My session sept'14

The Pundits’ Session
By Arnab Auddy
September 2014

Just don’t google. No other rules.
Let us begin

1. This is Arnob Shayan Chowdhuri, an Indie rock
musician from Bangladesh. In 2006, he released
an album that has very recently lent its name to
something special. What?

2. In 1977, a journalist called Michael Paterniti
drove across America with scientist Thomas Harvey
for company. He later recorded his experiences
during the journey in ‘Driving Mr. Albert’. Who/
What else had accompanied these two people?

Answer
Albert Einstein’s brain

3. Voting is a fundamental right in most countries.
However there are 3 countries where voting is
mandatory for all adults. You can land up in jail for
not voting.
Name them.

4. XY is a crowdfunding site that your organization
can use to fundraise. When the campaign “Y’s”
(reaches the goal) then everybody’s cards are
charged and you’ll get the funds. Plus, you get each
donor’s name, email, and contribution amount and
contribution date.

5. When Prithviraj Chauhan lost to Mohd. Ghori, he
had fled from the battlefield to a dense forest. It is
said that he met X here. X was incredibly tall and
had a scar in his forehead. A physician himself,
Chauhan offered to help this man. To this, X replied
that this wound had been caused by a curse and
could never be cured. Prithviraj recognised him
immediately.
Can you?

6. Because his cameos were much anticipated and
ruined the mood he was trying to create in his
films, Hitchcock usually appeared quite early in his
films, mostly in the first 30 minutes. In an episode
of ‘Koffee with Karan’ , Mahesh Bhatt claimed that
this was what had led his production house to do
something similar in some of their films. What?

Answer
Emraan Hashmi’s kiss happened early

7. X was an electrical engineer by profession. In
1920, he started a company, which has set the
standards in conducting surveys ever since. The
company is also known by the same name.
Identify X. Full name required.

Answer
Arthur Charles Nielsen
(AC Nielsen)

8. In 1858, a British lieutenant named Joseph
Sherer, while posted in Silchar, Assam, found
the local soldiers engaged in a game locally
called ‘Sagol Kangjei’. He liked the game and
introduced it to the rest of his men. This, is said
to be the story behind the birth of the game on
an international scale. Which game?

9. This is basically a custom borrowed into English
culture from French etiquette. The French name
literally means ‘Please contact if you accept this
invite’.
It has from then on been used in invitation
cards all over the world. Which custom are we
talking about?
Full name reqd.

Answer
RSVP
Respondez Sil Vous Plait
(and not Rosogolla SandeshVar Pet, as Syata Bose
said)

10. This is about someone called Tardar Sauce. She
has shot into fame in the internet world in late
2012. She featured on the Wall Street Journal in
July 2013 and on the New York Magazine in
September 2013. She went on to receive a
Lifetime Achievement award at Friskies 2013.
“Contrary to popular perception, she is actually
quite pleasant to people”, claims Tabatha
Bundesez, who has known her closely for a long
time.
How do we know her better?

11. Which famous piece of architecture is locally
known as the ‘coathanger’?

12. The first meeting was held from 1st-8th August,
1907. The location was Brownsea Island, off the
south of England. Such a remote location was
chosen to avoid the press, as the organiser was
really famous.
There were 20 participants.
The proceedings started with a blow of the
‘kudu’ horn (made of an antelope’s antlers) that
the organiser had.
Whose first meeting?

13. Identify this Egyptian goddess of magic and life

14. The Paris Peace talks, held in 1973, sought to
establish peace in Vietnam and end the
Vietnam war. This was between US President
Lyndon Johnson and political representatives
from North and South Vietnam. However, it was
delayed a number of times due to dispute over
an unexpected issue.
What?

Answer
The Shape of the Table.
North Vietnam wanted a circular table, while South
Vietnam wanted it to be a rectangle.

15. Identify the song described here.

16. This is a still from the film ‘Major Chandrakanth’
(1966) made by K. Balachander. The man in the
middle played the title role. The man on the left
is A.V.M. Rajan, who played the major’s son, a
negative character.
How was his character’s name re-used a few
years later?

Answer
The actor Shivaji Rao was given the name
‘Rajinikanth’ by K. Balachander after the character’s
name.

17. Julius _________ founded this company in
Switzerland in 1872. It was famous for
producing a sauce that tasted like soy sauce
without containing soy. It is known in the Baltic
states for instant soups and in the US for its
bouillon cubes. Indians know it for something
invented in Japan by Momofuku Ando in 1958.
Which company?

18. One of the major scandals of post independent
India centred around the eminent Indian
politician X and the lady Y. Though neither X nor
Y admitted it in public, their relationship was an
open secret. X’s opposition gave this a creative
touch in their election campaign----
Break open Ram’s heart,
You will find Sita.
Break open X’s heart,
You will find Y
Id X and Y.

Answer
X- Jawaharlal Nehru
Y- Lady Mountbatten

19. What unique feat have Kevin Gillespie, Dave
Kitson and Andreas Johannson achieved in The
English Premier League?

Answer
They have been sent off without touching the ball. An
equivalent to the diamond duck of cricket.

20. While it’s not very clear why this is done anti-clockwise,
the following facts have been
suggested as possible reasons:
• Blood circulates anticlockwise
• The Earth revolves around the sun
anticlockwise
• The Earth rotates on its axis anticlockwise
• Electrons revolve around nucleus anticlockwise
What?

Answer
Why Muslims go around the holy shrine at Mecca
anticlockwise

21. In 1965 band member Barrett created the name
XY on the spur of the moment when he
discovered that another band, also called the
Tea Set, were to perform at one of their gigs.
The name is derived from the given names of
two blues musicians whose Piedmont
blues records Barrett had in his collection, X
Anderson andY Council.
Which band?

22. Ashford vs. Thornton was an English murder
case in 1818, where the accused (Thornton) was
found not guilty in his trial, but had his acquittal
appealed in court by the victim’s family. He
escaped being tried on appeal by invoking an
ancient legal procedure, that had somehow had
not been repealed yet. Soon after, this
procedure was abolished. This case is held to be
the inspiration for the climax of Ivanhoe.
What was the procedure in question?

23. The Maltese Falcon (1941) was a movie on a San
Francisco detective and his dealings with three
adventures. It was nominated for 3 Academy
Awards. This was the debut film of actor Sydney
Greenstreet , who played the role of Kasper
Gutman (pic. Next slide).
What is important about this role in recent
history?

Answer
It inspired physicist Robert Serber to call the second
atom bomb by the name ‘Fat Man’

24. This is the newly relaunched ‘The Lalit Great
Eastern’. Incidentally, the present General
Manager of this hotel happens to be the great
grandson of someone we have known since our
childhood. For very different reasons.

Answer
George Bailey.
The character on the left was called George Bailey
(from It’s a Wonderful Life)

26. Identify this comedy show aired on BBC in
1989. This is based on real-life incidents of
World War I.

27. In 1865, after the American Civil War, most
soldiers became addicted to morphine. Looking
to find a remedy to this, chemist William
Pemberton made a mixture made of Bordeaux
wine, cocaine, caffeine, and Damiana (a Texus
drug found to increase libido).
However, medicinal drugs had to be alcohol-free.
What did Pemberton come up with?

28. November Rain, by Guns N Roses is one of the
most celebrated English rock songs ever. The
official youtube video of this song shows the
story of the frontman’s marriage and finally
ends on a sad note with his wife’s death.
Which short story is this video based on?

Answer
‘Without You’ by Del James

29. While shooting the film X, director Y did not
reveal the final twist to any of his cast
members. When it was finally revealed, actor
Michael McManus, who played a major role,
lost his temper and walked out of the sets.
This final twist had completely undone his
character, and had reduced it to a mere red
herring. The supporting character had actually
come out to be the real hero.
Give me X and Y

Answer
X- The Usual Suspects
Y- Bryan Singer

32. This shade of colour is named after him,
because, in the 1940s, he observed that ships
with this colour seemed to be less obviously
seen during twilight hours.
(later experiments showed this to be wrong,
and if anything, the colours could make things
more obvious)
Who?

Answer
Lord Mountbatten
The colour is called Mountbatten pink

33. The Oxford English Dictionary cites Ælfric's tenth-century
glossary, in which it is given the meaning
"precipice", or stone, thus the Stanheng "not far from
Salisbury" recorded by eleventh-century writers are
"supported stones". Christopher Chippendale gives the
derivation of the name as coming from the Old English
words meaning "stone", and either hencg meaning
"hinge" or hen(c)en meaning "hang" or "gallows" or
"instrument of torture". Medieval gallows consisted of
two uprights with a lintel joining them, rather than the
inverted L-shape more familiar today.
If this was the answer, what is the question?
Very specific answer required

Answer
150th birth anniversary of John Wisden

35. Looking for Richard is a 1996 documentary
based on William Shakespeare’s Richard III and
a broader examination of Shakespeare’s
relevance in popular culture.
Whose debut directorial venture was this?

Short Visual Connect:
•Identify each sportsperson and connect
them with their special ability.
•There are five slides.
•Identification marks: +10,+10,+10,+10,0
•+10 for a full house
•Connect marks indicated on each slide

Answer
1. Kobe Bryant
2. Ronnie O’ Sullivan
3. Paolo Maldini
4. Jonny Wilkinson
5. God
Connect: They are all ambidexterous

Bibliography Round
• Nine Slides
• Each slide gives the inspiration behind a
book/ literary character
• Guess the book and the author
• +10 for each (no half points)
• +10 for a full house

#1 Some locations and characters were inspired by
the author’s childhood in Birmingham, where
he first lived near Sarehole Mill, and later
near Edgbaston Reservoir. There are also hints
of the Black Country, which is within easy reach
of north west Edgbaston. Some parts have
been inspired by the Industrial Revolution in
England and the Iron Age and Roman mineral
workings and remains which the author saw in
1929. Other influences include his experiences
in World War I and II. The entire story was
finished before 1945.

#2 The author was working as a researcher and
bilingual secretary for Amnesty International at
that time. One day she was held up for four
hours in a train from Manchester to London in
1990. She wondered how she could escape. It
was here that the story was first conceived.

#3 The inspiration for the book, he explains, was
from an incident in Los Angeles in 1949, during
the period of intense censorship and
blacklisting known today as McCarthyism. He
and a friend were walking the streets of L.A.
when a police officer stopped them and asked
them what they were doing. The police officer
had no reason to do so, and this angered the
author.
The incident was the perfect example of the
paranoia and fear that overwhelmed the American
society at that time.

#4 "I was flipping through images of reality
television, there were these young people
competing for a million dollars ... and I saw
images of the Iraq War," the author said in a
video from the publisher, Scholastic. "Two
things began to sort of fuse together in a very
unsettling way, and there is really the moment
when I got the idea for the story."

#5 Bell was a great-grandson of Benjamin Bell, a
forensic surgeon. In his instruction, Joseph Bell
emphasized the importance of close observation in
making a diagnosis. . These skills caused him to be
considered a pioneer in forensic science (forensic
pathology in particular) at a time when science was
not yet widely used in criminal investigations. Bell
studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh
Medical School and received an MD in 1859.
The author served as his clerk at the Edinburgh Royal
Infirmary and later based the character on him. Bell
was aware of this and took pride in it.

#6 “I was watching a news story in the spring of
1999 on television. At some point along the line,
it mentioned that they had banned the sport of
_________, which kind of struck a personal
chord for me, because as a boy I grew up
with all my cousins and friends _________
So I sat down after that news story and wrote a 25-
page short story about two boys and it became this
kind of a much darker, more involved tale than I had
anticipated. A couple of years later, in March of 2001, I
rediscovered the short story in my garage, essentially,
and it kind of became the inspiration for the novel”
Both blanks are same

#7 The morning was cold and wet; then an easterly wind,
and the clouds hard and high; then thunder showers, and
wind shifting to every quarter. The group had apparently
also been discussing the experiments by Erasmus Darwin
(Charles Darwin's grandfather) with galvanism, the
contraction of muscles stimulated by electricity.
The writers and poets threw down the gauntlet to see who
could conceive the most fantastic tale of horror. "I saw the
hideous phantasm of a man stretched out, and then, on the
working of some powerful engine, show signs of life, and
stir with an uneasy, half-vital motion. Frightful must it be;
for supremely frightful would be the effect of any human
endeavour to mock the stupendous Creator of the world.”
What would result, a year later, was a full-blown novel with
elements from the Gothic and Romantic periods, and was
seen as a reaction to the Industrial Revolution and what
could go wrong. It is also laced with references to John
Milton's "Paradise Lost".

#8 The author said, "I've been reading books for adults my
entire life. Growing up I was an avid reader—the thicker the
book, the better."She also said she is a huge fan ofOrson
Scott Card, and "can't go through a year without re-reading"
Jane Austen's books.
She also says that her writing is strongly influenced by
music, and she posts playlists on her website of songs which
specifically inspired her books. Bands included most often
in her playlists are Muse, Blue October, My Chemical
Romance, Coldplay and Linkin Park. As a Mormon, she
acknowledges that her faith has influenced her work. In
particular, she says that her characters "tend to think more
about where they came from, and where they are going,
than might be typical." She says that she does not
consciously intend her novels to be Mormon-influenced, or
to promote the virtues of sexual abstinence and spiritual
purity, but admits that her writing is shaped by her values.

#9 ) The author noted that during his early schooling in
the midst ofWorld War I, he had drawn pictures in the
margins of his school workbooks of an unnamed young
man battling les Boches. He later commented that
these drawings depicted a brave and adventurous
character using his intelligence and ingenuity against
opponents, but none of these early drawings survive.
He was also influenced by the physical appearance and
mannerisms of his younger brother Paul, who had a
round face and a quiff hairstyle. In search of adventure,
Paul later joined the army.
The author later stated that in his youth, "I watched
him a lot; he entertained me and fascinated me... It
makes sense that took on his character, gestures,
poses. He had a way of moving and a physical presence
that must have inspired me without my knowing it.

Answer
Lord of The Rings
J.R.R. Tolkien

Answer
Harry Potter series
J.K. Rowling

Answer
Fahrenheit 451
Ray Bradbury

Answer
Hunger Games
Susanne Collins

Answer
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Answer
The Kite Runner
Khaled Hosseini

Answer
Frankenstein
Mary Shelley

Answer
Twilight series
Stephenie Meyer

Answer
Tintin
Georges Prosper Remi

Long Visual Connect
•There are eight slides connected to a
central theme
•Identify and guess the theme
•Connect marks indicated on each slide
•No points for identification
•However, if you guess the theme, you
have to explain the connection to at least
two slides.

+80,-40
The woman on the right

Answer
They all have units named after them

The woman on the right
is Helen of Troy.
A Helen is the unit of
beauty

Andy Warhol.
A Warhol is the unit
of fame.
One Warhol is being
famous for 15
minutes.

Carl Sagan. A Sagan is an incredibly large quantity of
anything.

Kim Kardashian.
A Kardashian is a unit of
time, equivalent to 72
days.
(She was married to Kris
Humphries for 72 days)

Mickey Mouse.
One Mickey per
second is the smallest
resolvable unit of
measurement for the
speed and direction
of a computer mouse

Blaise Pascal.
Pascal is a unit of
pressure.

Nikola Tesla.
Tesla is the unit of
magnetic intensity

My session sept'14

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