专八阅读真题(共14页).doc

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1、精选优质文档-倾情为你奉上PART IIREADING COMPREHENSION (30 MIN)In this section there are four reading passages followed by a total of 20 multiple-choice questions. Read the passages and then mark your answers on your coloured answer sheet.TEXT AStill, the image of any city has a half-life of many years. (So does

2、 its name, officially changed in 2001 from Calcutta to Kolkata, which is closer to what the word sounds like in Bengali. Conversing in English, I never heard anyone call the city anything but Calcutta.) To Westerners, the conveyance most identified with Kolkata is not its modern subwaya facility who

3、se spacious stations have art on the walls and cricket matches on television monitorsbut the hand-pulled rickshaw. Stories and films celebrate a primitive-looking cart with high wooden wheels, pulled by someone who looks close to needing the succor of Mother Teresa. For years the government has been

4、 talking about eliminating hand-pulled rickshaws on what it calls humanitarian groundsprincipally on the ground that, as the mayor of Kolkata has often said, it is offensive to see “one man sweating and straining to pull another man.” But these days politicians also lament the impact of 6,000 hand-p

5、ulled rickshaws on a modern citys traffic and, particularly, on its image. “Westerners try to associate beggars and these rickshaws with the Calcutta landscape, but this is not what Calcutta stands for,” the chief minister of West Bengal, Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, said in a press conference in 2006.

6、“Our city stands for prosperity and development.” The chief ministerthe equivalent of a state governorwent on to announce that hand-pulled rickshaws soon would be banned from the streets of Kolkata.Rickshaws are not there to haul around tourists. (Actually, I saw almost no tourists in Kolkata, apart

7、 from the young backpackers on Sudder Street, in what used to be a red-light district and is now said to be the single place in the city where the services a rickshaw puller offers may include providing female company to a gentleman for the evening.) Its the people in the lanes who most regularly us

8、e rickshawsnot the poor but people who are just a notch above the poor. They are people who tend to travel short distances, through lanes that are sometimes inaccessible to even the most daring taxi driver. An older woman with marketing to do, for instance, can arrive in a rickshaw, have the ricksha

9、w puller wait until she comes back from various stalls to load her purchases, and then be taken home. People in the lanes use rickshaws as a 24-hour ambulance service. Proprietors of cafs or corner stores send rickshaws to collect their supplies. (One morning I saw a rickshaw puller take on a load o

10、f live chickenstied in pairs by the feet so they could be draped over the shafts and the folded back canopy and even the axle. By the time he trotted off, he was carrying about a hundred upside-down chickens.) The rickshaw pullers told me their steadiest customers are schoolchildren. Middle-class fa

11、milies contract with a puller to take a child to school and pick him up; the puller essentially becomes a family retainer.From June to September Kolkata can get torrential rains, and its drainage system doesnt need torrential rain to begin backing up. Residents who favor a touch of hyperbole say tha

12、t in Kolkata “if a stray cat pees, theres a flood.” During my stay it once rained for about 48 hours. Entire neighborhoods couldnt be reached by motorized vehicles, and the newspapers showed pictures of rickshaws being pulled through water that was up to the pullers waists. When its raining, the nor

13、mal customer base for rickshaw pullers expands greatly, as does the price of a journey. A writer in Kolkata told me, “When it rains, even the governor takes rickshaws.”While I was in Kolkata, a magazine called India Today published its annual ranking of Indian states, according to such measurements

14、as prosperity and infrastructure. Among Indias 20 largest states, Bihar finished dead last, as it has for four of the past five years. Bihar, a couple hundred miles north of Kolkata, is where the vast majority of rickshaw pullers come from. Once in Kolkata, they sleep on the street or in their ricks

15、haws or in a deraa combination garage and repair shop and dormitory managed by someone called a sardar. For sleeping privileges in a dera, pullers pay 100 rupees (about $2.50) a month, which sounds like a pretty good deal until youve visited a dera. They gross between 100 and 150 rupees a day, out o

16、f which they have to pay 20 rupees for the use of the rickshaw and an occasional 75 or more for a payoff if a policeman stops them for, say, crossing a street where rickshaws are prohibited. A 2003 study found that rickshaw pullers are near the bottom of Kolkata occupations in income, doing better t

17、han only the ragpickers and the beggars. For someone without land or education, that still beats trying to make a living in Bihar.There are people in Kolkata, particularly educated and politically aware people, who will not ride in a rickshaw, because they are offended by the idea of being pulled by

18、 another human being or because they consider it not the sort of thing people of their station do or because they regard the hand-pulled rickshaw as a relic of colonialism. Ironically, some of those people are not enthusiastic about banning rickshaws. The editor of the editorial pages of Kolkatas Te

19、legraphRudrangshu Mukherjee, a former academic who still writes history bookstold me, for instance, that he sees humanitarian considerations as coming down on the side of keeping hand-pulled rickshaws on the road. “I refuse to be carried by another human being myself,” he said, “but I question wheth

20、er we have the right to take away their livelihood.” Rickshaw supporters point out that when it comes to demeaning occupations, rickshaw pullers are hardly unique in Kolkata.When I asked one rickshaw puller if he thought the governments plan to rid the city of rickshaws was based on a genuine intere

21、st in his welfare, he smiled, with a quick shake of his heada gesture I interpreted to mean, “If you are so naive as to ask such a question, I will answer it, but it is not worth wasting words on.” Some rickshaw pullers I met were resigned to the imminent end of their livelihood and pin their hopes

22、on being offered something in its place. As migrant workers, they dont have the political clout enjoyed by, say, Kolkatas sidewalk hawkers, who, after supposedly being scaled back at the beginning of the modernization drive, still clog the sidewalks, selling absolutely everythingor, as I found durin

23、g the 48 hours of rain, absolutely everything but umbrellas. “The government was the government of the poor people,” one sardar told me. “Now they shake hands with the capitalists and try to get rid of poor people.”But others in Kolkata believe that rickshaws will simply be confined more strictly to

24、 certain neighborhoods, out of the view of World Bank traffic consultants and California investment delegationsor that they will be allowed to die out naturally as theyre supplanted by more modern conveyances. Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, after all, is not the first high West Bengal official to say that

25、 rickshaws would be off the streets of Kolkata in a matter of months. Similar statements have been made as far back as 1976. The ban decreed by Bhattacharjee has been delayed by a court case and by a widely held belief that some retraining or social security settlement ought to be offered to ricksha

26、w drivers. It may also have been delayed by a quiet reluctance to give up something that has been part of the fabric of the city for more than a century. Kolkata, a resident told me, “has difficulty letting go.” One day a city official handed me a report from the municipal government laying out opti

27、ons for how rickshaw pullers might be rehabilitated.“Which option has been chosen?” I asked, noting that the report was dated almost exactly a year before my visit.“That hasnt been decided,” he said.“When will it be decided?”“That hasnt been decided,” he said.11.According to the passage, rickshaws a

28、re used in Kolkata mainly for the following EXCEPTA. taking foreign tourists around the city.B. providing transport to school children.C. carrying store supplies and purchasesD. carrying people over short distances.12.Which of the following statements best describes the rickshaw pullers from BiharA.

29、 They come from a relatively poor area.B. They are provided with decent accommodation.C. Their living standards are very low in Kolkata.D. They are often caught by policemen in the streets.13.That “For someone without land or education, that still beats trying to make a living in Bihar” (4 paragraph

30、) means that even so,A. the poor prefer to work and live in Bihar.B. the poor from Bihar fare better than back home.C. the poor never try to make a living in Bihar.D. the poor never seem to resent their life in Kolkata.14.We can infer from the passage that some educated and politically aware peopleA

31、. hold mixed feelings towards rickshaws.B. strongly support the ban on rickshaws.C. call for humanitarian actions fro rickshaw pullers.D. keep quiet on the issue of banning rickshaws.15.Which of the following statements conveys the authors sense of humor?A. “not the poor but people who are just a no

32、tch above the poor.” (2 paragraph)B. “,.which sounds like a pretty good deal until youve visited a dera.” (4 paragraph)C. Kolkata, a resident told me, “ has difficulty letting go.” (7 paragraph).D.“or, as I found during the 48 hours of rain, absolutely everything but umbrellas.” (6 paragraph)16.The

33、dialogue between the author and the city official at the end of the passage seems to suggestA. the uncertainty of the courts decision.B. the inefficiency of the municipal government.C. the difficulty of finding a good solution.D. the slowness in processing options.TEXT BDepending on whom you believe

34、, the average American will, over a lifetime, wait in lines for two years (says National Public Radio) or five years (according to customer-loyalty experts).The crucial word is average, as wealthy Americans routinely avoid lines altogether. Once the most democratic of institutions, lines are rapidly

35、 becoming the exclusive province of suckers(people who still believe in and practice waiting in lines). Poor suckers, mostly.Airports resemble France before the Revolution: first-class passengers enjoy lite security lines and priority boarding, and disembark before the unwashed in coach, held at bay

36、 by a flight attendant, are allowed to foul the Jetway.At amusement parks, too, you can now buy your way out of line. This summer I haplessly watched kids use a $52 Gold Flash Pass to jump the lines at Six Flags New England, and similar systems are in use in most major American theme parks, from Uni

37、versal Orlando to Walt Disney World, where the haves get to watch the have-mores breeze past on their way to their seats. Flash Pass teaches children a valuable lesson in real-world economics: that the rich are more important than you, especially when it comes to waiting. An NBA player once said to

38、me, with a bemused chuckle of disbelief, that when playing in Canada-get this-we have to wait in the same customs line as everybody else.Almost every line can be breached for a price. In several U.S. cities this summer, early arrivers among the early adopters waiting to buy iPhones offered to sell t

39、heir spots in the lines. On Craigslist, prospective iPhone purchasers offered to pay waiters or placeholders to wait in line for them outside Apple stores.Inevitably, some semi-populist politicians have seen the value of sort-of waiting in lines with the ordinary people. This summer Philadelphia may

40、or John Street waited outside an AT&T store from 3:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. before a stand-in from his office literally stood in for the mayor while he conducted official business. And billionaire New York mayor Michael Bloomberg often waits for the subway with his fellow citizens, though hes first dri

41、ven by motorcade past the stop nearest his house to a station 22 blocks away, where the wait, or at least the ride, is shorter.As early as elementary school, were told that jumping the line is an unethical act, which is why so many U.S. lawmakers have framed the immigration debate as a kind of funda

42、mental sin of the school lunch line. Alabama Senator Richard Shelby, to cite just one legislator, said amnesty would allow illegal immigrants to cut in line ahead of millions of people.Nothing annoys a national lawmaker more than a person who will not wait in line, unless that line is in front of an

43、 elevator at the U.S. Capitol, where Senators and Representatives use private elevators, lest they have to queue with their constituents.But compromising the integrity of the line is not just antidemocratic, its out-of-date. There was something about the orderly boarding of Noahs Ark, two by two, th

44、at seemed to restore not just civilization but civility during the Great Flood.How civil was your last flight? Southwest Airlines has first-come, first-served festival seating. But for $5 per flight, an unaffiliated company called BoardF will secure you a coveted A boarding pass when that airline op

45、ens for online check-in 24 hours before departure. Thus, the savvy traveler doesnt even wait in line when he or she is online.Some cultures are not renowned for lining up. Then again, some cultures are too adept at lining up: a citizen of the former Soviet Union would join a queue just so he could g

46、et to the head of that queue and see what everyone was queuing for.And then there is the U.S., where society seems to be cleaving into two groups: Very Important Persons, who dont wait, and Very Impatient Persons, who do-unhappily.For those of us in the latter group- consigned to coach, bereft of Fl

47、ash Pass, too poor or proper to pay a placeholder -what do we do? We do what Vladimir and Estragon did in Waiting for Godot: We wait. We are bored.17.What does the following sentence mean? “Once the most democratic of institutions, lines are rapidly becoming the exclusive province of suckersPoor suc

48、kers, mostly.” (2 paragraph)A. Lines are symbolic of Americas democracyB. Lines still give Americans equal opportunities.C. Lines are now for ordinary Americans only.D. Lines are for people with democratic spirit only.18.Which of the following is NOT cited as an example of breaching the line?A. Goin

49、g through the customs at a Canadian airport.B. Using Gold Flash Passes in amusement parks.C. First-class passenger status at airports.D. Purchase of a place in a line from a placeholder.19.We can infer from the passage that politicians (including mayors and Congressmen)A. prefer to stand in lines with ordinary people.B. advocate the value of waiting in lines.C. beli

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