San Francisco's Chinatown is the biggest and oldest in the country. It's the third most visited tourist destination in the city. It's also the city's most densely populated neighbor- hood. So why are. businesses in Chinatown struggling? In this week's paper, I outline some of the reasons for why Chinatown's crowded streets and busy shops might be declining. Underneath the surface, Chinatown is falling. And the city, local organizations and businesses are trying to figure out what they can do to turn things around. While numbers of people visit Chinatown, they don't stay long and they don't spend a lot of money. And beyond annual festivals,1ike Chinese New Years, this month's Moon Festival and last month's Sunday Streets - which drew about 15,000 t0 20.000 people - the neighborhood has a hard time attracting locals. Can you remember the last. time you went to Chinatown ?If you can't, You're not alone. Locals told me that Chinatown doesn't have much to offer them - that the stores are all the same. There are some good eating joints, people said, but they don't know how to find them. Some people even told me that they sometimes go to extreme measures to avoid the neighborhood altogether. But when asked if the-v would like to see Chinatown gone, the answer was always a strong no. Locals are hopeful that things will get better and traffic will increase when the Central Subway is complete. But chat's not for another five years. at least. And if' new shops or restaurants don't make their way into Chinatown. the same problem of attracting locals will exist. Not that Chinatown's going to die. The dragon still has some fire in its belly. And many people are rooting for positive change. The question is, how does Chinatown change without losing the very importance of what makes it unique? Which can we know about Chinatown according to the passage? A) Businesses in Chinatown are going well. B) Local people like going shopping there. C) A great number of people visit it every year. D) No period has seen a more prosperous Chinatown.
C
My daughter recently asked me what a Travel Agency does. There is one located on our street and it has just been completely rebuilt. I told her that they helped people book their trips and vacations. "Why haven't we ever been in there?" she wanted to know. "Because we do everything ourselves online these days" I explained. "But why do it yourself if other people want to do it for you?" she wondered out loud. The answer is that the travel agency makes a little bit of money on each ticket you book through them. If you book your ticket yourself, online, you save that money. Saving money sounds great except that when you think about it you typically spend three evenings comparing prices to end up saving $30 on a $300 trip. All those $30 discounts add up of course so I guess we should be happy with that. Still, how bad is it really to pay someone $30 and trust them to buy you something decent? Wouldn't you say your free evenings are worth more than $10 a piece? Consider books for a moment. Buying your book at Amazon saves you maybe 30% to 40% on each book. Add to that the convenience of shopping from home and getting the package delivered to your home address. So far so good. Unfortunately that does mean you spend way too much time browsing Amazon. com while you could do something fun instead. Like maybe reading an actual book? Then the package arrives and you aren't home and end up having to pick it up at the local post- office. All in all I wonder how much time I end up investing in the whole process. Time sounds free, but to most of us, it is more valuable than money. The Internet Economy promised to get rid of the middle-men and we loved it. Somehow, I'm starting to get the feeling that we ourselves ended up doing the work of that middle-men we were so eager to get rid of. In any project you can always pick two of these: fast, cheap or good. We seem to have focused a lot on 'cheap' and 'good' but the extra time we need to invest to keep it 'fast' comes out of our own pockets. You can always make more money but... What's the author's attitude towards the Internet Economy? A) The author thinks online shopping saves time and is a convenient way to buy products. B) The author worries about sending personal information over the internet. C) The author doesn't think online shopping is satisfactory in every way. D) The author likes the convenience but is concerned about the e-commerce environment.
C
Q: According to an English newspaper, scientists could begin cloning human embryos in Britain in 2001. It is understood that the government has already agreed to use Frankenstein's technology, believing the benefits are more important than ethical concerns .Researchers think it will be possible to grow brain tissue to cure the diseases that are likely to get worse as time passes like Alzheimer's , and produce "spare part" organs like hearts and kidneys for transplant . Ministers are aware that the change in the law will be as controversial as the law which legalized abortion more than 30 years ago. Some politicians reacted angrily , arguing that the government had already made up its mind without discussion. Church leaders and anti-abortion campaigners have long expressed their horror at the plans, arguing that even the earliest embryos are forms of human life.They believe that getting an embryo from cells is morally unacceptable . And it will also cause arguments about how far scientists should interfere with nature and lead to accusations that _ are "playing God". The cloning of human embryos to provide spare parts is regarded by most experts to be the most important step forward in the 21stcentury medicine. Scientists say treatment of diseases such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's will be the first application of cloning. The ability to clone embryos was first achieved by scientists in Scotland in the late 1990s and now the ability to grow stem cells into tissues and organs is being developed by American researchers. Combining the two technologies will mean an end to long waits for organs from donors and problems caused by rejection of transplanted tissues by the body. Ian Wilmut, the man who cloned Dolly the sheep, has warned that British experts will go to America, where such work is legal, if the government does not permit it. Which of the following statements is NOT true according to the passage? A) Most experts think that the cloning of human embryos is beneficial. B) Politicians were in favour of the government's decision. C) It is legal for scientists to clone embryos in America now. D) American researchers are developing the ability to grow stem cells into tissues and organs.
A: B