背诵为王 第 一 册 第 01 课

1 Chinese New Year

Chinese New Year is the most important festival for Chinese people all over the world. It is also called the Spring Festival or the Lunar New Year.

The exact date of the Spring Festival on the Western calendar changes from year to year. However, Chinese New Year takes place between January 1 and February 19.
 

On the Chinese calendar every year has an animal's name. These animals are the rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, ram¹, monkey, rooster, dog and pig. A Chinese legend² says that these twelve animals had a race. The first year was named after the rat, the winner. The other eleven years were named according³ to the order in which the animals arrived in the race. The clever rat jumped onto the ox's back, and then at the end jumped over the ox's head to arrive first!
 

The Chinese believe that a person born in a particular year has some of the characteristics⁵ of that animal.

lunar 月(亮)的

exact 确切的

calendar 日历

rat 鼠

ox 公 牛

rabbit 兔子

ram 公羊

rooster 公鸡

legend 传说

name after 按....命名

particular 特殊的 characteristic⁴ 特征

 

春 节

对于全世界的华人来说，中国的新年是最重要的节日。人们也称它为春节或农历新年。

公历春节的确切日期每年都在变化。但是春节一般都在 1 月 1 日 到 2 月 19 日 之间。

在农历中，每年都有一个生肖。这些生肖是鼠、牛、虎、兔、龙、蛇、马、羊、猴、鸡、狗和猪。据传说，这十二个动物举行了一次赛跑，第一年就以获胜者鼠命名，其他十一年就根据动物们到达终点的顺序命名。聪明的鼠跳在牛背上，在最后时刻跳过牛的头顶第一个到达终点！

中国人相信在某一年出生的人具有这一年生肖的一些特征

1 ram   

(random access memory)随机存取存储器

参考例句：

• 512k RAM is recommended and 640k RAM is preferred.推荐配置为512K内存，640K内存则更佳。

2 legend   

n.传说；传奇故事

参考例句：

• This is a popular legend.这是一个民间传说。
• According to ancient legend,the river is a goddess.据古代传说，这条河是位女神。

3 according   

adj.按照，根据

参考例句：

• According to the Bible we are all the seed of Adam.根据《圣经》所说的，我们都是亚当的后裔。
• We must cut our coat according to our cloth this year.今年我们必须学会量入为出。

4 characteristic   

adj.特有的，典型的；n.特性，特征，特色

参考例句：

• Bananas have their own characteristic smell.香蕉有其特有的香味。
• Some animals possess the characteristic of man.有些动物具有人类的特征。

5 characteristics   

n.特性，特征，特色，[数]（对数的）首数( characteristic的名词复数 )；独特性；性质

参考例句：

• the textural characteristics of the rocks 岩石的纹理特征
• Men have ascribed their own characteristics to their gods. 人们认为他们的特性属于诸神。 来自《简明英汉词典》