Question

I needed to buy a digital (數(shù)碼）camera, one that was simply good at taking good photos, maybe sometimes for magazines. I went online, spent 15 minutes reading product reviews on good websites, wrote down the names of three top recommendations and left for my nearest big friendly camera store. There on the shelf was one of the cameras on my list. And it was on special offer. I pointed at it and asked an assistant (售貨員），“Can I have one of those?” He looked perturbed (不安).“Do you want to try it first?” he said. It didn’t quite sound like a question. “Do I need to?” I replied. “There’s nothing wrong with it?” This made him look a bit unhappy and I started to feel bad. “No, no. But you should try it.” he said. “Compare (比較）it with the others.”

I looked across at the others: shelves of similar cameras along the wall, offering a bit different prices and discounts (折扣)，with each company selling some models around the same basic (基本的） box. With so many models to choose from, it seemed that I would have to spend hours weighing X against Y, always trying to take Z and possibly H into my choice. But when I had finished, I would still have only the same two choices that I had entered the store with: first, soon after I carried my new camera out of the shop, it would be worth half what I paid for it; and second, my wonderful camera would very quickly be replaced (取代）by a new model.

In the end, I agreed to try the model I had chosen. The assistant seemed a nice man. So I let him take out my chosen camera from the shelf, show how it took excellent pictures of some shoppers... and when he started to introduce the special parts, I stopped him and asked whether I needed to buy a carry-case and a memory card as well.

Why do we think that new choices still offer us anything new? Perhaps it is because they offer a chance to avoid facing the fact that our real choices in this culture are far more limited than we would like to imagine.

(    )6. The shop assistant insisted (堅持）that the writer should_.

A. try the camera to see if there was anything wrong with it

B. compare the camera he had chosen with the others

C. get more information about different companies

D. believe him and stop asking questions

(    )7. What does the writer mean by “it would be worth half what I paid for it”?

A. The camera would soon fall in value.

B. The price of the camera was very high.

C. The quality of the camera was not good.

D. He should get a 50% discount

(    )    8. The writer decided to try the model he had chosen because he_.

A. knew very little about it

B. didn’t believe the shop assistant

C. had a special interest in taking pictures of shoppers

D. wanted to make sure the one he chose would be the best

(    )    9. It can be inferred (推斷）from the passage that in the writer’s opinion (觀點(diǎn))，__.

A. people waste too much money on cameras

B. cameras have become an important part of our daily life

C. in fact we don’t need so many choices when buying a product

D. famous companies care more about the money they can make than quality

Answer 1

 6-9: BADC