Jamie Oliver has been invited by Gordon Brown to prepare a banquet at No. 10 for President Barack Obama and other leaders of the G20, offering a cut-price menu to reflect times when trade and industry are far from prosperous and the rate of employment is decreasing.
Downing Street sources say Oliver, the well-known chef, will cook using “honest high-street products” and avoid expensive or “fancy” ingredients.
The prime minister is trying to avoid a repeat of the embarrassment last year when he sat down to an 18-course banquet at a Japanese summit to discuss world food shortages.
Obama, President Nicolas Sarkozy of France, Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany and other leaders will be served by apprentices (学徒) from Fifteen, the London restaurant Oliver founded to help train young people in poverty in order to make a living by mastering a skill.
Brown wants the dinner to reflect the emphasis of the London summit, which he hopes will lead to an agreement to lift the world out of recession. “To be invited to cook for such an important group of people, who are trying to solve some of the world’s major problems, is really a privilege,” said Oliver.
“I’m hoping the menu I’m working on will show British food and produce is some of the best in the world, but also show we have pioneered a high-quality apprentice scheme at Fifteen London that is giving young people a skill to be proud of.”
The chef has not yet finalized the menu, but is expected to draw inspiration from his latest book, Jamie’s Ministry of Food, which has budget recipes for beef and ale stew (啤酒炖菜) and “impressive” chocolate fudge cake.
1. The underlined word “recession” in Paragraph 5 is closest in meaning to “____________”.
A. business B. opposition C. discussion D. depression
2. What can we learn about Oliver from the text?
A. He is a well-known American cook.
B. He is invited to attend the G20 summit.
C. He has founded the Fifteen London.
D. He is one of the apprentices serving leaders of the G20.
3. The menu of the banquet for the leaders of the G20 is supposed to _________.
A. include all delicious British food
B. use inexpensive produce with special characteristics
C. be rich, varied and of high quality
D. imitate the menu of last Japanese summit
4. Which of the following is TRUE according to the text?
A. Oliver is honored to be invited to cook for the G20 leaders.
B. Altogether three presidents are mentioned in the text.
C. President Barack Obama offers the cut-price menu.
D. The menu for the G20 dinner banquet has been decided.
At 2 p.m. on December 5, 1945, five Navy aircraft took off in perfect flying weather from a naval air installation in southeastern Florida, on a routine training mission over the Atlantic Ocean. Less than two hours later, the flight commander radioed that he was “completely lost”. Then there was silence. A rescue plane was sent to search for the missing aircraft, and it, too, disappeared. Despite one of history’s most extensive search efforts, involving more than 300 planes and dozens of ships, the Navy found nothing, not even an oil stain floating on the water.
This is just one of the many frightening stories told of “the Bermuda Triangle”, a mysterious area of the Atlantic Ocean roughly stretching southwest from Bermuda to the Florida coast and down to Puerto Rico. During the past 30 years, the triangle has claimed the lives of some 1,000 sailors and pilots.
Stranger yet are the numerous “ghost” ships that have been found floating crewless within the triangle. On one strange occasion in 1881, the cargo ship Ellen Austin discovered a small sailing ship, sails waving uselessly in the wind. The boat was full of wood with no one on deck. The captain of the Ellen Austin installed a new crew to sail it, but two days later, during a rough storm, the two ships temporarily lost sight of each other. When the captain again boarded the boat, he found his crew had disappeared. After a second crew was assigned, the ship was again lost in a fog bank. This time, no trace of the boat — or the crew — was ever found.
Charles Berlitz, a man with an interest in Atlantis, the legendary lost island, puts forward his theory that a giant solar crystal, which once was the power generator for Atlantis, lies on the ocean floor. From time to time, according to his theory, passing ships and planes set off the crystal, which confuses their instruments and engulfs them into the ocean.
Officially, the U.S. Navy does not recognize the triangle as a danger zone and is convinced that “the majority of disappearances in the triangle can be due to the unique features of the area’s environment.” These include the swift Gulf Stream current and the unexplored valleys under water of the Atlantic. Also, the triangle is one of only two places on earth where a compass needle points to true north rather than magnetic north, causing problems in navigation.
However, other scientists argue that beings from outer space have established a highly advanced civilization in the unexplored depths of the Atlantic inside the triangle. There, they believe, most of the missing vessels – and their crews – may still be on display for study by these higher intelligences.The author develops the first two paragraphs through _______.
| A．a series of events described in order of time |
| B．a general view supported by specific examples |
| C．a specific incident followed by a general introduction |
| D．a strange phenomenon followed by cause explanation |
What did the captain of Ellen Austin do when he discovered a small sailing ship floating crewless?
| A．He had all the wood transferred onto his own ship. |
| B．He had new powerful sails fixed on the small boat. |
| C．He sent a message that they were in danger and needed help. |
| D．He asked some of his sailors to get onto the boat to sail it. |
The underlined word “engulfs” in Paragraph 4 probably means ______.
| A．drops | B．sucks | C．puts | D．throws |
Which of the following could serve as the best title for this passage?
| A．The Mysterious Bermuda Triangle |
| B．The History of the Bermuda Triangle |
| C．A New Research on the Bermuda Triangle |
| D．A New Angle to Look at the Bermuda Triangle |
●What prevents depression：tea，coffee or hot chocolate?
Women who drink for or more cups of coffee a day are a fifth less likely to become depressed．Drinking two or three cups reduces the risk by 15 percent. This is the result of a study of 51,000 women over ten years, published in the Journal of the American Medicine Association.
One theory is that caffeine reduces the effect of the chemical adenosine(腺苷) in the brain, which can make us feel sleepy by slowing down nerve cell activity. Some anti-depressants also work by blocking the adenosine receptors. Coffee was found to be far more influential on depression levels than hot chocolate or tea due to the high caffeine content.
●How many eggs can we healthily eat: one a day or two a day?
Neither-eat them freely. We’ve long been warned to stick to two or three eggs a week because of their high cholesterol(胆固醇)content. But according to the Food Standards Agency, there is no recommended limit to how many eggs we can healthily eat, unless you have been told to cut down by your doctor.
There is no evidence that eating eggs raises cholesterol levels, and researchers found that eggs contain less cholesterol than in the past because hens are no longer given bone meal, which was banned in the 1990s after the BSE(疯牛病) cresis.
Research by the British Egg Council found that a medium egg gives you around 100 mg of cholesterol, a third of the 300mg recommended daily limit.What is considered to fight depression best?
| A．Tea． | B．Chocolate． | C．Adenosine． | D．Coffee． |
We can infer from the text that．
| A．too much caffeine will probably make people sleepy |
| B．coffee contains less caffeine than tea or hot chocolate |
| C．one is depressed if his brain chemical adenosine is active |
| D．tea and hot chocolate have no effect on men’s depression |
What can we learn about eggs from the text?
| A．We should stick to two or three eggs a week in general． |
| B．Eat as many eggs as you like unless your doctor advises you not to． |
| C．Eggs contain more cholesterol at present than ever before． |
| D．One egg daily and you’ll get more cholesterol than recommended． |
Most people watching Jeremy Lin these past two months saw Jeremy Lin, New York Knicks star; but I, watching him, saw someone else. That was my elder brother, Bob, who is athletic and energetic. He could never sit still when he was in second grade; he had to get up every now and then and run around the room. And sure enough, he grew up to be a starting player for an N.C.A.A. championship lacrosse（长曲棍球）team. He was a Nike-endorsed marathoner, too, and reached the top of Mt. Everest, unguided, in his 50s.
And yet my family never watched his lacrosse games. We did watch some of his marathons, but that wasn’t until he was in his 20s. When Bob was in his glory days, our Shanghainese-born parents were bent on getting him into medical school. There was a loving aspect to it: I can remember my father working through math books with him, lesson by lesson, at the big blackboard in the attic. Bob never did become a doctor, though; and neither did I. It wasn’t until my younger sister came along that someone in the family finally wore a white coat.
Bob today could be the fittest 58-year-old on the planet. His doctor estimates his biological age at 35; he’s still climbing big mountains in the Himalayas. And, like Jeremy Lin, he’s charming. No one sees Bob without leaving with a laugh. He sometimes jokes he could be mayor of his building, and it’s true. To know him is to cheer for him.
And yet my parents did not cheer for him. What if my mother had sat on the sidelines with her statistics, like Jeremy Lin’s mother? What if my father had played videos of athletes for my brother to watch and imitate? It’s hard not to wonder.
And how did Jeremy Lin’s parents manage to do these remarkable things? Amy Chua, the tiger mother, recalls her immigrant father beating the kids whenever they mispronounced a Chinese word. How is it that Jeremy Lin’s immigrant father in particular, Gie-Ming Lin, encouraged his son to follow such an untraditional path? Bob’s glory days were those ________.
| A．when he was doing well in math |
| B．when he was in second grade |
| C．when he was made mayor of his building |
| D．when he showed his talents in sports |
From the passage we can tell that Bob is ____________.
| A．active and optimistic |
| B．clever and determined |
| C．brave and helpful |
| D．considerate and independent |
Which of the following statements is probably TRUE?
| A．Bob was always ignored by his parents |
| B．Bob could also have been a sport star. |
| C．Bob’s parents often watched his games. |
| D．Nobody in the author’s family was a doctor. |
From the last two paragraphs we can infer that ___________.
| A．parents should always study together with their children |
| B．parents should know how to educate their children properly |
| C．children should be punished when they do anything wrong |
| D．children should try to live up to the hopes of their parents |
Today, almost everyone has heard of Harry Potter. The books detailing his experiences at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry have aroused passion, creativity, and interest in reading throughout the world.
But have you ever considered why you are a fan of the Harry Potter series?
JK Rowling has created a list of characters and an environment for them to inhabit that appeals to both adults and children.
The fantasy aspect of the wizarding world expands the imagination, and takes the mind to new and exciting places. Anything could happen there. Her stories contain parts of the believable and unbelievable, changing the predictability that readers commonly come across and bear in fiction.
The main theme of the series, including good versus evil, prejudice, love, death, sacrifice, friendship and loyalty, in actuality contributes to the ever-lasting nature of the stories. At the same time, these themes remind us of classic literature, offering mature readers tales that wear like a comfortable pair of shoes, while introducing younger readers to concepts they will meet throughout their lives.
Much of the appeal also comes from the characters. In each book, JK Rowling introduces and describes the characters in such a way that we wonder not only about their futures, but also about their pasts. Even supporting characters are suddenly more than just extras in the background. And what of Harry Potter himself? We care about Harry, because we watch him grow from an innocent boy to a powerful wizard. We see him as both Hero and Victim. He experiences endless love and extreme pain, and as readers, we experience them with him.
This perfect combination of emotion, suspense and fantasy, together with the fact that JK Rowling is a superb storyteller is the reason why we are Harry potter fans. People are fond of Harry Potter series. With books like these, it’s hard not to be.Harry Potter series become popular partly because____________.
| A．they remind us of the childhood and environment we had in the past |
| B．they take us to a world beyond our imagination and expectation |
| C．they offer us ever-lasting nature of the stories |
| D．they set an example of hero for us to follow |
What does the underlined sentence in Paragraph 6 mean?
| A．The supporting characters are not necessary in the story. |
| B．Readers care only about Harry but not those supporting characters. |
| C．Even the supporting characters are attractive in the story. |
| D．Those supporting characters only appear all of a sudden. |
The themes of the Harry Potter series do not contain____________.
| A．prejudice and love | B．good and evil |
| C．death and sacrifice | D．safety and peace |
People care for Harry Potter because ____________.
| A．they think of classic literature when reading the story |
| B．they find different experiences from theirs on Harry |
| C．they share the experiences with Harry |
| D．they like JK Rowling’s description very much |
Close your eyes and imagine you are living in the next two centuries or more. You’ll be living in a world filled with smart robots, which will be helping you to take care of your children, or your elderly parents in your home. You’ll live much longer thanks to the medicine made by genetic (基因的) science. And mankind may be going farther in space than ever before ––you will be living on the moon or Mars.
How should we view the changes that wait for us in the future? Should we be optimistic about the years ahead, or worried about what the future holds? Some scientists and experts are having a discussion about how technology, science and society will develop in the future.
“I’m looking forward to the day when more technology will come to my life,” says John Searle, a professor at the University of California Berkeley Philosophy, “because I think further research in such areas as genetics, physics, chemistry and medicine will help us to overcome poverty, improve health, and make life longer.”
Hugh Herr, at MIT’s Biomechatronics Group, considers very powerful weapons as concern over the future. Another is the growing role of technology in our lives.“Machines taking over what humans do is not a good thing,” Herr says.
That is a similar concern shared by Daniela Cerqui, a social and cultural scientist. “I am afraid that the long-term future we are building will have no space left for human beings,” says Cerqui. “The main values of our society are related to information that must progress as quickly as possible, and computers are much better than humans in these tasks .”The first paragraph mainly tells us ________.
| A．how science will develop in the next two centuries |
| B．how people will live in a modern society |
| C．what life would be like in the future |
| D．what computers will bring to our society |
What is John Searle’s attitude towards the future of technology?
| A．Worried. | B．Optimistic. | C．Uncertain. | D．Disappointed. |
The underlined word “That” in the last paragraph refers to______.
| A．the poverty problem in the future |
| B．machines taking over what humans do |
| C．the technology of weapons |
| D．the health problem of humans |
What would be the best title for the passage?
| A．The future––full of hope or concern? |
| B．Great changes will take place in the future |
| C．The relationship between technology and humans |
| D．The role of robots and computers in the future |