AMERICAN MOSAIC - Baseball Season Opens / Quilt Exhibit / Fa

AMERICAN MOSAIC¹ - Baseball Season Opens / Quilt Exhibit / Faith Hill
By Nancy Steinbach

Broadcast: Friday, April 09, 2004

(MUSIC)

HOST:

Welcome to AMERICAN MOSAIC, in VOA Special English.

(MUSIC)

This is Bob Doughty².

On our show this week, we have music from Faith Hill. And we answer a question about her. We also report about a new exhibit of hand-made quilts.

But first, we tell about the opening of an important sports season.

Baseball Season Opens

HOST:

 
Graphic³ Image
The Major League professional baseball season opened in the United States last Sunday when the Baltimore Orioles played the Boston Red Sox. But two baseball games were played even earlier - in Japan. Gwen Outen explains.

ANNCR:

Perhaps no other sport has become as deeply rooted in American life as baseball. No other sport has created so many popular traditions, including poems, songs, books and films. Famous players of the past and present are as well-known to Americans as the country's great scientists, writers and political leaders.

Major League Baseball officials continue to explore ways to add to these traditions. One of these is to play the season opening games in another country. So far, such games have been played in Mexico and Japan.

This year, the first two games of the major league baseball season were played in Tokyo at the end of March. The New York Yankees played the Tampa Bay Devil Rays. The Yankees are famous for winning more championships than any other baseball team in America. This year, the Yankees are paying some of their best players huge amounts of money. These famous athletes include Alex Rodriguez, Derek Jeter and the Japanese baseball hero, Hideki Matsui.

 
New York Yankees' slugger Hideki Matsui, center, is flanked by Major League Baseball Commissioner⁴ Bud⁵ Selig, right, and Yankees' manager Joe Torre
All three played in the two opening games at the Tokyo Dome⁶ in Japan. Hideki Matsui won the most valuable player award. After the games, he said he got his power from the Japanese fans at the game and their high expectations of him. He told the New York Times newspaper that he was the happiest man in the world.

Some American baseball writers and fans were less than happy about the opening games this year. They began in Tokyo at seven o'clock in the evening. That was about five o'clock in the morning in New York! Newspaper reports said fans held opening day breakfast parties so friends could gather to eat and watch the game on television. And many drinking places in the city opened early for the same reason. The Devil Rays won the opening day game. The Yankees won the second game one day later.

Quilt Exhibit

HOST:

A new exhibit of colorful bed coverings called quilts opened last month at the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. African-American women in a tiny farming town called Gee⁷'s Bend, Alabama, created the quilts. Shep O'Neal tells us more.

ANNCR:

There is only one road into and out of the town of Gee's Bend. It is a very poor community. Yet it is rich in traditions. For many years, the women of Gee's Bend have created beautiful quilts from everyday cloth material. Now, seventy of these quilts made by forty-six women are being shown in an exhibit called "The Quilts of Gee's Bend." These large, colorful quilts hang on the walls of the museum. They look like modern abstract paintings. In fact, the chief art critic for the New York Times newspaper calls the quilts "some of the most miraculous⁸ works of modern art that America has produced."

The women of Gee's Bend made the quilts to cover their beds and keep their families warm at night. The women sewed squares, triangles and long pieces of cloth together. They used everyday materials like old clothing and pieces of cloth left over from making other things. Experts say the bright colors and modern designs are different from traditional American quilts made in other parts of the country.

Gee's Bend, Alabama, is named after Joseph Gee, a white man who owned land in the area in the early eighteen-hundreds. Today, about seven-hundred-fifty people live in the town. All of them are black. Most of them have ancestors who were slaves on two large farms in the area. Women in the town learned quilting from their mothers and grandmothers. They made the quilts from the nineteen-thirties to the present time.

There are several different kinds of quilts in the exhibit. Some are made of bright colored pieces of cotton cloth called corduroy. Others are "work clothes" quilts made of old blue denim⁹ clothing worn by farm workers.

Experts say a Gee's Bend quilt represents many things. It is useful as well as beautiful. It expresses the artistic¹⁰ ideas of the quilter and the cultural identity of the community. One of the women said this about her quilt: "It represents safekeeping, it represents beauty, and you could say it represents family history."

Faith Hill

HOST:

Our VOA listener question this week comes from Wuhan, China. Qiu Tsuly asks about American singer Faith Hill.

That is her name to music fans all over the world. Her name at birth was Audrey Faith Perry. She was born in the southern state of Mississippi in nineteen-sixty-seven. She grew up singing in church, and decided¹¹ to become a singer when she was fourteen years old.

 
Faith Hill
Faith Perry moved to Nashville, Tennessee at the age of nineteen. She married songwriter Dan Hill the next year. Their marriage ended four years later.

Faith Hill had her first hit record in nineteen-ninety-four. It is called "Wild One."

(MUSIC)

Today, Faith Hill is married to another popular country singer, Tim McGraw. They have three daughters. Here is a hit song they recorded together a few years ago. It is called "Let's Make Love."

(MUSIC)

Faith Hill has won or been nominated¹² for just about every music industry honor. Last year, she won a Grammy Award for Best Female Country Vocal¹³ Performance for the title song of her latest album. We leave you now with that song, "Cry."

(MUSIC)

HOST:

This is Bob Doughty.

Send us your questions about American life! Be sure to include your name and postal¹⁴ address. We will send you a gift if we use your question.

Send e-mail to [email protected]. Or write to American Mosaic, VOA Special English, Washington, D.C., two-zero-two-three-seven, USA.

Our program was written by Shelley Gollust and Nancy Steinbach. Paul Thompson was our producer. And our engineer was Tom Verba.

I hope you enjoyed AMERICAN MOSAIC. Join us again next week for VOA's radio magazine in Special English.

1 mosaic   

n./adj.镶嵌细工的，镶嵌工艺品的，嵌花式的

参考例句：

• The sky this morning is a mosaic of blue and white.今天早上的天空是幅蓝白相间的画面。
• The image mosaic is a troublesome work.图象镶嵌是个麻烦的工作。

2 doughty   

adj.勇猛的，坚强的

参考例句：

• Most of successful men have the characteristics of contumacy and doughty.绝大多数成功人士都有共同的特质：脾气倔强，性格刚强。
• The doughty old man battled his illness with fierce determination.坚强的老人用巨大毅力与疾病作斗争。

3 graphic   

adj.生动的，形象的，绘画的，文字的，图表的

参考例句：

• The book gave a graphic description of the war.这本书生动地描述了战争的情况。
• Distinguish important text items in lists with graphic icons.用图标来区分重要的文本项。

4 commissioner   

n.（政府厅、局、处等部门）专员，长官，委员

参考例句：

• The commissioner has issued a warrant for her arrest.专员发出了对她的逮捕令。
• He was tapped for police commissioner.他被任命为警务处长。

5 bud   

vi.发芽，萌芽；n.芽，花蕾

参考例句：

• Some flowers bud their leaves very early in spring.有些花在春季里很早发出叶来。
• A bad habit in a child should be nipped in the bud.应该尽早把孩子的坏习惯改过来。

6 dome   

n.圆屋顶，拱顶

参考例句：

• The dome was supported by white marble columns.圆顶由白色大理石柱支撑着。
• They formed the dome with the tree's branches.他们用树枝搭成圆屋顶。

7 gee   

n.马；int.向右！前进！，惊讶时所发声音；v.向右转

参考例句：

• Their success last week will gee the team up.上星期的胜利将激励这支队伍继续前进。
• Gee,We're going to make a lot of money.哇！我们会赚好多钱啦！

8 miraculous   

adj.像奇迹一样的，不可思议的

参考例句：

• The wounded man made a miraculous recovery.伤员奇迹般地痊愈了。
• They won a miraculous victory over much stronger enemy.他们战胜了远比自己强大的敌人，赢得了非凡的胜利。

9 denim   

n.斜纹棉布；斜纹棉布裤，牛仔裤

参考例句：

• She wore pale blue denim shorts and a white denim work shirt.她穿着一条淡蓝色的斜纹粗棉布短裤，一件白粗布工作服上衣。
• Dennis was dressed in denim jeans.丹尼斯穿了一条牛仔裤。

10 artistic   

adj.艺术(家)的，美术(家)的；善于艺术创作的

参考例句：

• The picture on this screen is a good artistic work.这屏风上的画是件很好的艺术品。
• These artistic handicrafts are very popular with foreign friends.外国朋友很喜欢这些美术工艺品。

11 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

12 nominated   

adj.被提名的，被任命的 动词nominate的过去式和过去分词

参考例句：

• She has been nominated for the presidency. 她已经获得了董事长职位的提名。
• The movie was nominated for an Oscar. 这部电影获奥斯卡金像奖提名。

13 vocal   

adj.直言不讳的；嗓音的；n.[pl.]声乐节目

参考例句：

• The tongue is a vocal organ.舌头是一个发音器官。
• Public opinion at last became vocal.终于舆论哗然。

14 postal   

adj.邮政的，邮局的

参考例句：

• A postal network now covers the whole country.邮路遍及全国。
• Remember to use postal code.勿忘使用邮政编码。