Unit2 Rules and Customs （规则与风俗习惯）

Unit2 Rules and Customs （规则与风俗习惯） 1、 Dear Dr Know, Im not happy. I have too many rules in my house. I have to get up at six oclock every morning. I cant meet my friends after school because I have to do my homework. I cant watch TV on school nights. And I have to be in bed by ten oclock. On weekends, I have to clean my room and wash my clothes. Then I have to help my mom make dinner. Later I have to go to the Childrens Palace to learn the piano. I never have any fun. What can I do? 2、 If I become an athlete, will I be happy? For many young people, becoming a professional athlete might seem like a dream job. If you become a professional athlete, youll be able to make a living doing something you love. If you become famous, people all over the world will know you. Many athletes give money to schools and charities, and do a lot of work to help people. This is a great chance that many people do not have. However, professional athletes can also have many problems. If you are famous, people will watch you all the time and follow you everywhere. This can make life difficult. If you play sports for a living, your job will sometimes be very dangerous. Many professional athletes get injured. And if you become rich, you will have a difficult time knowing who your real friends are. In fact, many famous people complain that they are not happy. They say they were happier before they became rich and famous. 3、 The other day, my friends and I talked about the rules that we have in school. At our school, we have to wear uniforms every day. The problem is that all my classmates think the uniforms are ugly. We think young people should look smart and so we would like to wear our own clothes. Our teachers believe that if we did that, we would concentrate more on our clothes than our studies. We disagree. We would feel more comfortable and that is good for studying. If we cant do that we should be allowed to design our own uniforms. That would be a good way to keep both teachers and students happy. Its also probably a good idea for parents to allow teenagers to study in groups during the evening. I know we get noise sometimes, but we learn a lot from each other. We also think that vacations should be longer. At present theyre too short. Longer vacations would give us time to do things like volunteering. Last summer I had an opportunity to volunteer at the local hospital, but I couldnt because I had to go back to school. It would be a good experience for me because I want to be a doctor when Im older. 4、 Helping and Learning At our school, we sometimes have a special day to help others. Last year we went to an old peoples home and sang songs and performed a play for them. The old people were very happy. We should be allowed to take time to do things like that more often. For example, we should visit primary schools and help teach young students. I want to be a teacher when Im older so it would be a great experience for me. Other students would like to do other jobs. For example, my friend Tian Ge wants to write for a newspaper. She should be allowed to volunteer at the newspaper office once a week. On Friday afternoons, many students are sleepy after a long week of classes. Some students should be allowed to have Friday afternoons off to volunteer and help others. 5、 Where Im from, were pretty relaxed about time. If you tell a friend youre going to their house for dinner, its okay if you arrive a bit late. Spending time with family and friends is very important to us. We often just drop by our friends homes. We dont usually have to make plans to meet our friends. Often we just walk around the town center, seeing as many of our friends as we can! In Switzerland, its very important to be on time. Were the land of watches after all! If someone invites you to meet them at 4:00, you have to be there at 4:00. If youre even fifteen minutes late, your friend may get angry. Also, we never visit a friends house without calling first. We usually make plans to see friends. We usually plan to do something interesting, or go somewhere together. 6、 Dear Laura, Thanks for your message. Yes, Im having a great time on my exchange program in France. Its even better than I thought it would be. I was a bit nervous before I arrived here, but there was no reason to be. My host family is really nice. They go out of their way to make me feel at home. And you wouldnt believe how quickly my French has improved! Im very comfortable speaking French now. Although I still make lots of mistakes, it doesnt bother me like it used to. My biggest challenge is learning how to behave at the dinner table. As you can imagine, things are really different from the way they are at home. For example, youre not supposed to put your bread on your plate. Youre supposed to put it on the table! I thought that was pretty strange at first, but now Im used to it. Youre not supposed to eat anything with your hands except bread, not even fruit! ( You have to cut it up and eat it with a fork.) Another thing is that it is very rude to say youre full. If you dont want any more food, you should just say, “It was delicious.” Also, its rude to put your hands in your lap. You should always keep your