Long bus rides are like television shows. They have a beginning, a middle, and an end with commercials thrown in every three or four minutes. The commercials are unavoidable. They happen whether you want them or not. Every couple of minutes a billboard glides by outside the bus window. "Buy Super Clean Toothpaste.” Drink Good Wet Root Beer.” Fill up with Pacific Gas.” Only if you sleep, which is equal to turning the television set off, are you spared the unending cry of "You Need It! Buy It Now!"
The beginning of the ride is comfortable and somewhat exciting, even if you’ve traveled that way before. Usually some things have changed new houses, new buildings, sometimes even a new road. The bus driver has a style of driving and it’s fun to try to figure it out the first hour or so. If the driver is particularly reckless (鲁莽的) or daring, the ride can be as thrilling (惊心动魄的) as a suspense story. Will the driver pass the truck in time? Will the driver move into the rightor the lefthand lane? After a while, of course, the excitement dies down. Sleeping for a while helps pass the middle hours of the ride. Food always makes bus rides more interesting. But you’ve got to be careful of what kind of food you eat. Too much salty food can make you very thirsty between stops.
The end of the ride is somewhat like the beginning. You know it will soon be over and there’s a kind of expectation and excitement in that. The seat of course, has become harder as the hours have passed. By now you’ve sat with your legs crossed, with your hands in your lap, with your hands on the armrests even with your hands crossed behind your head. The end comes just at no more ways to sit.According to the passage, what do the passengers usually see when they are on a long bus trip?
A.Buses on the road. | B.Films on television. |
C.Advertisements on the billboards. | D.Gas stations. |
What is the purpose of this passage?
A.To give the writer’s opinion about long bus trips. |
B.To persuade you to take a long bus trip. |
C.To explain how bus trips and television shows differ. |
D.To describe the billboards along the road. |
The writer of this passage would probably favor .
A.bus drivers who aren’t reckless | B.driving alone |
C.a television set on the bus | D.no billboards along the road |
The writer feels long bus rides are like TV shows because .
A.the commercials![]() |
B.they both have a beginning, a middle, and an end, with commercials in between |
C.the drivers are always reckless on TV shows just as they are on buses |
D.both traveling and watching TV are not exciting. |
The writer thinks that the end of the ride is somewhat like the beginning because both are .
A.exciting | B.comfortable | C.tiring | D.boring |
Andreea,18,from Romania, sent a photograph of the view from her window and included a brief apology, “Sorry, this picture is plain and boring. No one would like it.”
At home in New Jersey, US, Coreen Burke,16, clicked on the same image on the internet. She saw a village with its rooftops and walls painted in reds and yellows, a distant chimney(烟囱) giving off smoke. “Isn’t this amazingly different from my country?” She thought to herself.
Burke, a teenager with a skill for computers, saw beauty in that photo. She posted it to her blog, Outside My Window, which features a daily snapshot(快照) of someone’s window view around the world.
The concept is simple: We can all relate to the act of staring through a piece of glass, onto the scene on the other side. “Maybe if we understood the way people from all over the world live,” she explained, “we would all get along better than we have been lately.”
With a click of a mouse, you can see Frederic’s window in the south of France, looking out on sailboats anchored (抛锚) in a peaceful harbor. Or Virginia’s view in Canada, a winter scene with trees laced in white.
Like most high school students, Burke has traveled the world. But she says someday she hopes to collect stamps in her passport, starting with Greece and India. Her recent break was devoted to launching the site with a blogger account and recruiting(招募) contributors from deviant ART, an online art community. She posted the first window view from Switzerland, a sunset photographed by an 18-year-old. Then others came flowing in by email, up to seven a day, from as far as Kazakhstan and Indonesia.
Contributors are marked on maps pinned on her bedroom wall: a blue dot indicates their country and a pink dot shows their city, if they provide it. The most responses have come from Europe – Estonia, Poland, Italy, Germany and Sweden, to name a few. She is crossing her fingers, thinking that she’ll receive a photo from Africa or Antarctica, which are unrepresented so far.
While she’s become a cyber crusader(网络革新者) for appreciating the beauty outside our own windows, get this: She has no windows in her bedroom. She has a nice skylight(天窗), though.
66. What does Burke think of the picture she received from Andreea?
A. Boring B. Charming C. Strange D. Plain
67. Outside My Window is a blog intended to show_______.
A. the view from Burke’s window
B. pictures of rural New Jersey
C. photos of window views taken by people all over the world
D. beautiful scenes of famous places of interest
68. We can conclude from the article that Burke _______.
A. believes we should reach out to people of different cultures
B. has traveled around the world and taken many pictures
C. is a member of an online art community
D. has made a lot of money by selling beautiful pictures
69. Which of the following is not true?
A. Burke is likely to receive a photo from Africa or Antarctica.
B. Burke is a junior middle school student.
C. Burke has photos from many countries in the world, including Kazakhstan.
D. Burke wants a photo of window view from Africa or Antarctica.
70.What is the best title of this passage?
A. World Windows
B. Beautiful Pictures
C. Pictures on the Internet
D. Windows in Bedrooms
You are watching a film in which two men are having a fight. They hit one another hard. At the start they only fight with their fists. But soon they begin hitting one another over the heads with chairs. And so it goes on until one of the men crashes through a window and falls thirty feet to the ground below. He is dead!Of course he isn't really dead. With any luck he isn't even hurt. Why? Because the men who fall out of high windows or jump from fast moving trains are professionals. They do this for a living. These men are called stuntmen. That is to say, they perform tricks. There are two sides to their work. They actually do most of the things you see on the screen. For example, they fall from a high building. However, they do not fall on to hard ground but on to empty cardboard boxes covered with a mattress (床垫). Again, when they hit one another with chairs, the chairs are made of soft wood and when they crash through windows, the glass is made of sugar! But although their work depends on trick of this sort, it also requires a high degree of skill and training. Often a stuntman' s success depends on careful timing. For example, when he is "blown up" in a battle scene, he has to jump out of the way of the explosion just at the right moment.
Naturally stuntmen are well paid for their work, but they lead dangerous lives. They often get seriously injured, and sometimes killed. A Norwegian stuntman, for example, skied over the edge of a cliff (悬崖) a thousand feet high. His parachute (降落伞) failed to open, and he was killed. In spite of all the risks, this is no longer a profession for men only. Men no longer dress up as women when actresses have to perform some dangerous action. For nowadays there are stuntgirls tool.
61. Stuntmen are those who ______.
A. often dress up as actors
B. prefer to lead dangerous lives
C. often perform seemingly dangerous actions
D. often fight each other for their lives
62. Stuntmen earn their living by ______.
A. playing their dirty tricks
B. selling their special skills
C. jumping out of high windows
D. jumping from fast moving trains
63. When a stuntman falls from a high building, ______.
A. he needs little protection
B. he will be covered with a mattress
C. his life is unprotected
D. his safety is generally all right
64. Which of the following is the main factor (因素) of a successful performance?
A. Strength. B. Exactness. C. Speed. D. Carefulness.
65. What can be inferred from the author' s example of the Norwegian stuntman?
A. Sometimes an accident can occur to a stuntman.
B. The percentage of serious accidents is high.
C. Parachutes must be of good quality.
D. The cliff is too high.
第三部分:阅读理解(共20小题;每小题2分。满分40分)
阅读下列短文,从每题所给的四个选项(A、B、C和D)中,选出最佳选项,并在答题卡上将该项涂黑
Mr. Peter Johnson, aged twenty-three, battled for half an hour to escape from his trapped car yesterday when it landed upside down in three feet of water. Mr. Johnson took the only escape route—through the boot(行李箱).
Mr. Johnson’s car had finished up in a ditch(沟渠) at Romney Marsin, Kent after skidding on ice and hitting a bank. “Fortunately, the water began to come in only slowly,” Mr. Johnson said. “I couldn’t force the doors because they were jammed against the walls of the ditch and dared not open the windows because I knew water would come flooding in.”
Mr. Johnson, a sweet salesman of Sitting Home, Kent, first tried to attract the attention of other motorists by sounding the horn and hammering on the roof and boot. Then he began his struggle to escape. Later he said, “It was really a half penny that saved my life. It was the only coin I had in my pocket and I used it to unscrew the back seat to get into the boot.
It took ten minutes to unscrew the seat, and a further five minutes to clear the sweet samples from the boot. Then Mr. Johnson found a wrench and began to work on the boot lock. Fifteen minutes passed by. “It was the only chance I had. Finally it gave, but as soon as I moved the boot lid, the water and mud poured in. I forced the lid down into the mud and jumped out of the ditch.”
His hands and arms cut and bruised(擦伤), Mr. Johnson got to Beckett Farm nearby, where he was looked after by the farmer’s wife, Mrs. Lucy Bates. Huddled in a blanket, he said, “That thirty minutes seemed like hours.” Only the tips of the car wheels were visible, police said last night. The vehicle had sunk into two feet of mud at the bottom of the ditch.
56. What is the best title for this newspaper article?
A. The Story of Mr. Johnson, A Sweet Salesman
B. Car Boot Can Serve As The Best Escape Route
C. Driver Escapes Through Car Boot
D. The Driver Survived A Terrible Car Accident
57. Which of the following objects is the most important to Mr. Johnson?
A. The hammer. B. The coin. C.The screw. D. The horn.
58. Which statement is true according to the passage?
A. Mr. Johnson’s car stood on its boot as it fell down.
B. Mr. Johnson could not escape from the door because it was full of sweet jam.
C. Mr. Johnson’s car accident was partly due to the slippery road.
D. Mr. Johnson struggled in the pouring mud as he unscrewed the back seat.
59. “Finally it gave” (Paragraph 4) means that _______.
A. Luckily the door was torn away in the end
B. At last the hammer went broken
C. The lock came open after all his efforts
D. The chance was lost at the last minute
60. It may be inferred from the passage that _______.
A. the ditch was along a quiet country road
B. the accident happened on a clear warm day
C. the police helped Mr. Johnson get out of the ditch
D. Mr. Johnson had a tender wife and was well attended
HONG KONG-----Hong Kong Disneyland is too crowded,a senior Chinese tourism official said today,hinting that another Disney Park is necessary to accommodate demand from China’s huuge population.
The comments by Shao Qiwei,director of China’s State Administration of Tourism, came a day after Shanghai’s mayor Han Zheng said the city was preparing to build China’s second Disney theme park.
“China has a very large population.We now have 1.3 bullion people. The market is very large.As far as I know,Hong Kong Disneyland is now very crowded.”said Shao,whose comments were broadcast on Hong Kong’s Cable TV.
The Hong Kong theme park,which opened in September,was widely criticized in January when it turned away hundreds of Lunar New Year holiday makers from mainland China because the park was full. Chaos(混乱) erupted when angry crowds tried to force their way into the park.
The embarrassing incident prompted a public apology from Hong Kong Disneyland Managing Director Bill Ernest and a dressing down from Hong Kong’s leader Donald Tsang.Authorities are carefully studying the issue of overcrowding in preparation for the possible building of the Disney park in Shanghai.Shao said.
The official Xinhua News Agency reported Tuesday that no agreement has been reached on the park in Shanghai,quoting senior vice president of Walt Disney Parks and Resorts, Leslie Goodman. Hong Kong Disneyland is a joint venture between The Walt Disney Co. and the local government, which shouldered the bulk of the park’s construction fees.
68.Why is it necessary to build a Disney park in Shanghai?
A.Hong Kong Disneyland can’t meet the need of the large population.
B. Hong Kong Disneyland is too small and very crowded.
C.Hong Kong Disney Park was criticized by tourists.
D. Hong Kong Disneyland is far from the mainland.
69.Hundreds of visitors from mainland China got angry because_____.
A.the services in the park were not as good as expected.
B.they were not allowed to go into the park.
C.the park was too crowded.
D. chaos happened at the entrance to the park.
70.The building of a Disney park in Shanghai_____.
A.has been agreed to by The Walt Disney Co.
B.is financed by The Walt Disney Co.
C.willl be in the charge of the Shanghai government.
D.remains to be discussed with The Walt Disney Co.
The story goes that two friends were walking through the desert. During some point of the journey they had an argument, and one friend slapped the other one in the face. The one who got slapped was hurt, but without saying anything, wrote in the sand: "Today my best friend slapped me in the face." They kept on walking until they found an oasis(绿洲), where they decided to take a bath. The one who had been slapped got stuck in the mire and started drowning, but the friend saved him. After he recovered from the near drowning, he wrote on a stone: "Today my best friend saved my life." The friend who had slapped and saved his best friend asked him, "After I hurt you, you wrote in the sand and now you write on a stone. Why?"
The other friend replied: "When someone hurts us we should write it down in the sand where winds of forgiveness can erase it away. But when someone does something good for us, we must engrave it in the stone where no wind can ever erase it."
You have to learn to write your hurts in the sand and to carve your benefits in the stone.
64.One friend slapped the other because ____.
A.he was angry that his friend took him to the desert by mistake.
B.He was angry that his friend did not agree with him about something.
C.He was angry that his friend kept wasting time writing and carving.
D.He had to save his friend from drowning, and this almost took his own life.
65.The underlined sentence means we should _____.
A.not let others know we are angry with them by letting wind erase what we write down.
B.gradually forgive others for bad things they have done to us as time goes by.
C.make sure what we write in the desert does not remain long .
D.not try to find stones to record things on in a desert.
66.What is the right understanding of the last sentence of the passage?
A.We should write and carve to record different kinds of feelings.
B.We should record different kinds of things in different ways.
C.We should remember only good things others have done to us and let go bad things.
D.We should remember things that others do to us, including both good things and bad things.
67.Which of the following can be the proper title of the passage?
A.True Friendship B.Sand and Stone
C.Hurts and Benefits D.Forgiveness and Gratitude