After battling hard times and danger for over nine months, British teenager Mike Perham made history last month as the youngest person to sail solo around the world.
The 17-year-old made the record after he cleared the Panama Canal and then sailed through the Caribbean and got home across the Atlantic.
Mike is only three months younger than Zac Sunderland, the 17-year-old American boy who had taken the crown as the youngest solo around-the-world sailor in July.
The two youngsters met in Cape Town in South Africa as they crossed the globe in different directions. Mike insisted they were not rivals(竞争对手). “No. It's two teenagers going out there, living their dream and having the adventure of a lifetime,” he said.
Mike may be young, but he is no stranger to sailing adventures. He picked up the hobby at the age of 6 when his father took him out in a small boat on a local lake. Father and son sailed separate boats across the Atlantic when Mike was 14, making him the youngest person to cross that ocean solo. That record gave him the taste for this even greater challenge.
On the recent journey, the scariest moment for Mike came when his sailboat was hit by storms in the southern Indian Ocean.
“We were picked up by what felt like a 60-foot wave and threw down on our side at 90 degrees,” he said.
“It felt like I was going right over. Stuff was flying around and I just thought ‘Oh no’.”
At other times, he had to dive into the Pacific and fix problems. He tied himself to the boat, jumped into the water and went to work with a knife in 30-second dives underneath the boat to cut a rope away.
Mike said he felt proud that he made his dream come true. “You've got to have confidence in yourself that you will make it,” he said.. What's the main idea of the passage?
| A．A British teenager became the youngest person to sail solo around the world. |
| B．How a British teenager developed his sailing hobby. |
| C．A British teenager's brave experience. |
| D．A British teenager's confidence. |
Which of the following statements is NOT true?
| A．Mike Perham crossed the Panama Canal. |
| B．Mike and Zac took the crown as the youngest solo around-the-world sailor at the same age. |
| C．The two youngsters crossed the globe in different directions. |
| D．Mike was never frightened during the sailing. |
What does the underlined word “taste” in the fifth paragraph mean?
| A．Flavor. | B．Preference. | C．Experience. | D．Ability. |
What can we infer from the passage?
| A．Both Mike and Zac had adventured spirits. |
| B．Mike is older than Zac. |
| C．They both are brave but they have different goals. |
| D．Mike took up the hobby of sailing adventures at 14. |
What did Mike believe in?
| A．Having confidence in yourself will make you successful. |
| B．Braveness is important in sailing. |
| C．One should pick up a hobby as a child. |
| D．Pride goes before a fall. |
第三部分：阅读理解（共20小题，每题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。
“BANG!” the door caused a reverberation(回声). It was just standing there, with Father standing on one side, and I on the other side.
We were both in great anger. “Never set foot in this house again!” stormed Father. With tears welling up in my eyes, I rushed out of the flat and ran along the street.
The street lights were shining rather desolately(凄凉的). I wandered aimlessly.
A young father who held a child in his arms walked past me. I felt as if I saw my childhood from another space: happy and harmonious.
But now… I don’t know whether it is because I have grown up or because dad is getting old. We differ in our ways of thinking. He always imposes his opinions and codes of behavior on me. Whenever I do something wrong, he never admits it. We are just like two people coming from two different worlds. It feels like there is an iron door between us that can never be opened.
I wandered the streets, without a destination in mind. My heart was frozen on this hot summer night. As I walked on there were fewer and fewer people on the streets, until I had only the street lights to keep me company. When I finally reached the high-rise apartment block in which I lived, I saw that the light was still on.
In fact, it was nothing. Perhaps, dad was throwing away some of his old stamps. Perhaps he thought they were useless. I never had the courage to tell him that I liked collecting stamps. I can’t stand his outrageous(蛮横的) words: “ I can throw you away, let alone these old papers.”
All the lights were off except father’s.
Dad was always like this. Maybe he didn’t know how to express himself. After shouting at me, he never showed any mercy or any moments of regret. After an argument he has the habit of creeping up in my sleep and then tucking me underneath the covers.
This was how he always was. He has been a leader for so long that telling everyone else what to do has become his second nature.
The light was still on. “Am I wrong?” I whispered, maybe… With the key in hand, I was as nervous as I had ever been. At last, I decided to open the door. As soon as I opened the door, tears ran down my cheeks. I suddenly realized that the iron door that I had imagined between us did not exist at all. Love – is second to none.
56.Decide which is the best order of the following according to what happened in the passage.
a. I opened the door and entered the house.
b. Sadly I ran out into the street.
c. I reached the place where I lived and saw my house still brightly lit.
d. I thought of my father’s kindness towards me.
e. I walked about in the street without any aim.
A. b, e, d, c, a B. b, e, c, d, a C. b, e, a, c, d D. b, e, c, a, d
57.What made the writer think of his childhood?
A. The sight of the desolate street lights.
B. The sight of the empty street.
C. The sight of a father with a child in his arms.
D. The sight of light in his own house.
58.Why do you think the father often shouts at his son?
A. Perhaps the father is getting older and older.
B. Perhaps the son has already grown up.
C. Perhaps they never agree with each other.
D. Perhaps the father has got used to doing that.
59.What conclusion can you draw after reading the passage?
A. The father is actually kind to his son.
B. The father treats his son in an unfair way.
C. The father is neither kind nor cruel to his son.
D. The father is always finding fault with his son.
If you feel at present that you don’t have enough friends in your life, one reason may be that you have let yourself become too busy to make time for the relationships you already have. Starting and keeping friendship requires effort and commitment.
Many of us let our lives become so busy with work and other commitments that we don’t get around to scheduling time for pleasure and renewal（叙旧）with the friends, relatives and acquaintances we already have.
Making the effort to call your friends more regularly and to accept more of the invitations you receive from others can improve your social life in a hurry!
Are there any people you could call right now and be assured of a pleasant welcome? Are there people that you could count on to help you in time of difficulty? Can you have close talks with them? Do you have fun when you are together? Are you happy to have them in your life?
If you haven’t seen much of them lately, is it because you have become too busy? Have you grown apart? Was there an argument?
If the main reason you haven’t been getting together with the people you already know is that you have got too busy, take a good look at how you spend your time. Compare it with your real values and priorities（优先考虑的事）in life. Is your busy lifestyle really bringing you the quality of life that you want?
If you have become too busy for friends, why has this happened? Are you seeking material toys in your life at the expense of relationships with other human beings? Have you allowed your time to be over-committed because you never say “No” to anyone? Do you insist on doing things yourself that could be appointed to others? If so, why? Do you believe that everything depends on you?
Examine whether the way you are now spending your time accurately reflects your deepest values and priorities. Make sure that you schedule adequate time for the things that are truly most important to you.
If you really want to keep friends in your life, make a space in your schedule, and a space in your heart for them.
72.In this passage the author mainly discusses ____.
A. how to balance friendship and work
B. how to spend our spare time
C. whether we should keep friendship
D. whether we should invite friends to dinner
73.Which of the following doesn’t indicate a good relationship?
A. You have someone to count on when you are in trouble.
B. You have someone to have close talks with.
C. You have fun when you are with someone.
D. You feel depressed with others in life.
74.The reason why you have become too busy for friends may be the following EXCEPT that ____.
A. you spend too much time seeking material toys in your life
B. you feel it difficult to keep friendship
C. you stick to doing everything all by yourself
D. you never refuse whatever other people ask you to do
75.Which would be the best title for the text?
A. Too Busy for Friendship? B. Too Busy with Work?
C. How to Spend Your Time D. How to Make New Friends
“ONLY A COKE WILL DO”
“We don’t necessarily believe that new advertising, which might make consumers feel better about the Coke brand or better about the ads themselves, will actually result in consumers consuming more of the product,” Morgan Stanley’s Bill Pecoriello wrote in a research note the day after the investor meeting. But Coke is optimistic it can regain its old magic, and is banking on a new slogan: “Welcome to the Coke side of life.”
BREAKTHROUGH HIT?
With PepsiCo about to surpass Coke as the beverage king on Wall Street – Pepsi’s market capitalization has soared in recent years to $97.9 billion, putting it less than a billion dollars behind its rival(对手) – the heat is on Coke. It’s set to launch a new marketing campaign in March, 2006. And having taken a quick look at Coke’s investor presentation on Dec. 7 in New York, my sense is that Coke may be moving in the right direction.
Given the continued shift by consumers away from soda – Coke’s stronghold – and into alternative beverages like juice, tea and water, Coke badly needs a breakthrough hit. And given that shift away from soda, some analysts wonder whether even the catchiest new ads will be enough to put the fizz back into Coke.
SAME OLD, UPDATED.
The new flavors of PowerAde sports drink will probably enable Coke to continue stealing market share from PepsiCo’s Gatorade brand. And Coke is getting a little more creative with packaging, including new, aluminum bottles of Coke that will be sold in nightclubs, and an 8.4-ounce “100 calorie” version of its flagship Coke that will appeal to women who want fewer calories and will like the fact that the small can will fit in their purse. I doubt whether other new products will be successful, including a new coffee-flavored soda called Coke-Cola Blak that I tried. Think carbonated coffee. But I’m not sure if the product, which Coke is pitching as an afternoon pick-me-up for the 35-and-over set, is going to pull people away from their afternoon Frappucino fix. And my opinion is that Vault, an orange-flavored energy drink, will have just as much trouble unseating Mountain Dew among teens as did Coke’s last attempt, a product called Surge.
If there is one concern I have about the fresh offerings Coke plans to launch this year, it appears that many of them are simply new brands, not new products.
68.According to the passage, we can know that ____.
A. Coke mainly depends on new products recently
B. nowadays Coke is comparatively less popular
C. PepsiCo has taken the place of Coke
D. Coke has few new brands
69.The underlined word “soared” means ____.
A. achieved B. dropped C. increased D. failed
70.When the middle-aged people feel tired, what would they prefer to drink in order to continue their work?
A. Vault. B. Surge. C. Coke-Cola Blak D. Frappucino.
71.What is the best title of the passage?
A. Troubles in Coke Company
B. Varieties of New Products
C. The Importance of New Advertisements
D. The Relationship Between Coke and Pepsi
For photographers lacking training, experience and even the ability to click a shutter button, they produce remarkable pictures. Under the sea, deep in the woods and high in the sky, furry, feathery and leathery-skinned creatures are opening up vistas（远景）by taking cameras where no human can go.
This is the world of animal-borne imagine celebrated last month at a conference sponsored(supported) by the National Geographic Society for the 20th anniversary of its Crittercam, the device that started it all.
Since its debut（首次公开露面）in 1987 on the back of a turtle, the Crittercam and similar devices developed by others have grown smaller and more powerful.
“It’s more than just a camera now,” said Greg Marshall, the marine biologist and now filmmaker who invented the Crittercam. “We are now including more instruments to gather more data while at the same time reducing everything in size.”
The idea of attaching video cameras to animals came to Mr. Marshall in 1986 on a dive off Belize when a shark apporached him. When the animal quickly turned away, he noticed a shark with a sucker fish on its belly. He came up with the idea that putting a camera in place of the sucker fish would allow people to witness the shark’s behavior without disturbing it.
Crittercams have been attached to sharks, sea lions and other marine animals, and, more recently, to land animals.
Birds are a new addition, Mr. Marshall said. Dr. Christian Rutz of Oxford recently reported on tiny cameras called feathercams that monitor the crows in the South Pacific. It has discovered that crows are smarter than anyone knew they not only use twigs（嫩枝）and grass stems as tools to root out food, but they also save their favorite tools to use again.
Tracey L. Rogers, director of the Australian Marine Mammal Research Center in Sydney, said crittercam was a powerful tool in her work with leopard seals（豹斑海豹）in Antarctica. “In studying animals,” Dr. Rogers said at the meeting, “you want to see how our animal models align（与……一致）with reality. With a camera, you actually see what they do. You don’t have to guess.”
64.What’s the text mainly about?
A. The advantages of crittercam.
B. The development of Crittercams in the past 20 years.
C. How crittercam was invented.
D. How crittercam works.
65.What inspired Marshall to invent crittercam?
A. The sight of sucker fish clinging to a shark on a dive.
B. The thought of how to photograph animals better.
C. Noticing a shark eating a sucker fish on a dive.
D. Seeing a shark with a camera on its belly on a dive.
66.According to Dr. Rogers, crittercam ____.
A. can clear up all your doubts about animals
B. is the most powerful tool in studying animals
C. enabled her to observe the crows in the South Pacific closely
D. helped a lot with her research on leopard seals in Antarctica
67.All of the following are improvements of crittercams EXCEPT that ____.
A. the size is becoming smaller
B. more instruments are involved to gather more data
C. they allow researchers to see where and how animals live
D. they are able to be applied to smaller animals such as birds
At 227 billion yuan ($33 billion) for 2008, Guangdong's cultural industries accounted for 6.4 percent of its GDP and experienced a growth rate of 13.8 percent. But Lai admits that size does not equal weight. "Our businesses are mostly small, financing difficult and brands few."
One local brand that has made it big is Pleasant Goat and Big, Big Wolf, also translated as Happy Sheep and Gray Wolf, China's most popular cartoon series currently being aired. But according to Liu Manyi, general manager of Creative Power Entertaining Inc, the firm behind the hit show, is not laughing to the bank. Instead she is bitter: "Pirate discs were all over the streets before our first movie hit the screen. Their images appear on all kinds of products. All this has no proper licensing."
In case you don't know, China produces the largest amount of animated(动画的) programming in the world. But quantity is not quality. Behind every Pleasant Goat there are tens of thousands of flops. The best way for the government to promote the country's creative industries is to crack down on piracy (盗版). Hollywood often raises its voice about being victimized (受害) in China. Truth be told, Hollywood is probably the least affected since there is a quota system for China's importation of Hollywood films.
Many Chinese producers are taking baby steps and the domestic market is all they have. If their rights in the home market are not protected, they will never see the day their products find a foreign audience.
The sudden closure(关闭) of BT websites where copyrighted materials used to flow freely suggests a determination on the part of the government to take intellectual property rights seriously. This kind of websites is bad for us, so we should ban them.
Much of the news coming out of the 2009 International Cultural Industries Forum was encouraging. China's film industry is expected to get 6 billion yuan ($879 million) in box office receipts this year. A decade from now, this number may go up to 30 billion, according to some forecasts.
If the government takes serious action against online and offline pirates, China's creative industries may well have a bright future.What does the underlined sentence in paragraph 1 mean?
| A．Fast as the development of Guangdong's cultural industries is, they don’t have a big challenge in the world. |
| B．Guangdong's cultural industries can make a big profit although they are just the small companies. |
| C．Guangdong's cultural industries make a big contribution to its GDP because of their strong economic power. |
| D．The development of Guangdong's cultural industries cannot catch up with any other industries. |
What does Liu Manyi think about Pleasant Goat and Big, Big Wolf?
| A．It is a failure since it is a local brand. |
| B．It is a success but cannot get the expected profit. |
| C．Its profit from the images has been shared legally. |
| D．Pirate discs make it more popular among the children. |
Which of the following statements is TRUE?
| A．Chinese creative industries are more advanced than foreign ones. |
| B．The domestic market is of little significance to the survival of Chinese creative industries. |
| C．BT websites stand in the way of the development of Chinese creative industries. |
| D．The growth of China's film industry is always slow and needs more support |
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