Mathilde Wittock, a designer from Belgium, makes resting chairs out of old tennis balls. She creates them with no wood or plastic. Instead, each of her chairs is made of 500 tennis balls. It is both stylish and strong.
Wittock wants to help protect the environment because many tennis balls are thrown away and don't break down easily. About 300 million tennis balls are produced each year, and almost all of them end up in landfills (垃圾填埋场). It takes them over 400 years to break down. Big tennis events use a large number of balls, like the US Open with 70,000 and Wimbledon Championships with 55,000. The life cycle of a ball is not long, which usually lasts for nine games.
Wittock receives all her materials from donations(捐赠), mostly from tennis clubs. It takes Wittock three to four weeks to make a chair. To meet the customers' needs, she cuts and colors the tennis balls by hand to match their rooms. It takes her much hard work and patience to change how the balls look.
Creation isn't the only goal. In fact, what's more important to Wittock is what happens to the chairs when they're old. At the end of her chairs' life, she takes them apart and recycles the tennis balls. The fuzz(细毛) is burned off, and the balls are cut into pieces to make bouncy mats (弹性垫) for kids to play on. In this way, nothing goes to waste.
( )41. Which of the following can best describe Mathilde Wittock?
A. She is a designer of a big company.
B. She is creative and helpful.
C. She used to be a tennis player.
D. She is an old environmentalist.
( )42. What can we learn about tennis balls from Paragraph 2?
A. 55,000 tennis balls are used by the US Open every year.
B. Tennis balls can be broken down easily.
C. Many balls are needed in big tennis events.
D. About 300 million tennis balls are made each month.
( )43. Where does Wittock get most of the tennis balls for her chairs?
A. From landfills.
B. From her customers.
C. From tennis clubs.
D. From kind-hearted groups.
( )44. What will most probably be used in making resting chairs?
①Brush ②Ruler ③Scissors ④Printer
A. ①②
B. ①③
C. ②④
D. ③④
( )45. What's the last paragraph mainly about?
A. How to continue to reduce waste.
B. How to make tennis balls into mats.
C. How to improve the design of chairs.
D. How to take tennis balls apart quickly.