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I cry easily. I once burst into tears when the curtain came down on the Kirov Ballet’s "Swan Lake". I still choke up every time I see a film of Roger Bannister breaking the "impossible" four-minute mark for the mile. I figure I am moved by witnessing men and women at their best. But they need not be great men and women, doing great things. Take the night, some years ago, when my wife and I were going to dinner at a friend’s house in New York city. It was sleeting. As we hurried toward the house, with its welcoming light, I noticed a car pulling out from the curb. Just ahead, another car was waiting to back into the parking space -- a rare commodity in crowded Manhattan. But before he could do so another car came up from behind, and sneaked into the spot. "That’s dirty pool." I thought. While my wife went ahead into our friend’s house. I stepped into the street to give the guilty driver a piece of my mind. A man in work clothes rolled down the window. "Hey," I said, "this parking space belongs to that guy," I gestured toward the man ahead, who was looking back angrily. I thought I was being a good Samaritan, I guess -- and I remember that the moment I was feeling pretty manly in my new trench coat. "Mind your own business!" the driver told me. "No," I said. "You don’t understand. That fellow was waiting to back into this space." Things quickly heated up, until finally he leaped out of the car. My God, he was colossal. He grabbed me and bent me back over the hood of his car as if I was a rag doll. The sleet stung my face. I glanced at the other driver, looking for help, but he gunned his engine and hightailed it out of there. The huge man shook his rock of a fist of me, brushing my lip and cutting the inside of my mouth against my teeth. I tasted blood. I was terrified. He snarled and threatened, and then told me to beat it. Almost in a panic, I scrambled to my friend’s front door. As a former Marine, as a man, I felt utterly humiliated. Seeing that I was shaken, my wife and friends asked me what had happened. All I could bring myself to say was that I had had an argument about a parking space. They had the sensitivity to let it go at that. I sat stunned. Perhaps half an hour later, the doorbell rang. My blood ran cold. For some reason I was sure that the bruiser had returned for me. My hostess got up to answer it, but I stopped her. I felt morally bound to answer it myself. I walked down the hallway with dread. Yet I knew I had to face up to my fear. I opened the door. There he stood, towering. Behind him, the sleet came down harder than ever. "I came back to apologize," he said in a low voice. "When I got home, I said to myself," what right I have to do that" I’m ashamed of myself. All I can tell you is that the Brooklyn Navy Yard is closing. I’ve worked there for years. And today I got laid off. I’m not myself. I hope you’ll accept my apology." I often remember that big man. I think of the effort and courage it took for him to come back to apologize. He was man at last. And I remember that after I closed the door, my eyes blurred, as I stood in the hallway for a few moments alone. Why didn’t the writer’s wife and friends ask him what had happened
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Questions 6 to 8 are based on the following news. At the end of the news item, you will be given 15 seconds to answer each of the following questions.Now listen to the news. How could the researchers explore the mummy now
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People are moving to cities in droves. In 1950, two-thirds of the world’s population lived in the countryside. New York was then the only settlement with more than 10 million people. Today there are 20 such megacities, and more are on their way. Most of these megacities are in developing countries that are struggling to cope with both the speed and the scale of human migration. Estimates of the future spread of urbanization are based on the observation that in Europe, and in North and South America, the urban share of the total population has stabilized at 75%-85%. If the rest of the world follows this path it is expected that in the next decade an extra 100 million people will join the cities of Africa, and 340 million the cities of Asia: the equivalent of a new Bangkok every two months. By 2030 nearly two-thirds of the word’s population will be urban. In the long run, that is good news. If countries now industrializing follow the pattern of those that have already done so, their city-dwellers will be both more prosperous and healthier. Man is gregarious species, and the words" urbane" and "civilized" both derive from the advantages of living in large settlements. History also shows, though, that the transition can be uncomfortable. The slums of Manchester were, in their time, just as awful as those of Nairobi today. But people moved there for exactly the same reason: however nasty conditions seemed, the opportunities of urban life outstripped those of the countryside. The question is how best to handle the change. If there is one thing that everybody agrees on, it is that urbanization is unstoppable. Migrants attempting to escape poverty, and refugees escaping conflict, are piling into cities in what the executive director of UN-HABITAT, Anna, Tibailjuka, describes as "premature urbanization." Dr Tibaijuka believes it might be possible to slow the pace of migration from the countryside with policies that enhance security and rural livelihoods. There is room for debate, though, over whether better rural development in any form can seriously slow the pace of urbanization-- or even whether such a slowdown would be a good thing. Michael Mutter, an urban planning adviser at the British government’s Department for International Development (DFID), says that the relevant indicators suggest that in many countries the effective" carrying capacity" of rural areas has been reached. As happened in Europe in the 18th century, population growth and technological improvements to agriculture are creating a surplus population. That surplus has to go somewhere to earn its living. Indeed, some people go so far so to argue that governments, international donors and aid agencies spend too much on rural development and neglect the cities. Most countries have a rural development policy, but only a few have urban ones. DFID, for example, spends only 5% of its budget directly on urban development. Moreover, these critics point out that, although rural areas often have worse sanitation, illiteracy and homelessness than cities, such figures are deceptive. Being illiterate, homeless or without access to a flush toilet are far more serious problems in a crowded city than in the countryside. Of the many lessons being learnt from past urban-development failures, one of the most important is that improvements must involve local people in a meaningful way. Even when it comes to the poorest slum-dwellers, some governments and city authorities are realizing that people are their own greatest assets. Slumdwellers International is a collection of "grassroots" federations of people living in slums. Its idea is simple. Slum-dwellers in a particular place get together and form a federation to strengthen local savings and credit schemes, and to lobby for greater co-operation with the authorities. Such federations are having a big impact on slum-upgrading schemes around the world. By surveying local needs and acting as voices for slum-dwellers, these federations have been able to show the authorities that slum-dwellers are not simply a homogenous and anonymous mass of urban poor, but are real people in need of real services. They have also been able to apply pressure for improvements in security of tenure--either through temporary guarantees of residency or, better still, formal ownership. Such secure tenure gives people an incentive to improve their dwellings and is thus the crucial first step to upgrading a slum into a suburb. Over the past six years, South Africa’s government has been pursuing an active programme of housing improvement. The government quickly realized that, with the poor in the majority, providing social housing for all would be impossible. The minister for housing, Sakie Mthembi-Mahanyele, says the approach that has worked so far has been a combination of government, the private sector and the poor themselves. The poor, says Mrs. Mthembi-Mahanyele, have responsibilities, and the government meets them halfway. Those with an income are expected to contribute some of it to the building of their houses. Those without are asked to contribute" sweat equity" by helping to build with their own hands. South Africa has also transferred ownership of more than 380,000 council houses, worth more than 28 billion rand ($2.7 billion) to private individuals. With these houses as collateral for loans, owners have already started to upgrade and improve their properties. There is still a long way to go. An estimated 2-3 million more houses are needed. She adds that the government is still wrestling with financial institutions to get a better deal for the poor. Anna Tibaijuka (Par
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