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  • R E A D I N G

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Tea

Every morning we like to begin our day with a cup of tea for breakfast-time. We drink tea every day. But more than three hundred years ago most of the people in Europe didn’t know anything about tea. Some people had heard about tea, but very few of them knew what to do with it.

There is a story about an English sailor who went to countries in the east, the west and the south. He was in India and China. One day he came home and brought some tea as a present for his mother. She told her friends about a present and asked them to a “tea party”.

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When her friends came for tea party, the old woman brought in a large plate and put it in the middle of the table. There were a lot of tea-leaves on it. The old woman’ friends began to eat them. Of course nobody liked the tea-leaves.

At that time the sailor came in. He looked at the table and said, “Mother, what did you do with the tea?”

“I boiled it, as you said”

“And what did you do with the water?”

“I threw it away, of course,” answered an old woman.

“Now you may throw away the leaves, too,” said her son.

This story shows that people in England knew very little about tea at that time.

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  • II. Mark if the statements are true or false:
  • 1. We begin our day with a cup of milk or water.
  • 2. About two hundred years ago people knew nothing about tea.
  • 3. An American sailor visited different countries.
  • 4. One day he brought some tea as a present for his mother.
  • 5. Mother didn’t invite her friends to the tea-party.
  • 6. The sailor’s mother boiled tea-leaves.
  • 7. The woman’s friends didn’t eat the tea-leaves.
  • 8. Everybody liked the tea-leaves.
  • 9. The sailor told her mother to throw away the tea-leaves.
  • 10. This story shows that people in England knew nothing about tea.

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  • III. Answer the following questions:
  • 1. What do we begin our day with?
  • 2. What is this story about?
  • 3. What countries did the sailor visit?
  • 4. What did he bring her mother as a present?
  • 5. What did his mother do with tea?
  • 6. Whom did she invite to the tea-party?
  • 7. Did the guests like the tea-leaves?
  • 8. What did the sailor ask her mother?
  • 9. What was the answer?
  • 10. What did this story show?