It was Thanksgiving morning. I was busy preparing the traditional Thanksgiving turkey when the doorbell rang. I opened the front door and saw two small children in rags huddling together on the top step.

“Any old papers, lady?” asked one of them.

I was busy. I wanted to say “no” until I looked down at their feet. They were wearing thin little sandals(凉鞋), wet with heavy snow.

“Come in and I'll make you a cup of hot cocoa.”

They walked over and sat down at the table. Their wet sandals left marks upon the floor. I served them cocoa and bread to fight against the cold outside. Then I went back to the kitchen and started cooking.

The silence in the front room struck me. I looked in. The girl held the empty cup in her hands, looking at it. The boy asked in a flat voice, “Lady, are you rich?”

“Am I rich? Pity, no!”

I looked at my worn?out slipcovers(椅套). The girl put her cup back in its saucer(茶碟)carefully and said, “Your cups match your saucers.” They left after that, holding their papers against the wind. They had reminded me that I had so much for which to be grateful.

Plain blue china cups and saucers were only worth five pence. But they matched.

I tasted the potatoes and stirred(搅动)the meat soup. Potatoes and brown meat soup, a roof over our heads, my man with a regular job, these matched, too.

I moved the chairs back from the fire and cleaned the living room. The muddy marks of little sandals were still wet upon my floor. Let them be for a while, I thought, just in case I should begin to forget how rich I am.

1.Which of the following would be the best title for the text?

A.A story of Thanksgiving Day.

B. Lady, are you rich?

C.Don't forget how rich you are

D.Does cups and saucers match well?

2.Which of the following statements is NOT true according to the passage?

A.The writer had thought she wasn't rich because her supplies were not expensive.

B.The girl thought the writer was rich just because she wanted to make the writer happy.

C.If cups and saucers match well, they are a best pair even though cheap.

D.After hearing what they said, the writer seemed to understand what a rich life was.

3.The writer left the muddy marks of little sandals on the floor for a while to________.

A.remind her that she shouldn't forget how rich she was

B.show that she was a kind?hearted lady

C.leave room for readers to think about what being rich is

D.prove that she had understood what meant being rich

4.It can be inferred from the text that whether you are rich depends on________.

A.what attitude you have had towards life

B.how much money you have made

C.the way you help others

D.your social relationship

I had five hours in the company of First Great Western(FGW) last weekend, on a train full of passengers, all the way from Cornwall to London. I got to know some of my fellow passengers rather well. Not through talking to them, you understand.

There was the youth who was explaining to his friend exactly how he enjoyed a party with his friends last night. Opposite him was a young woman who was very excited to be going to Lanzarote for her summer holiday. And then there was the man who I took to be a car mechanic(汽车修理工); so detailed and technical was his conversation about a second-hand Audi. Everyone had a different, noisy ringtone, and none of the mobile phone conversations I was forced to hear was interesting.

By the end of the journey, I was silently complaining about the modern world, and feeling mad with FGW who, at the very moment when our carriage fell silent, would make an announcement about the buffet car (a carriage where food and drinks are sold) either opening or closing.

FGW seems to be campaigning against peace and quietness, having removed quiet carriage spaces where passengers were requested not to use mobiles so that their trains could carry more passengers. How so? I cannot understand why FGW takes no notice of passengers like me, who have suffered a lot from hearing endless telephone conversations. I have no interest in the smallest details of others’ lives. Making people listen to boring mobile phone conversations should be regarded as a rude act.”

Every train carriage should, in theory, be quiet. Why can’t that be the standard? It is possible to change public custom and practice. It was not so long ago that sidewalks were littered with dog waste:now it’s a general rule that dog owners clean it up after their pets. And once we restore peace and quietness to trains, we can then move on and stop people bringing fast food onto them, too.

1.How did the author get to know the three passengers?

A.From their phone conversations.

B.Through introductions.

C.In informal conversations.

D.By using a mobile phone.

2.At the end of the journey, the author ______.

A.became satisfied with FGW’s service

B.felt uneasy about the silence

C.was filled with anger

D.went to the buffet car

3.What can we learn about the author from Paragraph 4?

A.He is in support of the decision of FGW.

B.He believes FGW will have more passengers.

C.He dislikes hearing others’ phone conversations.

D.He thinks it’s rude to listen to others’ conversations.

4.The author mentioned the rule of cleaning up dog mess to show ____.

A.dog mess has become a serious problem

B.quiet carriages can become the standard

C.noise in carriages is as troubling as dog mess

D.changing public custom and practice is difficult

I am a writer. I spend a great deal of my time thinking about the power of language—the way it can evoke (唤起) an emotion, a visual image, a complex idea, or a simple truth.Language is the tool of my trade. And I use them all—all the Englishes I grew up with.

Born into a Chinese family that had recently arrived in California, I’ve been giving more thought to the kind of English my mother speaks. Like others, I have described it to people as “broken” English. But I feel embarrassed to say that. It has always bothered me that I can think of no way to describe it other than“broken”, as if it were damaged and needed to be fixed, as if it lacked a certain wholeness. I’ve heard other terms used, “limited English,” for example. But they seem just as bad, as if everything is limited, including people’s perceptions(认识)of the limited English speaker.

I know this for a fact, because when I was growing up, my mother’s “limited” English limited my perception of her. I was ashamed of her English. I believed that her English reflected the quality of what she had to say. That is, because she expressed them imperfectly her thoughts were imperfect. And I had plenty of evidence to support me: the fact that people in department stores, at banks, and at restaurants did not take her seriously, did not give her good service, pretended not to understand her, or even acted as if they did not hear her.

I started writing fiction in 1985. And for reasons I won’t get into today, I began to write stories using all the Englishes I grew up with: the English she used with me, which for lack of a better term might be described as “broken” ; and what I imagine to be her translation of her Chinese, her internal (内在的) language, and for that I sought to preserve the essence, but neither an English nor a Chinese structure. I wanted to catch what language ability tests can never show: her intention, her feelings, the rhythms of her speech and the nature of her thoughts.

1.The author used to think of her mother’s English as .

A. impolite B. amusing

C. imperfect D. practical

2.Which of the following is TRUE according to Paragraph 3?

A. Americans do not understand broken English.

B. The author’s mother was not respected sometimes.

C. The author’s mother had positive influence on her.

D. Broken English always reflects imperfect thoughts.

3.The author gradually realizes her mother’s English is .

A. well structured

B. in the old style

C. easy to translate

D. rich in meaning

4.What is the passage mainly about?

A. The change of the author’s attitude to her mother’s English.

B. The limitation of the author’s perception of her mother.

C. The author’s misunderstanding of “limited” English.

D. The author’s experiences of using broken English.

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