阅读下列短文，从下面每题的A、B、C、D四个选项中选出最佳答案。

    Just as I entered my house, I heard a sound coming from the bedroom upstairs — it was from myJust as I entered my house, I heard a sound coming from the bedroom upstairs — it was from my favourite violin.

    “Thief!”

    I rushed upstairs and saw a boy in dirty clothes pulling my violin down. At first sight, I found a new pair of shoes missing. It seemed he was surely a thief.

    However, when I saw his eyes full of fear, my anger disappeared. I smiled and asked, “Are you Mr. Ram's student Rubens? I'm his butler（男管家）. I've heard Mr. Ram said his student would come. It must be you.”

    “Has my teacher gone out?” the boy said, “I think I'd better visit him again in a while.”

    I nodded and asked him, “Do you like playing the violin?”

    “Yes, but I'm too poor to afford one.” the boy replied. 

    “Then, I'll give you this violin.” The boy looked at me in surprise, but he picked up the violin. While going out of the room, he suddenly saw a huge photo of me playing the violin at the Grand Theatre of Sydney on the wall. His face turned pale. He stood there for a moment and ran out. He must have understood what had happened because no master would put up the butler's photo on the wall of his living room.

    A few years later, at a music competition in Melbourne, I was invited to be the judge. Finally, a violin player called Merritt won the first prize.

    After the prize-giving, Merritt ran to me holding a violin box, his face red, and asked, “Mr. Brian, do you still know me? You gave me this violin, which I have treasured ever since! Today, I want to say sorry and give back the violin to you without regret…”

    He was just the “Mr. Ram's student”!

    Mrs. White likes shopping. Today is Sunday. She wants to buy a new dress for herself. Now she is in a clothes store and has a look at a red one. She asks the salesgirl(售货员), “How much is it?”

    “It's thirty dollars.” the salesgirl answers.

    “Can I try it on, please?” she asks.

    “Yes, you can. The dressing room is over there. This way, please.” the salesgirl says.

    After Mrs White comes out of the dressing room, the salesgirl says to her, “You look ten years younger(更年轻的) in this red dress.”

    Hearing(听到) that, Mrs. White says, “I will not take the dress, because I don't want to look ten years older(更年老的) after I take off(脱下) the dress.”

    Joseph Sekar is 62 years old and he is in India(印度). He feeds thousands of parrots(鹦鹉) every day. And he has got himself another new and interesting name "birdman".

    Joseph always left small number of rice on the top of his house. The neighborhood parrots often came to eat them. One day two parrots flew in and Joseph fed them some rice. The birds not only returned the following day, but also brought along other hungry friends. Today between 2,000~4,000 beautiful parrots visit the birdman twice a day.

    Joseph does not feed the birds raw(生的) rice. He cooks the rice! This means that the amazing man usually gets up at 4:30 am every morning and spends over an hour making the breakfast for birds. He then puts the rice on 14 boards on the top of his house carefully.

The breakfast rush begins at about 6:00 am when the beautiful parrots fly in and continues until every last piece of the delicious rice is gone! The similar situation happens in the evening when the birds arrive at around 4:00 pm and stay for almost two hours. Not only the superman feeds them, but also takes in sick and hurt birds and nurses them back to health.

    Of course, feeding so many birds is not a cheap job. Joseph spends 40% of his income(收入) of $13 as a camera repairman on the meals every day. The superman says all of his actions come out of a feeling of love.

    Though Joseph has no plans to stop the action now, he does worry about what will happen to the beautiful birds as he gets older and is unable to go on.

    My grandfather Jack is 96 years old, and he has had an interesting life. He has traveled a lot in his life in the Far East He visited the Taj Mahal in India and the Pyramids in Egypt. He hunted (狩猎）lions in Africa, and rode a camel in the Sahara Desert. He says the most beautiful place he has travelled to is Kathmandu in Nepal.

    Jack has married twice. His first wife died when she was 32. He met his second wife Maria while he was cycling round France. They have been married for 50 years, and they have lived happily in a small village since they got married.

    Jack says that he has never been ill in his life. The secret of good health, according to my grandfather, is exercise. He goes swimming every morning. He has done this since he was a boy. He also has a glass of wine every night Perhaps that is his secret!

    One day, 100 people were attending a speech. The speaker was making a speech about happiness. However, after a few hours, people began to lose their attention. The speaker thought of an idea. He stopped his speech and asked all of the people to take part in a group activity.

    He gave each person a balloon in the room. Each person was asked to write his or her name on the balloon with a black marker (记号笔). Then, all of the balloons were collected and moved to another room.

The 100 people were then let into the room and told to find the balloon with their own name

    Everyone rushed around, crazily searching for their own balloon. People were bumping into and tripping (绊倒) over each other.

But after about five minutes of searching, no one could find their own balloon.

    After seeing this, the speaker asked each person to collect a balloon and try to find the person, whose name was written on it. Everyone started talking to each other and asking each other for their name. In just a few minutes, everyone had his or her own balloon.

    "Can you see what happened?" the speaker said. "The balloons are like the happiness we look for in our own lives. Everyone is busy looking for their own happiness, not caring what happens to others. But sometimes the best way to find happiness is to help others. Help them find happiness and you can find your own."

    In ancient China, people's names had three parts: their family name, given name and courtesy name (字).

    Take Li Bai, a famous Tang Dynasty poet as an example. His family name was Li, his given name was Bai, and his courtesy name was Taibai.

    People used their given name when they were among family members. But in social (社交的) life, they called each other by their courtesy names to show respect(尊重).

    Men would get their courtesy name when they turned 20. It was a symbol of adulthood (成年). Women would get their courtesy name after getting married (结婚).

    One's courtesy name often had something to do with one's given name. For example, Mencius' name was Meng Ke (孟轲). His courtesy name was Ziyu (子舆). Both Ke and Ziyu mean "carriage (马车)". Zhuge Liang's given name was Liang (亮), which means "bright". His courtesy name was Kongming (孔明), and it means "very bright".