Quiz time….

Did a quiz on Saturday after a looong time. This was at the quizfamilies group that deponti had introduced me to, a few months ago. I am not very regular, but I have a good time whenever I do attend. Had volunteered to conduct the quiz this time, and while I had half the questions ready well in advance, a sudden Delhi trip meant I had to prepare the other half at pretty much the last minute. Despite my misgivings, the quiz went off quite well, and I particularly enjoyed a compliment one of the participants gave me – that the quiz met all the three crtiera of a good quiz, namely a good mix of “easy questions, hard questions, and fun questions”.

I had fun setting the questions, and my idea of starting with a light-hearted C&H round turned out to be a good way to set the ball rolling. Had some theme rounds – words/etymology/origins, mythology, movies, bangalore/karnataka, fictional characters, sports, C&H, and the rest were general. Mostly guessable stuff..

Here are a few questions from the quiz…..questions were designed to be read out, so you will have to live with some of them being disjointed..

 

1. Seventeen of the twenty-nine attendees at this event (the 5th conference) were or became Nobel Prize winners. They met to discuss a newly formulated theory. What event, and what did they discuss in the 5th conference? (the first conference was held in 1911 and the 23^rd happened in 2005, and it is held every three years.)
2. Connect the following British prime ministers – Tony Blair, Lord John Russell and Viscount Goderich?
3. This is the only Buddhist republic in Europe? (think Chess)
   
4. These awards are given in early October each for ten achievements that “first make people laugh, and then make them think.” Some winners include (2006 Ivan R. Schwab, of the University of California Davis, and the late Philip R.A. May of the University of California Los Angeles, for exploring and explaining why woodpeckers don’t get headaches, Howard Stapleton of Merthyr Tydfil, Wales, for inventing an electromechanical teenager repellant — a device that makes annoying high-pitched noise designed to be audible to teenagers but not to adults), D. Lynn Halpern (of Harvard Vanguard Medical Associates, and Brandeis University, and Northwestern University), Randolph Blake (of Vanderbilt University and Northwestern University) and James Hillenbrand (of Western Michigan University and Northwestern University) for conducting experiments to learn why people dislike the sound of fingernails scraping on a blackboard.
5. The north tower of this famous temple has a statue of foreigner in a top hat smoking a pipe. The myth is that the foreigner depicted is Marco Polo. Which temple are we talking about?
6. acoustic guitar, Parallel ATA, terrestrial radio, Star Wars – Episode IV: A New Hope – What are these examples of? 
7. In his most famous and controversial novel, a fictional traveler, Raphael Hythloday  describes the political arrangements of the imaginary island nation where private property does not exist and almost complete religious toleration is practiced. Author, and book?
8. For all C&H fans: According to Calvin…
•  HOw does vaccumcleaner, lightbulb and toasters work
• According to Calvin, What is the difference in transmogrifier and time machine discounting the functional difference?
• Why does he put a toy duck before him in the bathtub
9. This popular Disney film’s tagline was “It’s Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious”. Also appears in a song in the movie.
10. Connect Peter Carter, Peter Lundgren, Tony Roche
11. He got the name of this character from his wife who commented that “the ________ was a sad English fish”. The creator of this comic character wanted this character to have a colourful vocabulary, but did not want him to use any cusswords for broad appeal. From a personal experience he faced, he hit upon the solution of making the character using strange or difficult words that were not offensive in themselves, but which he would hurl out as if they were very strong cusswords. Identify the character?
12. In Greek mythology, what were the first generation of Gods, born of the earth(gaia) and the sky(Uranus) called?
13. He was a priest and indologist with the Basel Mission in south India and worked in Mangalore, Madikeri and Dharwad in Karnataka. He is most famous for his studies of the Kannada language and for producing the first ever Kannada–English dictionary of about 70,000 words in 1894This Englishman made the first “Kannada-English” dictionary. His statue is at one end of MG Road. Who is he?
14. What is the “Slashdot effect” or the “digg effect”?
15.  The first occasion was the American Independence Day, 4^th July 2000. The second one was on Bastille Day. Many more occasions followed including the Korean Independence day in 2001 and Edward Munch’s birthday. What is being discussed?