Question

FIND THE ANSWERS TO THE QUESTIONS IN THE TEXT



Passage 1

is as though we slip into a worm-hole in the fabric of
LITERARY NARRATIVE: This passage is adapted from the time and space, travel into the past and then back again essay "Rough Water" by David McGlynn (©2008 by David to the present in the same instant. That morning, swim- McGlynn).




One of my best races could hardly be called a race
door pool. All summer long my teammates and I swam
at all. I was a senior in high school, gunning to qualify
under an open sky. After this day we would spend the
for the USA Junior Nationals. The previous summer I
rest of the season in a dank and moldy indoor pool.
had missed the cut by less than a second in the mile,
5 and just the day before, at my high school regional
The triangular backstroke flags were strung across
meet, I had come within three-tenths ofa second in the
50 the lanes and the adjacent diving well. My teammates
500-yard freestyle. The qualification time was 4:39.69;
liked to run down the long cement deck, jump out over
I swam a 4:39.95. The next day, Sunday, I drove with
the diving well, and try to grab hold of the line. Many
my mother to the far side of Houston where a time trial
of them could jump far enough to make it. I could not,
10 was being held-an informal, unadvertised event
though I tried every day. I tried that day, and missed.
thrown together at the last minute. The only races
55 Since I would not have another shot until May, I
Swum were those the swimmers requested to swim.
decided to try again. I squared up and ran, my feet wet
Most were short, flapping sprints in which swimmers
against the pavement, and just as my foot hit the water's
attempted to shave off a few one-hundredths of a
edge, one of my teammates called out "Jump!" I bent
15 second. I didn't have the courage to face the mile, and
my knees and pushed off hard and got my hand around
since I'd struck out in the 500 the day before, I decided
60 the flag line. I pulled the whole thing into the water.
to swim the 1,000-yard freestyle. Forty lengths of the
Autumn was coming and I wondered if there was a
pool. It was a race I'd swum fast enough to believe that
metaphor in what I had just done; a fortune folded
given the right confluence of circumstances-cold
inside a cookie: my greatest effort would come when I
was down to my last opportunity.
20 water, an aggressive heat, an energetic meet-I could
make the cut. I had fifteen seconds to drop to qualify.
Now it was March andI was down to my last
65
opportunity, thinking about that day and hearing the
By the time I stood up on the blocks, I was not
word “Jump!" as my eyes followed the finger of the boy
only the only one in the race, I was practically the only
pointing me onward. What I understood-not later, but
one in the natatorium. The horn sounded and I dove in.
right then, in the water-was how little this swim added
25 I was angry and disheartened at having missed the cut
70 up to in the world. I had spent more than a year training
the day before and I had little belief that I could go any
for this one swim, and when it was finished the world
faster today.
would be no different than before it began. If no one
else cared, then the swim was mine alone. It mattered
About six hundred yards in, my coach started to
because it was the task before me now, the thing I
pace. I stayed steady on, not in a hurry, not about to get
75 wanted now. Swimming, I had long understood, is a
30 my hopes up. In my mind, I had already missed the
constant choice between the now and the later: exhaus-
time. Then a boy from a rival high school, whom I
tion now for the sake of fitness later, all those Friday
hardly knew, unfolded his legs and climbed down from
nights spent in the pool in pursuit of an end that seemed
the bleachers and started to cheer. He squatted low to
always one step farther on. I was out of laters, this was
the water and pointed his finger toward the end of the
80 the end, and I made my choice. I cashed in the energyI
15 pool, as if to say, That's where you're going, now hurry
set aside for climbing out of the pool and unfolding my
up. I thought, If he's cheering, maybe I'm close.
towel and tying my shoes. I've never sprinted harder in
my life, not before and not since. I hit the wall. I knew
Sometimes a moment comes along when the world
by instinct, by the spasm of my tendons and the ache in
slows down, and though everything else moves around
85 my bones, before İ ever turned toward the clock or
us at the same frenetic speed, we're afforded the oppor-
heard my coach scream, that I had made it.
tunity to reflect in real-time rather than in retrospect. It







Passage 2



Passage A by Erika Janik


In early September of 1929, Nikolai Vavilov,
Discerning where a crop originated and where the
famed Russian plant explorer and botanist, arrived in
greatest portion of its genetic diversity remains extant
the central Asian crossroads of Alma-Ata, Kazakhstan.
may seem esoteric to the uninitiated. But knowing
Climbing up the Zailijskei Alatau slopes of the Tian
where exactly our food comes from-geographically,
60 culturally, and genetically-is of paramount importance
5 Shan mountains separating Kazakhstan from China,
Vavilov found thickets of wild apples stretching in
to the rather small portion of our own species that regu-
larly concerns itself with the issue of food security. The
every direction, an extensive forest of fruit coloured
variety of foods that we keep in our fields, orchards,
russet red, creamy yellow, and vibrant pink. Nowhere
and, secondarily, in our seed banks is critically impor-
else in the world do apples grow thickly as a forest or
65 tant in protecting our food supply from plagues, crop
10 with such incredible diversity. Amazed by what he saw,
diseases, catastrophic weather, and political upheavals.
Vavilov wrote: I could see with my own eyes that I had
Vavilov himself was personally motivated to become an
stumbled upon the centre of origin for the apple.'
agricultural scientist by witnessing several famines
during the czarist era of Russia. He hoped that by com-
With extraordinary prescience and few facts,
70 bining a more diverse seed portfolio with knowledge
Vavilov suggested that the wild apples he had seen
from both traditional farmers and collaborating scien-
15 growing in the Tian Shan were in fact the ancestors of
tists, the number of Russian families suffering from
the modern apple. He tracked the whole process of
hunger might be reduced.
domestication to the mountains near Almna-Ata, where
the wild apples looked awfully similar to the apples
In a very real sense, the forests of wild foragers
found at the local grocery. Unfortunately, Vavilov's
75 and the orchards of traditional farmers in such centers
20 theory would remain mostly unknown for decades.
of crop diversity are the wellsprings of diversity that
plant breeders, pathologists, and entomologists return
Exactly where the apple came from had long been
to every time our society whittles the resilience in our
a matter of contention and discussion among people
fields and orchards down to its breaking point.
who study plant origins. Vavilov, imprisoned by Joseph
Stalin in 1940 for work in plant genetics that chal-
And whittle away we have done. Here in North
80
25 lenged Stalin's beliefs, died in a Leningrad prison in
America, according to apple historian Dan Bussey,
1943. Only after the fall of communism in Russia did
some l6,000 apple varieties have been named and nur-
Vavilov's theory, made more than half a century earlier,
tured over the last four centuries. By 1904, however, the
become widely recognized.
identities and sources of only 7,098 of those varieties
85 could be discerned by USDA scientist W. H. Ragan.
As Vavilov predicted, it's now believed that all of
Since then, some 6,121 apple varieties-86.2 percent of
Ragan's 1904 inventoryhave been lost from nursery
30 the apples known today are direct descendents of the
catalogs, farmers' markets, and from the American
wild apples that evolved in Kazakhstan. Apples do not
comprise all of Kazakhstan's plant bounty, however. At
table.
least 157 other plant species found in Kazakhstan are
either direct precursors or close wild relatives of
35 domesticated crops, including 90 per cent of all culti-
vated temperate fruits. The name of Kazakhstan's
largest city, Alma-Ata, or Almaty as it is known today,
even translates as Father of Apples' or, according to
some, where the apples are'. So this news about the
40 apple's origins was probably no surprise to residents,







4. The narrator indicates that when he swam the 1,000- yard freestyle in the time trials, the world, for a moment, seemed to:

F. speed up, blurring past and present events
G. rush past, forcing him to reflect in retrospect
H. move in slow motion, as did everything around him
J. slow down, allowing him to reflect in real time.



5. The passage indicates that during the narrator's swim at the time trial, he understood for the first time that:

A. his goals would always be one step farther on.
B. he had trained for this swim for over a year.
C. the swim was an event that was important to
D. swimming is a choice between the now and the later


6. Based on the passage, the "end" the narrator mentions in line 80 most likely refers to his:

F. final pursuit of fitness.
G. last chance to qualify for Junior Nationals.
H. memory of his final Friday night practice.
J. ultimate realization that he had defeated the other
in competitors in the race.


7. The narrator of the passage characterizes the time trial in Houston as:

A. one long sprint in which swimmers attempted to
improve their times.
B. a meet advertised as a way to qualify for the Junior Nationals.
C. a regional meet that featured only the 500-yard
freestyle and 1,000-yard freestyle.
D. an informal swimming event put together at the
last minute.





8. The statement "That's where you're going, now hurry
up (lines 35-36) can most directly be attributed to the:


F. cheering boy, as he verbally criticizes the narrator's
efforts.
G. cheering boy, as he shouts encouragement to the
narrator.
H. narrator, as he speculates about what the cheering
boy meant when the boy pointed at the pool
J. narrator, as he angrily contemplates his response to the cheering boy.




10. When the narrator heard "Jump !" in his mind while
Swimming (line 67), he was most likely remembering:


F. his teammate's command the day the narrator
caught the flag line.
G. his own shout as he leapt off the outdoor pool's
him deck that fall.
H. the cheers of the boy from the rival school.
J. the abrupt start of his race that Sunday.

Answer 1

Here are the answers to the questions based on the passages provided:

4. The narrator indicates that when he swam the 1,000-yard freestyle in the time trials, the world, for a moment, seemed to:
**J. slow down, allowing him to reflect in real time.**

5. The passage indicates that during the narrator's swim at the time trial, he understood for the first time that:
**D. swimming is a choice between the now and the later.**

6. Based on the passage, the "end" the narrator mentions in line 80 most likely refers to his:
**G. last chance to qualify for Junior Nationals.**

7. The narrator of the passage characterizes the time trial in Houston as:
**D. an informal swimming event put together at the last minute.**

8. The statement "That's where you're going, now hurry up" (lines 35-36) can most directly be attributed to the:
**G. cheering boy, as he shouts encouragement to the narrator.**

10. When the narrator heard "Jump!" in his mind while swimming (line 67), he was most likely remembering:
**F. his teammate's command the day the narrator caught the flag line.**