Social Affairs

1. Click the link for the news:

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE64A44C20100511

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Cigars loved by Churchill to be auctioned in June

A rare box of the Cuban cigars cherished by Winston Churchill and preserved for almost 60 years are going up for auction in London next month.

The wartime British prime minister's penchant for Romeo y Julieta Piramides cigars became part of his pugnacious image as a leader who defied the might of Hitler's Nazi Germany. The picture of Churchill giving the two-fingered victory sign with a cigar in his mouth is a classic World War Two image.

Now the 1950s Romeo y Julieta Piramides cigars he so loved will be on sale in C.Gars Ltd's second vintage cigars auction on June 21 at Boisdale Belgravia in London.

"We're expecting significant bids from both sides of the Atlantic from aficionados who'd love to taste Churchill's favorite cigars," C.Gars managing director Mitchell Orchant said in a statement.

Orchant said smokers interested in buying the cigars could emulate the bull-dog spirit that Churchill embodied and defy the anti-smoking "puritans" who have made smoking verboten in the public spaces of cities across Europe and North America.

"If Churchill were alive today he wouldn't put up with all this political correctness."

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2. Vocabulary Words:

cigars

a tube made from dried and rolled tobacco leaves, which people smoke

auction

a public sale of goods or property, where people make higher and higher offers of money, until the thing is sold to the person who will pay most

penchant

a strong liking

pugnacious

aggressive; wanting to start an argument or fight

defied

to oppose; to resist

aficionados

a fan; someone who is very interested in a particular subject

emulate

to imitate something achieved by someone else and try to do it as well as they have

puritans

someone who believes that self-control and hard work are important and that pleasure is wrong

verboten

forbidden; prohibited

put up

to endure without complaint

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