Exercise 1:

Read the article and for questions 1-5, choose the answer (A, B, C or D) which
you think fits best according to the text.

We travel, initially, to lose ourselves; and we travel, next, to find ourselves. We

travel to open our hearts and eyes and learn more about the world than our
newspapers will accommodate. We travel to bring what little we can, in our
ignorance and knowledge, to those parts of the globe whose riches are
differently dispersed. And we travel, in essence, to become young fools again -
to slow time down and get taken in, and lose ourselves. Travel is a wondrous
thing that guides us toward a better balance of wisdom and compassion - of
seeing the world clearly, and yet feeling it truly. For seeing without feeling can
be uncaring; while feeling without seeing can be blind. Yet for me the first
great joy of travelling is simply the luxury of leaving all my beliefs and
certainties at home, and seeing everything I thought I knew in a different light,
and from a crooked angle.

The sovereign freedom of travelling comes from the fact that it whirls you
around and turns you upside down, and stands everything you took for granted
on its head. If a diploma can famously be a passport (to a journey through hard
realism), then a passport can be a diploma (for a crash course in cultural
relativism). And the first lesson we learn on the road, whether we like it or not,
is how provisional and provincial are the things we imagine to be universal.

We travel, then, in part just to shake up our complacencies by seeing all the
moral and political urgencies, the life-and-death dilemmas, that we seldom
have to face at home. Travel is the best way we have of rescuing the humanity
of places, and saving them from abstraction and ideology. And in the process,
we also get saved from abstraction ourselves, and come to see how much we
can bring to the places we visit, and how much we can become a kind of carrier
pigeon transporting back and forth what every culture needs. For in closed or
impoverished places, like Pagan or Lhasa or Havana, we are the eyes and ears
of the people we meet, their only contact with the world outside. One of the
challenges of travel, therefore, is learning how to import – and export –
dreams with tenderness.
By now, all of us have heard the old Marcel Proust line about how the real
voyage of discovery consists not in seeing new places but in seeing with new
eyes. Yet one of the subtler beauties of travel is that it enables you to bring
new eyes to the people you encounter. Thus, even as holidays help you
appreciate your own home more - not least by seeing it through a distant
admirer's eyes –

they help you bring newly appreciative – distant – eyes to the places you visit.
For many of us travel is a quest not just for the unknown, but the unknowing; I,
at least, travel in search of an innocent eye that can return me to a more
innocent self. I tend to believe more abroad than I do at home and I tend to be
more easily excited abroad, and even kinder.

In that spirit, it's vitally important to remember that all travel is a two-way
transaction, a point intrinsic to travel that we all too easily forget. For what we
often ignore when we go abroad is that we are objects of scrutiny as much as
the people we scrutinise, and we are being consumed by the cultures we
consume. At the very least, we are objects of speculation (and even desire)
who can seem as exotic to the people around us as they do to us.

Travel, at heart, is a kind of life-changing ritual. A desperate way for our

modern secular selves to latch onto some sense of spirituality that enriches us
as people. A chance to share something meaningful with others while keeping
our minds mobile and awake. As Harvard philosopher George Santayana wrote,
“There is wisdom in turning as often as possible from the familiar to the
unfamiliar; it keeps the mind nimble; it kills prejudice, and it fosters
humour.” Travel, in the end, is a heightened state of awareness, in which we
are receptive, undimmed by familiarity and ready to be transformed. That is
why the best trips, like the best adventures, never really end.

1 The author claims that the main pleasure of travelling is

A being able to let go of everything and experience new perspectives.

B contributing to the lives of people in less developed countries than your own.

C experiencing the thrill of throwing oneself into the moment.

D understanding our place in the world in a global context.

2 In the third paragraph, what does the author say is an important responsibility
of a traveller?
A They must preserve the memory and goodness of the place they visit.

B They should help promote the hopes and aspirations of those they
meet.

C They have to respect the social and cultural conditions of where they
are.

D They need to appreciate their unique status as a link to the wider world.

3 Why does the author mention Marcel Proust?

A to expand further on his ideas

B to provide a perfect example

C to contrast it with other people’s opinions

D to criticise his view on the topic

4 In paragraph five , the author believes that travel is

A an unequal enterprise that favours only the traveller.

B a reciprocal exchange that fascinates hosts as much as visitors.

C a risk to locals who the tourism industry exploits.

D a sector where issues are overlooked and conveniently ignored.

5 The reference to ritual serves to illustrate

A the need to follow traditions while travelling.

B the power of religion in other parts of the world.

C the way that people use travel to fill a void in their lives.

D the degree of superstition practiced by travellers.

6 Which best serves as the title for the passage?

A The Search for Wonder

B Being a Responsible Traveller

C How to Make a Wonderous Trip

D Mission of a Carrier
Exercise 2.

Do You Have True Friendships?

Think of your friends from the ones you spend considerable time with to those you just chat
with on social media. How many of them are really your friends? How many just offer
artificial closeness? How can you tell the difference?

In his ethical masterpiece The Nicomachean Ethics, the eminent philosopher Aristotle turns his
brilliant mind to the problem of what true friendship actually is. Aristotle views the good life as
requiring not only virtue, an internal good that you are largely responsible for, but also external
goods which facilitate virtue and are enjoyable in themselves. Such things include being well-off
financially, educated, reasonably healthy, having decent luck and having good friends. The
question of what a friend is therefore holds great importance for him.

As with all of Aristotle’s virtues friendship, or ‘philia’, as he calls it, is the midway point
between two vices. A lack of it leads to the vice of egoism and a detached coldness, while the
person who is too friendly with everyone is also vicious in their own way. Aristotle would agree
that ‘The friend to all is a friend to none’. To be a self-actualised person, in the Aristotelian
sense, you need to master the art of genuine friendship.

He defines three sorts of friendship. The friendship of utility is the first. These friendships are
those of the materialist, based on what the two people involved can do for one another, and often
have little to do with the other individual as a person at all. Such friendships as this include
offering hospitality or gifts for purely selfish motivations. These friendships lack sincerity and
can end rapidly, as soon as any possible use for the other person is gone.

The second is the friendship of pleasure. These are the friendships where you choose to
associate with someone based on enjoyment of a shared activity and the pursuit of fleeting
pleasures and emotions. The guy who you go to a football game with but would never be able to
tolerate seeing anywhere else is this kind of friend. Aristotle declares it to be an immature
friendship of the young. This is, again, an often short-lived friendship as people’s interests may
vary, causing them to suddenly lose a connection. In both of these friendships the other person is
not being valued ‘in themselves’ but as a means to an end: pleasure in one and some useful thing
in the other. While these are listed as ‘lesser’ friendships due to the motive, Aristotle is open to
the idea of the final, and greatest, form of friendship finding its genesis in these categories.

The final category is true friendship. These are the people you bond with and like for
themselves, the people who push you to be a better person. The motivation is that you care for
the person themselves and therefore the relationship is much more stable than the previous two
categories. These friendships are few and far between because people who make the cut are
hard to find. Aristotle laments the rarity of such friendships, but notes they are possible between
two virtuous people with empathy who can invest the energy and time needed to create such a
bond.

While Aristotle encourages us to seek the ‘pure’ friendship, he doesn’t necessarily think you
are a bad person for having friends of the previous two sorts. We all have them after all. The real
problem is when you fail to grasp that they are of the lower kind and make no effort to find
better relationships. Aristotle was explicit in his opinion; while friendships of virtue are rare and
might take time to form, they offer formidable benefits and greater resilience over time. In a
world of hyper-connectivity and ever increasing social interactions, the question of what
friendship really is has never been more pertinent. The guidance of Aristotle, with his views of
differing relationships and the potential for improvement, is much needed in our modern world.

1 According to the passage, which of these elements is important to virtue?

A understanding the difference between right and wrong

B possessing a natural decency which comes from the heart

C continuing a strict moral code that has been passed on to you

D being receptive to positive influences around you

2 In paragraph 2, the writer suggests that

A those who attempt to please everyone ultimately satisfy nobody.

B universal kindness bears rewards for all parties involved.

C the desire to be popular motivates people to make unrealistic promises.

D in friendships sometimes you have to be cruel to be kind.

3 Which word in paragraph 4 conveys the idea of how long a friendship might last?

A fleeting

B lesser

C short-lived

D immature

4 The phrase ‘make the cut’ in paragraph 5 is used to imply that virtuous friends

A have high standards.

B are quite rare to find.

 C are inflexible in their beliefs.

D don’t easily accept others.

5 What does they refer to in paragraph 6?

A pure forms of friendships

B friendships from the first two categories

C friendships of pleasure

D friendships of utility