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TEXT B
Every year thousands of people are arrested and taken to court for shop-lifting. In Britain alone, about HK$3,000,000’s worth of goods are stolen from shops every week. This amounts to something like HK$150 million a year, and represents about 4 per cent of the shops’ total stock. As a result of this “shrinkage” as the shops call it, the honest public has to pay higher prices.?
Shop-lifters can be divided into three main categories: the professionals, the deliberate amateur, and the people who just can’t help themselves. The professionals do not pose much of a problem for the store detectives, who, assisted by closed circuit television, two-way mirrors and various other technological devices, can usually cope with them. The professionals tend to go for high value goods in parts of the shops where security measures are tightest. And, in any case, they account for only a small percentage of the total losses due to shop-lifting.?
The same applies to the deliberate amateur who is, so to speak, a professional in training. Most of them get caught sooner or later, and they are dealt with severely by the courts.?
The real problem is the person who gives way to a sudden temptation and is in all other respects an honest and law-abiding citizen. Contrary to what one would expect, this kind of shop-lifter is rarely poor. He does not steal because he needs the goods and cannot afford to pay for them. He steals because he simply cannot stop himself. And there are countless others who, because of age, sickness or plain absent-mindedness, simply forget to pay for what they take from the shops. When caught, all are liable to prosecution, and the decision whether to send for the police or not is in the hands of the store manager.?
In order to prevent the quite incredible growth in ship-lifting offences, some stores, in fact, are doing their best to separate the thieves from the confused by prohibiting customers from taking bags into the store. However, what is most worrying about the whole problem is, perhaps, that it is yet another instance of the innocent majority being penalized and inconvenienced because of the actions of a small minority. It is the aircraft hijack situation in another form. Because of the possibility of one passenger in a million boarding an aircraft with a weapon, the other 999,999 passengers must subject themselves to searches and delays. Unless the situation in the shops improves, in ten years’ time we may all have to subject ourselves to a body-search every time we go into a store to buy a tin of beans!?
70.Why does the honest public have to pay higher prices when they go to the shops?
A. There is a “shrinkage” in market values.?
B. Many goods are not available.?
C. Goods in many shops lack variety.?
D. There are many cases of shop-lifting.
?
71.The third group of people steal things because they ____?
A. are mentally ill. B. are quite absent-minded.?
C.can not resist the temptation. D. can not afford to pay for goods.?
72.According to the passage, law-abiding citizens ____.?
A. can possibly steal things because of their poverty?
B. can possibly take away goods without paying?
C. have never stolen goods from the supermarkets?
D. are difficult to be caught when they steal things?
73.Which of the following statements is NOT true about the main types of shop-lifting??
A. A big percentage of the total losses are caused by the professionals.?
B. The deliberate amateurs will be punished severely if they get caught.?
C. People would expect that those who can’t help themselves are poor.?
D. The professionals don’t cause a lot of trouble to the store detectives.?
74.The aircraft hijack situation is used in order to show that ____.?
A. “the professionals do not pose much of a problem for the stores”?
B. some people “somply forget to pay for what they take from the shops”?
C. “the honest public has to pay higher prices”?
D. the third type of shop-lifters are dangerous people
TEXT C
My bones have been aching again, as they often do in humid weather. They ache like history: things long done with, that still remain as pain. When the ache is bad enough it keeps me from sleeping. Every night I yearn for sleep, I strive for it; yet it flutters on ahead of me like a curtain. There are sleeping pills, of course, but the doctor has warned me against them.?
Last night, after what seemed hours of damp turmoil, I got up and crept slipperless down the staris, feeling my way in the faint street light that came through the window. Once safely arrived at the bottom, I walked into the kitchen and looked around in the refrigerator. There was nothing much I wanted to eat: the remains of a bunch of celery, a blue-tinged heel of bread, a lemon going soft. I’ve fallen into the habits of the solitary; my meals are snatched and random. Furtive snacks, furtive treats and picnics. I made do with some peanut butter, scooped directly from the jar with a forefinger: why dirty a spoon??
Standing there with the jar in one hand and my finger in my mouth, I had the feeling that someone was about to walk into the room — some other woman, the unseen, valid owner — and ask me what in hell I was doing in her kitchen. I’ve had it before, the sense that even in the course of my most legitimate and daily actions — peeling a banana, brushing my teeth — I am trespassing.?
At night the house was more than ever like a stranger’s. I wandered through the front room, the dining room, the parlour, hand on the wall for balance. My various possessions were floating in their own pools of shadow, denying my ownership of them. I looked them over with a burglar’s eye, deciding what might be worth the risk of stealing, what on the other hand I would leave behind. Robbers would take the obvious things — the silver teapot that was my grandmother’s, perhaps the hand-painted china. The television set. Nothing I really want.
75.The author could not fall asleep because ____.?
A. it was too damp in the bedroom?
B. she had run out of sleeping pills?
C. she was in very poor health?
D. she felt very hungry?
76.The author did not like the food in the refrigerator because it was NOT ____.
A. fresh B. sufficient?C. nutritious D. delicious?
77.By “At night the house was more than ever like a stranger’s”(Line 1, Para. 4), the author probably means that ____.?
A. the house was too dark at night?
B. ther were unfamiliar rooms in the house?
C. she felt much more lonely at night?
D. the furniture there didn’t belong to her?
TEXT D
The chief problem in coping with foreign motorists is not so much remembering that they are different from yourself, but that they are enormously variable. Cross a frontier without adjusting and you can be in deep trouble.?
One of the greatest gulfs separating the driving nations is the Atlantic Ocean. More precisely, it is the mental distance between the European and the American motorist, particularly the South American motorist. Compare, for example, an English driver at a set of traffic lights with a Brazilian.?
Very rarely will an Englishman try to anticipate the green light by moving off prematurely. You will find the occasional sharpie who watches for the amber to come up on the adjacent set of lights. However, he will not go until he receives the lawful signal. Brazilians view the thing quite differently. If, in fact, they see traffic lights at all, they regard them as a kind of roadside decoration.?
The natives of North America are much more disciplined. They demonstrate this in their addiction to driving in one lane and sticking to it — even if it means settling behind some great truck for many miles.?
To prevent other drivers from falling into reckless ways, American motorists try always to stay close behind the vehicle in front which can make it impossible, when all the vehicles are moving at about 55 mph, to make a real lane change. European visitors are constantly falling into this trap. They return to the Old World still flapping their arms in frustration because while driving in the State in their car they kept failing to get off the highway when they wanted to and were swept along to the next city.?
However, one nation above all others lives scrupulously by its traffic regulations — the Swiss. In Switzerland, if you were simply to anticipate a traffic light, the chances are that the motorist behind you would take your number and report you to the police. What is more, the police would visit you; and you would be convicted.? The Swiss take their rules of the road so seriously that a diver can be ordered to appear in court and charged for speeding on hearsay alone, and very likely found guilty. There are slight regional variations among the French, German and Italian speaking areas, but it is generally safe to assume that any car bearing a CH sticker will be driven with a high degree of discipline.?
78.The fact that the Brazilians regard traffic lights as a kind of roadside decoration suggests that ____.?
A. traffic lights are part of street scenery
B. they simply ignore traffic lights?
C. they want to put them at roadsides
D. there are very few traffic lights
?
79. The second and third paragraphs focus on the difference between ____.?
A. the Atlantic Ocean and other oceans
B. English drivers and American drivers?
C. European drivers and American drivers
D. European drivers and South American drivers?
80.The phrase “anticipate the green light”(Line 1, Para. 3) is closest in meaning to ____.
A. wait for the green light to be on
B. forbid others to move before the green light?
C. move off before the green light is on
D. follow others when the green light is on
SECTION B SKIMMING AND SCANNING ［5 MIN.］
In this section there are seven passages with a total of ten multiple-choice questions. Skim or scan them as required and then mark your answers on your answer sheet.??
TEXT E
First read the following question.?
81.This paper will mainly discuss ____?
A. China’s economic policies in general.?
B. China’s special economic zones.?
C. significance of investment in China.?
D. China’s recent development.??
