2015_05_LT_III_MOCK_Lingua e Traduzione Inglese III

Corso di Laurea in Lingue e Culture Moderne
Lingua e Traduzione Inglese III (dott.ssa Renata Oggero)
Mock Exam May 2015
Nome e Cognome __________________________ Matricola __________
Part A: Use of English and Reading Comprehension (1h30’)
A.1 Rewrite the phrases below, keeping the same meaning, by completing the following phrases
and including the word in brackets.
E.g.
This is the first time I have been to Rome
(never)
I have……………………………….
I have never been to Rome before
1.
Bill Gates has got more money than I have.
(rich)
I _______________________________________________ Bill Gates.
2.
Unless you do your homework, you won’t be allowed to go out.
(if)
You_______________________________________________ homework.
3.
We last went to the seaside in August.
(since)
We _______________________________________________ August
4.
They telephoned the police to get them to come to the scene of the accident.
(called)
The police_______________________________________________ the scene of the accident.
5.
“Do you like sausages?”, she asked us.
(if)
She asked _______________________________________________
6.
When the water boils, we will put the pasta in.
(until)
We_______________________________________________ the water boils.
7.
The mechanic is going to repair my car tomorrow.
(get)
I am _______________________________________________ tomorrow.
8.
I didn’t go to the concert because I hadn’t got enough money.
(would)
If I ________________________, ________________________________ concert.
9.
You mustn’t smoke in the classroom.
(smoking)
_______________________________________________ in the classroom
10.
He can’t speak English very well.
(good)
He isn’t_______________________________________________ English.
(___/20)
A.2 Complete the following text by using ONE word only for each gap
Getting from the airport to the centre of Valencia, ________ is where paella originally comes from, is a doddle. You
unpack and settle into your downtown self-catering apartment and already you are thinking about paella, ________ no
one has warned you that ordering paella in the centre of Valencia is the equivalent to a culinary catastrophe. Other things
you probably do not know are that there are dozens of kinds ________ paella as ________ as the fact that for the best
paellas you need to order in advance.
________ a delicious seafood paella take the metro to the Las Arenas beach where there is a row of famous and
reasonably priced restaurants right by the sand. Here you will not ________ to book ahead but you will need to be
patient as real paellas are made individually and take half an hour or so ________ prepare. While away your time
munching tellinas or clams.
________ you decide to rent a car, book a Valencian paella in Serra, which is a town up in the mountains, to savour
what the Valencians consider to be the authentic paella. It is made with chicken, rabbit, snails, rosemary, butter beans
and green beans and cooked over a log fire. You have to book though or your journey will be wasted. My favourite
restaurant is "La Balsa de San Antonio", just out of town tucked into a bend in the mountain road by a small reservoir.
________ advantage of having a car and drive out to ________ fishing village of El Palmar by the lagoon. Order arros
a banda or arros amb caranc, which is crab and rice stew along with a serving of spicy eels with potatoes called all i pebre.
(___/10)
Corso di Laurea in Lingue e Culture Moderne
Lingua e Traduzione Inglese III (dott.ssa Renata Oggero)
Mock Exam May 2015
Nome e Cognome __________________________ Matricola __________
A.3 Carefully read the passage below and answer the following questions (N.b. answer using complete
sentences)
This isn't a story about Elvis Presley. This is a story about Chuckie Walaach, Chuck's wife, Carol, and me. Carol should
have been my wife but things didn't work out the way they should have and so she became Chuck's wife instead. Carol got
pregnant right after our senior year at Stimson High. It's true that Carol and I hadn't actually had a date in four years but
I would have married her anyway, even though I knew it couldn't really have been my baby. I'd always been too much of a
gentleman for something like that to happen. But not Chuckie Walaach. Carol admitted it was Chuck's baby so he was the
one who got to marry her.
That's so typical of Chuck Walaach. Lucky Chuckie, I call him. In our penultimate year at school, the star of the school
football team pulled a muscle when in the back of Tamara Newsome's father's Cadillac with Tamara. Chuck took his place
in the team and ended up getting the credit for the whole successful season. When they were choosing the leading man
for the end of year Stimson High School Musical, the first choice, Pete Boyd Beasley, got laryngitis but who got the part
instead of me? Chuckie Walaach.
All that happened about twenty years ago though. I'm a mature man now; forgive and forget. Except. After school,
Chuck went into the family business as a junior executive. I went to college and was doing fine until my father crushed his
foot under a tractor and my mother got ill with a rare type of swine breeder's syndrome so I had to come home to help.
Besides on a farm, there's only one place in Stimson to work: the Walaach School Bus Body Manufacturing Plant. Chuck
knew I had a talent with numbers from my days on the scoreboards at the Stimson High games. Walaach Bus moved me
in as head of their accounts department.
The general public would be surprised at all that goes into making a school bus body. But this isn't about accounts or
design and construction of school bus bodies. It's about Chuck and his Elvis impersonation. Since Chuck became
company president, he hasn’t seemed to be interested in the bus body business anymore. In fact, for this last year I've
practically been running the whole show for him. Partly that's because I'm better at it than he is but mostly it's because
Chuckie Walaach thinks he can be Elvis. He's grown sideburns and instead of letting the grey come naturally, as I do, he's
started dying all his hair black. I'm not just talking about what’s on his head and face. I'm talking about those little tufts
that come out through his shirt front. It's disgusting.
At this year's company picnic, Chuck came in a white and gold lame skin suit with three backing singers and a full
rhythm band. The men who work in the factory all cheered for him, but what does that mean? They work for the guy for
two hundred sixty-one and a half days of the year (less three weeks vacation if they've been there for over five years). And
Carol! Well, she came to that company function in a short flared skirt that didn't belong up on a stage with all that open
strut-work underneath. She cheered him on, too. But of course she has to, she's got to live with the guy for three-hundred
sixty-five days a year, no planned vacation. Now a platinum blonde, she's still a good looking woman. She's got too much
style for Chuckie Walaach and when she bent down and looked under the stage to ask if I'd like to crawl out and eat lunch
at her private table, I could tell that she'd finally got bored with the shallow excuse for a man that Chuck really is. I also
realized how much fulfilment she and I could bring into each other's empty lives.
This induced me to work out a plan. I already knew that in March, Chuck would perform in an Elvis Look-Alike
Contest. Chuckie Walaach is certainly not the only man in the world who thinks he could pass for Elvis. Apparently a
hundred and thirty-six other fools think the same thing. This was to be a battle of the Elvises. Elvii's? Whatever.
So. I bought myself some temporary hair dye and a snub nose like the ones Elvis favored towards the end and I booked
a room at the Elvis Contest Hotel. I did not, however, give my real name. It was a good plan. Almost foolproof, I've got to
say. Imagine the police looking for an Elvis assassin who looks like Elvis in a town with one hundred-thirty-seven Elvis's
walking around. I didn't even have to hide, I just walked into the Elvis Grand Ball Room, pulled my gun, shot my Elvis,
dropped the gun and walked back out before any of those other Elviis could swivel a hip. Then I immediately got on a
plane back to Stimson, washed out the midnight-blue out of my hair and reported for work the next morning.
And who was there? Chuckie Walaach, third in the Battle of the Elvis Look-Alikes. He was full of news about this contest
and the killing. Seems that the number two Elvis — the one who was killed — was wanted for serial murders in three
different states. The bullet which killed him just missed Lucky Chuckie and now he some kind of hero. Pictures in all the
newspapers, national news coverage. Even people who should know better have started treating him like he had
superstar status, especially Carol. She even asked me if I'd like to drive them back to the airport. The Elvis Contest Hotel
has had so much publicity, they've decided to give the hero and his adoring wife a week long vacation in their honeymoon
suite.
Adapted from “Impersonating Elvis” by Polly Nelson
1. Who could not perform the leading male role in the Stimson High School musical and who played the part instead?
___________________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________________
2. What colour did the narrator and Carol dye their hair?
___________________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________________
3. How many Elvis-look-alikes entered the competition and what position did Chuckie finish in?
___________________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________________
4. Why did Carol and Chuckie get married?
___________________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________________
5. When did Chuckie lose interest in the company and why?
___________________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________________
6. Why was the narrator made the head of accounts at the Walaach School Bus Body Manufacturing Plant?
___________________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________________
7. What injury meant that Chuckie played in the school football team?
___________________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________________
8. What has Chuckie done to look like Elvis?
___________________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________________
9. How did Chuckie and Carol dress for the company picnic?
___________________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________________
10. Will Carol and the bring fulfilment “into each others lives”? Why/why not?
___________________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________________
(___/30)
Corso di Laurea in Lingue e Culture Moderne
Lingua e Traduzione Inglese III (dott.ssa Renata Oggero)
Mock Exam May 2015
Nome e Cognome __________________________ Matricola __________
Part C: Writing (1h30’)
Write at least 350 words on ONE of the following.
1.
Over recent months there has been a lot of talk about the university reforms. How do you think the university
should be reformed and why?
2.
Calabria is one of the poorest regions in Western Europe and would be even poorer if it did not receive financial
help. What do you think needs to be changed so that Calabria can become economically independent?
3.
The comprehension text referred to Elvis Presley and how he is a hero to some people. Do you think it is
important to have heroes? Why/why not?
(40)
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(___/40)