Unit 1 【原文】
Social customs and ways of behaving change. But they do not necessarily always change for the better. Things which were considered impolite many years ago are now acceptable. Just a few years ago, it was considered impolite behaviour for a man to smoke on the street. No man who thought of himself as being a gentleman would make a fool of himself by smoking when a lady was in the room.
The important thing to remember about social customs is not to do anything that might make other people feel uncomfortable — especially if they are your guests. There is a story about a rich nobleman who had a very formal dinner party. When the food was served, one of the guests started to eat his peas with a knife. Other guests were amused or shocked, but the nobleman calmly picked up his knife and began eating in the same way. It would have been bad manners to make his guest feel foolish or uncomfortable.
Unit 2 【原文】
Undoubtedly, Tibet is one of the harshest places for human existence. It is cool in summer but freezing cold in winter. In Lhasa, the mildest city temperature may exceed 29C in summer while plummeting to -16C in winter! Sun radiation is extremely strong in Tibet. The sunlight in Lhasa is so intense that the city is called Sunlight City. The thin air can neither block off nor retain heat so that the temperature extremes can be met in daytime and the same night respectively in Tibet. However it is not impossible to visit the holy snow land. April to October is the best time to visit Tibet, out of the coldest months, which are from December to February usually. The average temperature in north Tibet is subzero and winter arrives in October until the following May or June. July and August are the best time to visit the area, enjoying warm temperature, intense sunshine, beautiful scenery and festive events. May, June and September is the tourist season in east Tibet. In winter, roads are all blocked by heavy snow. Landslides and rock falls frequently occur, which will make travel difficult.
Unit 3 【原文】
I could hear the guard blowing his whistle, so I ran onto the platform and up to the train. Luckily someone saw me coming, a door opened, and I jumped on while the train was moving out of the station. “Phew!” I thought. “That was hard work!” I was sure the other passengers could hear my heart beating; it was so loud, and I was in a cold sweat.
After a while, I recovered, and had a look at the other passengers. The compartment was full, but I was the only one standing. The people in the carriage turned their eyes away as they noticed me looking at them; all except one, a beautiful woman sitting in the corner. I saw her watching me in the mirror. Automatically, I adjusted my tie. She had seen me running for the train: maybe this was my lucky day after all. I prepared to say hello.
She spoke first, however. “Would you like my seat?” she asked. “You look rather ill.” That was the day on which I realized I was getting middle-aged.
Unit 4 Aesop was a very clever man who lived in Greece thousands of years ago. He wrote many good fables. He was known to be fond of jokes. One day, as he was enjoying a walk he met a traveler, who greeted him and said, “Kind man, can you tell me how soon I shall get to town?”
“Go,” Aesop answered.
“I know I must go”, said the traveler, “but I should Like you to tell me how soon I shall get to town.”
“Go,” Aesop said again angrily.
“This man must be mad,” the traveler thought and went on.
After he had gone some distance, Aesop shouted after him, “You will get to town in two hours.” The traveler turned around in astonishment. “Why didn’t you tell me that before?” he asked.
“How could I have told you before?” answered Aesop. “I did not know how fast you could walk.
Unit 5 Americans know that higher education is the key to the growth they need to lift their country, and today that is more true than ever. Just listen to these facts. Over half the new jobs created in the last three years have been managerial and professional jobs. The new jobs require a higher level of skills.
Fifteen years ago the typical worker with a college degree made 38 percent more than a worker with a high school diploma. Today that figure is 73 percent more. Two years of college means a 20 percent increase annual earnings. People who finish two years of college earn a quarter of a million dollars more tan their high school counterparts over a lifetime.
Unit 6 【原文】
I began my career during college, reporting on news stories at a Toronto radio station. The station’s program manager was also a professor who taught one of my classes. I convinced him that she needed a youth reporter because that year was International Youth Year. After graduation, I took a job as a television news reporter and later, news anchor. But sports reporting was something different, so I decided to try it. Figure skating was my first assignment.
I had two months until my new job began. It was like waiting an entire summer for school to start. I spent those two months talking to figure skating coaches and judges. I read boring rule books. I drove to the rinks where the skaters trained, and made notes about our conversations. I even took a lesson, which made some of the skaters laugh.
Unit 7 Thomas Edison was one of ten said to be the greatest genius of his age. There are only a few men in all of the history, who have changed the lives of other men as much as the inventor of the first useful electric light. But Edison could never be happy only because someone said he was a genius.“ There is no such thing as genius,” Edison said. He said that what people called genius was mostly hard work.
But Edison was a dreamer as well as a worker. From his earliest days as a child he wondered about the secrets of nature. Nature, he often said, is full of secrets. He tried to understand them; then, he tried to learn what could usefully be done with them.
Edison enjoyed thinking. He knew that most people will do almost anything instead of the difficult work of thinking, especially if they do not think very often. But he knew, too, that thinking can give men enjoyment and pleasure.
Unit 8 The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization says hunger kills millions of people each year — especially children . The UN organization says millions more people will die unless more money is invested to fight against hunger.
This is based on the result of a new UN study called “The State of Food Insecurity in the World, 2002”. It found that more than nine million people die each year from hunger. Six million of them are children younger than age five. Researchers also found that the number of starving people is growing in some parts of the world.
The report says that about eight hundred and forty million people around the world are getting enough food to eat. Ninety-five percent of these people are in developing countries.