Seeing Fengxia cry was like having a knife pierce my heart. Even at such a young age, Fengxia was trying to protect her dad. Just looking at her made me feel like I deserved to be cut to pieces.

Quoted from Yu Hua’s To Live

1. The underlined phrase “taken back” in paragraph 2 means ______.

A．regretful

B．astonished

C．shameful

D．concerned

2. Fugui kept saying “I’ve lost everything” to his mom and his wife because he ______.

A．wanted to gradually process the strong emotion and beg for their forgiveness

B．pretended to lose his mind and go crazy so as to get away with the punishment.

C．was afraid to face his father and wanted them to break the bad news to him

D．believed that they might still lend him some money to gamble again

3. According to the passage, what do the three female characters have in common?

A．Hard-work.

B．Bravery.

C．Self-discipline.

D．Compassion

4. What can be inferred from the passage?

A．Fugui’s father was also addicted to gambling when he was young.

B．Jiazhen would ask for a divorce from Fugui since he was penniless.

C．Fugui’s mother and his wife decided to hide the truth from his father.

D．Fengxia had more affection towards her father than her mother.

2 . Directions: Complete the following passages by using the words in the box. Each word can only be used once. Do note that there is one word more than you need in each passage.

What My Wife and I Talk about When We Talk about Love

A. company       B. weather       C. desirable       D. restore       E. readily       F. considering G. sharpen       H. hesitation       I. peacefully       J. access       K. inconvenience

My wife used to believe that romantic love is the most important and exciting thing in the entire world when she was a teenager. And the mark of true love is when two good-looking boys get in a physical fight over her. It’s even     1     that they both get injured but don’t end up going to hospital, not because she is worried about them but because it may cause her a lot of     2     and indirect responsibility. One day this will certainly happen to her, if she’s lucky. So you might understand her anger and frustration when I told her that if the other male competitor I have to “fight” with weighs more than 100 kilograms, I will simply hand her over to him without     3    , wish them a happy marriage and walk away with the feeling that tomorrow is another day.

Fortunately, we’ve both grown a lot older and grown out of expecting our life partner to “die” for us     4    . The older we get, the more honest, open and vulnerable we allow each other to be. One of the hardest things about getting older and being in love is knowing when something is just reality and when it’s too much hard work. Identifying what the calm, joyful but often challenging sensation of long-term love is and identifying what has just become totally intolerable is where we all have to really     5     our instincts.

Shared interests are one of the most overrated     6     factors when it comes to choosing a partner. Deciding that someone is a good person, or your soulmate, or made of exactly the same stuff as you just because you both love the music of Faye Wong is ridiculous. Having the same Agatha Christie collection or enjoying most of the movies directed by Richard Linklater will not help you     7     the various unexpected storms of life together.

A much more crucial factor in terms of finding a partner is how much you love their     8    . Since my son was born, I have experienced firsthand how overwhelming it is to be a working parent of a newborn. It has become even more apparent to me that the most important thing in a relationship is how well married couples work as a team. Couples need to be really, really good friends.

When you’re looking for love, and it seems like you might not ever find it, remember you probably have     9     to plenty of love already, just not the romantic kind. This kind of love might not kiss you in the rain or propose marriage. But it will listen to you, inspire and     10     you. It will hold you when you cry and celebrate when you smile. You can carry it with you and keep it as close to you as you can.

3 . 听下面一段独白，回答以下小题。1.

A．Mother’s shouting.	B．The unusual smell.
C．The terrible sound.	D．The heat of the fire.

2.

A．At the supermarket.	B．In the kitchen.
C．In the bed.	D．In the living room.

3.

A．She forgot to turn off the stove.

B．It took long to put out the fire.

C．She would probably be punished by her mother.

D．She would have to study music against her will.

4 .

A．Their home was broken into lately.	B．Their home alarm system is broken.
C．A violent storm is approaching.	D．Their home is securely locked.

5 . Researchers came to the conclusion that having two daughters is the key to a happy and harmonious family life after examining the lives of families with different combinations of children, both male and female.

The results show of all the variations, two girls make for the most harmonious family life as they are unlikely to fight, will play nicely and are generally a _______ to be around.

It also emerged that two girls rarely _______ their parents, make limited noise, often trust in their parents and are unlikely to wind each other up or_______ each other.

_______, doubling the number of daughters is likely to lead to a whole world of pain, the report found. Mums and dads with four girls _______ out to be the least happy with family life overall. Parents of four girls also admitted to having to _______ an average of four fights or arguments a day, the study of 2,116 families_______.

The study looked into families with twelve different combinations of children, _______ only children but including everything from a brother and sister to four of the same _______.

Mums and dads were asked to rank their children’s behavior. Two girls ________ highly in every category. They were “easy to reason with”, “helped around the house” and ________ “liked each other”.

In fact, mums and dads with four children of any gender found it harder, the results showed. ________, sixty-two per cent of parents with this combination would have exactly the same number of children if they had their time again.

“Every child is a blessing and there are lots of things parents can do to ________ family life is as harmonious as possible.”

“Making sure quality time is spent with all children, ________ them how lucky they are to have siblings and creating family ________such as eating and playing together can all help everyone to get the most out of family life together.”

1.

A．contribution

B．burden

C．pleasure

D．coincidence

2.

A．delight

B．annoy

C．consider

D．respect

3.

A．forgive

B．benefit

C．ignore

D．comfort

4.

A．By contrast

B．As a result

C．In addition

D．To some extent

5.

A．figure

B．carry

C．burst

D．turn

6.

A．adjust to

B．cope with

C．lead to

D．negotiate with

7.

A．predicted

B．surveyed

C．revealed

D．conducted

8.

A．enclosing

B．concluding

C．exposing

D．excluding

9.

A．sex

B．age

C．hobby

D．background

10.

A．spoke

B．appreciated

C．educated

D．scored

11.

A．definitely

B．generally

C．narrowly

D．exactly

12.

A．Therefore

B．Besides

C．Moreover

D．However

13.

A．secure

B．promise

C．ensure

D．influence

14.

A．reminding

B．remembering

C．recalling

D．reforming

15.

A．rituals

B．power

C．alternative

D．events