【明報專訊】On 13 December 2016, a six-year-old Afghan (阿富汗的) boy's dream of meeting football superstar Lionel Messi finally came true! Murtaza Ahmadi, the lucky boy, met his idol in Doha, Qatar, where Barcelona had come to play a friendly against Al Ahli, a Saudi Arabian team.
In January last year, a photo of him wearing a blue-and-white striped plastic bag with "Messi 10" written on it was posted on the Internet. His brother made that "shirt" because they could not afford to buy a real one. After the photo had gone viral, Murtaza received a real shirt from his hero.
Murtaza walked out onto the pitch as a mascot hand-in-hand with Messi at the start of the match at Doha's Al-Gharafa Stadium. "I'm very happy to have met my hero. It is a dream for me," he said. His once-in-a-lifetime experience was cut short when the referee carried him off the pitch.
(sources: Ming Pao, The Guardian, Daily Mail, The Telegraph)
■Photo Story
Murtaza Ahmadi met Messi months after becoming famous on the Internet.
■Quiz
Answer the following questions. (Answers on next text)
1. Is the following sentence true or false?
Murtaza Ahmadi had received a new shirt before his brother made him one out of a plastic bag.
True/False
2. Why did Murtaza Ahmadi become famous?
__________________________________________
3. Find a word in paragraph three to fill in the blank.
The _______ of the Rio Olympics was a mix of Brazilian animals.
4.According to the passage, which of the following is not what Murtaza Ahmadi did?
a. meeting Lionel Messi
b. staying in the Stadium for a short while
c. playing for Barcelona in a friendly
d. wearing a plastic-bag shirt made by his brother
■English highway﹕once-in-a-lifetime
A once-in-a-lifetime event is very special because such an event probably happens only once in one's life.
e.g. A journey to the South Pole is a once-in-a-lifetime experience.
■Glossary
striped (adj) 有條紋的
viral (adj) (資訊)迅速傳播的
mascot (n) 吉祥物
experience (n) 經驗
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