They were given a warm welcome at the airport.

With the rapid spread of the internet eye where in the world, and the (1)_____ number of users, one of the most exciting developments on the internet is E-commerce—(2)_____ commerce. E-commerce has two forms, (3)_____ business-to-business, or B-to-B, and business-to-consumer, or B-to-C. B-to-C was the first of these developments. It grew (4)_____ from the first days when people started to buy things from their homes without going to a shop. First came "catalogue shopping" (5)_____ you choose what you want from a catalogue (6)_____ pictures and other details of everything that is (7)_____ sale. You then send an order with a check by (8)_____ and the things you have chosen sent to your home. Then (9)_____ "television shopping", where (10)_____ a catalogue, the items for sale are shown or (11)_____ on television to attract the customer. (12)_____, the customer sends a check and the item is delivered to his or her home. B-to-C is the (13)_____ development, where the "catalogue" is (14)_____ on the internet, combining the advantages of both the book catalogue and the television and indeed adding more (15)_____ The customer makes his choice but rather than sending an order and a (16)_____ through the post, he places the order and pays for it using his credit card, all using the (17)_____ Many people worry about giving (18)_____ of their credit card over the internet and the danger that it may be deceitfully used. (19)_____, the general view is that with modern systems of secure measures the dangers of the misuse of credit cards is (20)_____ greater in a shop, garage or restaurant than in using it for shopping on the internet.

Suppose you are director of Foreign Affairs Office of Hefei University and you visit an American University, where the American professors introduce to you many famous professors. Write a letter to Professor Smith to express your thanks, which includes: 1) Describe your feeling about the professor"s enthusiasm 2) Express your thanks 3) Express your hope to meet him again. You should write about 100 words. Do not sign your own name at the end of the letter. Use "Li Ming" instead. You do not need to write the address.

Nothing approaching last week"s toll of death and destruction has visited European or U.S. shores, but that doesn"t mean they are invulnerable. Large tsunamis are not that rare and, every now and again, they crash into familiar ports of call, sweeping away people and property. In 1960, for example, a tremendous earthquake in Chile unleashed an armada of giant waves that killed 61 on the island of Hawaii before moving on to kill at least 100 on the Japanese island of Honshu. Four years later, a tsunami triggered by an earthquake off the coast of Alaska resulted in more than 100 deaths there. The worst European tsunami in recorded history occurred in 1755, when an earth quake off Portugal"s Atlantic coast sent gigantic waves crashing into Lisbon. Together, the quake, the waves and fire took 60,000 lives in the city at a time when it was the cap ital of an empire. Similar death tolls were recorded in towns along Italy"s Strait of Messina in the wake of the tsunami of 1908. The more scientists look into the tsunami threat beyond Asia, the larger it seems to loom. Tsunamis can be triggered by massive landslides as well as earthquakes, and University of Hawaii oceanographer Gary McMurtry has evidence to suggest that around 120,000 years ago, a landslide unleashed by Mauna Loa created a megatsunami that heaved sand and sea fossils 500 m up the slopes of nearby Kohala. Sand layers along the coasts of the North and Norwegian seas and the northeastern Atlantic Ocean have been attributed to a huge tsunami created by an underwater landslide off Norway some 7,100 years ago. In the Canary Islands today, the unstable western slope of the Cumbre Vieja volcano poses a threat to Atlantic coastlines. Should it collapse and slide into the sea, a scientist from University College London warns, it would send tsunamis coursing through the Atlantic basin at hundreds of miles per hour. According to one nightmare scenario, the island chain would be wiped out, and massive waves would strike the west African coast, European countries lying along the Atlantic, northern South America, Caribbean islands, southeastern Canada and the U.S. East Coast. Some waves could be as tall as five-story buildings. Tsunamis take time to travel, which can give populations in harm"s way anywhere from a few minutes to many hours to flee. For this reason, 26 countries have banded together to establish a tsunami-warning system for the Pacific (though not yet for the Atlantic or Indian oceans, or the Mediterranean Sea). "Tsunamis are low-probability, high consequence events," says Viacheslav K. Gusiakov, head of the Russian Academy of Sciences" Tsunami Laboratory in Novosibirsk, Siberia. "But even we specialists on hazards could not quite believe that today a tsunami could kill so many. We used to think of vulnerability in terms of material damage, rather than loss of human life. This great tragedy showed we were wrong." As presently configured, the warning system is far from perfect, generating a 75% rate of false alarms. But that should change with the deployment of a new generation of buoy-anchored detectors that can be positioned deep underwater. In November 2003, a trial run of the system showed that a tsunami unleashed by an Alaskan earthquake would be too small to do any damage when it reached Hawaii—there by avoiding an unnecessary and costly coastal evacuation like one caused by a false alarm eight years earlier. After last week"s disaster, however, few are likely to ignore the tsunami sirens the next time they sound.

TheGoalWriteanessayof160-200wordsbasedonthedrawing.Inyouressay,youshould1)describethedrawingbriefly,2)explainitsintendedmeaning,and3)giveyourcomments.

AMERICA"S central bank sent a clear message this week. For the second consecutive meeting, the Federal Open Market Committee, the central bank"s policy-making commit tee, left short-term interest rates unchanged at 1.75%. But it said that the risks facing the economy had shifted from economic weakness to a balance between weakness and excessive growth. This shift surprised no one. But it has convinced many people that interest rates are set to rise again—and soon. Judging by prices in futures markets, investors are betting that short-term interest rates could start rising as early as May, and will be 1.25 percentage points higher by the end of the year. That may be excessive. Economists at Goldman Sachs, who long argued that the central bank would do nothing this year, now expect short-term rates to go up only 0.75% this year, starting in June. But virtually everyone reckons some Fed tightening is in the future. The reason? After an unprecedented 11 rate-cuts in 2001, short-term interest rates are abnormally low. As the signs of robust recovery multiply, analysts expect the Fed to take back some of the rate-cuts it used as an "insurance policy" after the September 11th terrorist attack. But higher rates could still be further off, particularly if the recovery proves less robust than many hope. The manufacturing sector is growing after 18 months of decline. The most optimistic Wall Streeters now expect GDP to have expanded by between 5% and 60% on an annual basis in the first quarter. But one strong quarter does not imply a sustainable recovery. In the short term, the bounce-back is being driven by a dramatic restocking of inventories. But it can be sustained only if corporate investment recovers and consumer spending stays buoyant. And since consumer spending held up so well during the "recession" it is unlikely to jump now. These uncertainties alone suggest the central bank will be cautious about raising interest rates. That caution is all the more necessary given the lack of inflationary pressure. Although America"s consumer prices have stopped falling on a monthly basis, the latest figures show few signs of nascent price pressure. Indeed, given the huge pressure on corporate profits, the Federal Reserve might be happy to see consumer prices rise slightly. In short, while Wall Street frets about when and how much interest rates will go up. The answer may well be not soon and not much.

Whether an atheist or a creationist, the most researched arguments will incline towards the same conclusion: people are inherently evil. Creationists who hinge the existence of man on the story as told by Moses in the book of Genesis must understand that, as backed? by the same book, God created both good and evil. If the account of creation is to be believed, then the creation of evil is also to be believed as a premeditated design of the creator. Evil can then be said as created to exist with the other creations. When Adam and Eve occupied the Garden of Eden, they only had to choose between living in obedience or disobedience. In this particular case, obedience can be said to be good while disobedience is evil. If God knows everything, then he could be said to know that Adam and Eve would disobey. Why then did he not remove the evil part so they could live in obedience forever? The answer is simple; Man"s evil part is his free will. Stopping a man from being inherently evil is the same as imprisoning the man. The level of this imprisonment does vary. Man did not become evil after eating the forbidden fruit. No, he was evil right from the dust. Man"s free will is his tendency to choose evil when aware of the existence and consequences of both good and evil. What makes a man choose good ahead of evil is not his free will but things that aim to check his free will. These include morals, laws, religion etc. From the creationist angle, all people are inherently evil. From the atheist"s angle, the well researched conclusion remains the same. In the first place, nothing can be more evil than chance and evolution. In this case, survival depends on the elimination of the unfit for the fit to survive. In an evolutionary society that is not evil, both the fit and the unfit will have the same rights and an equal chance to survive. But this is not so. Every inclination of the evolutionary man, whether conscious or unconscious, is designed to beat his fellow man in the survival game. What can be more evil than this? Is it robbery, murder, war, genocide or rape? None. They are all the unpalatable children of the evolutionary mama. The need to survive gives birth to them all. All people are inherently evil. If i am not evil, then i haven" t faced the challenge to survive in an evil way.

We can certainly overcome these difficulties so long as we are closely united.

You want to recommend Mr. Collins to Professor Smith to find a position for the former. Write a letter based on the following outline: 1) Personal information about Mr. Collins curriculum vitae, personality, job capabilities etc., 2) Your sincere hope. You should write about 100 words. Do not sign your own name at the end of the letter. Use "Li Ming" instead. You do not need to write the address.

Traditionally, the study of history has had fixed boundaries and focal points—periods, countries, dramatic events, and great leaders. It also has had clear and firm notions of scholar procedure: how one inquires into a historical problem, how one presents and documents one"s findings, what constitutes admissible and adequate proof. Anyone who has followed recent historical literature can testify to the revolution that is taking place in historical studies. The currently fashionable subjects come directly from the sociology catalog: childhood, work, leisure. The new subjects are accompanied by new methods. Where history once was primarily narrative, it is now entirely analytic. The old questions "What happened?" and "How did it happen?" have given way to the question "Why did it happen? Prominent among the methods used to answer the question "Why" is psychoanalysis, and its use has given rise to psychohistory. Psychohistory does not merely use psychological explanations in historical contexts. Historians have always used such explanations when they were appropriate and when there was sufficient evidence for them. But this pragmatic use of psychology is not what psychohistorians intend. They are committed, not just to psychology in general, but to Freudian psychoanalysis. This commitment precludes a commitment to history as historians have always understood it. Psychohistory derives its "facts" not from history, the detailed records of events and their consequences, but from psychoanalysis of the individuals who made history, and deduces its theories not from this or that instance in their lives, but from a view of human nature that transcends history. It denies the basic criterion of historical evidence: that evidence be publicly accessible to, and therefore assessable by, all historians. And it violates the basic tenet of historical method: that historians be alert to the negative instances that would refute their theses. Psychohistorians, convinced of the absolute rightness of their own theories, are also convinced that theirs is the "deepest" explanation of any event that other explanations fall short of the truth. Psychohistory is not content to violate the discipline of history (in the sense of the proper mode of studying and writing about the past); it also violates the past itself. It denies to the past an integrity and will of its own, in which people acted out of a variety of motives and in which events had a multiplicity of causes and effects. It imposes upon the present, thus robbing people and events of their individuality and of their complexity. Instead of respecting the particularity of the past, it assimilates all events, past and present, into single deterministic schema that is presumed to be true at all times and in all circumstances.

These are dark days for the book business. Borders, a once-huge bookseller,【C1】______on July 18th that it will close down its remaining stores,【C2】______nearly 10,700 staff jobless. Publishers will lose a showcase for their books,【C3】______could mean more laid-off editors.【C4】______the problem is not the【C5】______: writers will still scribble for scraps.【C6】______demand: American book publishers reported【C7】______across all platforms last year. It is just that no one is making money. The business needs fresh ideas.【C8】______Unbound, a British effort to "crowd-fund" books. Visitors to its website can【C9】______money for a book that is only part-written.【C10】______enough money is raised, the author can【C11】______to finish it—and the pledgers will get a copy. Having launched in May, the firm announced its first【C12】______on July 18th. Terry Jones, of Monty Python fame, has【C13】______the funds to finish a book of quirky stories. Handsome edited volumes and e-books will follow. "We can make books work at a much lower level of【C14】______," explains John Mitchin-son, who co-founded Unbound. Visitors can【C15】______￡10 for an e-book and a nod in the afterword, or up to ￡250 for such【C16】______as lunch with the author. Over 3,000 pledges have come in, averaging ￡30 apieca Authors see a new way to nurture fans and make money,【C17】______publishing budgets dwindle. Readers【C18】______enjoy feeling like part of the【C19】______process. Most readers won"t pay ￡8.99 for an acclaimed book, yet some will spend ￡50 on a signed unwritten one. In these digitally isolating times, the personal touch may【C20】______.

It seems to me that the time is ripe for the Department of Employment and the Department of Education to get together with the universities and produce a revised educational system which will make a more economic use of the wealth of talent, application and industry currently being wasted on certificates, diplomas and degrees that no one wants to know about.

【F1】 Roger Rosenblatt"s book Black Fiction, in attempting to apply literary rather than sociopolitical criteria to its subject, successfully alters the approach taken by most previous studies. As Rosenblatt notes, criticism of Black writing has often served as a pretext for expounding on Black history. Addison Gayle" s recent work, for example, judges the value of Black fiction by overtly political standards, rating each work according to the notions of Black identity which it propounds. 【F2】 Although fiction assuredly springs from political circumstances, its authors react to those circumstances in ways other than ideological, and talking about novels and stories primarily as instruments of ideology circumvents much of the fictional enterprise. Rosenblatt"s literary analysis discloses affinities and connections among works of Black fiction which solely political studies have overlooked or ignored. Writing acceptable criticism of Black fiction, however, presupposes giving satisfactory answers to a number of questions. First of all, is there a sufficient reason, other than the facial identity of the authors, to group together works by Black authors? Second, how does Black fiction make itself distinct from other modern fiction with which it is largely contemporaneous? Rosenblatt shows that Black fiction constitutes a distinct body of writing that has an identifiable, coherent literary tradition. Looking at novels written by Black over the last eighty years, he discovers recurring concerns and designs independent of chronology.【F3】 These structures are thematic, and they spring, not surprisingly, from the central fact that the Black characters in these novels exist in a predominantly white culture, whether they try to conform to that culture or rebel against it. Black Fiction does leave some aesthetic questions open. Rosenblatt"s thematic analysis permits considerable objectivity; he even explicitly states that it is not his intention to judge the merit of the various works—yet his reluctance seems misplaced, especially since an attempt to appraise might have led to interesting results. For instance, some of the novels appear to be structurally diffuse. Is this a defect, or are the authors working out of, or trying to forge, a different kind of aesthetic?【F4】 In addition, the style of some Black novels, like Jean Toomer"s Cane, verges on expressionism or surrealism; does this technique provide a counterpoint to the prevalent theme that portrays the fate against which Black heroes are pitted, a theme usually conveyed by more naturalistic modes of expression? In spite of such omissions, what Rosenblatt does include in his discussion makes for an astute and worthwhile study.【F5】 Black Fiction surveys a wide variety of novels, bringing to our attention in the process some fascinating and little-known works like James Weldon Johnson"s Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man. Its argument is tightly constructed, and its forthright, lucid style exemplifies levelheaded and penetrating criticism.

Condolence Write an e-mail of about 100 words based on the following situation: Your friend Mike's father passed away yesterday. Mike is in deep sorrow. Now write him an e-mail of condolence. Do not sign your own name at the end of the e-mail. Use "Li Ming" instead. Do not write the address.

The immune system is equal in complexity to the combined intricacies of the brain and nervous system. The success of the immune system in defending the body relies on a dynamic regulatory communications network consisting of millions and millions of cells. Organized into sets and subsets, these cells pass information back and forth like clouds of bees swarming around a hive. The result is a sensitive system of checks and balances that produces an immune response that is prompt, appropriate, effective and self-limiting. At the heart of the immune system is the ability to distinguish between self and non-self. When immune defenders encounter cells or organisms carrying foreign or non-self molecules, the immune troops move quickly to eliminate the invaders. Virtually every body cell carries distinctive molecules that identify it as self. The body's immune defenses do not normally attack tissues that carry a self marker. Rather, immune cells and other body cells coexist peaceably in a state known as self-tolerance. When a normally functioning immune system attacks a non-self molecule, the system has the ability to remember the specifics of the foreign body. Upon subsequent encounters with the same species of molecules, the immune system reacts accordingly. With the possible exception of antibodies passed during lactation, this so-called immune system memory is not inherited. Despite the occurrence of a virus in your family, your immune system must learn from experience with the many millions of distinctive non-self molecules in the sea of microbes in which we live. Learning necessitates producing the appropriate molecules and cells to match up with and counteract each non-self invader. Any substance capable of stimulating an immune response is called an antigen. Tissues or cells from another individual (except an identical twin, whose cells carry identical self-markers) act as antigens; because the immune system recognizes transplanted tissues as foreign, it rejects them. The body will even reject nourishing proteins unless they are first broken down by the digestive system into their primary, non-antigenic building blocks. An antigen announces its foreignness by means of intricate and characteristic shapes called epitopes, which stick out from its surface. Most antigens, even the simplest microbes, carry several different kinds of epitopes on their surface, some may even carry several hundred. Some epitopes will be more effective than others at stimulating an immune response. Only in abnormal situations does the immune system wrongly identify self as non-self and execute a misdirected immune attack. The result can be so-called autoimmune disease. The painful side effects of these diseases are caused by a person's immune system actually attacking itself.

The Bush administration is going to propose far-reaching new rules which would give people with disabilities greater access to tens of thousands of courtrooms, swimming pools, golf courses, stadiums, theaters, hotels and retail stores. The proposal would substantially update and rewrite federal standards for enforcement of the Americans With Disabilities Act, which is a landmark civil rights law passed with strong bipartisan support in 19 90. The new rules would set more stringent requirements in a lot of areas and address some issues for the first time, in an effort to meet the needs of an aging population and increasing numbers of disabled war veterans. More than seven million businesses and all state and local government agencies would be influenced. The proposal includes some exemptions for parts of existing buildings, but any new construction or renovations would have to comply. The new standards would affect everything from the location of light switches to the height of retail service counters, to the use of monkeys as "service animals" for people with disabilities, which would be forbidden. The White House approved the proposal in May after a five-month review. It will be published in the Federal Register on Tuesday, with 6 0 days for public comment. After considering those comments, the government would issue final rules with the force of law. Already, the proposal is stirring concern. The United States Chamber of Commerce says it would be onerous and costly, while advocates for disabled Americans say it does not go far enough. Since the disability law was signed by the first President Bush, advances in technology have made services more available to people with disabilities. But Justice Department officials said they were still receiving large numbers of complaints. In recent months, the federal government has settled lawsuits securing more seats for disabled fans at Madison Square Garden in New York and at the nation's largest college football stadium, at the University of Michigan. The Justice Department acknowledged that some of the changes would have significant costs. But over all, it said, the value of the public benefits, estimated at ￥54 billion, exceeds the expected costs of ￥23 billion. In an economic analysis of the proposed rules, the Justice Department said the need for an accessible environment was greater than ever because the Iraq war was "creating a new generation of young men and women with disabilities." John L. Wodatch, chief of the disability rights section of the Justice Department, said: "Disability is inherent in the human condition. The vast majority of individuals who are fortunate enough to reach an advanced age will benefit from the proposed requirements."

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

The majority of people, about nine out of ten, are right-handed. (1)_____ until recently, people who were left-handed were considered (2)_____ and once children showed this tendency they were forced to use their right hands. Today left-handedness is generally (3)_____, but it is still a disadvantage in a world (4)_____ most people are right-handed. For example, most tools and implements are still (5)_____ for right-handed people. In sports (6)_____ contrast, doing things with the left hand or foot, is often an advantage. Throwing, kicking, punching or batting from the" (7)_____ "side may result in throwing (8)_____ many opponents who are more accustomed to dealing with the (9)_____ of players who are right-handed. This is why, in many (10)_____ at a professional level, a (11)_____ proportion of players are left-handed than in the population as a whole. The word "right" in many languages means "correct" or is (12)_____ with lawfulness, whereas the words associated (13)_____ "left", such as "sinister", generally have (14)_____ associations. Moreover, among a number of primitive peoples, there is (15)_____ close association between death and the left hand. In the past, in (16)_____ western societies, children were often forced to use their right hands, especially to write with. In some cases the left hand was (17)_____ behind the child"s back so that it could not be used. If, in the future, they are allowed to choose, (18)_____ will certainly be more left-handers, and probably (19)_____ people with minor psychological disturbances as a result of being forced to use their (20)_____ hand.

Success, it is often said, has many fathers—and one of the many fathers of computing, that most successful of industries, was Charles Babbage, a 19th-century British mathematician. Exasperated by errors in the mathematical tables that were widely used as calculation aids at the time, Babbage dreamed of building a mechanical engine that could produce flawless tables automatically. But his attempts to make such a machine in the 1920s failed, and the significance of his work was only rediscovered this century. Next year, at last, the first set of printed tables should emerge from a calculating "difference engine" built to Babbage"s design. Babbage will have been vindicated. But the realization of his dream will also underscore the extent to which he was a man born ahead of his time. The effort to prove that Babbage"s designs were logically and practically sound began in 1985, when a team of researchers at the Science Museum in London set out to build a difference engine in time for the 200th anniversary of Babbage"s birth in 1992. The team, led by the museum"s curator of computing, Doron Swade, constructed a monstrous device of bronze, iron and steel. It was 11 feet long, seven feet tall, weighed three tons, cost around $500,000 and took a year to piece together. And it worked perfectly, cranking out successive values of seventh-order polynomial equations to 31 significant figures. But it was incomplete. To save money, an entire section of the machine, the printer, was omitted. To Babbage, the printer was a vital part of design. Even if the engine produced the correct answers, there was still the risk that a transcription or typesetting error would result in the finished mathematical tables being inaccurate. The only way to guarantee error-free tables was to automate the printing process as well. So his plans included specifications for a printer almost as complicated as the calculating engine itself, with adjustable margins, two separate fonts, and the ability to print in two, three or four columns. In January, after years of searching for a sponsor for the printer, the Science Museum announced that a backer had been found. Nathan Myhrvold, the chief technology officer at Microsoft, agreed to pay for its construction (which is expected to cost $373,000 with one Proviso: that the Science Museum team would build him an identical calculating engine and printer to decorate his new home on Lake Washington, near Seattle). Construction of the printer will begin—in full view of the public—at the Science Museum later this month. The full machine will be completed next year. It is a nice irony that Babbage"s plans should be realized only thanks to an infusion of cash from a man who got rich in the computer revolution that Babbage helped to foment. More striking still, even using 20th-century manufacturing technology the engine will have cost over $830,000 to build. Allowing for inflation, this is roughly a third of what it might have cost to build in Babbage"s day, in contrast to the cost of electronic-computer technology, which halves in price every 18 months. That suggests that, even had Babbage succeeded, a Victorian computer revolution based on mechanical technology would not necessarily have followed.

【F1】 Japan said Tuesday it had successfully extracted methane hydrate, known as "fire ice", from its seabed, possibly unlocking many years' worth of gas for the resource-starved country. In what they are claiming as a world first, a consortium is drilling for the hydrate, a fossil fuel that looks like ice but consists of very densely-packed methane surrounded by water molecules, one kilometre(3, 300 feet)below sea level.【F2】 The solid white substance burns with a pale flame, leaving nothing but water. One of it is estimated to contain many times the equivalent volume of methane in gas form. The consortium, led by Japan Oil, Gas and Metals National Corporation, began initial work in February last year and on Tuesday started a two-week experimental production, an economy, trade and industry ministry official said. "It is the world's first offshore experiment producing gas from methane hydrate," the official said, adding that the team successfully collected methane gas extracted from the half-frozen substance.【F3】 Under the government-led project, the consortium is to separate methane—the primary component of natural gas—from the solid clathrate compound under the seabed using the high pressures available at depth, officials said. A huge layer of methane hydrate containing 1.1 trillion cubic metres(38.5 trillion cubic feet)in natural gas—equivalent to Japan's consumption of the gas for 11 years—is believed to lie in the ocean floor off the coast of Shikoku island, western Japan, the officials said. 【F4】 "We aim to establish methane hydrate production technologies for practical use by the fiscal 2018 year ending March 2019." a consortium official said. "We want to consolidate technologies for its commercialisation," economy, trade and industry minister Toshimitsu Motegi also told a news conference, according to Jiji Press. "I hope we can make use of resources surrounding our country as soon as possible by clearing hurdles one by one," he added. 【F5】 The move comes as resource-poor Japan has struck out in search of new energy supplies after it shut down its stable of nuclear reactors in the wake of 2011 's tsunami-sparked nuclear crisis.