Bundessprachenamt S8 Reading Practise Two Level 2 Dalvi

Troublesome catch
One spring morning, the crew of the Danish fishing boat Soraya was
catching cod in the Baltic Sea near the Polish territorial waters. As the men
pulled their fish on board, the young fisherman, Theis Branick, went under the
net to make sure it was all right and to open it. When the fish spilled out onto
the deck, he found the net had also caught something else – a large, yellow-
brown lump of a strange substance. The Soraya fishermen suspected the
additional catch might be a throwback from the past. And they were right – what
Branick found turned out to be a big piece of solidified mustard gas from World
War II.
“It was a huge lump, weighing about 15 kg, and with no traces of metal
casing,” says Michael Jepson, skipper of the Soraya. He realized how dangerous
the catch was and immediately followed the regulations and alerted the military
authorities on Bornholm. Soon the navy officers boarded the boat, inspected the
poison and took it away. They were going to throw it back into the sea in a
designated dumping area. Two hours later Branick started to feel strange. “I was
fine outside in the cold, but when I came into the warm cabin it started to itch
and burn like hell on my back. I took off my clothes. The others said I had a red
spot the size of a fist on my back.”
Fishing has long been regarded as one of the world’s most dangerous
occupations. Many fishermen around the world die each year in weather-related
accidents. But in the Baltic Sea there is another danger – about 35,000 tons of
chemical munitions sunk by the Russians in the late 1940s near Bornholm and
the Swedish island of Gotland, west of Latvia. Even more dangerous loads,
sealed in German warships, were sunk by Britain and the U.S. in the deep waters
of the Skagerrak, an arm of the North Sea, and in the Norwegian Sea. Over time,
some of the weapons in the Baltic, e.g.: blister agents (such as sulfur mustard),
and other chemical irritants, which were once the property of Nazi Germany,
have lost their metal casings. As a result, they become solidified and get directly
into water where they are caught in fishing nets. This is another danger
fishermen face.
“In the Baltic,” says Commander K.M. Jorgensen of the Danish Navy, “the
shells were dumped over the rails of Russian ships. In the Skagerrak, they were
sunk inside ships that are now lying in 500 to 700m of water.” The Helsinki
Commission, which works to protect the Baltic marine environment, has said the
toxins should be left on the seabed. That is the general agreement. “It has been
there for so long that it poses the least hazard where it is,” says biologist
Henning Karup of Denmark’s Environmental Protection Agency. Only a few
fishermen have been treated for gas-related injuries since the 1960s, and the
long-term environmental impact is unclear.
A Greenpeace Denmark spokesman, Jackob Hartmann, admits that trying
to raise the chemicals “might pose new and even worse problems”. But he also
says: “It is not an easy issue, and referring to a 1994 report by the Helsinki
Commission isn’t good enough. We need updated information on the state and
location of the materials.” But there are no plans and funds for a new survey,
and neighboring countries accuse each other of not sharing information.
The Ecology and Foreign Affairs committees of Russia’s Parliament held
hearings on weapons, then recommended a program of evaluation, monitoring
and forecasting. “We keep working on the issue,” says Vladymir Mandrygin, chief
of the Ecology Committee. “However, not all our Baltic neighbors are supportive;
they prefer not to talk about it. Russian scientists have been offering various
projects for handling the issue, but there is no financing.” Another Russian expert
adds that old munitions are not only a potential threat to ecology and harm to
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fishermen, “but most importantly, they put at risk gas pipes and communication
cables lying on the sea shelf.”
The young Danish fisherman was lucky. “I only got hit by the water that
had been in contact with the gas. If I had touched the gas itself, it could have
been much, much worse.” Like their governments, Baltic fishermen are learning
to live with the danger.

1. The Danish fishermen …

a) had difficulty pulling the net out of water
b) discovered the fishing net was damaged
c) found something unusual in the fishing net

2. After inspecting the net, the Danish skipper …

a) decided that it was nothing serious
b) acted according to the standard rules
c) dumped the load back into the sea

3. The WW2 chemical munitions are dangerous today because they …

a) get directly into the water
b) lie in too shallow waters
c) are in wrecks which corrode

4. According to the Helsinki Commission, the weapons should be …

a) moved to deeper sea areas
b) left where they currently are
c) monitored by marine scientists

5. The Greenpeace spokesman says removing the chemicals might be

difficult because …
a) the new plan for their recovery has to be accepted
b) the details about munitions need to be updated
c) there is too little funding to raise the chemicals

6. Russia wants the problem to be solved because it worries about …

a) the safety of submarines
b) the underwater ecosystem
c) the underwater installations

7. In the final paragraph, the author says that all the interested people
…
a) accept the dangerous situation
b) are optimistic about the future
c) try to reduce the existing threat

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Being Special

Everybody likes to feel special. Sadly, many of us grow up believing that

we're not special at all. We wish that we could be more attractive or better at
sports. We wish we had more money or more beautiful clothes. Like the Tin Man,
the Scarecrow, or the Cowardly Lion from The Wizard of Oz, we think we're not
good enough just as we are. In the film, The Tin Man wishes he had a heart. The
Scarecrow wishes that he had a brain, and the Lion wants courage. Eventually,
each of them realizes that he already has what he wants.
Nearly all parents want us to be the best we can be. They occasionally
attempt to encourage us to do better by comparing us to others. They mean
well, but the message we usually get is that we're not good enough. We start to
believe that the only way we can be special is by being better than somebody
else, but we are frequently disappointed. There will always be somebody out
there that is better than we are at something. There are a lot of people around
who may not be as intelligent as we are but who are better at sports. Or they
may not be as handsome, but they have more money. It is unthinkable for us to
be better than everybody else all the time. Like the Tin Man, the Scarecrow, and
the Cowardly Lion, we all need what we believe will make us better people.
What we don't understand is that often we already have inside us the very
things that we look for in life. Our parents often forget to tell us that we are
special, that we are good enough just as we are. Perhaps no one told them when
they were growing up, or maybe they just forgot. Either way, it's up to us to
remind them sometimes that each of us, in our own way, is special. What we are
is enough!

8. What is the writer's main aim in writing the text?

A to talk about your family problems

B to explain the importance of being yourself
C to describe how intelligent we are
D to suggest how people can change their way of life

9. This essay was most likely written by …

A a young person
B a coach
C a teacher
D a parent

10. What does the writer say about our parents?

A They always tell us that we are good enough.

B They never forget to tell us that we are special.
C They always tell us that we are special.
D They frequently forget to tell us that we are special.

11. The author of this essay believes that …

A we are all good enough just the way we are
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B the richer you are, the better you are

C intelligent people are more special than others
D not everyone can be special

The End of TV?

Tom Collins offers his opinion

I keep reading articles that argue the TV is dead. According to this view,
people are spending far more time using the Internet for their entertainment and
for information. As a result, they argue the TV is becoming less and less
important in our lives. The time we spend watching videos online is certainly
increasing but I don't think this is a reason to believe we should be saying
goodbye to the television.

The TV is still a very popular way a lot of us get our entertainment at

home. It offers us the chance to see top musical artists, great films and
documentaries and sometimes, thanks to important live events, it has the power
to bring the whole country and all ages together in a way the Internet never
could. How often do thousands or even millions of friends or families sit down at
the same time to watch something together online?

Some people argue that the TV offers a poor quality of programmes on

the many channels we now have. It is certainly true that many of the channels
do nothing more than repeat old shows or offer cheap, low quality programmes.
However, I would argue that a lot of content on the Internet isn't particularly
great. At least TV shows have professional people checking the quality of shows,
which a lot of content on the web doesn't.

I agree that it is easy to keep up-to-date with the latest news on the
Internet, even though much of it is not true or certainly can't be trusted. I enjoy
sitting down to the news on TV in the evening, knowing that I am more likely to
believe the information than the things I read online. Anybody can post
information on the Internet and a lot of it is opinion rather than fact.

So I don't think we should be so quick to say goodbye to the TV. In

fact, I think it has many more years left in it! I certainly won't be swapping my
TV for the latest laptop and will continue to enjoy relaxing in front of it in the
evening

  

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12. The author thinks that

A.       TV is no longer important.

B.      people are spending more time watching videos on the Internet.

C.     people spend too much time on the Internet.

D.     people don't have time to watch TV.

13. What does the author say about TV?

A.    It's the only way to see important live events.

B.      It is more popular than the Internet.

C.     It can attract huge audiences for live events.

D.      It is more popular with certain age groups.

14. The author thinks that

A.       nothing on the Internet is checked.

B.      it is cheaper to make programmes for the Internet.

C.       some programmes are shown again and again on TV.

D.      there are too many channels on TV.

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15. What might the author say about the TV?

A.       "Eventually, mobile phones and laptops will replace it."

B.      "It will remain a popular form of entertainment."

C.       "We need fewer channels and better quality programmes."

D.     "It's not as important as it used to be."

Chocolate town for chocolate workers

If you love chocolate, maybe you have eaten a bar of Cadbury’s
Bournville chocolate. But Bournville isn’t just the name of an English
chocolate bar. It’s the name of a village which was built especially for
workers at the Cadbury’s chocolate factory.
George and Richard Cadbury took over the cocoa and chocolate business
from their father in 1861. A few years later, they decided to move the
factory out of the centre of Birmingham, a city in the middle of England,
to a new location where they could expand. They chose an area close to
the railways and canals so that they could receive milk deliveries easily
and send the finished products to stores across the country.

Here, the air was much cleaner than in the city centre, and the
Cadbury brothers thought it would be a much healthier place for their
employees to work. They named the site Bournville after a local river
called ‘The Bourn’. ‘Ville’, the French word for town, was used because at
the time, people thought French chocolate was the highest quality. The
new factory opened in 1879. Close to it, they built a village where the
factory workers could live. By 1900, there were 313 houses on the site,
and many more were built later.

The Cadbury family were religious and believed that it was right to
help other people. They thought their workers deserved to live and work
in good conditions. In the factory, workers were given a fair wage, a
pension and access to medical treatment. The village was also designed to
provide the best possible conditions for workers too. The houses, although
traditional in style, had modern interiors, indoor bathrooms and large
gardens. The village provided everything that workers needed including a
shop, a school and a community centre where evening classes were held
to train young members of the workforce.

Since the Cadbury family believed that their workers and their
families should be fit and healthy, they added a park with hockey and

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football pitches, a running track, bowling green, fishing lake, and an

outdoor swimming pool. A large clubhouse was built in the park so that
players could change their clothes and relax after a game. Dances and
dinners were also held here for the factory workers, who were never
charged to use any of the sports facilities. However, because the
Cadbury’s believed that alcohol was bad for health and society, no pubs
were ever built in Bourneville!

The Cadbury brothers were among the first business owners to

ensure that their workers had good standards of living. Soon, other British
factory owners were copying their ideas by providing homes and
communities for their workers designed with convenience and health in
mind. Today, over 25,000 people live in Bournville village. There are
several facilities there to help people with special needs, such as care
homes for the elderly, a hostel for people with learning difficulties and
affordable homes for first-time homeowners and single people. Over a
hundred years since the first house in Bournville Village was built, the
aims of its founders are still carried out.

16. The new site for the chocolate factory was chosen because ……..

a)  it was close to several transportation route

b) it was close to farms which provided milk.

c) a lot of people lived nearby.

17. The original houses in Bournville were ……

a) traditional in appearance

b)large

c)built by factory workers

18. Workers at the Cadbury received :

a) Dancing lessons

b) free food and drink

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c) free access to sports facilities

Sources: Test English - Prepare for your English exam (test-english.com)

The Polish Armed Forces School of Languages - level 2 (wp.mil.pl)

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Answers

1 C
2 B
3 A
4 B
5 B
6 C
7A

8B

9A

10 D

11 A

12 B

13C

14 C

15 B

16 A

17)A

18) C