SECTION 1
Read the text below and answer questions 1—7

Fitness Centre classes

Find the perfect class for your needs and get fit today! All classes are drop-in-friendly, unless otherwise stated.

A. Yin Yoga

With its gentle movements, Yin Yoga focuses on your deep connective tissues to get you feeling refreshed and energized. Participants should expect to hold poses for three to five minutes, and to come away with the ability to sit comfortably for longer periods of time. Great for the joints and a perfect introduction to yoga for beginners.

B. Spin101

An introduction to the basics of indoor cycling, Spin101 will have you working up a sweat and strengthening your heart in a fun, relaxed group setting. Follow the lead of our enthusiastic cycling experts Ashley and Clare as you pedal your way to improved heart health! As bikes fill up quick, members must book their spots in Spin101 at least 24 hours in advance.

C. Hot Power Yoga

Think yoga is all slow stretching and quiet meditation? Think again! This intermediate yoga class combines the fast-paced flow of power yoga with the 35° heat of hot yoga to help you move deeper into poses and improve your flexibility, stamina and posture. In Hot Power Yoga gives seasoned yogis the chance to push themselves to limits they never thought possible.

D. Zumba

Dance like no one’s watching! Zumba is a fitness dance party (complete with a soundtrack of Latin dance hits) that will have you sweating off the calories and boosting your heart rate. It doesn’t matter if you have two left feet: all are welcome at Zumba! Come in comfortable, loose-fitting clothing and supportive footwear, and get ready to sweat!

E. Body Bootcamp

This high-intensity class combines calisthenics, body weight exercises, cardio and strength training to get you feeling stronger and fitter. Classes are held in the park next to the Fitness Centre.

Read the text below and answer Questions 8—15

Vacancy for Sous Chef

Full time, permanent

A modern French-style fine dining establishment is seeking a talented Sous Chef to join our team immediately.

The Sous Chef will assist our Executive Chef in menu development and will oversee the daily operation of the kitchen. Day-to-day responsibilities will include maintaining the kitchen stock and ordering supplies as necessary, instructing and supervising line cooks and ensuring that they follow all standards and regulations, preparing dishes for customers that meet our impeccably high standards and accommodating requests related to dietary restrictions and allergies as they arise. As our guests’ satisfaction and comfort are of the utmost importance to us, we are always willing to meet whatever unique requests come our way, and have come to be especially known for our vegetarian, vegan and gluten-free options. The Sous Chef will be expected to continue satisfying such dietary requests.

The Sous Chef will be expected to arrive sometime after the lunchtime rush and remain in the kitchen until close, Tuesday to Saturday.

The ideal candidate will have five or more years of kitchen experience, at least one of which should be in a management role. Formal culinary training is a major asset, but not a necessity. Candidates should be highly knowledgeable about classic French culinary techniques and willing to learn (and teach) new recipes.

In addition to creativity and culinary expertise, the successful candidate will have strong leadership skills and will demonstrate the ability to run a large, fast-paced kitchen, often with little oversight from the Executive Chef, who will be focusing on menu planning and the development of a restaurant cookbook in the coming months.

Because our restaurant prides itself on its status as a leader in eco-friendly gastronomy, the Sous Chef will also be responsible for ensuring all waste-minimizing activities are maintained, including adhering to our composting and recycling procedures and reducing the usage of single-use plastics in the kitchen.

We will only be considering local candidates. Compensation will be calculated based on the experience level of the successful candidate. We’re proud to offer a competitive health and dental plan for our full-time employees.

We thank all applicants for their interest, but only those selected for interviews will be contacted. We will keep all CVs on file and return to them should any relevant positions become available in the future.

SECTION 2

Read the text below and answer Questions 16—22

15th Annual Seaside Half Marathon

REGISTRATION INFORMATION

Date: Thursday, October 29, 2020

Start time: 9:00 a.m.

ENTRY FEES

General (from July 1 until October 23): $115

Early bird (until June 30): $95

Charity entry: $60 (please list the charity you’re running for and the number they’ve assigned you on your registration form)

WHAT’S INCLUDED IN YOUR REGISTRATION

  • Participation medal (to be presented at the finish line)
  • Refreshments
  • Race t-shirt
  • Race bib with timing chip
  • Course and finish line entertainment
  • Free swag from our sponsors

 

RACE PACKETS

These will contain your bib (with your race number and timing chip) and t-shirt, and will be posted to racers the first week of October. These packets will also include training advice, coupons from our sponsors and information about future races and events!

 

RACE DAY

The race begins on Madeira Drive. Participants will be divided between five corrals, which will start the race at five-minute intervals from 9:00 a.m. until 9:20 a.m. Upon registration, you’ll be assigned a colour (based on your projected finish time) which will appear on your bib and determine your corral; look for the coloured flags (red, blue, green and yellow) to find your group.

 

WHAT TO EXPECT ALONG THE COURSE

Water and sports drinks will be available at six tables located every three km along the course and will be handed out by our enthusiastic volunteers. Medical attendants will also be present at each drink table, should any participants require assistance.

Portable toilets can be found at 6K, 12K and 18K.

Entertainment will also be provided along the course, including performances by local musicians and dancers. Further entertainment will wrap up the day at the finish line. Acts will be revealed closer to race day, so keep an eye on the “Updates” tab on our website! The entertainment will go ahead rain or shine!

 

TIME RESTRICTIONS

The course will be blocked off from traffic and monitored by our team of volunteers until 1:20 p.m., four hours after the final wave of participants crosses the start line. Following this time, racers who continue toward the finish line do so at their own risk, and are advised to be mindful of traffic.

Read the text below and answer Questions 23—30

How Do Languages Change Our View of the World?

In the 2016 science fiction blockbuster Arrival, the protagonist—a linguist tasked with helping the government communicate with recently-landed extra-terrestrials—finds herself, after months of losing her in their world, dreaming in the aliens’ language. Eventually, her very perception of reality is altered by their strange, complex method of communication.

This is far from just a convenient sci-fi plot point, and Arrival is far from a typical sci-fi action flick. The film is about language and its ability to change how we see the world—a concept based very much in reality.

The belief that the languages we speak change our perception of the world was first proposed hundreds of years ago, and was further developed into the theory we know today (as “linguistic relativity”, or the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis) in the 1920s. Proponents of linguistic relativity argue that language forms our world view, and therefore, people who speak different languages (with different vocabulary, grammar and sentence structures) will have different world views.

A popular example in support of this claim is the name (or rather, names) for the colour blue in Russian. Unlike in most other languages, there is no all-encompassing name for the colour most of us know of as “blue”. Russian has two words—goluboj, or light blue, and siniy, dark blue—and this linguistic difference means the two shades are treated as entirely separate colours.

So, what does this mean for perception? Well, in studies of English and Russian speakers, the Russians were shown to be faster at matching shades of blue in a colour discrimination study.

If this isn’t significant enough evidence for you, look to the Guugu Yimithirr language of Australia, which utilizes words related to cardinal points (in English: north, east, south and west) to talk about direction rather than position related to oneself (like left, right, in front of, beside, etc.). Because of this feature, speakers must therefore be constantly directionally-aware, whether they’re inside or out, in a familiar place or a new one—an ability that few speakers of languages without this attribute can claim to have.

As a still-developing hypothesis, linguistic relativity has its detractors, but however much (or little) language does influence our perceptions, there’s no question that acquiring a new language means acquiring a new perspective, even if just for the simple fact that it enables you to access a whole new range of opinions, media and works of art.

Picking up a new language may not completely alter your perception of time and reality like it did for the linguist in Arrival, but we can guarantee it will change how you look at things at least a little bit—just ask the many multilingual speakers who declare with absolute certainty that their thoughts, and even their personalities, change when the language coming out of their mouths does. It’s not sci-fi, but it is pretty magical all the same.

Read the text below and answer Questions 31—40  

The Prehistoric Settlement of Akrotiri

The Changing Face of Santorini Over the Millennia

Santorini, Greece—known for its stunning sunsets, whitewashed architecture and distinctive blue domes—is a dream destination for travellers and honeymooners around the globe. While the blue and white buildings that dot its hills have come to be symbolic of the island, they are, in fact, a rather recent development, having only become a trademark of Santorini in the late 1960s, and thus represent only a tiny blip in its lengthy history—one that extends back thousands of years into the past.

While the island’s city of Ancient Thera was excavated back in the 19th century (and now stands in remarkably well-preserved condition on a ridge of the Mesa Vuono mountain), it wasn’t until 1967 that a Greek archaeologist by the name of Spyridon Marinatos began excavating in the area and stumbled upon a vast settlement that predated Thera by thousands of years.

The settlement, the original name of which has been lost to history but which is now known as Akrotiri, was part of the great Minoan civilization, a Bronze Age civilization that was primarily located on the island of Crete. Archaeologists determined that Akrotiri had begun as a farming and fishing village, and evidence points to the settlement having been inhabited by humans as far back at the fifth millennium BC. It flourished around the third millennium BC, likely due to trade with other Aegean settlements. Its people were prosperous and enjoyed stone-paved roads and town squares and an impressively sophisticated drainage system that allowed for indoor toilets. Many of the town’s building were multi-level and featured intricate architecture, as well as gorgeous frescoes, which were recovered in the excavation and which show a rather advanced society.

So, what happened to this once-great settlement? The reason for its decline is the same reason we’re able to know so much about it today; Akrotiri was victim to one of the biggest volcanic eruptions in history, which—much like Italy’s Pompeii—preserved the town in the lava that destroyed it. Unlike at Pompeii, no human remains were discovered by archaeologists at Akrotiri, which suggests that the town’s inhabitants were spared.

The fateful event occurred sometime between 1642 and 1540 BC. The people of Akrotiri, who’d been busy repairing the settlement following the earthquake that preceded the eruption, were forced to flee and leave their lives on the island behind. In addition to wiping out the Akrotiri settlement, the eruption and its associated earthquakes and tsunamis destroyed other settlements on surrounding islands, including Crete, 120km to the north, and may have in fact contributed to the ultimate decline of the Minoan civilization. It’s no surprise that a volcanic eruption factors so significantly in Santorini’s history; the island itself is part of the remains a volcanic caldera, a crater that forms as the result of a volcanic eruption.

From all appearances, Akrotiri continued to thrive right up until the eruption that resulted in the community being lost to history for several millennia, which has led some to speculate that Akrotiri was the inspiration for Plato’s story of the lost city of Atlantis.

Following the desertion of the island by the Minoan people, Santorini remained uninhabited until the Phoenicians eventually established a settlement there after the Bronze Age, and in the 9th century BC, the Dorians set up the city that is now known as Ancient Thera. Another mass exodus took place in the middle of the last century following the economic devastation that resulted from the world wars, as well as a 1956 earthquake.

Today, the island is thriving once again, and hosts roughly two million tourists each year. Visitors to Santorini can now take a break from their caldera-side hikes and sunset cocktails to visit the excavation site of the real-life Atlantis that is Akrotiri and experience the once-great settlement firsthand.

Inhabitants come and go, but through volcanic eruptions, earthquakes and world wars, it appears that nothing can stop people from eventually finding their way back to this gem of the Agean.

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