高中年级英语课外阅读文章材料(2)
高中年级英语课外阅读文章(三)
Exams now and then
AT 5 pm on June 8, Senior 3 student Li Xinjie breathed a sigh (叹息) of relief (放松) when he handed in his English paper of the college entrance examination. It had finally come to an end.
"All I can think about is sleeping for two days," exclaimed (大喊) the 18-year-old from Wuhan.
Every day for the past year Li got up at 6:10 am and stayed at school till his evening classes finished at 9:50 pm.
His home schedule (日程表) kept him studying until midnight. Sometimes, his mom or dad would come into his room and remind him to take some supplements (补品). As many other parents did, Li's parents bought him these "nutrient pills" (营养药片) three months ago, which were said to help memory and fight fatigue (疲劳).
Li quit all his social jobs at the Student Union as well as his hobbies once he entered Senior 3. With all his other classmates studying fulltime, he did not want to fall behind.
"Of course it is my goal to enter a top university, so I had to try my best," he said.
30 years ago
SOMETIMES 60-year-old Tian Ying thinks it was all like a dream when she looks back at her way to college.
After having graduated from Beijing Foreign Language School, Tian became one of the urban youngsters who were sent to the poor rural areas far away from home to learn from peasants (农民) by working in the fields.
One morning in 1977, she heard the news about the re-introduction of the national college entrance exam that had been stopped a decade ago. At that time, Tian had worked as a peasant and later a Chinese teacher in a high school of Yanchang County, Shaanxi Province for 10 years.
Although Tian, then 30, was expecting a baby, she did not want to regret something that she hadn't done.
Once determined, Tian taught and farmed in the daytime and studied hard at night. She often felt sleepy as the cave house was too warm for her to concentrate (专注). So she went to the classroom, where it was cold and she could keep awake. Due to fruit shortages, she ate only slices of carrots as she studied in dim (昏暗的) light.
The exams finally arrived in December. Tian finished Chinese, math, politics, history and geography along with other test takers, most of whom were in their teens.
However, when the only selective exam, English, was held on the last day, only Tian took it as others had forgotten the language. Tian remembered her English scored 99 out of 100 points.
"I often recited those simplified English novels while sowing and weeding in the fields. It's not that I was a keen (求知若渴的) learner but simply for fun in those dull days," said Tian, now assistant editor-in-chief (总编助理) of China Daily.
When the admission letter from Xi'an Foreign Language Institute reached her on April 7, 1978, Tian had just given birth to her baby son one week before.
