选题一
As everyone knows, birds cannot fly without wings and a person cannot walk without legs. But for Yin Xiaoxing, while birds cannot fly without wings, a person can walk even without legs!
Born in 1970 into a farmer’s family in Jiangsu Province, Yin Xiaoxing suffered from polio and acute pneumonia at the age of only eight months. He survived but lost the ability to stand on his feet. Because of his disability, Xiaoxing had to give up his study after junior middle school. The burden of life seemed to be especially heavy for him. He tried to make a living by selling fruits, raising chickens and taking pains to learn traditional Chinese medicine.
At the age of 21, this young man, with a map and a compass in hand, embarked on the hard journey of traveling around China in his wheelchair.
In the last 12 years, Yin Xiaoxing traveled a total of 70,000 kilometers in his wheelchair and left his footprints in 31 provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions. During this period, he wore out four wheelchairs. He left a trail of human records including climbing more than 20 famous mountains like Mont Tai, Mount Hua and Mount Heng with his hands, crossing the 5,231-meter-high Mount Tanggula alone, traveling along the Silk Road in wheelchair, crossing the Taklimakan Desert, getting to the top of the Oriental Pearl TV Tower in Shanghai with his hands, and completing the journey from the desert to Hong Kong.
选题二
The Great Wall is a wonder of the world. Now, millions of people journey to the Great Wall each year, making its most popular sites besieged by hordes of tourists during busy seasons.
The Chinese have a long history of building walls, dating from the Warring States period. In history, about 20 walls were built, with the wall constructed during the Ming Dynasty being the longest, extending 6,700 km. China was the most technologically advanced nation in the world then, so the wall was also the most sophisticated in structure. It was built to ward off the invasion of nomads from the north.
After the establishment of the Qing Dynasty, since its founders were themselves nomads, they did not see a need to continue with wall building. Nonetheless, the Qing government did institute a law to preserve the wall, banning the removal of bricks from it. But, the impact of time and continuous wars have left the wall greatly damaged in its most accessible sections.
Over the past 10-plus years, the booming tourist industry has stimulated the Great wall’s renovation project. Now, many of its sections have been or are being revamped.
