DATE: YOUR CITY:

RULES FOR CONTESTANTS:

90 questions are to be answered in 60 minutes. You score 1 point per correct answer. In the event of a tie, the person with the greater number of starred questions answered correctly is the winner. Please silence your mobile phones for the duration. Do not Google for answers or talk to fellow contestants while the quiz is in progress. If you need to leave the hall during the 60 minute period that the quiz is in progress, re-entry will be at proctors discretion. Your proctors decision is final with regard to accuracy of an answer. As the quiz will take place over two weeks in other cities over different time zones, please do not discuss or post any of the questions online or to any forum. All questions and answers will be uploaded to our website soon. Pace yourself and enjoy the quiz. Even what appears to be a tough question can sometimes be worked out.

Thanks to G Krishnamurty, Nikhil Soneja and Sandeep Fernandes for their valuable support, and also to all the proctors for their time and efforts in making Brain Busters a worldwide event. Dr. Chandrashekhar

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1.

QUESTION
Among the countries that the International Prime Meridian (0 longitude) passes through, which is the largest? Chryselephantine is a sculptural medium that is primarily a combination of two prized materials. Name either one. Which multinational corporation takes its name from an early product, a mechanical pencil invented by its founder Tokuji Hayakawa? Which athletic school activity is considered one of the most dangerous, often causing broken or sprained ankles, wrists, spines, head injuries and concussions, exceeding those from all other high school and college sports combined? Which U.S. President had a (cat named) Tiger for a pet?

ANSWER
Algeria

2.

Gold and Ivory

3.

SHARP

4.

Cheerleading

5.

Calvin Coolidge (it would have to be a Calvin, right?) Yemen

6.

The 2011 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Tawakkul Karman for her non-violent struggle for the safety of women and for women's rights to full participation in peace-building work, making her the first national of which country to be so honoured? Which hero of Greek mythology was a great slayer of monsters (including the dreaded Chimera) and was the one who captured and rode the winged horse Pegasus? Intaglio or counter-relief is a method of carving in which the image is sunken, or negative; what name is given to the opposite method which features a raised or positive image? Clue: its a word associated with Alfred Hitchcock. The website howrichareyou.com.au invites you to enter your annual income to see how long it takes X (the richest person of that country) to earn it. For instance, if you put in $1,000,000 youll see that X makes that amount in just 44.8 minutes. Who is X? A millihelen was a unit invented either by Cambridge mathematician W.A.H. Rushton or by writer Isaac Asimov, with obvious reference to Marlowes lines from the 1592 play The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus. Thus, 1 millihelen is the amount of beauty needed to do what?

7.

Bellerophon

8.

Cameo

9.

*
10.

Mining heiress Gina Rinehart of Australia.

Launch a single ship.

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11.

QUESTION
Which language, beginning with F, completes this list of Nordic or Scandinavian languages: Norwegian, Swedish, Danish, and Icelandic?

ANSWER
Faroe or Faroese (Finnish is not considered a Scandinavian language). United Arab Emirates

12.

Mali, Peru and Mexico have alternating vowels and consonants. Which is countrys name is the longest to show this feature? Which all-time bestseller was filmed by John Houston in 1966?

13.

The Bible: In the Beginning Ratiocination

14.

*
15.

Arthur Conan Doyles Sherlock Holmes solved problems by deduction. Similarly what word did Edgar Allan Poe use to describe his detective C. Auguste Dupins method of combining superior intellect with creative imagination in solving crimes? Only five times have the New York Times headlines appeared in 96point type (the biggest theyve used). After MEN WALK ON MOON (1969), NIXON RESIGNS (1974), 1/1/00 (ushering in 2000), and U.S. ATTACKED (2001), which single word headline was the fifth, on November 5, 2008? The word florentine means that a dish has been cooked using what ingredient? What word completes this sequence in a butterflys metamorphosis? Egg/ovum caterpillar/larva chrysalis/pupa adult/_____? Which state of India was partitioned in 1960 into the two new states of Gujarat and Maharashtra? Who is the only person ever to light an Olympic cauldron and win a gold medal in the same Summer Olympic Games? Physiologists and psychologists believed that sweetness, sourness, saltiness, and bitterness were the only four basic tastes. In 1985 which fifth taste was added, giving it a Japanese name that translates as pleasant savoury taste?

OBAMA

16.

Spinach

17.

Imago

18.

Bombay

19.

Cathy Freeman, Sydney 2000 (400 m) Umami

20.

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21.

QUESTION
Brain teasers that are simply alphabets and numbers to be expanded (like 7 D I A W = seven days in a week) are called ditloids, after the Daily Express carried this first puzzle 1 = DitloID. What literary works title is the expansion of ditloid? Which solo entertainer has sold 40 million tickets and grossed over $4 billion, more than any other in history? What story by Arthur Conan Doyle is said to have been inspired by Mount Roraima on the borders of Guyana, Brazil and Venezuela? Which orchestral interlude first written for the opera The Tale of Tsar Saltan features the most notes per bar in classical music, thus being a favourite for virtuoso instrumentalists to show off their skill in playing it solo? Which rigid natural latex (from a tree of the same name) is used for insulating undersea telegraph cables, is the primary material used by dentists to fill root canals, and formed the hard core of early golf balls? What is the offspring of a male donkey and a female horse called?

ANSWER
Day in the life of Ivan Denisovich (from Solzhenitsyns book).

22.

Illusionist David Copperfield The Lost World

23.

24.

Flight of the Bumblebee (by Rimsky-Korsakov)

25.

Gutta-percha

26.

Mule (hinny is of female donkey + male horse). Germany

27.

Tunnels, bridges and causeways being excepted, Denmark shares a land border with only one other country. Which one? What word is missing from this WHO definition of health: "a state of complete physical, mental, and ______ well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity? Christopher Robin Milne, the young son of author A.A. Milne, had named his toy bear Winnie-the-Pooh after Winnie, a Canadian black bear from Winnipeg which he often saw at the London Zoo, and Pooh. What kind of creature was Pooh? Which is the only Islamic country whose capital citys name features the Sanskrit word for God?

28.

Social

29.

Swan

30.

Brunei (Bandar Seri Begawan)

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NO.
31.

QUESTION
A traceuse is a female practitioner of what kind of sporting activity?

ANSWER
Parkour

32.

Francis Poulencs Mouvement Perpetuel #1 was chosen, appropriately enough, to be heard over the main credits of which of Alfred Hitchcocks films?

Rope, which had the camera in perpetual motion as though the movie was shot in a single take with no cuts. Communist manifesto/Das Kommunistische Manifest Bn

33.

Which 1848 publication written by the political theorists Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels presents an analytical approach to the class struggle (historical and present) and the problems of capitalism?

34.

The Himalayan peak of Mount Kailash is sacred to four religions, of which Hinduism, Jainism, and Buddhism are three. Which is the fourth, which predates Buddhism in Tibet? Just as running a mile in under 4 minutes was considered a landmark achievement, so also was the 10 second deadline for the 100 metres dash. Who was the first person to run 100 metres in under 10 seconds?

35.

Jim Hines (of the USA, at the 1968 Mexico Olympics) a record he held unbeaten for 15 years Smiles

36.

What are classified into two types, a genuine one called a Duchenne, after a French neurologist, and a fake one called a Pan-Am? Which country, the smallest on mainland Africa, is the most recent to withdraw from the Commonwealth of Nations (in October 2013)? With more than 53 million likes on the application page, which is the most popular app on Facebook and the highest-grossing app in the Apple and Google app stores? In plane geometry what name is given to a polygon with eleven sides?

37.

Gambia

38.

Candy Crush Saga

39.

Hendecagon or undecagon Rihanna

40.

What is the middle name of recording artist, actress, and fashion designer Robyn Fenty?

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41. 42.

QUESTION
Which famous book begins with the line Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way? In a second post-credit scene at the end of The Avengers we see the superheroes silently eating what fast food invented by Turkish-born German restaurateur Kadir Nurman, who died in October 2013? Magellan circumnavigated the globe in the 16 th century; Sir Ranulph Fiennes, described as the greatest explorer alive today, did it in the 1980s but with what difference?

ANSWER
Anna Karenina (by Leo Tolstoy) Doner kebab or shawarma It was a polar circumnavigation, pole to pole (accept vertical, longitudinal etc.) Lego Eureka (the state motto of California).

43.

*
44. 45.

Who is the worlds largest manufacturer of rubber tyres by number of units produced (381 million annually on an average)? What word connects a 3rd century BC inference that the volume of water displaced must be equal to the volume of what was submerged in it, to the momentous 1848 discovery of gold near Suttons Mill in California? Since the early 2000s which island, that is the southernmost part of Italy, has become a prime transit point for immigrants from Africa, the Middle East and Asia wanting to enter Europe? What name is given to the study of the social, psychological and biological aspects of aging?

46.

Lampedusa

47.

Gerontology (not geriatrics, which is the branch of medicine that studies the diseases of the elderly). The Spy Who Loved Me The Owl and the Pussycat, or, Pussy Cat and Owl

48. 49.

Which is the shortest of Ian Flemings James Bond novels, and the only one told in the first person by a young woman? Our mother was the _____ ___, our father was the ___, And so we're partly little beasts and partly little fowl, The brothers of our family have feathers and they hoot, While all the sisters dress in fur and have long tails to boot. So begins the posthumously published sequel to which famous poem of 1871? (Or, fill in the blanks.) Nickel silver is an alloy of nickel and two other metals. Name either one.

50.

Copper and Zinc

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51.

QUESTION
The camera obscura is an optical device that projects an image of its surroundings on a screen. Translated directly from the Latin, camera obscura yields a different definition, yet one strongly associated with photography as well. What two-word term is this? Which word for a picture you take of yourself on a smart phone was declared Word of the Year 2013 by Oxford Dictionaries? Which cartoon characters real first name is Minerva? A pseudonymous developer known as "Satoshi Nakamoto" is responsible for which online virtual currency, the worlds fastest growing? In law what term is applied to a defence in which the defendant claims he committed a crime because he believed he was in a computer-generated world, and not in the real one? In ancient times gold was weighed against carob seeds. In late Roman times, the pure gold coin known as the solidus weighed how many carob seeds?

ANSWER
Dark room

52.

Selfie

53. 54.

Minnie Mouse Bitcoin

55.

Matrix defence

56.

24 hence the word carat, with 24 carats being the purest form of gold. Umm-Al-Quwain

57.

*
58.

Among the United Arab Emirates, Abu Dhabi translates as father of deer. Which Emirates name means mother of two powers?

What connects the Marilyn Monroe movie Somethings Got to Give, Schuberts Symphony No. 8 in B Minor, Coleridges poem Kubla Khan and the P.G. Wodehouse novel Sunset at Blandings? Which republic in the Pacific has its islands scattered east and west of the 180 degree meridian, as well as north and south of the Equator, making it the only country to exist in all four nominal hemispheres? A tradition held in the United Kingdom during the State Opening of Parliament requires a Member of Parliament to travel to Buckingham Palace just as the Queen leaves for Parliament. Why?

They were all unfinished.

59.

Kiribati

60.

To serve as hostage until the Queens safe return.

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NO.
61.

QUESTION
For correctness, or political correctness, what term has recently been applied to a humanoid robot designed to more accurately look like a human female than a male?

ANSWER
Gynoid

62.

The Bosphorus strait in Istanbul derives its name from bos (an adult Oxford castrated male of that cattle genus) and poros (passing of a river, shallow crossing or ferry). Which city in central southern England has a different name but with exactly the same etymology (name origin)? Which city has more Japanese than any other outside of Japan, more Italians than in Rome, and more than twice the number of Lebanese in all of Lebanon? Which imitation diamond is named for the river from which it was originally gathered as a rock crystal? What two word term describes the belief that Jesus was conceived and born with his mother Marys virginity remaining intact before, during and after his birth? Sao Paulo, Brazil

63.

64. 65.

Rhinestone Virgin birth (and not immaculate conception, which refers to Marys own conception being free or exempt from the taint of original sin). Grasse

66.

With fields of rose, jasmine, tuberose and mimosa blanketing the hills that surround it, which township on the French Riviera is considered to be the perfume capital of the world? In business and accounting what two-word term describes total assets minus total liabilities?

67. 68.

Net worth

What name is common to the night club in the movie Cabaret, KitKat or Kit Kat version 4.4 of the Android operating system, and a chocolate-coated wafer confection? Which British artist is the worlds richest (valued at over 300 million), whose artworks often feature death as a central theme, involving dead animals in formaldehyde? The popularity of the website Wheres George? has led to the establishment of other tracking sites that track other objects such as used booksand it has been used in at least one research paper to provide statistical patterns of human travel in the United States. What does Wheres George? track? Damien Hirst

69.

70.

U.S. dollars (paper money, dollar bills acceptable)

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NO.
71.

QUESTION
What is the only thing that Marvel Characters Inc. and DC Comics share a trademark on? Coca-Cola is officially available in every country in the world except two: North Korea, and which other? Which multi-millionaires parents first met on a train departing from Kings Cross Station bound for Arbroath in 1964? The title of which Beatles song simply means Amen? Which letter of the Greek alphabet corresponds to the O in English?

ANSWER
The term Super Heroes Cuba

72.

73.

J.K. Rowling

74. 75.

Let It Be Omicron

76.

In Charles Dickens Oliver Twist during supper at the orphanage when Oliver said Please sir, I want some more, what precisely was he asking for? Which early (1936) self-help book that has since sold 15 million copies has suggestions such as be hearty in your approbation and lavish in your praise? Among the worlds largest French-speaking cities with a population in excess of 1 million, which is the northernmost?

Gruel

77.

How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie Paris (48 degrees north of the Equator; Quebec City is about 46, and Montreal is about 45 degrees north) Bellatrix

78.

79.

*
80.

Also the first name of a character in Harry Potter, which bright star serves as Orions left shoulder in the constellation of the same name?

Chop into small pieces, freeze on a plate for an hour, then blend, blend, blend so goes an ice-cream recipe using what single ingredient?

Banana

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81.

QUESTION
Ethiopias first emperor Menelik I who ruled around 950 BC is traditionally believed the son of which legendary couple?

ANSWER
King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba (accept Bilquis, Nicaule, Nakuti or Makeda but not just Sheba) Yawning (pandiculation if accompanied by stretching). Armadillo

82.

*
83.

In medicine, tussis is coughing, deglutition is swallowing and singultus is hiccoughing; what is oscitancy?

Which is the only mammal that gives birth to identical quadruplets every time?

84. 85.

With independence proclaimed on 4 February, 1948, who became the Don Stephen first Prime Minister of Ceylon (now Sri Lanka)? Senanayake In ancient Greece the laurel wreath was a symbol of the highest status, often awarded to the victor at the Pythian Games. What is the leaf called when used in cooking? (See image on Page 11) In comic books typographical symbols standing for profanities are called what? (See image on Page 11) Who is the author/artist behind this comic strip? Alison Bechdel Bay leaf

86.

Grawlix

*
87.

88.

(See image on Page 11) Popularly used to symbolize music itself, what is the correct twoword term to describe this musical symbol?

Treble clef

89.

(See image on Page 12) The exotic-looking Dragon Blood tree is unique and distinctive to which Indian Ocean island that lies south of the Arabian Peninsula?

Socotra

90.

(See image on Page 12) What play is this?

Macbeth

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86.

87.

88.

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89.

90.

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