英语听力：自然百科 天堂岛屿
时间：2014-05-20 06:53:00
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（单词翻译）
Ever since man first began setting out for new lands by small boats heading over unknown horizons, he's been searching for among other things, paradise. And paradise in the Tuamotus, a small archipelago in the Pacific about 200 miles northeast of Tahiti, means coconuts2, digging clams3, spear fishing and camping on the beach with the surf lulling4 to sleep.
But paradise today is not without its concerns. The biggest worry here is global warming. The 78 atolls that make up the two Tuamotus are just thin coral reefs, at their highest they are 10 feet above sea level.
As the average temperature of the oceans climb, estimates are that many of these living, breathing, still growing reefs and the
lagoons6 they protect will very likely disappear in the next 50 to 100 years as the seas rise.
Frank Murphy is a University of California of Berkeley-trained
marine7 biologist.
"It struck me the other day when my children arrived at Tahiti and saw that for the first time, that actually in their life time, this could disappear, and it's pretty amazing."
Fishing is a primary source of both food and cash. Doriat will take a dozen big My-Mys from his plywood boat which will sail on the island of Fakarava.
Gathering8 and drying the white meat of
coconut1 known as copra is the chain's biggest business. A 100-pound sack sells for 38 dollars. A hard working family will produce 100 sacks a month.
In the past 20 years, a new economy has boomed in Tuamotus - black pearls. Pamala and Valda are 22 and have their own pearl growing business on a tiny spit of sand in the middle of a
lagoon5 at Tuwao. They have thousands of
oysters10 drowned just below the surface. Valda takes daily care of the boxes of the oysters, making sure they are close tightly to protect them from their natural
predators11. Pamala works 8 hours a day, seeding as many as 400 oysters a day. Once planted below the surface, each
oyster9 will
nurture12 a pearl for a year and a half.
Outsiders come looking for paradise and leave with many questions.
Is it ideal here?
Certainly.
Is it paradise?
As close as you can come, a tropical dream comes true.
Yet it is clear these tiny spits of land at the midst of a giant sea of blue paradise are at some risk. These westerners are happy to have seen a glimpse of paradise since it may soon change forever.
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