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QUESTION: 408 Exam Topic: 30 Sec Thirty (401 to 410)

What if someone told you about a kind of grass that grows as tall as the tallest trees?
A grass that can be made as strong as steel?
A grass from which houses, furniture, boats, and hundreds of other useful things can be made? A grass that you would even enjoy eating?

Would you believe that person?
You should, for that grass is bamboo, the “wood” of 1,001 uses. Bamboo may look like wood, but it is part of the family of plants that includes wheat, oats, and barley. It is a kind of grass. This grass is not just a material for making useful products.
Young bamboo is eaten, often mixed with other vegetables, in many Asian foods. Bamboo grows in many parts of the world. In the United States it grows in an area from Virginia west to Indiana and south to Florida, Louisiana, and Texas. Most bamboo, however, is found in warm, wet climates, especially in Asia and on the islands of the South Pacific Ocean. In most Asian countries, bamboo is nearly as important as rice. Many Asians live in bamboo houses.

They sit on bamboo chairs and sleep on bamboo mats. They fence their land with bamboo and use the wood for cages for chickens and pigs. Bamboo is used to build large buildings as well as homes.
When it is glued in layers, it becomes as strong as steel. On some islands in the South Pacific, bamboo is even used for water pipes. This extraordinary material has many other uses. It is used to make musical instruments, such as flutes and recorders. Paper made from bamboo has been highly prized by artists for thousands of years. Bamboo is light and strong, and it bends without breaking. It is cheap, floats on water, almost never wears out, and is easy to grow. Nothing else on earth grows quite so fast as bamboo.
At times you can even see it grow! Botanists have recorded growths of more than three feet in just twenty-four hours! Bamboo is hollow and has a strong root system that almost never stops growing and spreading. In fact, only after it flowers, an event that may happen only once every thirty years, will bamboo die. There are more than a thousand kinds of bamboo.

The smallest is only three inches tall and one-tenth of an inch across. The largest reaches more than two hundred feet in height and seven inches in diameter. No wonder, then, that the lives of nearly half the people on earth would change enormously if there were no longer any bamboo. No wonder, too, that to many people bamboo is a symbol of happiness and good fortune.
What is the main idea of this passage?

Bamboo has at least 2,000 uses.
Bamboo grows at an amazing rate and is found primarily in Asia.
Bamboo is an amazing grass that can be used in multiple ways.
There are at least a 1,000 types of bamboo.
Bamboo could be considered a flower in some cases.

Answer(s): C

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QUESTION: 409 Exam Topic: 30 Sec Thirty (401 to 410)

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Every year since 1986, some of the world's most daring runners have gathered in the desert of Morocco. They are there to take part in one of the most difficult races in the world. The Marathon of the Sands, as it is called, covers over 125 miles of desert and mountain wilderness. The runners complete the course in fewer than seven days, and they run with their food, clothing, and sleeping bags on their backs. The Marathon of the Sands was founded in 1986 by Patrick Bauer. His idea was to give the runners, who come from all over the world, a special kind of adventure. Most of the runners in this race have found that they form deep friendships with the other runners during their days and nights in the desert. Facing terrible heat and complete exhaustion, they learn much about themselves and each other. For most of the runners, though, the challenge of the race is the main reason for coming. On the first day, for example, they run fifteen miles across a desert of sand, rocks, and thorny bushes. Few runners finish the day without blistered and raw feet. They also suffer from a lack of water. (They are allowed less than nine quarts of water during each day of the race.) Most of all, they are exhausted when they arrive at the campsite for the night. The second day, the runners are up at 6:00am.

Within a few hours, it is 100 degrees F, but the runners do not hesitate. They must cover eighteen miles that day. That night, they rest. They must be ready for the next day's run. On the third day, the runners must climb giant sand dunes- the first they have faced. Dust and sand mix with the runners' sweat. Soon their faces are caked with mud. After fifteen miles of these conditions, the runners finally reach their next camp.

The race continues like this for four more days. The fourth and fifth days are the worst. On the fourth day, the runners pass through a level stretch and a beautiful, tree-filled oasis, but then, on this and on the next day, they cross more than twenty-one miles of rocks and sand dunes. The temperature soars to 125 degrees F, and many runners cannot make it. Helicopters rush fallen runners to medical help. Runners who make it to the end of the fifth day know that the worst is over.

On the sixth day, heat and rocks punish the racers terribly. In the Valley of Dra, the wind picks up and, as the desert heat is thrust against them with great force, they grow more and more exhausted. The seventh day is the last, with only twelve miles to be covered. The dusty, tired, blistered runners set out at daybreak.

Near the finish line, children race along with the runners, for everybody has caught the excitement. The ones who have run the whole marathon know they have accomplished what most people could not even dream of. “During the hard moments,” says one contestant who has raced here twice, “I'd think, ‘Why am I here?'

Then I'd realize I was there to find my limits.” What is the main idea of this passage?

The Marathon of the Sands race tests the limits of human endurance.
The runners run at their own pace.
The race causes the strong to stumble and the weak to not finish.
The seventh day is the hardest day of the race.
Every runner runs the race to find their human limits.

Answer(s): A

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QUESTION: 410 Exam Topic: 30 Sec Thirty (401 to 410)

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High in the Andes Mountains in Peru stands the ancient city of Machu Picchu. No one knows why this great city was built, nor is it likely that we will ever know. Nevertheless, the deserted city of Machu Picchu is important for what it reveals about the ancient Inca people of South America.

The Incas once ruled a great empire that covered a large part of the South American continent. The empire was more than five hundred years old when the first Spanish explorers, looking for gold, went to that continent in the sixteenth century. The Incas were an advanced people. They were skillful engineers who paved their roads and built sturdy bridges. They plowed the land in such a way that rains would not wash away valuable soil.

They dug ditches to carry water into dry areas for farming. Even though they did not know about the wheel, the Incas were able to move huge stone blocks- some as heavy as ten tons- up the sides of mountains to build walls. The blocks were fitted so tightly, without cement of any kind, that it would be impossible to slip a knife blade between them! The walls have stood firm through great storms and earthquakes that have destroyed many modern buildings.

The Incas were great artists, too. Today, Incan dishes and other kinds of pottery are prized for their wonderful designs. Since both gold and silver were in great supply, the Incas created splendid objects from these precious metals.
While it is true that the Incas had no written language, they kept their accounts by using a system of knotted strings of various lengths and colors. The sizes of the knots and the distances between them represented numbers. At its height, the Incan empire included as many as thirty million people.

The emperor ruled them with an iron hand. He told his subjects where to live, what to plant, how long they should workeven whom they could marry. Since he owned everything, the emperor gave what he wished when he wished- and in the amount he wished -to his people. In 1533 Spanish explorers led by Francisco Pizarro murdered the emperor of the Incas. Earlier, the heir to the Incan empire had also been killed. The Incas, who had always been entirely dependent on their emperor, now had no recognized leader. The Spaniards easily conquered the empire and plundered its riches. Have the Incas disappeared from South America?

Not at all. In Peru alone, once the center of that great empire, eighty percent of the twenty million people are descendants of the Inca people. Evidence of the Incan empire can be found in many other places in South America as well. You can even visit Machu Picchu. The remains of this ancient city still stand high in the mountains of Peru, an awesome tribute to this once powerful empire.
What is the main idea of this passage?

The Incas once inhabited the ancient city of Machu Picchu.
Peru was the primary country of the Incas.
The Incan empire can be found in ancient cities and was plundered by the Spanish.
Spanish conquerors destroyed the Incan empire in the thirteenth century.
Machu Picchu was the capital of the Incan empire.

Answer(s): C

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