The first sentence needs a past tense conjugation. Myself, I would use the present perfect but an AmE speaker might prefer the simple past. 'Pick up' here means 'collect.' And 'post' means 'mail.' So in other words 'has someone/anyone collected the mail?' Has anyone/someone picked up the post? Has the post been picked up? Or with the simple past: Did anyone/someone pick up the post?

1. The post "Is the post picked up (by messenger as opposed to us having to pick it up from the post room)?" means "Are the letters picked up as a matter of regular arrangements?" The simple present tense denotes a regular occurrence. For example, if you are in a rather grand private office in Britain or Europe, the post is picked up by messengers or footmen from the post room and delivered by hand to each person's room. The post are letters that have arrived. If you mean, "Has someone picked up the post today (from the front door / post room / porter's)?", then you should say, "Has the post been picked up?" 2. Hardest hit Two correct versions: - Yongkang District is the area most seriously damaged/affected by the Tainan earthquake.  - Yongkang District is the area hardest hit by the Tainan earthquake.  There can be other verbs and adverbs, but the important thing to remember is to put "area" before the adverb and the adjective.

1. The sentence is incorrect, to the point in which I cannot understand the meaning of the sentence. Please explain the sentence and I will send you a correct way of saying it. 2. Not only is "The" not necessary, it would be wrong to use it. The word "The" is used to show that you mean something specific(there's only one of it) and not an idea or definition (for instance if you point at an apple to a salesman and wish to know it's price you would say: "How much does the apple cost?" because you are asking about a specific apple. however, if you asked about the price of an apple in general you would say: "How much does an apple cost?" because it could be any apple) and so things that are already said to be specific by capitalizing their first letter (like places, names, nationalities, etc.) do not need to have a "the" before them and it is considered incorrect. "(The) Yongkang District is the hardest-hit area by the Tainan earthquake." This sentence is incorrect because the word "area" becomes what was done "by the Tainan earthquake". Therefore, instead of the area being hit by the earthquake like the sentence is meant to mean, it means the the hit was area by the earthquake.