VOA标准英语2012--Angola's Economic Boom Has Winners and Losers
时间:2019-01-13 作者:英语课 分类:VOA标准英语2012年(九月)
Angola's Economic Boom Has Winners and Losers
The city has become a big construction site. Everywhere in Luanda, new buildings are rising from the ground, as a ballet of cranes is shaping the new skyline of the capital. Luanda is busy leaving the past behind - burying 27 years of civil war and devastation 1 under mountains of petrodollars.
With an annual growth rate of 11 percent, the second biggest oil producer in Africa is attracting companies and western workers - many fleeing economic crises elsewhere.
Like Sylvia Soares, the young Portuguese 2 architect who has lived in Luanda for two years. She says she would not have had the same opportunities, had she stayed in Portugal.
"There is no job in Portugal. Not even for the renowned 3 architects, so you can imagine how it is for young architects who have just graduated from university," she said.
Soares says her parents approve of her choice to come work in Angola.
"[My parents] have seen it as a short-period thing to do, because by the time I come back to Portugal, I'll have a better financial situation than if I had stayed in Portugal," she said.
And Luanda is a good place for a young architect, as it transforms itself to meet its ambition of becoming a world-class city. A few of the changes include the new parliament that is a replica 4 of the American congress and the newly inaugurated waterfront.
Geographer 5 Chloé Buire says the social composition of the city is also changing.
"There is a whole rescaling of the city actually," Buire said. "And it's not only that there is a special sprawl 6, like, expansion, but also a whole social reshaping of the central city being emptied of its poorest communities [which] were evicted 7 in the peripheries 8."
The evictions started in 2010. To provide the space for a new political center, the government destroyed several slums and neighborhoods. Thousands of families were relocated - one hour, sometimes two, away from the city center.
Zango is one of the new neighborhoods where the people were re-settled.
Carolina, who now lives in Zango, remembers the day they came to destroy her house in the city.
"It was a surprise, nobody knew. Suddenly, they came and said that they were going to destroy the houses," she said. "They brought us in this open space. We had nothing. There was a lot of young kids, and we were getting sick because of the mosquitos."
Carolina says her husband lost his truck-driving job because he now lives too far away. She has to spend $10 and take five different taxis to travel to the city and back every day.
"My life is worse now, because to eat, we have move up and down every day to sell things," she said.
Today, approximately 30 percent of Angolans live in Luanda, and the development of the city - that started even during the war - is expected to continue in the coming years.
- The bomb caused widespread devastation. 炸弹造成大面积破坏。
- There was devastation on every side. 到处都是破坏的创伤。 来自《简明英汉词典》
- They styled their house in the Portuguese manner.他们仿照葡萄牙的风格设计自己的房子。
- Her family is Portuguese in origin.她的家族是葡萄牙血统。
- He is one of the world's renowned writers.他是世界上知名的作家之一。
- She is renowned for her advocacy of human rights.她以提倡人权而闻名。
- The original conservatory has been rebuilt in replica.温室已按原样重建。
- The young artist made a replica of the famous painting.这位年轻的画家临摹了这幅著名的作品。
- His grandfather is a geographer.他的祖父是一位地理学家。
- Li Siguang is a famous geographer.李四光是一位著名的地理学家。
- In our garden,bushes are allowed to sprawl as they will.在我们园子里,灌木丛爱怎么蔓延就怎么蔓延。
- He is lying in a sprawl on the bed.他伸开四肢躺在床上。
- A number of tenants have been evicted for not paying the rent. 许多房客因不付房租被赶了出来。
- They had evicted their tenants for non-payment of rent. 他们赶走了未交房租的房客。
- The peripheries are lined by respiratory epithelium. 表面是线性排列的呼吸道上皮。 来自互联网