vehicle'sdashboard. In Ontario，ask the dealer or seller for the Used Vehicle Information Package. thisgives details of previous owners，any outstanding liens on the car, and the fair market value of thevehicle.
练习：
1. According to the passage，in buying asecond-hand vehicle it is most important to know
A) how long it has been used.
B) what color it is.
C) whether it has been in a collision.
D) whether it leaks oil.
2. All of the following are mentioned as tricks which dishonestsecond-hand Car dealers may play upon their customers EXCEPT
A) To re-Paint the car
B) To roll back the odometer.
C) T0 replace the old pedal.
D) T0 disengage the odometer.
3. \paragraph means
A) a technician who checks a car free of charge.
B) a technician who learned his trade all by himself.
C) a technician who works for a particular car-dealer.
D) a technician who runs his own inspection service.
4. According to Bleakley, before buying a used Car all theinspection work Can
A) be done by a mechanic together with the dealer.
B) only be done by a qualified mechanic.
C) be done by the buyer himself.
D) be done by a qualified mechanic together with the buyer.
5. According to the passage，from which of thefollowing Call the buyer obtain reliable information of the previous owner?
A) The vehicle identification number.
B) The unbiased inspector.
C) The second. hand car dealer.
D) The Used Vehicle Information Package.
Thirsty in Karachi
After two weeks in Karachi，I'm not sure whetherto laugh or to cry. Either way，it involves water—or rather the lack of it.
In Western Europe or the US，you only have toturn on the tap and you'11 see a jet of cold water, ready to drink，cook andbathe in，or wash the car. Turn on the tap in Karachi and you'll be lucky tofill a few buckets. Until 1947，the city was part of British India，whose engineersbuilt and maintained a modest water supply network for the city's 500. 000 inhabitants.Today, Karachi is home to around 12 million people. Half of them live in slumtownships，with 1ittle or no water through the mains. Even the \through their pipes. And thecoloured liquid that finally emerges is usually too contaminated to drink.
According to the state. owned Karachi Water and Sewerage Board，the cityneeds more than 2. 500 million liters of water each day. The board currentlysupplies 1，650 million 1itres of which nearly 40 per cent is lost from 1eaks—and theft. Leaksare dime a dozen to water utilities the world
over, but theft?
Karachi's unlikely water pirates turn out to be ordinary
familiesstruggling to get adequate supplies of one of life's necessities. Stealingwater takes many forms. The simplest is to buy a suction pump and get itattached to the water pipe that feeds your house from the mains. This shouldmaximize your share of water every time the board switches oil the supply. Whenthe practice started 20 years ago. the pumps would be carefully hidden ordisguised as garden ornaments. These days people hardly bother. The pumps areso widespread and water board inspectors so thin on the ground that whenofficials do confiscate a pump its owner simply buy a replacement.
Insisting that people obey the law won't work because mosthouseholds have little alternative but to steal. For its part, the KarachiWater and Sewerage Board says it would dearly like to make 1ire easier, butfinds itself mired in debt because most residents either won't pay watercharges or can't afford to. According to the Urban Resource Centre, aKarachi-based think tank，of the 1. 2 million known consumers of water only 750，000 arebilled，of whom just 163. 000 actually pay for their supplies. The boardmakes a perpetual loss，and there is no money to improve the system or even plug the leaks. Worse,the board increasingly relies on international 1oans from institutions such asthe Asian
Development Bank, which only makes its debt worse.
The joke is that the owners of the suction pumps end up with little—if any—extra water.Your house is in a line with 20 other households all tapping into onehorizontal pipeline. All you can end up doing，given you have pumpsof equal strength，is redistribute each other's entitlement and pay higher electricitybills into the bargain.
Back home in London. I'll remember not to complain about the watermeter, or the hosepipe ban.
练习：
1. According to the passage，people in Karachitoday suffer from a short supply of water because
A) the water supply network built in 1947 has stopped functioning.
B) the city has become much larger than before.
C) old networks cannot meet the need of the city's greatly-increasedpopulation.
D) the city is no longer a part of British India.
2. Now people in Karachi do not hide or disguise the suction pumpsthey use to steal water because