Informal conversation is an important part of any business
relationship. Before you start a discussion, however, make sure you understand
which topics are suitable and which are considered taboos (禁忌) in a particular
culture. Latin Americans enjoy sharing information about their local history,
art, and customs. They expect questions about their family and are sure to show
pictures of their children. Yon may feel flee to ask similar questions of your
Latin American friends. The French think of conversation as an art form, and
they enjoy the value of lively discussions as well as disagreements. For them,
arguments can be interesting-and they can cover pretty much or any topic-as long
as they occur in a respectful and intelligent (智慧的) manner.
In the United States, business people like to discuss a wide range of
topics, including opinions about work, family, hobbies, and politics. In Japan,
China, and Korea, however, people are much more private. They do not share much
about their thoughts, feelings, or emotions because they feel that doing so
might take away from the harmonious (和谐的) business relationship they’re trying
to build. Middle Easterners are also private about their personal lives and
family matters. It is considered rude, for example, to ask a businessman from
Saudi Arabia about his wife or children. As general rule, it’s
best not to talk about politics or religion (宗教) with your business friends.
This can get you into trouble, even in the United States, where people hold
different views. In addition, discussing one’s salary is usually considered
unsuitable. Sports is typically a friendly subject in most parts of the world,
although be careful not to criticize a national sport. Instead, be friendly and
praise your host’s team.Which is typically a friendly topic in most places according to the
author
To face the music Like every
language, American English is full of special expressions, phrases that come
from the day-to-day life of the people and develop in their own way. Our
expression today is "to face the music". When someone
says, "well, I guess I’ll have to face the music," it does not mean he’s
planning to go to the concert. It is something far less pleasant, like being
called in by your boss to explain why you did this and did that, and why you
didn’t do this or that. Sour music indeed, but it has to be faced. At sometime
or another, every one of us has had to face the music, especially as children.
We can all remember father’s angry voice, "I want to talk to you." and only
because we did not obey him. What an unpleasant business it was!
The phrase "to face the music" is familiar to every American,
young and old. It is at least 100 years old. And where did this expression come
from The first explanation comes from the American novelist, James Fenimore
Looper. He said, in 1851, that the expression was first used by actors while
waiting in the wings to go on the stage. When they got their cue to go on, they
often said, "Well, it’s time to face the music." And that was exactly what they
did-facing the orchestra which was just below them. And an actor might be
frightened or nervous as he moved on to the stage in front of an audience that
might be friendly or perhaps hostile, especially if he forgot his lines. But he
had to go out. If he did not, there would be no play. So the expression "to face
the music "come to mean "having to go through something, no matter how
unpleasant the experience might be, because you knew you had no
choice." Other explanations about the expression go back to the
army. When the men faced an inspection by their leader, the soldiers would be
worried about how well they looked. Was their equipment clean, shinny enough to
pass the inspection Still the men had to go out and face the music of the band
as well as the inspection. What else could they do Another
army explanation is more closely related to the idea of facing the results and
accepting the responsibility for something that should not have been done. As,
for example when a man is forced out of the army because he did something
terrible, he is dishonored. The band does not play. Only the drums tap a sad,
slow beat. The soldier is forced to leave, facing such music as it is and facing
the back of his horse.How many ways does the phrase "to face the music" comes from
The number of speakers of English in Shakespeare’s time is
estimated (估计) to have been about five million. Today it is estimated that some
260 million people speak it as a native language, mainly in the United States,
Canada, Great Britain, Ireland, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand. In
addition to the standard varieties of English found in these areas, there are a
great many regional and social varieties of the language as well as various
levels of usage that are employed both in its spoken and written
forms. In fact, it is impossible to estimate the number
of people in the world who have acquired an adequate (足够的) working knowledge of
English in addition to their own languages. The purpose for English learning and
the situations in which such learning takes place are so varied that it is
difficult to explain and still more difficult to judge what forms an adequate
working knowledge for each situation. The main reason
for the widespread demand for English is its present-day importance as a world
language. Besides serving the indefinite needs of its native speakers, English
is a language in which some of important works in science, technology, and other
fields are being produced, and not always by native speakers. It is widely used
for such purposes as meteorological and airport communications, international
conferences, and the spread of information over the radio and television
networks of many nations. It is a language of wider communication for a number
of developing countries, especially former British colonies. Many of these
countries have multilingual populations and need a language for internal
communication in such matters as government, commerce, industry, law and
education as well as for international communication and for entrance to the
scientific and technological developments in the West.What would be the best title for this passage
A child who has once been pleased with a tale likes, as a
rule, to have it retold in almost the same words, but this should not lead
parents to treat printed fairy stories as formal texts. It is always much better
to tell a story than read it out of a book, and, if a parent can produce what,
in the actual situation of the time and the child, is an improvement on the
printed text, so much the better. A charge made against
fairy tales is that they harm the child by frightening him or making him sad
thinking. To prove the latter, one would have to show in a controlled experiment
that children who have read fairy stories were more often sorry for cruelty than
those who had not. As to fears, there are, I think, some cases of children being
dangerously terrified by some fairy story. Often, however, this arises (出现) from
the child having heard the story once. Familiarity with the story by repetition
turns the pain of fear into the pleasure of a fear faced and mastered.
There are also people who object to fairy stories on the grounds
that they are not objectively true, that giants, witches, two-headed dragons,
magic carpets, etc. do not exist; and that, instead of being fond of the strange
side in fairy tales, the child should be taught to learn the reality by studying
history. I find such people, I must say so peculiar (奇怪的) that I do not know how
to argue with them. If their case were sound, the world should be full of mad
men attempting to fly from New York to Philadelphia on a stick or covering a
telephone with kisses in the belief that it was their beloved
girl-friend. No fairy story ever declared to be a description
of the real world and no clever child has ever believed that it was.The author considers that a fairy story is more effective when it is
（）.
王某分别购买了长江寿险公司的投资连结保险和传统寿险，保额均为10万元，长江寿险公司按照监管规定，分别对以上两个险种的法定偿付能力额度提取准备金。投资连结帐户现有某企业债券1000单位，每单位赎回价值10元。此时长江寿险公司因其他业务影响，负债增加。王某独立账户的资产将受长江寿险公司整体负债增加的影响，收益下滑。
A characteristic of American culture that has become almost
a tradition is to respect the self-made man-the man who has risen to the top
through his own efforts, usually beginning by working with his hands. While the
leader in business or industry or the college professor occupies a higher social
position and commands greater respect in the community than the common laborer
or even the skilled factory worker, he may take pains to point out that his
father started life in America as a farmer or laborer of some sort.
This attitude toward manual (体力的) labor is now still seen in many
aspects of American life. One is invited to dinner at a home that is not only
comfortably but even luxuriously (豪华地)furnished and in which there is every
evidence of the fact that the family has been able to afford foreign travel,
expensive hobbies, and college education for the children; yet the hostess
probably will cook the dinner herself, will serve it herself and will wash
dishes afterward, furthermore the dinner will not consist merely of something
quickly and easily assembled from contents of various cans and a cake or a pie
bought at the nearby bakery. On the contrary, the hostess usually takes pride in
careful preparation of special dishes. A professional man may talk about washing
the car, digging in his flowerbeds, painting the house. His wife may even help
with these things, just as he often helps her with the dishwashing. The son who
is away at college may wait on table and wash dishes for his living, or during
the summer he may work with a construction gang on a highway in order to pay for
his education.From paragraph 1, we can know that in America （）.
