Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct word or phrase that best fits each of the numbered blanks from 26 to 30.

(26) _____________friends is one of the most difficult and worthwhile experiences of human life because it requires time and effort and patience and understanding and acceptance and honesty. Many people (27)_____________friendship with acquaintances and they're not the same at all. Acquaintances are people you (28) _____________with; they're convenient but interchangeable.

Friends are people you actively seek out, people with whom you have something in (29)_____________, and the link is deeper and stronger. It is very possible for one to become the other, and everyone who becomes a friend had to be an acquaintance first. (Friendship can be downgraded, for example, when two people move apart geographically or emotionally or situationally - changing jobs, (30) _____________ status, and so on). If you've taken yourself off house arrest, you've begun making acquaintances. The question then is how to turn an acquaintance into a friend.

Due to lacking_____________, they couldn’t open a new shop as scheduled.

Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the questions from 31 to 35.

In the 1960s it took pop and rock groups one or two days to record their songs. Nowadays, it can take months and months. Many rock groups begin by recording only one instrument, for example, the voice. Then they record other instruments- electric piano, synthesizer, guitars and drums.

Next, they might use a computer to add special effects. Finally, they 'mix' all the instruments until they get the sound that they want. This means that a CD or cassette will always sound very different from a live concert.

Music engineers have developed a new computer program that will change the future of music. A computer can analyze a singer's voice. Then if you give the computer the lyrics and music of a song, the computer can 'sing' it in that voice. This means that a singer only needs to record one song and the computer can then sing other songs in the singer's own voice Singers can sing new songs many years after they have died.

Most of us listen to music for pleasure, but for the record companies, music is a product, the same as soap powder. When a record company finds a new group (or "band"), they first try to develop the band's 'profile'. They will try to create an 'image' for the band that they think will attract young people. Instead of allowing the band's full artistic freedom, they will often tell the band what they should wear, what they should say and how they should sing and play.

In recent year, many rock groups have started their own record companies because they say that the big companies are too commercial:

Today, to record songs, it takes_____________.

We put his success_____________his efforts.

The book says that the revolution was_____________off by the assassination of the president.

What made Mark_____________his family and his job? Where did he go and why?

Mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the following questions.

If your invitations are met with repeated_____________, you should just leave him alone.

After leaving high school, my brother decided to_____________in the army.