Eat, drink and be merry. That’s what the Spring Festival is all about. But there are millions of people, too, who love to let happiness go up in smoke.
Offering cigarettes to guests is a traditional Chinese way of showing respect to them. A cup of tea and cigarettes are perhaps the most common way of welcoming a guest in China, especially during festive occasions such as the Lunar New Year.
No wonder, 40 percent of the people surveyed recently said they would smoke at least twice the usual number of cigarettes during the Spring Festival holiday because of all those gatherings and parties. Only 20 percent of the respondents said they would refuse a cigarette when offered one. Why can't the others do the same? Because they could be seen as being rude, said more than half of the respondents. Fifteen percent feared they could be taken as "someone who cannot get along well with others".
The Think-tank Research Center for Health Development and Sohu.com survey shows 61 percent Chinese think offering a cigarette is useful for socializing, and 52 percent have offered cigarettes to others. The study polled 3,800 people, 64 percent of them men.
One-third of those polled were smokers, out of which 57 percent said they couldn't give up smoking because of the offering-and-accepting culture. "People have accepted offering cigarettes as an effective way of making friends." research center director Wu Yiqun says.
China has more than 350 million smokers, catering to the tobacco market that is worth 500 billion yuan. "The survey shows we still have a lot of work to do," she says. "Since Beijing is trying to make the Olympic Games smoke-free, it is time to let people know that offering a cigarette is a bad habit and it should be given up immediately."
1．The passage is written with the purpose of .
A．telling us a custom about the Chinese Spring Festival
B．introducing a way to make friends with Chinese
C．stopping smoking during the Beijing Olympics
D．telling us that offering cigarettes is a bad habit
2．The third paragraph mainly tells us .
A．the fact that smokers are greatly increasing during the festival
B．the reason why refusing cigarettes is acceptable
C．the fact that many people have to smoke more cigarettes during the festival
D．it is rude to attend parties without smoking cigarettes
3．Which of the following may not be the reason that makes many people fail to refuse the offered cigarette?
A．It’s impolite to refuse. B．Smoking is harmful to non-smokers.
C．They want to be friendly. D．It’s a kind of social habit.
4．The writer mentions the 500 billion yuan tobacco market because .
A．the tobacco market is not developing smoothly
B．the writer thinks that smoking wasters a lot of money.
C．smoking is helpful to the tobacco market
D．the tobacco market attracts too many smokers
5．We can infer from the passage that .
A．people will be free to smoke during the Beijing Olympic Games.
B．only a few smokers still have the habit of offering cigarettes
C．offering cigarettes is the most effective way for socializing
D．some non-smokers will even accept the offered cigarettes
