题目内容

When I paid for the bicycle repair, the repairman told me, “ No change, Professor Pan. We’re friends.”

“I’d rather pay,” I replied. “If it’s free, I can’t afford it.”

Chinese often refuse payment for professional services, insisting, “We’re friends now!” But then they show up later to ask me to tutor them in English, or get them into an American university, and I wish I’d have just paid the 30 yuan I owed them in the first place.

According to the Americans, “There’s no free lunch,” meaning that there’s a price for everything, and I’m always looking around to figure out what this means.

Many of our neighbors have given us fruit or flowers or costly teas, never asking anything in return. For years, a bicycle repairman has repeatedly refused to let me pay him. “Wait until you have something major to fix!” he insists.

Chinese generosity is a real education for Americans like me, who would rather avoid social entanglements (纠纷) and just hand over the money. But cash can’t make up for the greatest gift – friendship.

When an American saw some of my friends sitting on bamboo stools under the trees, sipping tea, he said, “They must have nothing better to do.” “Actually,” I said, “they are professors, with plenty to do. But probably you’re right in saying that, at this moment, they have nothing better to do. And neither do I.”

And I joined the group. We chatted about tea and Chinese cooking and how much my boys have grown since we arrived. One man said, “They were pocket-sized when you came here. Now they’re taller than you. How time flies.”

How life flies. And Chinese are smart enough to share what they know they cannot keep. They freely give of their time, never too busy to help a friend. And they are teaching me, slowly, to both give and receive. So the next time someone says, “No charge. We’re friends.” I will thank them heartily. But if they show up later asking me to tutor them in English, I’ll make sure they tutor my son in Chinese as well, because there’s still no free lunch.

1.Why did the author insist on paying the repairman while he was offered free repairs?

A. Because he was an upright man.

B. Because he didn’t know the repairman.

C. Because he thought it natural to pay for other’s service.

D. Because he didn’t want to help others in return.

2.Generally, the author thinks that ___________ .

A. Chinese are generous and always ready to help their friends

B. Chinese are good at exchange of equal values

C. Chinese are free enough to drink and chat with their friends

D. Chinese are helpful but don’t treasure time

3.The best title for the passage should be “_________ ”.

A. Still No Free Lunch B. A Good Lesson from Chinese

C. True Help or Not D. Learn to Both Give and Receive

4.Which of the following is TRUE?

A. All the Chinese help foreigners on purpose.

B. Chinese like to ask for help.

C. The author thinks little of the Chinese way of life.

D. The author thinks that Chinese are wise enough to enjoy the limited life.

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Would it surprise you to learn that, like animals, trees communicate with each other and pass on their wealth to the next generation?

UBC Professor Simard explains how trees are much more complex than most of us ever imagined .Although Charles Darwin thought that trees are competing for survival of the fittest, Simard shows just how wrong he was. In fact, the opposite is true: trees survive through their co-operation and support, passing around necessary nutrition “depending on who needs it”.

Nitrogen(氮) and carbon are shared through miles of underground fungi(真菌) networks, making sure that all trees in the forest ecological system give and receive just the right amount to keep them all healthy. This hidden system works in a very similar way to the networks of neurons(神经元)in our brains, and when one tree is destroyed, it affects all.

Simard talks about “mother trees”, usually the largest and oldest plants on which all other trees depend .She explains how dying trees pass on the wealth to the next generation, transporting important minerals to young trees so they may continue to grow .When humans cut down “mother trees” with no awareness of these highly complex “tree societies” or the networks on which they feed, we are reducing the chances of survival for the entire forest.

“We didn't take any notice of it .” Simard says sadly .“Dying trees move nutrition into the young trees before dying, but we never give them chance.” If we could put across the message to the forestry industry, we could make a huge difference towards our environmental protection efforts for the future.

1.What would be the best title for the passage?

A. Old Trees Communicate Like Humans

B. Young Trees Are In Need Of Protection

C. Trees Contribute To Our Society

D. Trees Are More Complex Than You Think

2. In Simard's opinion, trees _______

A. compete for survival

B. protect their own wealth

C. depend on each other

D. provide support for dying trees

3.We can learn from the passage that .

A. “mother trees” are usually of no use to other trees.

B. Charles Darwin had the same thought as Simard.

C. if “mother trees” are cut down, the survival for the entire forest will be affected.

D. people know much about the complex “tree societies”.

4.The underlined word “it” in the last paragraph refers to .

A. how “tree societies” work

B. how trees grow old

C. how forestry industry develops

D. how young trees survive

根据短文内容,从短文后的选项中选出能填入空白处的最佳选项,有两项为多余选项。

●Does failure really exist?

If you believe you have failed, then you have. If you believe you don’t have the ability to succeed, then you don’t.__1.__ The moment you decide to give up or stop working toward your goals, failure is born.

● __2.__

Most people give themselves an out without even realizing it.They are willing to work hard on reaching their goals, but only until the going gets too rough or their energy dies down. Don’t do that!__3.__Never quit, never admit failure, and never lose heart.

●Don’t believe in a clear finish line for goals.

It’s a good idea to set a general timeline, but remember that something will be beyond your control.__4.___If you lock yourself into a given timeline, you might make yourself feel like a failure! Instead, get a general idea of when you’d like your goal to be completed. Then take it one day at a time and focus on making progress instead of reaching the finish line in as little time as possible.

●Be sure that you don’t see difficulties as failures.

Difficulties mean only one thing: it’s not time for your goal to be completed yet.That’s it! It doesn’t mean you failed; it doesn’t mean you’re weak; it doesn’t mean you’ll never achieve your goals.__5._ You’ve got to keep moving forward and find a way over, around, or through the difficulties.

A. Never give up on yourself.

B. Failure only exists in your own mind!

C. That’s exactly how failure makes us feel.

D. It simply means you have not done enough yet.

E. You can never say exactly when your goal will be reached.

F. Instead, make up your mind to make your goal happen, no matter what!

G. Work hard towards your goal, and you will be likely to get good results.

Finally, I entered the university.Because of my careful savings, I did not have to work during the school year. Then, summer came and it was time to work harder than ever. I continued working as a waitress at night, instructed tennis camps several mornings a week and worked as a secretary for a few hours in the afternoons. I even decided to take a class at a community college. This class at the community college saved me $650. It was an extremely tiring summer and made me anxious to return to my relatively easy life at the university.

During my second and third years of undergraduate schooling, I decided to work about five hours per week in the campus admissions office answering phones. This provided a little spending money and kept me from drawing my savings out. The overall situation looked hopeful as I approached my senior year as long as I could make as much money as I had the previous summer. I wanted to go to Israel to study for 3 weeks, but I hesitated in making this decision because it would cost me $1,600 more to get the credits in Israel. About two weeks later my Mom called to tell me that I had $1,600 in the bank that I had forgotten about! One of my concerns about this trip was not only the cost, but the loss of time to make money; however, I made as much that summer in the ten weeks when I was at home as I had made during the fourteen weeks when I was at home the summer before. The way everything worked together to make this trip possible was one of the most exciting things that have ever happened to me.

This experience has shaped me in many important ways. The first thing that I learned was the importance of a strong work ethic. Working long hours did a lot to develop my character and helped me learn the value of a dollar. It also made me learn how to search for creative ways to settle difficult situations.

1.Where did the writer probably work part-time before attending the university?

A. In the tennis camps B. In a restaurant

C. In a company D. In the admissions office

2.The writer took a class at a community college mainly because_____.

A. summer time was tiring

B. life there was relatively easy

C. she wanted to save money

D. it was required by the university

3.The writer’s concern about the trip to Israel was that _____.

A. her mother would not give her approval

B. she would fail to get credits in Israel

C. $1,600 couldn’t be drawn out in time

D. a summer job would be lost

4.The passage is mainly about how the writer _____.

A. was shaped by working part-time through college

B. managed to make full use of her vacation

C. was forced to support herself by her mother

D. made money on the college campus

For thousands of years,we have looked for ways to measure time. Early humans found that the regular movements of the sun,the earth,the moon,and the stars made good ways to measure time. The rising and setting of the sun were used to distinguish day from night.

But,eventually,people needed to tell time more accurately,or exactly. So,by using the sun’s position in the sky,they divided the day into dawn,morning,midday and evening.

Then it was noted that the sun cast a changing shadow as it moved across the sky. Time could be told more accurately by setting up a stick and marking the positions of the sun’s shadow. It was the ancient Greeks who divided each position of this “sundial(日晷)” into hours.

But the sun doesn’t always shine. So,for the past 6,000 years,many other ways of keeping time have been tried. Slow?burning candles were divided into hours,and the hourglass was invented. When all the sand in the top of an hourglass has shifted to the bottom,an hour has passed.

Later,the pendulum(摆钟),with its regular back?and?forth movement of weights,was used to move the hands on a clock. Pendulums are still used in grandfather clocks.

Today,even more accurate clocks are in use,such as battery?operated quartz clocks(石英钟),digital clocks,and clocks run by electrical tuning forks and tiny atoms. These atomic clocks are the most accurate clocks ever invented. The exact time can be kept to within 1 second a century.

1.Humans in the old days used ________ to tell day from night.

A.the rising and setting of the sun

B.battery?operated quartz clocks

C.atomic clocks

D.digital clocks

2.A sundial works by ________.

A.tracking the movement of the stars around the sun

B.marking a shadow cast by the moving sun

C.burning candles in the sunlight

D.watching the stars

3.Which of the following was NOT used in the past to measure time?

A.An hourglass. B.A sundial.

C.Digital clocks. D.A pendulum.

4.Which of the following ways of measuring time is ordered from the least accurate to the most accurate?

A.Sundial,pendulum,sun.

B.Atomic clock,quartz clock,sundial.

C.Sun,pendulum,atomic clock.

D.Digital clock,hourglass,slow?burning candles.

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