UNIT9 Section One Part 1 Spot Dictation
Celebrations in Australia, Asia Ring in 2010
One of the first major cities to celebrate the beginning of 2010 was Sydney, Australia. More than a million people gathered along the Sydney harbor to watch the city's annual fireworks show, set to booming rock music.
Hours before midnight people arrived at Harbor Bridge to stake out good seats for the 12-minute display. This year's show involved more than 5,000 kilograms of explosive devices.
Other cities around Asia and the Pacific region celebrated with fireworks, such as Kuala Lumpur and Hong Kong.
In other places people marked the New Year without fireworks. Millions in Japan prayed at shrines for good fortune in 2010. In Seoul, South Korea, a giant bell was rung.
In China's capital, signs around Beijing cautioned not to light fireworks within the heart of the city on New Year's Eve.
This did not seem to bother Beijing residents, who say the Lunar New Year is their traditional time to celebrate with fireworks. This year that holiday is in mid-February.
Many young people were at bars and clubs in Beijing until the early hours of the morning. Still others had to work on New Year's Eve. As late-night revelers waited in the cold for a scarce cab, two men unloaded a truck at a bakery on Worker's Stadium Road. One of them said he hoped for good health for his parents in the New Year. His coworker said he hoped to spend the Lunar New Year with family at his home in nearby Shandong province.
Part 2 Listening for Gist
Unlike air travel, which is regulated internationally, rail travel is in many cases controlled nationally. The degree of safety of rail travel is therefore highly variable from country to country, depending on the degree of regulation and the quality of regulation in the country concerned. In Britain and the United States rail passenger deaths work out at an average of less than 10 rail passenger deaths per year. Unfortunately, the rail passenger deaths per year statistics in the less developed parts of the world are considerably higher than the rail passenger deaths per year statistics are in the western world.
In the UK over the last 25 years, there has been an average of one train accident for every million miles run. Because individual trains carry such a large number of passengers compared with the number of passengers carried in cars, buses and planes, this actually means that the degree of risk is, comparatively, one which is almost non-existent.
By far the greatest cause of railway accidents is human error, either in controlling or responding to signals. Recent improvements in the numbers of accidents are in large measure due to the introduction of automatic and computerized signaling equipment. Radio communication systems between drivers and control centers have also proved influential in reducing accidents. With the continuing development of radio communication systems and automatic signaling systems we can look forward to further reductions in what are already impressively low accident rates.
Directions: Listen to the passage and write down the gist and the key words that help you decide. 1. This passage is about rail travel safety.
2. The key words are highly variable. degree and quality of regulation: Britain and the United States. Less than 10 rail passenger deaths per year: less developed parts. Higher: UK. Last 25 years. One train accident for every million miles run: cause. Human error: automatic. Computerized signaling. Radio communication systems. Reduce accidents.
Section Two Listening Comprehension
Part 1 Dialogue
Adolescence
Interviewer: So, you say Eric's what you'd consider pretty strict but pretty fair? So, for example, when he tells you to do Interviewer: something
Jora: Well, he's strict and I get angry when he doesn't want me to do stuff. But afterwards I can almost always see why he said it, y'know? Interviewer: Yeah.
Jora: And there's only a couple of incidents where, well, that were totally, y'know, that I didn't understand at all. Interviewer: Hmm. Not a bad record.
Eric: No. Vh, 'cos I'm sure I've made some mistakes.
Interviewer: Is ... how would you compare your mom? Is she less strict than your dad? Mm-hmm. Well, she's less strict, but it's, it's like I can't win, y'know? The stuff that my dad's not strict about, my mom's strict about, and· the stuff that my mom's not strict about, my dad is. And, well, like my dad doesn't let me see PG-13* or R movies, but my mom does. She, well, she rents R-rated* movies, and lets me watch them and all, but my dad won't even let me see PG-13.
Eric: Well, uh, that's not really true. It depends on what it is. My rule with PG-13 is either I've had to have seen it first or, you know, talked to someone who I trust ... who's seen it.
Interviewer: So, your mom's looser about movies. Uh, what's she stricter about? Jora: Chores, junk food, buying me specific things - Interviewer: When you say buying you things, do you mean- Jora: Like when we go to the store.
Interviewer: She doesn't want to pay for them?
Jora: She doesn't want to pay for things. She wants me to buy my own friends' presents, you know, stuff like that
Interviewer: So, do you get an allowance? Jora: Yeah, I do.
Interviewer: So, Jora, what do you think about your dad? Do you think he's a pretty good dad? I mean, how does he compare with your friends' fathers?
Jora: Urn, my dad is very strict, but he's ... he's .. , he's pretty good. He ... he's very nice and he lets me do just enough so I don't get too angry. Directions: Listen to the dialogue and decide whether the following statements are true (T) or false (F). l.T 2. T 3. F 4. T 5. T 6.F 7. T 8. T
Part 2 Passage
A Brief History of Banking When did the first banks appear? The first bankers lived more than 2,000 years ago. They were money changers, situated usually at a table or in a small shop in the commercial district, aiding travelers who came to the town by exchanging foreign coins for local money or discounting commercial notes for a fee in order to supply merchants with working capital.
The first bankers probably used their own capital to fund their activities, but it wasn't long before the idea of attracting deposits and securing temporary loans from wealthy customers became an important source of bank funding. Loans were then made to merchants, shippers, and landowners, at rates of interest as low as 6 percent per annum to as high as 48 percent a month for the riskiest ventures! Most of the early banks of any size were Greek in origin.
The banking industry gradually spread outward from the classical civilizations of Greece and Rome into northern and western Europe. Banking encountered religious opposition during the Middle Ages, primarily because loans made to the poor often carried high interest rates. However, as the Renaissance began in Europe, the bulk of bank loans and deposits involved relatively wealthy customers, which helped to reduce religious opposition to banking practices.
The development of new overland trade routes and improvements in navigation in the 15th, 16th, and 17th centuries gradually shifted the center of world commerce from the Mediterranean region toward Europe and the British Isles, where banking
became a leading industry. The Industrial Revolution demanded a well-developed financial system. In particular, the adoption of mass production methods required a corresponding expansion in global trade to absorb industrial output, requiring new methods for making payments and credit available. Banks that could deliver on these needs grew rapidly.
The early banks in Europe were places for safekeeping of valuable items (such as gold and silver bullion) as people came to fear loss of their assets due to war, theft, or expropriation by government. In England during the reigns of Henry VIII and Charles I, government efforts to seize private holdings of gold and silver resulted in people depositing their valuables in goldsmiths' shops, who, in turn, would issue tokens* or certificates, indicating that the customer had made a deposit at these businesses. Soon, goldsmith tokens or certificates began to circulate as money because they were more convenient and less risky to carry around. The goldsmiths also offered certification of value services - what we today might call property appraisals*. Customers would bring in valuables to have an expert certify that these items were indeed real and not fakes - a service many banks still provide their customers.
When colonies were established in North and South America, Old World banking practices were transferred to the New World. As the 19th century began, state governments in the United States began chartering* banking companies. The development of large, professionally managed banking firms was centered in a few leading commercial centers, especially New York. The federal government became a major force in US banking during Civil War. A: Pre-listening Question A bank is, actually, a business organization, usually a limited company, which trades mainly in money, receiving and holding deposits and paying sums out of them by order of the customer, lending money at interest, discounting bills of exchange, moving from one place to another, acting as customer's agent in buying and selling securities, serving as trustee or executor, and performing various extra services for customers, e.g. arranging travel and insurance and advising on tax and investment. B: Sentence Dictation Direction: Listen to some sentences and write them down. You will hear each sentence three times. 1. Situated usually at a table or in a small shop in the commercial district, the bankers aided travelers who came to the town by exchanging foreign coins for local money.
施心远主编《听力教程》3 - （第2版）Unit - 9答案
