听说教程第四册听力原文.docVIP

全新版大学英语听说教程第四册听力原文Unit1(BOOK4)Part B The Hospital Window Jack and Ben, both seriously ill, occupied the same hospital room. Jack, whose bed was next to the rooms only window, was allowed to sit up in his bed for an hour each afternoon to help drain the fluid from his lungs. But Ben had to spend all day and night flat on his bed. To kill time the two men began to talk. They talked for hours about their wives, families, their homes, their jobs, their involvement in the military service, and where they had been on vacation. As days went by, a deep friendship began to develop between them. Every afternoon when Jack could sit up, he would pass the time by describing to Ben all the things he could see outside the window. And Ben began to live for those one-hour periods where his world would be broadened and enlivened by all the activity and color of the world outside. The window overlooked a park with a lovely lake. Ducks and swans played on the water while children sailed their model boats. Young lovers walked arm in arm amid flowers of every color of the rainbow. Grand old trees beautified the landscape, and a fine view of the city skyline could be seen in the distance. As Jack described all this in exquisite detail, Ben would close his eyes and imagine the picturesque scenes. One warm afternoon Jack described a parade passing by. Although Ben couldnt hear the band - he could see it in his minds eye as Jack portrayed it with descriptive words. Days and weeks passed. One morning the day nurse arrived to bring water for their baths only to find the lifeless body of Jack, who had died peacefully in his sleep. She was saddened and called the hospital attendants to take the body away. Ben was heart broken. Life without Jack was even more unbearable. How he longed to hear Jacks voice and his melodious descriptions of the outside world! As he looked at the window, an idea suddenly occurred to him. Perhaps he could see for himself what it was like outside. As soon as it seemed appropriate, Ben asked if he could be moved next to the window. The nurse was happy to make the switch, and after making sure he was comfortable, she left him alone. Slowly, painfully, he propped himself up on one elbow to take his first look at the world outside. Finally, he would have the joy of seeing it for himself! He strained to slowly turn to look out the window beside the bed. It faced a blank wall! What could have compelled my roommate to describe such wonderful things outside this window? Ben asked the nurse when she returned. Perhaps he just wanted to encourage you to live on, she said. You know, he was blind and could not even see the wall. Part CAdditional ListeningShort ConversationsConversation 1: M: How do you like your roommate, Debby?W: Ever since we met on the first day of college, weve been inseparable.Q: What do you know about Debby and her roommate?Conversation 2: M: Have you heard from Linda lately? You two were so intimate in college.W: Well, honestly, I havent heard from her as much as I used to since she moved to the east coast two months ago. But Im sure the friendship between us is as strong as it was before.Q: What can you infer from the womans response?Conversation 3: W: Do you keep in touch with your old friends back home now that you dont see them regularly?M: Frankly, after I moved to this city, Im out of touch with most of them except a few close ones.Q: What does the man mean?Conversation 4: W: Its polite to call a friend before we visit, isnt it?M: Youre right. People usually dont like surprise visits. But close friends often drop in on each other. Q: What does the man mean?Conversation 5: M: Cathy, it seems that you and Sally do almost everything together. W: Thats true. You see, we were born on the same day. We both majored in fashion designing. And we even have the same love for using bright-colored material in our designs. Isnt it amazing!Q: What can we learn from the conversation?Unit 3 Part B Birthday Celebrations Around the WorldChairman: Welcome to this special birthday edition of One World. Yes, folks, weve been on the air for exactly one year now, and we thought it would be a nice idea to have a special program dedicated to birthday celebrations around the world. With us in the studio tonight we have Shaheen Hag and Pat Cane, who have a weekly column on birthdays in the Toronto Daily Star.Shaheen: Good evening.Pat: Good evening.Chairman: Shaheen, perhaps we could begin with you. How are birthdays celebrated in India?Shaheen: Well, perhaps were all assuming that everyone in the world celebrates their birthday. This just isnt the case. Low-income families in India, for instance, simply cant afford any festivities. And most Muslims dont celebrate their birthdays.Pat: I think Shaheen has raised an interesting point here. The Christian church, too, was actively against celebrating birthdays, and in any case most people, until a couple of hundred years ago, couldnt even read and wouldnt have even been able to spot their birthday on a calendar anyway.Shaheen: Of course some Muslims do celebrate their birthdays. In Egypt, Turkey and Indonesia, for example, the rich people invite friends and families around. But not in small villages.Chairman: Here in England your twenty-first used to be the big one. But now it seems to have moved to eighteen. Is that true?Pat: Yes, in most parts of the West eighteen is now the most important birthday. In Finland, for example, eighteen is the age when you can vote, you know, or buy wines, drive a car and so on. But in Japan I think you have to wait till youre twenty before you can smoke or drink.Shaheen: I know in Senegal, which is another Muslim country, girls get to vote at sixteen and boys at eighteen. And in Bangladesh, girls at eighteen and boys at twenty-one.Chairman: Thats interesting. I mean is it typical that around the world girls are considered to be more mature than boys?Shaheen: Yes, I think so, and there are some countries, particularly in South America, which have a big party only for girls. In Mexico and Argentina, for example, they have enormous parties for 15-year-old girls.Pat: You know in Norway they have a great party for anyone whos not married by the time theyre thirty. Its kind of embarrassing. I mean you get pepper thrown at you.Chairman: Pepper? Why pepper?Pat: Im not really sure.Shaheen: So does that mean that on your 29th birthday you can start thinking God I better get married?Pat: Well, Im not sure how seriously they take it.Chairman: In England we have quite big parties for your fortieth, fiftieth, sixtieth and so on.Pat: Well, in Japan your eighty-eighth is considered .Chairman: Eighty-eighth?Pat: . to be the luckiest birthday. Eight is a very lucky number in Japan. Part C Additional Listenings One World One Minute One World One Minute is a unique film project that invites participants in every country around the globe to record, simultaneously, one minute of their lives, one minute of our world. Sponsors of this project have chosen 12:48 GMT, September 11th 2002 as the one minute to record. At that moment exactly a year earlier began the terrorist attacks that led to the deaths of more than 2,000 people from over 60 countries. For many this will be a time of remembrance and reflection. And for others this will be an appropriate time for international communication, cooperation and sharing. It will offer them an opportunity to share a moment of their world and their life with others, an opportunity to both talk to and listen to the world, to join with others around the globe and create a truly unique record and experience. This is the idea behind the project One World One Minute. Participants are free to choose what and how to record their One Minute. Some may want to take photographs, some paint or draw pictures, while others may want to write something and record their readings. The material can be submitted to the project organizers in Scotland via e-mail or post within 6 weeks of September 11th. All the material will then be made into a feature-length film, which will capture that One Minute of our existence. The film will explore the rich diversity that is both humanity and our world. It will allow a voice to all people regardless of nationality, religion, race, political viewpoint, gender or age. The rich diversity that is Humanity shall be there for all to see. Participants will not only be kept informed of the progress of the film and the release process but will be invited to actively participate through newsletters and discussion forums. When the film is finished, it will be shown in every country of the world, both in cinemas and on TV. Contributors will be invited to attend the premiere of the film in their respective countries and will receive a full screen credit on the finished production. Unit5 PartB How Our Memory Work Try to imagine a life without a memory. It would be impossible. You couldnt use a language, because you wouldnt remember the words. You couldnt understand a film, because you need to hold the first part of the story in your mind in order to understand the later parts. You wouldnt be able to recognize anyone - even members of your own family. You would live in a permanent present. You would have no past and you wouldnt be able to imagine a future. Human beings have amazing memories. Apart from all our personal memories about our own lives, we can recall between 20,000 and 100,000 words in our own language as well as possibly thousands more in a foreign language. We have all sorts of information about different subjects such as history, science, and geography, and we have complex skills such as driving a car or playing a musical instrument. All these things and countless others depend on our memory. How well you remember things depends on many different factors. Firstly, some people naturally have better memories than others, in just the same way as some people are taller than others, or have different color eyes. Some top chess players, for example, can remember every move of every game that they have ever seen or played. Secondly, research shows that different things are stored in different parts of the brain. Ideas, words, and numbers are stored in the left-hand side, while the right-hand side remembers images, sounds, and smells. In most people one side of the brain is more developed than the other, and this may explain why some people can remember peoples faces easily, but cant remember their names. Thirdly, we all remember exciting, frightening, or dramatic events more easily. This is because these experiences produce chemicals such as adrenaline, which boost your memory. They say that anyone who is old enough to remember knows exactly where they were on Tuesday, September 11, 2001, when radio and TV programs around the world were interrupted with the shocking news that the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York were hit. Fourthly, the context in which you learn something can affect how well you remember it. Tests on divers, for example, showed that when they learned things underwater, they could also remember those things best when they were underwater. Lastly, the more often you recall a memory the more likely you are to remember it. If you dont use it, youll lose it. A telephone number that you dial frequently will stay in your memory easily, but you will probably have to write down one that you use only now and again. PartC Additional Listenings Techniques to Help Us Remember BetterWe all have problems remembering things, but there are some techniques that you can use to help you remember. First of all, remember the names and jobs of the people and where they come from. Here, the best thing is to imagine images of the people and the names that you want to remember. And you should try to think of funny images as they are easier to remember. For example, we have Tom the student from Australia. Well, for Tom you might imagine a tomato. Then Australia has a shape a bit like a dog. Now lets imagine its a very clever dog and is studying. So imagine Toms face as a tomato and hes with a dog and the dog is reading a book. So now we have a picture of Tom the student from Australia. Now lets take the numbers. The best thing to do here is to break a large number up into smaller numbers and then think of things that the numbers remind you of, such as a birthday, a particular year, the number of a house. Or with a number like 747 you might think of a jumbo jet - a Boeing 747. With the directions, the best thing is to imagine yourself following the directions. Create a picture in your mind of yourself going down the street. Count the turnings 1, 2, . Then turn left. Now imagine going past a supermarket and a cinema and so on. When you have to remember lists of words, try to build them into a story. So with our words we might start with, The sun was shining, so I went for a walk. I saw a horse wearing trousers. It was kicking some bananas over a television. The bananas landed in a bag. And so on. Again the funnier the story, the better. Try some of these techniques and youll be amazed at what you can remember. Unit6 PartBThe Embarrassment of RichesThe meaning of wealth today is usually defined as the amount of money and material goods that one has accumulated and the ability to purchase more goods at an ever-increasing rate. A wealthy person possesses so much money that it would be difficult for him to spend it all in his lifetime without being wasteful and extravagant. Speaking from a strictly practical point of view, the trouble with wealth is not that it arouses envy in the hearts of others but that it weighs very heavily upon the resources of its owner. Those who have never tasted luxury imagine that a new Porsche, a Picasso in the drawing room, an apartment in the Trump Tower, will bring them ease and happiness. If that were true, owners of the Porsches, Picassos, and Trumps of the world would all be happy souls. One glance at history tells you they are not. The problem is not simply that owning goods feeds upon itself, generating desires to possess more and to outdo other owners in a competitive madness. Its that goods themselves are an endless responsibility. They must be not only paid for but also stored, insured, and publicly admired. All of those cost not just money but personal freedom. As James Boswell, the famous British biographer, once wrote in his diary, If a man with a fortune cannot make himself easier and freer than those who are not, he gains nothing. Nothing except glittering baggage that must be attended to. In some Oriental countries poverty has never been such a disgrace as it is in the get-rich-quick zone. Wise men from these lands often remark on the tyranny of goods. According to an old Persian proverb, The larger a mans roof, the more snow it collects. And in his discussion of Houses, a Lebanese poet and philosopher compares the lust for comfort to a stealthy thing that enters the house a guest, and then becomes a host, and then a master. The same sentiment is also expressed here in America by the great philosopher Ralph Emerson, who scorns the acquisitiveness of his day with the famous line Things are in the saddle, and ride mankind.PartC Additional Listenings Perspectives One day a father took his young son on a trip to the country with the purpose of showing him how poor people can be. They spent a day and a night on the farm of a very poor family. When they got back from their trip to their fine house the father asked his son, How was the trip? Very good, Dad! answered the son. Did you see how poor people can be? the father asked. Yeah! And what did you learn? the father asked, thinking he had fulfilled his purpose. To his astonishment, the son answered, I saw that we have a dog at home, and they have four. We have a pool that reaches to the middle of the garden, they have a creek that has no end. We have imported lamps in the garden, they have the stars. Our patio reaches to the front yard, but they have a whole horizon. When the little boy finished, his father was speechless. Then his son added, Thanks, Dad, for showing me how poor we are! Isnt it true that whether you are rich or poor depends on the way you look at things? If you have love, friends, family, health, good humor and a positive attitude toward life, youve got everything! You cant buy any of those things. You can have all the material possessions you can imagine, provisions for the future, etc., but if you are poor of spirit, you have nothing.Unit7Part B Last Gasp for Smokers It was a normal day and in their New York office, Ken and his colleagues stopped for their coffee break. But while his colleagues were able to sit at their desks and drink their coffee, Ken had to go outside. He couldnt stay inside, because he wanted to smoke. If the smokers of the Big Apple want to enjoy a cigarette, the authorities have decided they must go out into the street or up onto the rooftops. Throughout the United States, the number of places where people are allowed to smoke has gradually dwindled. First it was banned on trains, buses, and planes, then in public places such as theaters and airports. Now you cant smoke in any workplace. Nonsmokers are definitely winning the battle. Why should we breathe their smoke? they say. If theyre lucky, smokers can still find some bars and restaurants or parks and recreation centers where they can light up a cigarette, but it may soon be banned