Section Two
vocabulary:
no-frills : adj 不加装潢
subsidiary : adj 附属的
asset ：n 资产；优点
terminal ：n 末端；终点
corridor ：走廊
slot ：n 位置；vt 跟踪
leverage ：n 手段
wholesale ：adj 批发的
eliminate ：vt 消除
phase out ：使逐步淘汰，逐渐停止
segment ：vi 分割
excessively ：adv 过分地，极度
Section Three
vocabulary:
album ：n 相簿，唱片集
supportive ：adj 支持的
hillbilly ：n乡下人
parakeet ：n 长尾小鹦鹉
escalator ：n 自动扶梯
pinging ：n 震性
dime ：n 一角硬币
pose ：vt 造成，形成
lyric ：adj 事情的
stanza ：n 演出期
duo ：n 二重奏
inspiration ：n 灵感；鼓舞

Section Two- Cultural Notes
Department of Transportation
The United States Department of Transportation (USDOT or DOT) is a federal Cabinet department of the U.S.government concerned with transportation. It was established by an act of Congress on October 15, 1966, and began operation on April 1, 1967. It is governed by the United States Secretary of Transportation.
Its mission is to "Serve the United States by ensuring a fast, safe, efficient, accessible, and convenient transportation system that meets our vital national interests and enhances the quality of life of the American people, today and into the future."
History
Prior to the Department of Transportation, the Under Secretary of Commerce for Transportation administered the functions now associated with the DOT. In 1965, Najeeb Halaby, administrator of the Federal Aviation Agency – the future Federal Aviation Agency (FAA) – suggested to U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson that transportation be elevated to a cabinet-level post, and that the FAA be folded into the DOT.
Affiliates
Saint Lawrence Seaway Development Corporation (SLSDC)
Surface Transportation Board (STB)
Former Administrations[edit]
Transportation Security Administration – transferred to Department of Homeland Security in 2003
United States Coast Guard – transferred to Department of Homeland Security in 2003

Section Three - Cultural Notes
Texas
Texas ( Texas or Tejas ) is the second largest state in the United States by both area and population. Geographically located in the south central part of the country, Texas shares borders with the U.S. states of Louisiana to the east, Arkansas to the northeast, Oklahoma to the north, New Mexico to the west, and the Mexican states of Chihuahua, Coahuila, Nuevo León, and Tamaulipas to the southwest, while the Gulf of Mexico is to the southeast.
Houston is the most populous city in Texas and the fourth largest in the U.S., while San Antonio is the second most populous in the state and seventh largest in the U.S. Dallas–Fort Worth and Greater Houston are the fourth and fifth largest metropolitan statistical areas in the country, respectively. Other major cities include Austin, the second most populous state capital in the U.S., and El Paso. Texas is nicknamed the Lone Star State to signify its former status as an independent republic, and as a reminder of the state's struggle for independence from Mexico. The "Lone Star" can be found on the Texan state flag and on the Texan state seal.The origin of Texas's name is from the word "Tejas", which means "friends" in the Caddo language.
The term "six flags over Texas"[note 1] refers to several nations that have ruled over the territory. Spain was thefirst European country to claim the area of Texas. France held a short-lived colony. Mexico controlled the territory until 1836 when Texas won its independence, becoming an independent Republic. In 1845, Texas joined the United States as the 28th state. The state's annexation set off a chain of events that caused the Mexican–American War in 1846. A slave state before the American Civil War, Texas declared its secession from the U.S. in early 1861, and officially joined the Confederate States of America on March 2 of the same year. After the Civil War and the restoration of its representation in the federal government, Texas entered a long period of economic stagnation.
One Texan industry that thrived after the Civil War was cattle. Due to its long history as a center of the industry, Texas is associated with the image of the cowboy. The state's economic fortunes changed in the early 20th century, when oil discoveries initiated an economic boom in the state. With strong investments in universities, Texas developed a diversified economy and high tech industry in the mid-20th century. As of 2010 it shares the top of the list of the most Fortune 500 companies with California at 57.With a growing base of industry, the state leads in many industries, including agriculture, petrochemicals, energy, computers and electronics, aerospace, and biomedical sciences. Texas has led the nation in export revenue since 2002 and has the second-highest gross state product.
Etymology
The name Texas, based on the Caddo word tejas meaning "friends" or "allies", was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves and to the region of their settlement in East Texas.
During Spanish colonial rule, the area was officially known as the Nuevo Reino de Filipinas: La Provincia de Texas.
Geography
Texas is the second largest U.S. state, behind Alaska, with an area of 268,820 square miles (696,200 km2). Though 10 percent larger than France and almost twice as large as Germany or Japan, it ranks only 27th worldwide amongst country subdivisions by size. If it were an independent country, Texas would be the 40th largest behind Chile and Zambia.
Wildlife
A wide range of animals and insects live in Texas. It is the home to 65 species of mammals, 213 species of reptiles and amphibians, and the greatest diversity of bird life in the United States—590 native species in all.At least 12 species have been introduced and now reproduce freely in Texas.
Climate
The large size of Texas and its location at the intersection of multiple climate zones gives the state highly variable weather. The Panhandle of the state has colder winters than North Texas, while the Gulf Coast has mild winters. Texas has wide variations in precipitation patterns. El Paso, on the western end of the state, averages 8.7 inches (220 mm) of annual rainfall, while parts of southeast Texas average as much as 64 inches (1,600 mm) per year.Dallas in the North Central region averages a more moderate 37 inches (940 mm) per year.

Section Three -
Tennessee Williams
Childhood
Thomas Lanier Williams III was born in Columbus, Mississippi, of English, Welsh, and Huguenot ancestry, the second child of Edwina Dakin (1884–1980) and Cornelius Coffin "C. C." Williams (1879–1957).:11 His father was an alcoholic traveling shoe salesman who spent much of his time away from home. His mother, Edwina, was the daughter of Rose O. Dakin, a music teacher, and the Reverend Walter Dakin, an Episcopal priest who was assigned to a parish in Clarksdale, Mississippi, shortly after Williams' birth. Williams' early childhood was spent in the parsonage there. Williams had two siblings, sister Rose Isabel Williams (1909–1996) and brother Walter Dakin Williams(1919–2008).
As a small child Williams suffered from a case of diphtheria which nearly ended his life, leaving him weak and virtually confined to his house during a period of recuperation that lasted a year. At least in part as a result of his illness, he was less robust as a child than his father wished. Cornelius Williams, a descendant of hearty east-Tennessee pioneer stock (hence Williams' professional name), had a violent temper and was a man prone to use his fists. He regarded his son's effeminacy with disdain, and his mother Edwina, locked in an unhappy marriage, focused her overbearing attention almost entirely on her frail young son. Many critics and historians note that Williams found inspiration for much of his writing in his own dysfunctional family.
When Williams was eight years old, his father was promoted to a job at the home office of the International Shoe Company in St. Louis, Missouri. His mother's continual search for what she considered to be an appropriate address, as well as his father's heavy drinking and loudly turbulent behavior, caused them to move numerous times around the city. He attended Soldan High School, a setting he referred to in his play The Glass Menagerie. Later he studied at University City High School.At age 16, Williams won third prize (five dollars) for an essay published in Smart Set entitled, "Can a Good Wife Be a Good Sport?" A year later, his short story "The Vengeance of Nitocris" was published in the August 1928 issue of the magazine Weird Tales. That same year he first visited Europe with his grandfather.
Literary influences
Williams' writings include mention of some of the poets and writers he most admired in his early years: Hart Crane, Arthur Rimbaud, Anton Chekhov (from the age of ten), William Shakespeare, D. H. Lawrence, August Strindberg, William Faulkner, Thomas Wolfe, and Emily Dickinson. In later years the list grew to includeWilliam Inge, James Joyce, and Ernest Hemingway; of Hemingway, he said "[his] great quality, aside from his prose style, is this fearless expression of brute nature."
Death
On February 25, 1983, Williams was found dead in his suite at the Hotel Elysée in New York at age 71. The Chief Medical Examiner of New York City reported that Williams had choked to death from inhaling the plastic cap of a nasal spray dispenser.
Williams left his literary rights to The University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee, an Episcopal school, in honor of his grandfather, Walter Dakin, an alumnus of the university. The funds support a creative writing program. When his sister Rose died in 1996 after many years in a mental institution, she bequeathed $7 million from her part of the Williams estate toThe University of the South as well.
Vancouver
History
Indigenous people
Archaeological records indicate the presence of Aboriginal people in the Vancouver area from 8,000 to 10,000 years ago.The city is located in the traditional territories of the Squamish, Musqueam, and Tseil-Waututh (Burrard)peoples of the Coast Salish group. They had villages in various parts of present-day Vancouver, such as Stanley Park, False Creek, Kitsilano, Point Grey and near the mouth of the Fraser River.
Ecology
The vegetation in the Vancouver area was originally temperate rain forest, consisting of conifers with scattered pockets of maple and alder, and large areas of swampland (even in upland areas, due to poor drainage). The conifers were a typical coastal British Columbia mix of Douglas fir, Western red cedar andWestern Hemlock.The area is thought to have had the largest trees of these species on the British Columbia Coast. Only in Elliott Bay, Seattle did the size of trees rival those of Burrard Inlet and English Bay. The largest trees in Vancouver's old-growth forest were in the Gastown area, where the first logging occurred, and on the southern slopes of False Creek and English Bay, especially around Jericho Beach. The forest in Stanley Park was logged between the 1860s and 1880s, and evidence of old-fashioned logging techniques such as springboard notches can still be seen there.
Many plants and trees growing throughout Vancouver and the Lower Mainland were imported from other parts of the continent and from points across the Pacific. Examples include the monkey puzzle tree, the Japanese Maple, and various flowering exotics, such as magnolias, azaleas, and rhododendrons. Some species imported from harsher climates in Eastern Canada or Europe have grown to immense sizes. The native Douglas Maple can also attain a tremendous size. Many of the city's streets are lined with flowering varieties of Japanese cherry trees donated from the 1930s onward by the government of Japan. These flower for several weeks in early spring each year, an occasion celebrated by the Vancouver Cherry Blossom Festival. Other streets are lined with flowering chestnut, horse chestnut and other decorative shade trees.

Pictures
Department of Transportation

Seal of the United States Department of Transportation

Headquarters of the U.S. Department of Transportation

State of Texas
Flag
Seal
Map

Houston

Tennessee Williams



Vancouver

@sckyee

Lesson Tweleve
Section One
espionage : n 侦察，间谍活动
swing ：vt 摇表，摆动
blink ：vt 眨眼间
stare out ：以目光压制某人，瞪服
dot the i's and cross the t's ：一丝不苟，详述
opposition ：n 反对，敌对
punitive ：adj 处罚的
executive ：n 总经理，行政部门
Section Two
warrant ：n 保证，担保
fabricate ：vt 制造，装配
leverage ：n 杠杆作用
stake out ：立柱标出
detention ：n 拘留，扣押
attorney ：n 代理人
dissident ：n 持异议者
expulsion ：n 驱逐
retaliate ：vi 报复，反击
rescind ：vt 废除，撤销
impediment ：n 妨碍，阻止
Section Three
massive ：adj 大的
garment ：n 衣服，服装
sweatshop ：n 血汗工厂
seamstress ：n 女裁缝
cuff ：n 袖口，护腕
fancy ：vt 认为，想象
cocktail ：n 鸡尾酒
cooperative ：adj 合作的
indemnification ：n 赔偿
patron ：n 赞助人
salvage ：n 海上营救
affiliate ：vt 使隶属于
hurdle ：n 障碍
clandestine ：adj 秘密地
soldout ：卖完了
municipal ：adj 市的，市政的
thoroughfare ：n 大道
taco ：n 墨西哥玉米薄饼卷
reinstate ：vt 使复原
uphill ：adj 上坡的
forge ：n 熔铁炉
alliance ：n 结盟
elite ：n 精华
legacy ：n 遗产

Cultural Notes
Frankfurt
Frankfurt is an alpha world city and a global hub for commerce, culture, education, tourism and traffic. It's the site of many global and European headquarters. Frankfurt Airport is among the world's busiest. Frankfurt is the major financial centre of the European continent, with the HQs of the European Central Bank, German Federal Bank, Frankfurt Stock Exchange, Deutsche Bank, Commerzbank, DZ Bank, KfW, several cloud and fintechstartups and other institutes. Automotive, technology and research, services, consulting, media and creative industries complement the economic base. Frankfurt's DE-CIX is the world's largest internet exchange point.Messe Frankfurt is one of the world's largest trade fairs. Major fairs include the Frankfurt Motor Show, the world's largest motor show, and the Frankfurt Book Fair, the world's largest book fair.
Frankfurt is home to many cultural and educational institutions, including the Goethe University, the UAS and various graduate schools like the Frankfurt School of Finance & Management, the Alte Oper, Europe's largestEnglish Theatre, many museums (e.g., Städel, Senckenberg Natural Museum, Liebieghaus, Goethe House), theSchirn art venue at the old town, and two major botanical gardens: the Palmengarten and the University's Botanical Garden. In electronic music, Frankfurt has been a pioneering city since the 1980s, with renowned DJs including Sven Väth, Marc Trauner, Scot Project, Kai Tracid, and clubs Dorian Gray, U60311, Omen andCocoon. In sports, the city is known as the home of the top tier football club Eintracht Frankfurt, the basketball club Frankfurt Skyliners and the venue of Ironman Germany.



Kansas City
Kansas City is the largest city in Missouri and the sixth largest city in the Midwest. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the city had an estimated population of 475,378 in 2015, making it the 36th largest city by population in the United States. It is the anchor city of the Kansas City metropolitan area, which straddles the Kansas–Missouri border. Kansas City was founded in the 1830s as a Missouri River port at its confluence with the Kansas River coming in from the west. On June 1, 1850 the town of Kansas was incorporated; shortly after came the establishment of the Kansas Territory. Confusion between the two ensued and the name Kansas City was assigned to distinguish them soon thereafter.
Kansas City, Missouri was officially incorporated as a town on June 1, 1850, and as a city on March 28, 1853. The territory straddling the border between Missouri and Kansas at the confluence of the Kansas and Missouri rivers was considered a good place to build settlements.

Cultural Notes
section two
KGB
The KGB, an initialism for Komitet gosudarstvennoy bezopasnosti (Russian: Комите́т госуда́рственной безопа́сности (КГБ); IPA: [kəmʲɪˈtʲet ɡəsʊˈdarstvʲɪnːəj bʲɪzɐˈpasnəsʲtʲɪ], translated in English as Committee for State Security), was the main security agency for the Soviet Union from 1954 until its break-up in 1991. Formed in 1954, as a direct successor of such preceding agencies as the Cheka, NKGB, and MGB, the committee was attached to the Council of Ministers. It was the chief government agency of "union-republican jurisdiction", acting asinternal security, intelligence, and secret police. Similar agencies were constituted in each of the republics of the Soviet Union aside from Russia and consisted of many ministries, state committees, and state commissions.
The KGB was a military service and was governed by army laws and regulations, similar to the Soviet Army or MVDInternal Troops. While most of the KGB archives remain classified, two online documentary sources are available. Its main functions were foreign intelligence, counterintelligence, operative-investigatory activities, guarding the State Border of the USSR, guarding the leadership of the Central Committee of the Communist Party and the Soviet Government, organization and ensuring of government communications as well as combating nationalism, dissent, and anti-Soviet activities.

Missouri
Nicknames
There is no official state nickname.However, Missouri's unofficial nickname is the "Show Me State", which appears on its license plates. This phrase has several origins. One is popularly ascribed to a speech by Congressman Willard Vandiver in 1899, who declared that "I come from a state that raises corn and cotton,cockleburs and Democrats, and frothy eloquence neither convinces nor satisfies me. I'm from Missouri, and you have got to show me." This is in keeping with the saying "I'm from Missouri" which means "I'm skeptical of the matter and not easily convinced." However, according to researchers, the phrase "show me" was already in use before the 1890s.Another one states that it is a reference to Missouri miners who were taken to Leadville, Coloradoto replace striking workers. Since the new men were unfamiliar with the mining methods, they required frequent instruction.
Other nicknames for Missouri include "The Lead State", "The Bullion State", "The Ozark State", "The Mother of the West", "The Iron Mountain State", and "Pennsylvania of the West". It is also known as the "Cave State"because there are more than 6000 recorded caves in the state (second to Tennessee). Perry County is the county with the largest number of caves and the single longest cave.
The official state motto is Latin: "Salus Populi Suprema Lex Esto", which means "Let the welfare of the people be the supreme law."
flag seal

Cultural Notes
section three
Mexico City earthquake
The earthquake occurred in the Pacific Ocean, off the coast of the Mexican state of Michoacán, a distance of more than 350 km (217 mi) from the city, in the Cocos Plate subduction zone, specifically in a section of the fault line known as the Michoacán seismic gap.The Cocos Plate pushes against and slides under the North American Plate, primarily along the coasts of the states of Michoacán and Guerrero in Mexico. Volatile trenches along the Cocos plate generally have had seismic events 30 to 70 years before 1985. This subduction zone outside the Michoacán gap was the source of 42 earthquakes of magnitude 7.8 or stronger in the 20th century prior to the 1985 event. However, this particular section of the subduction zone had not had an event for a much longer time. Shockwaves from the earthquake hit the mouth of the Río Balsas on the coast at 7:17 am and hit Mexico City, 350 km (217 mi) away, two minutes later at 7:19 am. The 19 September quake was a multiple event with two epicenters and the second movement occurring 26 seconds after the first. Because of multiple breaks in the fault line, the event was of long duration. Ground shaking lasted more than five minutes in places along the coast and parts of Mexico City shook for three minutes, with an average shaking time of 3–4 minutes. It is estimated the movement along the fault was about three meters. The main tremor was foreshadowed by a quake of magnitude 5.2 on 28 May 1985, and was followed by two significant aftershocks: one on 20 September 1985 of magnitude 7.5 lasting thirteen seconds and the third occurring seven months later on 30 April 1986 with magnitude 7.0 lasting ten seconds. However, at least twelve other minor aftershocks were associated with the seismic event.

10% achieved

《Kung Fu Panda》 dialogue
http://pan.baidu.com/s/1jHPKzjg
（传了几次内容都被度娘吃了- 。-只能发整个文档的链接了）