Women were friends, I once would have said, when they totally love and support and trust each other, and bear to each other the secrets of their souls, and run—no questions asked—to help each other, and tell harsh truths to each other(No, you can’t wear that dress unless you lose ten pounds first.) when these truths must be told.
In other words, I once would have said that a friend is a friend all the way, but now I believe that’s narrow point of view. Friendships serve many different functions，meet different needs and range from those as all-the-way as the friendship of the soul sisters mentioned above to that of the most casual playmates.
Convenience friends are women with whom we’d have no particular reason to be friends: a next-door neighbor or the mother of one of our children’s closest friends. They’ll lend us their cups for a party. They’ll drive our kids to school when we’re sick. They’ll take us to pick up our car when we need a lift .As we will for them. But we don’t , with convenience friends, ever come too close or tell too much; we maintain our public face and emotional distance.
Special-interest friends aren’t intimate（亲密）,and they needn’t involve kids or cats. Their value lies in some interest jointly shared .And so we may have an office friend or a tennis friend.
“I’ve got one woman friend,” says Joyce,” who likes, as I do, to take music courses, which makes it nice for me and her. I’d say that what we’re doing is doing together, not being together.”
Crossroads friends are important for what was for the friendship we shared at a crucial（关键的）,now past, time of life. A time, perhaps, when we roomed in college together or went together through pregnancy, birth and that scary first year of new motherhood.
Crossroads friends develop powerful links, links strong enough to endure with not much more contact than once-a-year letters at Christmas. And out of respect for those crossroads years, for those dramas and dreams we once shared, we will always be friends.
Crossroads friends seem to maintain a special kind of intimacy ----dormant（休眠的） but always ready to be revived（复活） ---and though we may rarely meet ,whenever we do connect, it’s personal and strong. Another kind of intimacy exists in the cross-generational friendships, the friends that form across generation in what one woman calls her daughter-mother and her mother-daughter relationships.
There are good friends, pretty good friends and very good friends, and these friendships are defined by their level of intimacy. We might tell a good friend, for example, that yesterday we had a fight with our husband. And we might tell a pretty good friend that this fight with our husband made us so mad that we slept on the couch. And we might tell a very good friend that the reason we got so mad in that fight that we slept on the couch had something to do with a girl who works in his office. But it’s only to our very best friends that we’re willing to tell all, to tell what’s going on with that girl in his office.The underlined word “harsh”(in Para.1)probably means “------“
| A．protective | B．impossible |
| C．unpleasant | D．unbelievable |
What can we know about convenience friends?
| A．People may share their sorrow and pain with their convenience friends. |
| B．People may borrow a large sum of money from their convenience friends. |
| C．People may ask their convenience friends to pick up their children for them. |
| D．People would like to seek comfort and convenience from their convenience friends. |
What is the similarity between crossroads friends and cross-generational friends?
| A．They often write to each other but never meet. |
| B．They become friends at a crucial time of their life. |
| C．They both enjoy a special kind of intimacy with each other. |
| D．The relationship usually exists between mothers and daughters. |
The friendships in the passage are classified（分类） according to _________.
| A．different stages of one’s life |
| B．the purpose of making friends |
| C．how people make friends with others |
| D．how close the relationship is |
What would be the best title for the passage?
| A．The value of friendship |
| B．How to make lasting friendships |
| C．Ways to avoid destroying your friendship |
| D．Friends, good friends and such good friends |
Ireland has had a very difficult history. The problems started in the 16th century when English rulers fried to conquer (征服) Ireland. For hundreds of years, the Irish people fought against the English. Finally, in 1921, the British government was forced to give independence to the south of Ireland. The result is that today there are two “Irelands”. Northern Ireland, in the north, is part of the United Kingdom. The republic of Ireland, in the south, is an independent country.
In the 1840s ,the main crop, potatoes was affected by disease and about 750, 000 people died of hunger. This, and a shortage (短缺) of work, forced many people to leave Ireland and live in the USA, the UK, Australia and Canada. As a result of these problems, the population fell from 8.2 million in 1841 to 6.6 million in 1851.
For many years, the majority of Irish people earned their living as farmers. Today, many people still work on the land but more and more people are moving to the cities to work in factories and offices. Life in the cities is very different from life in the countryside, where things move at a quieter and slower pace.
The Irish are famous for being warm-hearted and friendly, Oscar Wilde, a famous Irish writer, once said that the Irish were “the greatest talkers since the Greeks”. Since independence, Ireland has revived (复兴) its own culture of music, language, literature and singing. Different areas have different styles of old Irish songs which are sung without instruments. Other kinds of Irish music use many different instruments such as the violin, whistles, etc.What does the author tell us in Paragraph 1?
| A．How the Irish fought against the English. |
| B．How Ireland gained independence. |
| C．How two “Irelands” came into being. |
| D．How English rulers tried to conquer Ireland. |
The last paragraph is mainly about____.
| A．the Irish character | B．Irish culture |
| C．Irish musical instruments | D．a famous Irish writer |
We learn from the text that in Ireland _____.
| A．different kinds of old Irish songs are all sung with instruments |
| B．people are moving to the cities for lack of work in the countryside |
| C．it is harder to make a living as a farmer than as a factory worker |
| D．food shortages in the 1840s led to a decline in population |
What can be the best title for the text?
| A．Life in Ireland |
| B．Ireland, Past and Present |
| C．A Very Difficult History |
| D．The Independence of Ireland |
It’s you and I who are to blame for the state of the earth. No question about it. It’s our life-style that is threatening life on Earth, so we must make the changes. The good news is that many of those changes are really quite simple, even enjoyable, but for every careful step we take as individuals, we must press government and industry to take a big step on our benefit. And we must start now. Tomorrow’s too late.
My aim this year is to persuade as many of my friends and colleagues as possible to choose the train, and leave their cars behind too. My gardens have been pesticide(杀虫剂)–free zones for years and I enjoy seeing more wildlife on my doorstep as a result; I’ve tried to reduce my contribution to water pollution too, by using environment-friendly, phosphate(磷)–free washing powder , and by no longer thinking of the toilet as a suitable waste-disposal(处理) point .
I ran after a young lady through town recently to give her back the piece of paper she had carelessly thrown away. She disappeared into a shop, and when I followed her inside and made my presentation, she was doubly embarrassed--she worked there, and the boss gave her a ticking–off too. I’ve started asking fellow drivers at gas stations why they aren’t using unleaded (无铅的) petrol . These are small things, but we have to start somewhere, and every little does help.We can learn from the first paragraph that____________.
| A．you and I are responsible for looking after the environment |
| B．the government and industry are responsible for looking after the environment |
| C．the government is responsible for looking after the environment |
| D．both A and B |
To help the environment, the author is trying to do everything mentioned below EXCEPT_________.
| A．taking the train instead of a car |
| B．avoiding the use of pesticides |
| C．throwing away the old cars |
| D．running after those who throw articles carelessly |
The author ran after a woman through town because he wanted__________.
| A．to find out where she worked |
| B．to give her back the piece of paper she had lost |
| C．to ask her to pay him for picking up the piece of paper. |
| D．to tell her not to throw away pieces of paper carelessly |
The purpose of this passage is to__________.
| A．persuade his friends to take the train |
| B．try to advise us all to protect our environment |
| C．make clear who is responsible for the environment |
| D．inform us of the good news |
| Fun Day To celebrate the Year of the snake Organised by Lam Tin Youth Centre and Kwun Tong High School Date: 2 February 2013 Time: 10 am—5 pm Place: Kwun Tong Playground Fee: $20 (buy three get one free) Programmes: drama, lion dance, magic show and ballet performance Highlights: 1) enter the lucky draw to win a digital camera 2) learn to make festival food Join us on the Fun Day! All are welcome! Free Soft Drinks Note: ● Tickets are available at the General Office of Lam Tin Youth Center ● For those who would like to be a volunteer, please contact Miss Olivia Wong one week before the activity. |
What you have just read is a ________.
| A．note | B．poster | C．schedule | D．report |
What is going to take place on 2 February 2013?
| A．A big event to welcome a Chinese new year. |
| B．A social gathering to raise money for wildlife. |
| C．A party for close friends to meet and have fun. |
| D．A meeting of Kwun Tong High School students. |
How much do you have to pay in total if four of you go together?
| A．$20. | B．$40. | C．$80. | D．$60. |
Which of the following statements is true?
| A．Tickets are sold in Kwun Tong High School. |
| B．Free digital cameras are provided for everybody. |
| C．It’s unnecessary to take soft drinks with you. |
| D．Festival food will be served without extra charge. |
Global financial big dogs are no match for China's "Da Ma", or housewives, who have crowded into gold stores across China, buying up 300 tons of gold over the past two weeks. No wonder gold prices have steadied after taking a dive.
During the May Day holiday, gold stores were crowded with mostly female customers. Most of them are middle-aged "Chinese housewives". This group of buyers has risen to fame recently. They are big spenders and are desperate to get their hands on a bargain. "I bought some gold jewellery and kept them as a gift for my son when he gets married," said a buyer from Shanghai.
The gold business is skyrocketing. "Our sales are growing by the day. Yesterday we sold more than ten million yuan of gold products," a gold store salesperson said. The gold rush in China started about two weeks ago thanks to a decline in global gold prices. Media reports suggest that Chinese housewives have spent about 100 billion yuan, or about 16 billion US dollars, purchasing 300 tons of gold since mid-April. That has helped support gold prices.
"Gold prices depressed since the middle of last month but have risen gradually. That is mainly due to the strong demand from Asian markets," said foreign trader Zhang Chen from Industrial & Commercial Bank of China. "Some people even joked that Chinese housewives have beaten Wall Street analysts." For Chinese people, with limited investment options, the only thing better than buying gold is buying gold at discount prices.What does the author indicate(表明;预示)in the first sentence of the first paragraph?
| A．The global big dogs can’t match with Chinese housewives. |
| B．Chinese housewives spend a great deal of money on gold |
| C．China's "Da Ma" help a lot to support the global economic crisis |
| D．Chinese housewives have a better consumption idea than global financial big dogs . |
We can infer from the passage that_______________
| A．China’s "Da Ma" become the largest gold buyers due to a decline in global gold prices. |
| B．China's "Da Ma" crowded into stores to get gold as the best gifts for sons when they get married. |
| C．China's "Da Ma" are bigger spenders and cleverer than global financial big dogs. |
| D．Chinese housewives are most willing to spend money in buying gold . |
In the writer’s view, Chinese housewives are desperate to get their hands on a bargain because_____.
A. it is worthy to buy gold.
B .they have a strong demand
C. it is at discount prices.
D they have unlimited investment options The author’s description about the passage is ______.
| A．doubtful | B．subjective | C．objective | D．Negative |
A popular saying goes, “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.” However, that’s not really true. Words have the power to build us up or tear us down. It doesn’t matter if the words come from someone else or ourselves — the positive and negative effects are just as lasting.
We all talk to ourselves sometimes. We’re usually too embarrassed to admit it, though. In fact, we really shouldn’t be because more and more experts believe talking to ourselves out loud is a healthy habit.
This “self-talk” helps us motivate ourselves, remember things, solve problems, and calm ourselves down. Be aware, though, that as much as 77% of self-talk tends to be negative. So in order to stay positive, we should only speak words of encouragement to ourselves. We should also be quick to give ourselves a pat on the back. The next time you finish a project, do well in a test, or finally clean your room, join me in saying “Good job!”
Often, words come out of our mouths without us thinking about the effect they will have. But we should be aware that our words cause certain responses in others. For example, when returning an item to a store, we might use warm, friendly language during the exchange. And the clerk will probably respond in a similar manner. Or harsh (刻薄的) and critical language will most likely cause the clerk to be defensive.
Words possess power because of their lasting effects. Many of us regret something we once said. And we remember unkind words said to us! Before speaking, we should always ask ourselves: Is it true? Is it loving? Is it needed? If what we want to say doesn’t pass this test, then it’s better left unsaid.
Words possess power: both positive and negative. Those around us receive encouragement when we speak positively. We can offer hope, build self-esteem (自尊) and motivate others to do their best. Negative words destroy all those things. Will we use our words to hurt or to heal? The choice is ours.There is no need for us to feel embarrassed when we talk to ourselves because _________.
| A．almost everybody has the habit of talking to themselves |
| B．talking to ourselves always gives us courage |
| C．we can benefit from talking to ourselves |
| D．it does no harm to have “self-talk” when we are alone |
The underlined part in the third paragraph means that we should also timely ________.
| A．remind ourselves | B．praise ourselves |
| C．make ourselves relaxed | D．give ourselves amusement |
The author would probably hold the view that _________.
| A．encouraging words are sure to lead to kind offers |
| B．negative words may motivate us to make more progress |
| C．people tend to remember friendly words |
| D．it is better to think twice before talking to others |
In which column of the newspaper can you most likely read this passage?
| A．News. | B．Advice column. | C．Health. | D．Language. |