“Long time no see” is a very interesting sentence. When I first read this sentence from an American friend’s email, I laughed. I thought it was a perfect example of Chinglish.

Obviously, it is a word-by-word literal translation of the Chinese greetings with a ruled English grammar and structure! Later on, my friend told me that it is a standard American greeting. I was too thrilled to believe her. Her words could not convince me at all. So I did a research on google.com. To my surprise, there are over 60 thousand web pages containing “Long time no see.” This sentence has been widely used in emails, letters, newspapers, movies, books, or any other possible places. Though it is sort of informal, it is part of the language that Americans use daily. Ironically, if you type this phrase in Microsoft Word, the software will tell you that the grammar needs to be corrected.

Nobody knows the origin of this Chinglish sentence. Some people believe that it came from Charlie Chan’s movies. In the 1930s, Hollywood moviemakers successfully created a world wide famous Chinese detective named “Charlie Chan” on wide screens. Detective Chan likes to teach Americans some Chinese wisdom by quoting Confucius. “Long time no see” was his trademark. Soon after Charlie Chan, “Long time no see” became a popular phrase in the real world with thanks to the popularity of these movies.

Some scholars refer to America as a huge pot of stew. All kinds of culture are mixed in the stew together, and they change the color and taste of each other. American Chinese, though a minority ethnic(少数民族的成员) group in the United States, is also contributing some changes to the stew! Language is usually the first thing to be influenced in the mixed stew.

You can have some other examples than adoptions from Chinese, such as pizza from Italian, susi from Japanese, and déjà vu from French etc. There is a long list! Americans do not just simply borrow something from others. They will modify it and make it their own, so you would not be surprised to find a tofu and peanut butter hamburger in a restaurant, or to buy a bottle of iced Chinese green tea with honey in a grocery store. Since Americans appreciate Chinese culture more and more nowadays, I believe more Chinese words will become American English in the future. In this way the American stew keeps adding richness and flavor.

1.The writer himself felt surprised at ______. 

A．the Chinglish expression “Long time no see”

B．“Long time no see” used as standard American English

C．so many literal translation of the expressions used in America

D．finding out Americans use the expression every day

2.The word “stew” in the 4^th paragraph probably means ______.

A．mixture literature                       B．Confucius’ words

C．a kind of cooked dish                    D．American changing cultures

3.According to the passage, it can be inferred that ______.

A．detectives translate the phrase “Long time no see”

B．Hollywood made “Long time no see” popular

C．the huge pot of stew greatly affects all kinds of languages

D．cultures can be changed in the huge pot of stew

4.The main idea of the passage is that ______.

A．some Chinese expressions are introduced into English

B．you’ll not be surprised at a tofu in a restaurant in America

C．some American expressions can be used in China

D．American English keep being enriched from different cultures

5.According to the passage, which of the following statements is not true?

A．Informal language sometimes doesn’t go with grammar and structure.

B．Languages are always ruled by grammar and structure.

C．Long time no see” has been used in at least four media mentioned in the passage.

D．There are four languages mentioned to be adopted in the American stew.

I took the bus to work for many years. No one knew each other; the passengers all sat there sleepily in the morning. The bus was cheerless and silent.

One of the passengers was a small grey man who took the bus to the center for senior citizens every morning. No one ever paid very much attention to him. One July morning he said good morning to the driver and smiled. The driver nodded guardedly. The rest of us were silent.

The next day, the old man boarded with a big smile and said in a loud voice, “A very good morning to you all!” Some of us looked up, amazed, and murmured “ good morning” in reply.

The following weeks, our friend was dressed in a nice old suit and tie. The thin hair had been carefully combed. He said good morning to us every day and we gradually began to nod and talk to each other.

One morning he even had a bunch of wild flowers in his hand. The driver turned around smilingly and asked, “Have you got yourself a girlfriend, Charlie?” We never got to know if his name really was “Charlie”, but he nodded shyly and said yes. The other passengers whistled and clapped at him. Charlie waved the flowers before he sat down on his seat.

Every morning after that Charlie always brought flowers. Some passengers also brought flowers for him. The bus became a happy place.

Then, one morning, as autumn was closing in, Charlie wasn’t waiting at his usual stop. When he wasn’t there the next day and the day after that, we started wondering if he was sick or hopefully---on holiday somewhere. When we came nearer to the center for senior citizens, one of the passengers even asked the driver to wait.

We all held our breaths when he went to the door. The old gentleman was fine, but one of his close friends had died over the weekend. How silent we were the rest of the way to work.

The next Monday Charlie was waiting at the stop, and without a tie. Inside the bus was silent.

The story is mainly developed by ______.

A. time   B. logic    C. comparison    D. cause and result 

Greeted with “good morning” from the old man, people aboard the bus at first _____.

A. felt tired and sleepy and didn’t want to talk   B. greeted him back loudly and politely

C. guarded against the conversation from strangers D. felt surprised and became angry with him.

When the passengers found the old man was not waiting at the bus stop as usual, they did NOT _____.

A. buy flowers and wait for him to come   B. feel anxious and worried about him 

C. miss him and expect to see him    D. hope he was going on holiday rather than falling ill

It can be inferred from the text that _____.

A. the driver didn’t like the old man at first  B. people usually wear a tie when they are happy

C. passengers brought flowers to express gratitude（感激） to the old man 

D. the old man had a great influence on the passengers’ emotion

The purpose of the passage is to _____.

A. introduce the old gentleman and praise his good deeds

B. persuade us to become friendly and considerate to people around

C. tell us to keep silent when somebody passes away

D. criticize those who remain silent when they are greeted

The fictional Chinese-American detective Charlie Chan was the subject of popular books and movies for many decades. In recent years, however, the character has been criticized as an ill image of Asian-Americans.

Yunte Huang, an English professor at the University of California, says that’s not the case. He has been exploring the character and real-life policeman who inspired him.

Charlie Chan has been a familiar character to readers and film-goers, beginning in the 1920s. The detective solved crimes around the world in more than 40 films through the 1940s, and with the invention of television, found a new audience in the 1950s and 1960s.

Huang discovered Charlie Chan through books by American author Earl Derr Biggers, who created the character.

“One day, I happened to find two Charlie Chan novels. At that point I thought I knew that he was a negative character against Asians, but when I read the book,” he says, “I was immediately attracted. Ever since then, I’ve been a fan of Charlie Chan.”

As a fan of the books and films, Huang was surprised to learn that Charlie Chan was based on a real detective named Chang Apana, who was born to Chinese parents in Hawaii around 1871. Apana worked as a cowboy, and joined the Honolulu police force in 1898.

“He almost immediately became a local legend because as a former cowboy,” says Huang, “he would walk the most dangerous areas in Chinatown carrying a bullwhip（皮鞭）instead of a gun. He didn’t need that.”

Although some say the image of Charlie Chan, with his broken English, is embarrassing for Asian-Americans, Huang believes Chan’s broken English and unusual ancient sayings were part of his charm（魅力）.

“Let me just quote（引用）a few – ‘Actions speak louder than French,’ or ‘Mind like parachute (降落伞). Only function when open.’ Charlie Chan always owes these instructive sayings to Confucius’ eastern wisdom.

For Huang, the fictional Charlie Chan is highly entertaining, while the real-life policeman, Chang Apana, is a Chinese-American success, whose story is worth telling.

1.The passage mainly talks about ______________.

2.According to the passage, we know that Charlie Chan __________.

3.Chang Apana didn’t need a gun as a weapon because__________.

4.It can be inferred from the passage that ________.

“Long time no see” is a very interesting sentence. When I first read this sentence from an American friend’s email, I laughed. I thought it was a perfect example of Chinglish.

Obviously, it is a word-by-word literal translation of the Chinese greetings with a ruled English grammar and structure! Later on, my friend told me that it is a standard American greeting. I was too thrilled to believe her. Her words could not convince me at all. So I did a research on google.com. To my surprise, there are over 60 thousand web pages containing “Long time no see.” This sentence has been widely used in emails, letters, newspapers, movies, books, or any other possible places. Though it is sort of informal, it is part of the language that Americans use daily. Ironically, if you type this phrase in Microsoft Word, the software will tell you that the grammar needs to be corrected.

Nobody knows the origin of this Chinglish sentence. Some people believe that it came from Charlie Chan’s movies. In the 1930s, Hollywood moviemakers successfully created a world wide famous Chinese detective named “Charlie Chan” on wide screens. Detective Chan likes to teach Americans some Chinese wisdom by quoting Confucius. “Long time no see” was his trademark. Soon after Charlie Chan, “Long time no see” became a popular phrase in the real world with thanks to the popularity of these movies.

Some scholars refer to America as a huge pot of stew. All kinds of culture are mixed in the stew together, and they change the color and taste of each other. American Chinese, though a minority ethnic(少数民族的成员) group in the United States, is also contributing some changes to the stew! Language is usually the first thing to be influenced in the mixed stew.

You can have some other examples than adoptions from Chinese, such as pizza from Italian, susi from Japanese, and déjà vu from French etc. There is a long list! Americans do not just simply borrow something from others. They will modify it and make it their own, so you would not be surprised to find a tofu and peanut butter hamburger in a restaurant, or to buy a bottle of iced Chinese green tea with honey in a grocery store. Since Americans appreciate Chinese culture more and more nowadays, I believe more Chinese words will become American English in the future. In this way the American stew keeps adding richness and flavor.

1.The writer himself felt surprised at ______. 

A．the Chinglish expression “Long time no see”

B．“Long time no see” used as standard American English

C．so many literal translation of the expressions used in America

D．finding out Americans use the expression every day

2.The word “stew” in the 4th paragraph probably means ______.

A．mixture literature                       B．Confucius’ words

C．a kind of cooked dish                    D．American changing cultures

3.According to the passage, it can be inferred that ______.

A．detectives translate the phrase “Long time no see”

B．Hollywood made “Long time no see”popular

C．the huge pot of stew greatly affects all kinds of languages

D．cultures can be changed in the huge pot of stew

4.The main idea of the passage is that ______.

A．some Chinese expressions are introduced into English

B．you’ll not be surprised at a tofu in a restaurant in America

C．some American expressions can be used in China

D．American English keep being enriched from different cultures

5.According to the passage, which of the following statements is not true?

A．Informal language sometimes doesn’t go with grammar and structure.

B．Languages are always ruled by grammar and structure.

C．Long time no see” has been used in at least four media mentioned in the passage.

D．There are four languages mentioned to be adopted in the American stew.

D
If you enjoyed the spring-like sunshine over the weekend and thought the weather has finally turned a corner, you’re sadly mistaken.
Chilly (寒冷的) days and grey clouds are forecast for the week—making it far too early to pack away the winter woollies.
Temperatures will struggle to rise above zero at night and fail to make double figures during the day.
People enjoy the spring sunshine in Sefton Park, Aigburth, Liverpool. Forecasters have predicted a return to chilly weather this week.
Met Office forecaster Charlie said, “It was a nice, dry, bright weekend in many parts and Monday is going to be a similar affair for many.”
“Temperatures will be between 5℃and 8℃, which is below average for the start of spring.”
The sun will disappear from the south of the country after today, with dry but cloudy conditions forecast for tomorrow and Wednesday. 
Wednesday will be warmest of the three, with temperatures peaking at 9℃. But this is still two degrees below the March average for the district.
Overnight, temperatures will drop sharply, with lows of minus 3℃for the next three nights.
“It will generally stay on the cold side of average,” said Mr. Powell.
The March misery comes at the end of the coldest winter for more than 30 years.
Temperatures in December, January and February struggled to stay above zero, with the UK’s average 1.5℃, making it the deepest freeze since 1978—79.
It claimed there was just a one-in-seven chance of a cold December to February.
The agency also sadly predicted a “barbecue summer”, saying it was “quite optimistic” that it would be warmer and drier than average.
Following the two mistakes, the Met Office has dropped its long-range seasonal forecasts and will instead publish a monthly prediction for Britain, updated once a week.
In its defense, it says that while short-term forecasts are extremely accurate, Britain’s size and geographical position makes long-term predictions much more challenging.
It also points out that it gave warning of any heavy falls of snow this winter.
68. According to the passage, the weather on Tuesday in the south might be _______.
A. dry but cloudy  B. sunny but chilly  C. sunny and warm  D. cloudy and chilly
69. Which of the following statements is true according to the passage?
A. British people can put away their winter clothes now.
B. The Met Office has shortened its forecast range.
C. The weather forecast becomes more and more accurate.
D. The agency was quite confident of long-term predictions.
70. Which of the following would be the best title for the passage?
A. The big chill isn’t over yet                    B. A warm spring finally arrives
C. A heavy snow is on the way            D. The Met Office drops forecasts