quiz-wiz

Welcome back mates. Hope you enjoyed the questions that were put on my first page. Well the notion of starting the blog with a round of question and answers straightaway was to divert from the traditional mode of presenting a lenthy introduction and then getting on with the show. I consider this method to be dull and monotonic as the end-users, i.e , you people can already guess what is coming next. This makes the user fed up and thus prompting him to move to another thing that interests him or her. So what I think is that introduction is essential but one should not divert from the ultimate theme.
Today I am going to talk about the basic theme behind the word quiz which serves as the main factor for propelling its spirit among the masses. People who have heard about quizzing consider it to be a test where you are suppose to answer questions put at you. People who have seen quizzing once or twice feel it to be another form of interrogation but who have participated in quizzes can tell you what it is all about. Quizzing no longer remains the game of intellectuals alone. The growing popularity and the age group of the participants are clear indicators of this fact. A game which was confined to student community alone till a few years back has now grown to be a game enjoyed by the mass. The media has played a commendable role in transforming the game of erudites to the game of the masses. To add that, different game shows have also helped the cause a lot. With the popularity exponentially growing that day is not far when quizzing will overcome cricket in terms of participation and enthusiasm. Well that is all the part of introduction for the day. Now let us jump into the quizzing world!


1. The word originally meant 'to fart silently or unobtrusively.' In the mid-19th century,it came to mean 'a weak hissing or spluttering sound' and hence figuratively to end feebly. What is the word?

FIZZLE

2. The prior red-light area of Madras - this area gave rise to the term '
___ case' (where ___ is the name of the area in question) meant prostitute. Which part of Madras is being referred to here?

KODAMBAKKAM

3. What was added to Barbie dolls in the year 2000 to make them more
anatomically correct?

NAVEL
4. Where did Swami Vivekananda spend three days at the end of 1892(presumed to be 25, 26 and 27 December 1892)? AT WHAT WAS LATER TO BECOME VIVEKANANDA ROCK, JUST OFF THE COAST OFKANYAKUMARI 5. The word originally meant 'fireplace' (Latin) and later came to mean 'fire' itself. The first writer to use it as a word meaning 'point of convergence' was Johannes Kepler. Thomas Hobbes was the first writer to use it in English and used it to refer to the 'center of the home.' What is the word? FOCUS 6. What would the mnemonic "Mother saw father wearing the turban slowly" be familiar to most Madrasis? RAHUKALAM TIMINGS - THE MNEMONIC STANDARDS FOR MON-SAT-FRI-WED-THU-TUE-SUN-MON = 7:30-9:00AM SAT = 9:00-10:30 AM AND SO ON 7. What form of punctuation got its name from the Latin word meaning 'rod?' The noun was originally used in English to mean 'penis' and is still used in its Latin form to use to the male genital organ of some invertebrates. VIRGULE
8. What famous and long-standing Bangalore restaurant is now making its
name in the field of instant vegetarian treats and podis?

MTR (MAVALLI TIFFIN ROOMS)

9. This saint lived in the 4th century AD and after leading a debauched
life as a youth, reformed himself to write two famous works "Confessions" and "City of God." He is thought to have originated the idea that Catholic priests remain celibate. Who was he?

ST. AUGUSTINE

10. Which two Impressionist painters spent some time together in Arles,
France and painted self-portraits that were dedicated to the other painter?

VAN GOGH AND GAUGUIN

Getting started

Hey folks! I am here to take you to that part of the world where the mind is free and aspirations high. Guys, I am talking about the quizzing world. I will talk more about the origin and gradual development of quizzing in my subsequent posts. Today we will be engaged in what you have arrived for, quizzing. Here are some questions that will lighten up your mind and inspire you to get going. Here we go....

1. According to one legend, the Condessa de ____, wife of the Viceroy of Peru brought to Europe the
bark from which quinine was extracted after having herself benefited from its effects. In 1742,
Linnaeus named the tree in her honour. Researchers now believe that she never suffered from
malaria herself nor actually consumed the drug. Fill the blank or provide the name given by
Linnaeus.
1. Cinchon / Cinchona

2. What is travel writer Jonathan Raban describing in the lines that follow: “It begins in the mountains
of Turkey and ends in a brown bog at the neck of the Persian Gulf…it’s the town drain of Asia
Minor and one of the two oldest superhighways of the world. It is an Arab river with a Greek name,
meaning ‘of good fellowship’”?
2. Euphrates

3. What do Ernest Hemingway, Eric Linklater, Susan Ertz, Dorothy Sayers, Agatha Christie, Beverley
Nichols, E. H. Young, Mary Webb, Compton Mackenzie and André Maurois have in common,
especially in connection with the year 1935?
3. First Ten Penguin Titles

4. Early in 2006, this director shot an ad for American Express featuring himself as restaurant patron
who looks on while strange things happen around him — such as a woman snaring a fly with her
tongue and fellow-diners disappearing like shattered glass. Who?
4. Manoj ‘Night’ Shyamalan

5. Atlantic Magazine sponsored French philosopher Bernard Henri Levy’s journey through America —
chronicled in the newly-released book American Vertigo. This was a retracing of another
Frenchman’s ramble through America (1831-32) which resulted in a famous book. The trip was
done in honour of the latter’s 200th birth anniversary. Name this famous Frenchman.
5. Alexis De Tocqueville[who wrote Democracy In America
]

6. This work was a tongue-in-cheek submission to a 1917 American art-show whose rules said
anything would be accepted. When the organizers rejected it, the artist responded with the words
“That is absurd. The only works of art America has given are her plumbing and her bridges.”
Identify artist and work.
6. Marcel Duchamp & Fountain

7. The German term for punish was used a lot in their World War I propaganda posters against
England. It later became a verb in the English language meaning “to attack using an aircraft’s
machine-guns/cannons”. What term?
7. Strafe

8. This desert takes its name from the Uighur word for ‘labyrinth’ and is famous for its karaburan or
‘black sandstorms’. So feared were they that the ancient Silk Road actually forked at the eastern
edges of this desert so as to avoid them and joined up again on its Western periphery. The
Chinese nuclear-testing facility Lop Nor lies on its western edge. Identify.
8. Taklamakan / Taklimakan

9. Ossetra and Sevruga are two well-known varieties of this coveted culinary item which takes its
name from a Turkish word. The third and best-known variety takes its name from the Russian word
for ‘white’. Interestingly, this term is also applied to the white whale in these parts. Russia and Iran
dominate trade in this item. Name both the general term and the best-known variety.
9. Caviar and Beluga

10. In India, we tend to use this seven-letter word without the prefix motor, unlike in the West. English
dictionaries tend to define the word — as we use it — differently. It is glossed as ‘a child’s toy,
consisting of a long foot-board between two small end-wheels’ or as a ‘flat-bottomed sailboat with
runners for skimming over water or ice’. What word?
10. Scooter