A
(2019·云南高三检测一)My doorbell rings at 11 a．m. On the step, I find an elderly Chinese lady. She is small and slight. She holds a paper carrier bag in her hands.
I know this lady. It is by no means her first visit. Her daughter, Nicole, bought the house next door last October.Nicole, who is currently in Shanghai, has apparently told her mother that I am having heart surgery shortly, and the result is that her mother has decided I need to be supplied with meals.
I know what is inside the paper carrier bag—a stainless steel container with a meal of rice, vegetables and either chicken, meat or shrimp. This has become an almostdaily occurrence.
Communication between my benefactor(恩人) and me is somewhat handicapped by the fact that she doesn’t speak English and all I can say in Mandarin is “hello”. Once, she brought an iPad and pointed to the screen, which displayed a message from Nicole telling me that her mother wanted to know if the food was all right.
“Your mother just can’t be bringing me meals like this all the time，” I protested. “I can hardly reciprocate by cooking something from my native land, like roast beef or Yorkshire pudding for her，”I said.
“Oh, no，” Nicole said. “Don’t worry about that. She has to cook for the family anyway, and she wants to do it for you. You can call her Wing, which is her surname.”
The tenant in my basement suite is a university student who speaks Mandarin quite well, so with her help, I have found out that Wing is 68—13 years younger than I am. For my part, I was raised in wartime Britain.
So here we are, two grandmothers a world away from where we were raised, neither of us able to speak the other’s language. But the doorbell keeps ringing and there is the familiar paper carrier bag, handed smilingly to me by Wing.
Right now I am working on some more Mandarin words—it’s the least I can do after such a display of kindness.
“Thank you” is, of course, the first one, which somehow seems inadequate.
【解题导语】本文是一篇记叙文。文章讲述了作者与邻居之间的故事，邻居是一位来自中国的老太太，对作者非常关照。
1. The author and Wing got to know each other________．
A．as next door neighbors
B．when exchanging meals
C．by sharing similar experiences
D．after using an iPad to communicate
A 解析：细节理解题。根据第二段的前三句“I know this lady...Her daughter，Nicole，bought the house next door last October.”可知，作者与这位老太太是邻居。所以A项正确。
2．The underlined word “reciprocate” in Paragraph 5 probably means “________”．
A．do as well B．offer generously
C．give in return D．accept with pleasure
C 解析：词义猜测题。根据第五段第一句中的“Your mother just can’t be bringing me meals like this all the time”可知作者认为老太太一直对自己那么好，而自己只是做一些本国的食物，是几乎不能回报她的。C项意为“回报”，故选C。
3．The author’s effort to learn Mandarin shows her________．
A．great satisfaction B．real kindness
C．heartfelt thanks D．sincere friendship
C 解析：细节理解题。根据倒数第二段中的“it’s the least I can do after such a display of kindness”可知作者认为学习中文是为了感谢老太太对自己的好。A项意为“极大的满意”；B项意为“真正的友善”；C项意为“衷心的感谢”；D项意为“真诚的友谊”。
