Asking for More Time to Finish a Task Write a letter of about 100 words based on the following situation: You failed to finish an important task assigned by Professor Liu because of a severe illness. Write him a letter to express your apology, explain your reason, and ask for more time to finish the task. Do not sign your own name at the end of the letter. Use "Li Ming" instead. Do not write the address.

For man and women under 30, smoking does not prevent typical age-related weight gain, according to a study of nearly 4,000 white and black young adults ages 18 to 30.【F1】 The tobacco industry has named cigarettes "thins" and "slims" in an attempt to appeal to weight-conscious young women who think that smoking will help them control their weight, but this study indicates that smoking has a negligible effect on body weight. The researchers classified participants into six groups based on self-reported smoking status. Participants" self-reported smoking status and body weight were reassessed at two-, five-, and seven-year follow-ups. The researchers found minimal evidence of any weight control benefit from smoking. Those who smoked, or who began smoking, did not lose weight. 【F2】 While smoking was associated with an attenuation of weight gain among black adults, no such effect occurred among white men or women, the latter being the group most likely to smoke "to control body weight". 【F3】 The finding of little immediate or even long-term(seven years)weight-control benefit from smoking among young adults goes against the beliefs of both smokers and nonsmokers that smoking helps to control or to limit weight gain. Any weight control benefit derived from smoking is likely to take many years, according to the researchers. The researchers also found that individuals who quit smoking experienced greater weight gain than individuals who continued smoking or never smoked at all. While smoking is not a successful mechanism for weight control, smoking cessation does have serious long-term consequences for body weight. "These findings have important public health implications, since the perception that smoking controls body weight is widespread, particularly among youth," said Dr. Klesges, lead author of the study.【F4】 "Every day, many young Americans begin smoking believing that it will help them lose weight," but these results demonstrate that smoking does not help control weight, and only after decades of smoking do we see a difference in body weights of smokers and non-smokers. "If young people throughout the nation can learn that smoking has no effect on body weight, it is likely that a significant reduction among smoking in youth would be observed. " 【F5】 The authors suggest that future research should look at the effects of smoking on body weight among younger participants, since the pre-teen and teenage years are when individuals typically start smoking. While this research focused on smoking and weight gain among whites and blacks, future studies should also gauge whether these findings apply to other ethnic groups.

TheImportanceofIntegrityWriteanessayof160-200wordsbasedonthedrawing.Inyouressay,youshould1)describethedrawingbriefly,2)interpretitsintendedmeaning,and3)giveyourcomments.

You are a senior of computer science. You"d like to be an intern for an IT company. Write a letter to present your willing including: 1) your education background; 2) your purpose of being an intern. You should write about 100 words. Do not sign your own name at the letter. You do not need to write the address.

Writeanessayof160-200wordsbasedonthefollowingdrawing.Inyouressay,youshould1.describethedrawingbriefly,2.interpretitsintendedmeaning,andthen3.giveyourcomments.YoushouldwriteneadyontheANSWERSHEET.

Write a letter to a museum's staff to ask for some information about a historical exhibition. You should include the details you think necessary. You should write about 100 words on the ANSWER SHEET. Do not sign your own name at the end of the letter. Use "Li Ming" instead. Do not write the address. (10 points)

Television, the most pervasive and persuasive modern technologies, marked by rapid change and growth, is moving into a new era, an era of extraordinary sophistication and versatility, which promises to reshape our lives and our world.

Henri Matisse originally trained as a lawyer, turning to art whilst recovering from appendicitis. (46) Initially seduced by the Impressionists and, in particular. by Cezanne, Matisse brought together a circle of like—minded artists who became known as the Fauves(the Beasts)after their sensational exhibition of 1905. These early paintings revealed an intuitive and explosive colour sense which was to become the defining feature of Matisse"s long career. (47) Believing art to be "something like a good armchair in which one rests from physical fatigue", he was dedicated to producing work that expressed a harmony close to a musical composition. (48) There are two versions of La Danse, originally produced with another enormous panel entitled Musique for a Russian collector. Dance was a popular topic at the time as Diaghilev and the Russian Ballet had just visited Paris. (49) Despite, or because of, the simplification of colour, form, and line, the figures appear to be full of life. Matisse made sculptures, designed sets and costumes and illustrated books. (50) He was also an important graphic artist who, in his bed—ridden final years, evolved his own method of arranging cut—out paper shapes. He is indisputably the greatest decorative artist of the twentieth century.

Is Google creating the next generation of office blowhards? A clever psychological study by Yale University researchers【B1】______ the answer is yes. It seems that as we look things up on the Web, we become convinced that the information【B2】______ in our brains. It doesn't. But we behave as if it does, and we're not shy about 【B3】______ that it' s there. "This huge database is leading people to believe this information is in their heads,【B4】______in fact it's not," Matthew Fisher, the Yale graduate psychology student who【B5】______ the study, said. Is that a bad thing? 【B6】______an annoyance? Or no harm at all? It depends on whom you ask. Fisher's paper, published online Tuesday in the Journal of Experimental Psychology, 【B7】______that by " wrongly situating【B8】______knowledge within their own heads, people may unwittingly exaggerate how much【B9】______ work they can do in situations【B10】______they are truly on their own." But Clive Thompson, author of the book Smarter Than You Think: How Technology is Changing Our Minds for the Better, wasn't so sure. "I'm not quite as【B11】______about it as they seem to be at the end of the article," he said after reading the study. "The【B12】______is that we' re not that often truly on our own." And only a few of those【B13】______when we truly are on our own may be dangerous. 【B14】______you might not want your brain surgeon overconfident about how much knowledge she has 【B15】______in her head, does it really【B16】______whether your auto mechanic can change your fan belt from memory or with an assist from a quick laptop【B17】______? "I don't think we can conclude this is some terrible strategy," Fisher acknowledged. But, he warned, "if you're【B18】______of the gaps in your understanding【B19】______it's being filled in by this information you think you know, you' d be less inclined to【B20】______out and fill in those gaps."

Big macs. Nacho-Cheese Chalupas. Subway subs. Rob Borucki adores them all. The 37-year old indulges in fast-food fare at least five times a week. A really good day for Borucki? When Wienerschnitzel, a West Coast hot-dog chain he grew up with, recently opened just a few blocks from his Tempe Arizona office and he got to enjoy with his fellow sausage enthusiasts. "I was so excited" says the Internet project manager, who runs a fast-food fan Web site. "And so was everyone there." In fast-food terms, Borucki is called a "heavy user," even though he is quite slender. Loosely defined as the 20 percent of fast-food eaters who account for 60 percent of all fast-food sales, a typical heavy user is male, in his 20s or 30s and extremely loyal to the burgers and fries he loves, lately, heavies are feeling under siege as fast-food chains have come under attack. Obese diners are suing companies like McDonald"s for allegedly contributing to their weight problems, And the endless flood of studies detailing the horrors of obesity provide plenty of ammo for the chatter, types who want heavy users to change their ways. Heavy users like Borucki insist they don"t need saving, protesting that they are far from the use less fatties anti-fast-food activists make them out to be. For his part, Borucki is a moderate exerciser. And he"ll occasionally substitute a side salad for his regular fries. Indeed, in a recent study of restaurant-goers by the research firm Technomic, 90 percent said they had concerns about obesity, and 50 percent said they"d changed their eating habits in the past year as a result. Fast-food companies have noticed. You can give your waistline a break today with a McDonald"s fruit-and-walnut salad or skip the flame-broiled meat and have a Burger King Fire-Grilled salad with shrimp instead. The healthy approach is working: sales are expected to increase by as much as 4 percent this year. Heavy users are adapting—in their own way. They"re eating Chicken Whoppers as well as the real thing and cutting back on anything that has the word "fried" in its name. McDonald"s dropped its Super Size portions, apparently because customers stopped ordering the gigantic servings. "But the Ouarter Pounder with Cheese or the Big Mac—those items will not be touched," says Technomic"s Dennis Lombardi. Jeremy Hageman can take some comfort in that. The 26-year-old Web designer hits the gym three times a week so that he can indulge in as much fast food as he likes. "I like things that taste good," Hageman says. He came up with a plan: eat more Taco Bell. "For some reason," he says, "it doesn"t seem as bad."

One pertinent question in the wake of the earthquake near Aceh and the tsunami it generated is how much notice of an approaching wave can be given to vulnerable people without the risk of crying "wolf" too often. Earthquakes themselves are unpredictable, and likely to remain so. But detecting them when they happen is a routine technology. That was not the problem in this case, which was observed by monitoring stations all over the world. Unfortunately for the forecasters, although any powerful submarine earthquake brings the risk of a dangerous tsunami, not all such earth quakes actually result in a big wave, and false alarms cost money and breed cynicism. On top of that, most "tsunamigenic" earthquakes, which are caused when the processes of plate tectonics force heavy, oceanic crustal rock below lighter, continental rock to create a deep trench at the bottom of the sea, occur in the Pacific, which is almost surrounded by such trenches. In the India Ocean, deep trenches are confined to the southern coast of Indonesia, and tsunamis are rare. Since most of the countries affected by this tsunami are poor, or middle-income at best, and monitoring costs money, this might suggest that a fatalistic approach to the question is reasonable. But American and Japanese experience suggests that effective monitoring need not be that expensive. These two countries have networks of seabed pressure-detectors that can monitor tsunamis and indicate whether and where evacuation is necessary—data they share with their Pacific neighbors. A system of seven detectors, run from Hawaii, cost about $18m to develop, and the experience gained doing so means a similar system might now be had for as little as $2m. So, to the sound of stable doors being bolted firmly shut, politicians in South-East Asia and Australia are proposing one for the Indian Ocean. Detecting tsunamis directly, rather than relying on earthquake monitors, is important for another reason, too. Not all tsunamis are caused by earthquakes. Some of the worst, such as a 15-metrehigh monster that killed more than 2,000 people in New Guinea in 1998, are the result of submarine landslides (though these can themselves be triggered by earthquakes, as was the case in New Guinea). Indeed, a few years ago it was suggested that a landslide in an unstable part of La Palma, one of the Canary Islands, might cause a tsunami that would devastate the east coast of America. Even if you have an effective detection system, though, it is useless if you cannot evacuate a threatened area. Here, speed is of the essence. Computer modeling can help show which areas are likely to be safest, but common sense is often the best guide—run like the wind, away from the sea. Evacuation warnings, too, should be easy to give as long as people are awake. Radios are ubiquitous, even in most poor places. It is just a matter of having systems in place to tell the radio stations to tell people to run. The problem was that no one did.

Recruiting New Members Write an ad of about 100 words based on the following situation: The Martial Art Association in your university wants to recruit new members. Please inform others of the advantages and requirements of being a member of the association. Do not sign your own name at the end of the ad. Use "The Martial Art Association" instead. Do not write the address.

Birth, growth, decline, death: it is the usual cycle for people, companies and industries. But the story of violin-making in Cremona in northern Italy, which flourished under such master craftsmen as Andrea Amati, Giuseppe Guarneri and Antonio Stradivari from the mid-16th century to the early 18th, suggests that, for industries at least, there may be life after death. Violin-making in Cremona struggled through the 19th century in the hands of a few carpenters who turned out low-quality instruments. By the 1950s it had died out, says Gio Batta Morassi, a 73-year-old maestro liutaio (master violin-maker). Yet today, in workshops overlooking the city"s cobbled streets, more than 100 craftsmen cut and plane maple and spruce to make string instruments—more than in any other European city. Cremona is once again the capital of hand-crafted instruments. A new school to train craftsmen in instrument-making opened in Cremona in 1938, though when Mr. Morassi began his studies in 1950 there were just six students on the course, of whom only one other went on to make instruments. But this slight revival was sustained by a growing interest in Baroque music in northern Europe in the 1960s and 1970s, says Hildegard Dodel, a German who studied at the school. It created new demand for instruments made in the traditional Cremonese style. Today Italians are a minority among the school"s 150 students; 30 are South Korean, 26 are Japanese, six are from China and three from Taiwan. Some will set up shop in the city: Ms Dodel worked for about ten years restoring and repairing instruments in Germany and the Netherlands before returning to open her own workshop in Cremona in 2003. Instrument-making is not an easy life. "I often thought of giving up," says Francesco Toto, who moved to Cremona 17 years ago and specializes in making cellos. Wood is expensive, must be seasoned properly and is at risk from woodworm; the maple for a cello costs around € 1,500, for example. Mr. Toto was able to raise his prices after winning a competition, but to maintain quality he makes just four instruments a year. Violin-makers can produce perhaps seven top-quality instruments a year. (Cellos made by Cremona"s craftsmen typically cost € 15,000-35,000, and violins € 8,000-20,000.) Having come back from the dead, Cremona"s instrument-makers, like many others in Italian industries, hope that an emphasis on quality, tradition and craftsmanship will keep cheaper foreign rivals at bay.

You may have another three minutes.

For more than a decade, Dell has posted double-digit growth by selling computers directly to customers, most of them corporate clients. But two unfriendly trends have driven Dell to sell its computers at a place where chairman Michael Dell swore he would never be caught dead: a Dell retail store. 【F1】______"We"re seeing more andmore of our technology intersecting with home entertainment," says Ro Parra, a senior vice president of Dell"s home and small-business group. To attract gamesters and movie watchers, Dell has unveiled new models in its multimedia XPS line. The units range from a $3,500 desktop-notebook hybrid with a 20-in. screen and a remote, to a $2,270 gaming desktop with a swanky scarlet-and-gray exterior and high-end specs. Parra says Dell"s stores give consumers a chance to see its multimedia PCs and laptops in a home environment, paired with some of Dell"s other consumer goods like its flat-screen TV sets. The company expects to open more stores in the fall. The second reason for Dell to go retail is more prosaic. For years, Dell"s direct-shipment model proved especially good for selling to businesses, which generate 80% of its sales.【F2】______So everyday shoppers are powering the industry"sgrowth. The consumer market grew at twice the pace of the enterprise market last year, according to technology-research firm IDC. Many of the challenges facing Dell seem to spring from the very innovations that made it a power force. By selling direct, Dell keeps a lid on overhead and offers customized computers at competitive prices, with relatively swift delivery. As the price of computing dropped, Dell was consistently able to shed costs and maintain a price advantage over rivals. But this year Dell"s competitors have attacked that price gap.【F3】______Retailers have also cut prices, evenselling at cost and relying on upgrades and services for profits. One possibility that doesn"t exist is the ability to walk out of the store with a computer. The newstores won"t carry inventory, so consumers will have to wait a few days for delivery.【F4】______Even as the company speeds up its retail operation, Dell CEO KevinRollins still downplays the significance of the home market, saying "It"s a secondary priority compared to our corporate customers." And he argues that the move is really an expansion of the small booths that Dell has set up in malls to allow customers to place orders. Says Parra: "We have 160 booths that have been very successful, and all we are doing is expanding on that success." 【F5】______Dell is retraining its customer-support staffand offering a new service called Dell Direct, which allows a technician to connect to a customer"s computer to root out problems. That"s partly in response to harsh criticism after the company didn"t initially beef up customer support as business grew, leading to 30-min. waits to talk to a phone representative. Last year Dell also announced it would hire 1,500 more call-center workers. "What I am most excited about is the investment in customer support," says Rollins."It allows consumers who are not on a network directly, to connect with us the same way a big corporate client would." A.HP slashed thousands of jobs and reduced the number of assembly plants, streamlining its supply chain and enabling it to go head to head with Dell on low-end machines. B.The stores are part of a bigger program to make the company more user-friendly. C.That lowers operating costs, but Vitelli, senior vice president of consumer electronics, says the impatience of the gotta-have-it-now mall shopper is not on Dell"s side: "Are you going to go to the restaurant, look at the menu and say, "That"s great. Send me the meal in 10 days"?" D.But the business market is becoming more commoditized, and prices are in a free fall. On the other hand, the sale to individual customers has grown rapidly. E.Dell CEO Kevin Rollins considers the home market as its second priority because it generates less profit. F.The first trend is the ever popular commingling of computing and entertainment in your living room. Yet Dell lives at the office. G.The company is very confident that its retail stores will expand rapidly in the next few years.

[A] Title: GOOD HEALTH [B] Time limit: 40 minutes [C] Word limit: 120-150 words (not including the given opening sentence) [D] Your composition should be based on the OUTLINE below and should start with the given opening sentence: "The desire for good health is universal." [E] Your composition should be written neatly on ANSWER SHEET 2. (15 points) OUTLINE: 1. Importance of good health 2. Ways to keep fit 3. My own practices

BPart CDirections: Read the following text carefully and then translate the underlined segments into Chinese./B

Is it possible to persuade mankind to live without war? War is an ancient institution which has existed for at least six thousand years. It was always wicked and usually foolish, but in the past the human race managed to live with it. Modern ingenuity has changed this. Either Man will abolish war, or war will abolish Man. For the present, it is nuclear weapons that cause the gravest danger, but bacteriological or chemical weapons may, before long, offer an even greater threat. If we succeed in abolishing nuclear weapons, our work will not be done. It will never be done until we have succeeded in abolishing war. To do this, we need to persuade mankind to look upon international questions in a new way, not as contests of force, in which the victory goes to the side which is most skilful in massacre, but by arbitration in accordance with agreed principles of law. It is not easy to change age-old mental habits, but this is what must be attempted. There are those who say that the adoption of this or that ideology would prevent war. I believe this to be a profound error. All ideologies are based upon dogmatic assertions(主张)which are, at best, doubtful, and at worst, totally false. Their adherents believe in them so fanatically that they are willing to go to war in support of them. The movement of world opinion during the past two years has been very largely such as we can welcome. It has become a commonplace that nuclear war must be avoided. Of course very difficult problems remain in the international sphere, but the spirit in which they are being approached is a better one than it was some years ago. It has begun to be thought, even by the powerful men who decide whether we shall live or die, that negotiations should reach agreements even if both sides do not find these agreements wholly satisfactory. It has begun to be understood that the important conflict nowadays is not between East and West, but between Man and the H-bomb.

"Forests are the lungs of our land," said Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Twenty years ago, the world"s lungs were diseased. Roughly half of all the planet"s once-luxuriant tropical forests had been felled and the further deterioration of the Earth"s green spaces seemed【C1】______. Over time countries【C2】______a "forest transition curve". They start in【C3】______with the land covered in trees. As they get richer, they fell the forest and the curve drops sharply until it reaches a low point when people decide to【C4】______whatever they have left Then the curve rises as reforestation【C5】______. At almost every point along the【C6】______, countries are now doing better defor-esters are【C7】______down less; reforesters are【C8】______more. This matters to everyone because of the extraordinary【C9】______that tropical forests make to reducing carbon emissions. Trees are carbon【C10】______. If you fell and burn them, you【C11】______carbon into the atmosphere. If you let them【C12】______they store carbon away in their trunks for centuries. Despite decades of【C13】______, tropical forests are still【C14】______about a fifth of emissions from fossil fuels each year. Encouraging countries to plant trees(or【C15】______them from logging)is by far the most【C16】______way of reducing greenhouse-gas emissions.【C17】______Brazil had kept on felling trees as rapidly as it was cutting them【C18】______in 2005, it would, by 2013, have put an extra 3.2 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. As a way of【C19】______the environment, protecting trees is hard to beat. It is in everyone"s interest to find out which forest policies work—and【C20】______them.

A young consultant"s life is tiring. A【C1】______week starts before dawn on Monday, with a rush to the airport and a【C2】______to wherever the client is based. He can【C3】______to stay in hotels at least three nights a week, gorging on minibar peanuts and gloomily texting a(n) 【C4】______lover. "It"s quite【C5】______to spend a year living out of a suitcase," sighs one London-based consultant. So the job【C6】______to "insecure overachievers" —a phrase【C7】______used in the industry—"who are always worried that they haven"t done enough work," jokes a consultant Some 60-65% of consultants are recent college-leavers. Most【C8】______out within a few years and take more settled jobs elsewhere in the business world,【C9】______their experience and contacts【C10】______them to slot in several levels above their less-travelled【C11】______. The elite consultancies have offices in big cities, which is where【C12】______young people want to live. The best-paid jobs are in places【C13】______London and New York. Such cities are also where the culture and dating opportunities are richest. Such attitudes are frustrating for firms in Portsmouth or Peoria.【C14】______consultancies benefit from it They【C15】______bright young things in the metropolis and then hire out their brains to firms in the sticks. This is one【C16】______why consultants have to travel so much. The system【C17】______, more or less, for everyone. Firms in the provinces get to【C18】______talent they could not【C19】______hire. And young consultants get to experience life in the real world before returning to the capital to party with their friends at the weekend. They have it all,【C20】______enough sleep.