Lesson 5 New Year’s Celebration

Nancy Beveridge

1、On Thursday night, people all over America will say goodbye to 1997, and will welcome the new year. Some will spend the night quietly at home. And some will attend church services. For many others, however, the 1ast night of the old year will be a loud, lively celebration.

2、New Year’s Day is the world’s oldest celebration. In fact, ancient people celebrated the New Year even before they had exact ways of measuring time. New Year also is the one holiday that is observed everywhere in the world, by people of all national and religious groups.

3、Not everyone celebrates the New Year at the same time. Members of the Russian Orthodox Church, for example, observe it on January 13th. The Chinese celebrate at different times each year, sometime between January 21st and February 19th. But most people today—including Americans—celebrate the New Year on January 1st.

4、In some countries, the New Year’s holiday is the most important celebration of the year. This is not true in the United States, even though it is a celebration that many people enjoy. One reason may be that Christmas comes just one week before the New Year. And Christmas is America’s biggest holiday.

5、The most popular way to welcome the new year in the United States is with a big party. Some parties are at private homes. But in recent years, it has become more and more common for Americans to go to a hotel or eating place on the night of December 31st. There, they can eat a big dinner, drink champagne, and dance.

6、Most New Year’s parties have some things in common. First of all, they are usually noisy. People shout and sing. Bands play. And often, guests blow on small noise-makers when the New Year arrives at midnight. This tradition of noise-making is believed to have started centuries ago in Babylonia and India. People thought that loud sounds would drive away the evil spirits of the old year, before the new year began.

7、Another very old tradition is drinking alcohol at New Year’s parties. This is a religious ceremony observed many centuries ago. In that ceremony, people made themselves drunk to show what the world was like before God brought order to it.

8、For many people, New Year is the one night when they might drink too much. Some New Year’s celebrations have ended sadly for people who got drunk and had driving accidents. Radio and television announcements warn of the danger of drunk driving. Some eating and drinking places offer free rides home for people who have had too much to drink. And parties close to home—to which people can walk—are becoming more popular.

9、The biggest noisiest New Year’s party in the United States takes place at Times Square in New York City. Thousands of people gather there. Some of them ring bells or explode firecrackers. Others blow whistles or car horns. And at twelve o’clock, they begin to cheer as an electric sign in the shape of a red apple lights up on top of a tall building.

10、People have been celebrating the new year at Times Square for many years. For more than twenty years, millions of other Americans have been able to watch the event on television. The Times Square celebration has become so popular that many American hotels and eating places put up big television screens so their guests can watch it on New Year’s Eve. At twelve o’clock, everyone stops talking and dancing, to join in the television broadcast from New York.

11、After all the celebrating, many Americans begin the first day of the new year a little tired. They usually are happy to spend a quiet day at home watching the most popular New Year’s Day activities on television. These activities include two parades, and a number of championship football games.

12、On the Atlantic coast, the Mummers Parade is held in the city of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The Mummers are people dressed in funny clothing and face masks.

13、Across the country, on the Pacific Coast, another big parade takes place on New Year’s Day. It is the Rose Parade, held in the city of Pasadena, California. The Rose Parade includes floats, moving vehicles covered with brightly-colored flowers.

14、After the parade, a famous football game takes place in Pasadena, in a huge stadium called the Rose Bowl. There, the top university team from the Pacific Coast plays one of the top teams from the Middle West. Other top university teams across the country also play against each other on New Year’s Day.

15、Americans observe one other important tradition as the new year begins. They make resolutions. These are decisions about how to improve themselves in the year ahead. The most common New Year’s resolution in the United States is to eat less. But many Americans also promise themselves to stop smoking, or to stop drinking alcohol, or to be nicer to their friends and families. Experts find that fewer than ten percent of Americans carry out their New Year’s resolutions. Still, few want to give up this tradition. Almost everyone seems to enjoy looking back over the year that has just ended… while looking forward to a nice beginning of a new year.

(906 words)

Exercises

Ⅰ. How well did you read?

1. [Check the details] When do the Chinese celebrate their New Year?

A. On January 13th.

B. Sometime between January 21st to February 19th.

C. On January 31st.

2. [Give the reason] People made noise on New Year’s Eve because ______.

A. they thought the loud noise would bring them good luck B. they believed the loud noise would drive away the evil spirits of the old year C. they hoped to have a happy party 3. [Understand the main idea] What is the passage mainly about?

A. How people in the USA celebrate the New Year.

B. Why people in the USA celebrate the New Year.

C. Where people in the USA celebrate the New Year.

Ⅱ. Read for words.

1. Choose one best paraphrase or Chinese meaning for the underlined words.

(1) Radio and television announcements warn of the danger of drunk driving.(Para. 8, Line 3)

A. 警告 B. 建议 C. 反对

(2) Americans observe one other important tradition as the New Year begins. They make resolutions. (Para. 15, Line 2)

A. solutions B.decisions C. suggestions

2. Choose one best paraphrase or Chinese meaning for the underlined expressions.

(1) The biggest noisiest New Year’s party in the United States takes place at Times Square in New York City. (Para. 9, Line 1)

A. instead of B. happens C. be in the place

(2) Still, few want to give up this tradition. (Para. 15, Line 6)

A. 保持 B. 分发 C.放弃

Ⅲ. Writing practice.

1. According to the passage, what do people usually do to celebrate the New Year?

2. Have you ever made a New Year’s resolution? How do you carry it out?