VOA慢速英语--两只大熊猫来到了白雪覆盖的芬兰

Two Giant Pandas Arrive in Snowy Finland

Two giant pandas arrived in Finland Thursday. They are a gift from China to mark the small European nation’s 100 years of independence.

The two are a four-year-old male panda, named Hua Bao, and a three-year-old female, named Jin Baobao.

Finnish officials and the Chinese ambassador to Finland welcomed the animals in a ceremony at Helsinki’s airport.

“We think this is the best gift that Chinese people can give to Finland,” said the ambassador, Chen Li. He was speaking about the country’s 100th anniversary in December 2017.

The pandas have been renamed. Their new, Finnish names are Pyry -- or “Snowfall” -- for the male, and Lumi -- or “Snow” -- for the female.

Finnish panda keeper Anna Palmroth said the 6,500-kilometer flight from Chengdu, China to Helsinki went smoothly¹. She said the pandas spent most of the time resting and eating bamboo, carrots and apples.

Shortly after arrival, the pandas began a trip to the Ahtari Zoo nature reserve in central Finland, about 330 kilometers north of Helsinki. The Associated Press reports that the cold weather on Thursday was similar to conditions in China’s mountain areas.

The two countries agreed on the panda deal in April 2017, when Chinese President Xi Jinping was in Helsinki for talks with Finnish President Sauli Niinisto.

The Ahtari Zoo specializes in northern European animals such as bears and lynxes. The zoo will have the giant pandas for 15 years. It has built a special Panda House annex² in hopes of receiving more visitors. The building project cost an estimated nearly 8 million euros.

For more than half a century, the Chinese government has used “panda diplomacy” as a sign of goodwill³ and closer relations with other countries.

In 1972, the United States received two giant pandas after U.S. President Richard Nixon’s historic visit to China.

More than 1 million people came to see the pandas during their first year at the National Zoo in Washington, D.C.

I'm Susan Shand.

Words in This Story

bamboo – n. a tall, woody plant with hard hollow stems that can be used for food, building materials and furniture

zoo – n. a place where many kinds of wild animals are kept

reserve – n. an area where animals or plants are given special protection

1 smoothly   

adv.平滑地，顺利地，流利地，流畅地

参考例句：

• The workmen are very cooperative,so the work goes on smoothly.工人们十分合作，所以工作进展顺利。
• Just change one or two words and the sentence will read smoothly.这句话只要动一两个字就顺了。

2 annex   

vt.兼并，吞并；n.附属建筑物

参考例句：

• It plans to annex an England company in order to enlarge the market.它计划兼并一家英国公司以扩大市场。
• The annex has been built on to the main building.主楼配建有附属的建筑物。

3 goodwill   

n.善意，亲善，信誉，声誉

参考例句：

• His heart is full of goodwill to all men.他心里对所有人都充满着爱心。
• We paid ￡10,000 for the shop,and ￡2000 for its goodwill.我们用一万英镑买下了这家商店，两千英镑买下了它的信誉。