Exam practice

Kagbeni, Mustang: Take a bus or a flight from Kathmandu to Pokhara. From Pokhara, fly to Jomsom (a short flight between the mountains) or go by jeep along the Kali Gandaki valley. From Jomsom, Kagbeni is about 10 kilometers up the valley: a few hours’ walk, or a short jeep ride.

Shey Phoksundo Lake, Dolpa: Fly from Kathmandu to Nepalgunj, then take a small plane to Juphal, the airport of Dolpa. From Juphal, trek for two or three days through Dunai and up the Suligad valley to Ringmo village, which stands at the southern end of the lake.

Pathibhara, Taplejung: Fly from Kathmandu to Bhadrapur (or Biratnagar), then take a bus or jeep to Phungling, the district headquarters of Taplejung. From there, a jeep goes up to the trailhead, and the last part is a steep walk of a few hours to the temple.

Bhaktaraj Acharya (1943–2011) was one of Nepal’s best-loved singers. He sang patriotic songs, modern songs and devotional songs (bhajans) for more than forty years, and was called Bhajan Shiromani, the crown of bhajan singers.
Deepak Bista and Ayasha Shakya are taekwondo players. Both won bronze medals for Nepal at the 2006 Asian Games in Doha, and Deepak won another at the 2002 Asian Games. (The two later married.)
Pushpa Basnet is a social worker. She started a center in Kathmandu for children who had been living in prison with their parents, and gives them a home, food and school. In 2012 she was named CNN Hero of the Year, and in 2016 viewers voted her the CNN Superhero, chosen from the earlier Heroes of the Year.

• a.I love reading, especially in the holidays, when I can read for hours. The last book I read was Wings of Fire, the autobiography of A. P. J. Abdul Kalam, the scientist who became the President of India.
• b.My favorite writer is Laxmi Prasad Devkota, the Mahakavi (great poet) of Nepal. Something interesting about him: he wrote his famous long poem Muna Madan in the simple jhyaure folk rhythm, so that ordinary people could sing it, and it has sold more copies than almost any other book in Nepali.

Torture is both a noun and a verb, with the same form: They tortured him / He suffered torture.

• a.inspiring (an adjective before the noun example)
• b.tortured (a past tense verb)
• c.embroidered (a past tense verb: I added details to the story)
• d.investigation (a noun after internal)
• e.attracting (the -ing form after is: present continuous)

Find a year or a time word for each event: from an early age, during adolescence, since 1980, 1986, 1987, one year later, in 1996.

1. g Coelho wanted to become a writer. (from an early age)
2. d He stayed in a mental hospital. (as a teenager)
3. b He was enrolled in a law school.
4. f He left school and lived the life of a hippie. (a year later)
5. c He got married to the artist, Christina Oiticica. (1980)
6. a He traveled to Santiago de Compostela, which inspired him to write The Pilgrimage. (1986; the book 1987)
7. h Coelho wrote the allegorical novel The Alchemist. (1988)
8. e Coelho established the Paulo Coelho Institute. (1996)

So the order is g, d, b, f, c, a, h, e.
Some answer keys put the marriage (c) after The Alchemist. But the text says he has been married since 1980, years before his pilgrimage and his famous novel, so c comes before a.

Because they wanted him to become a lawyer.

A pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela in Spain. On it he had a spiritual awakening, and it inspired him to write The Pilgrimage; he changed his life completely after it.

Because it became a worldwide phenomenon: at first almost no one noticed it, but after its French translation became a bestseller it spread round the world, sold millions of copies, and became the most translated book by any living author. It was also Coelho’s breakthrough as an international writer.

Most of his books are partly autobiographical, and they deal with spirituality and faith, the effects of society on individuals, and love.

Any two:

1. His books have been translated into dozens of languages (The Alchemist is the most translated book by a living author) and sold millions of copies around the world.
2. He has won international awards, such as the World Economic Forum’s Crystal Award and France’s Légion d’honneur.
3. He is called one of the world’s most widely read authors.

Grammar note: evidence is uncountable in English, so we say “two pieces of evidence”, not “two evidences”.

His critics say that his books merely promote vague spirituality devoid of rigor: they offer fuzzy spiritual ideas without careful, exact thinking.

Aleph (2010), about his journey on the Trans-Siberian Railway in 2006, and Hippie (2018), about his travels as a hippie in the 1970s. (The Pilgrimage, about his walk to Santiago de Compostela, is a third.)

I would most like to read The Alchemist. First, it is his most famous book, and I want to know why millions of people in about 80 languages have loved it. Second, it is the story of a young shepherd who follows his dream across the desert, and like him, I sometimes wonder what my own purpose in life is. Third, it is short and written in simple language, so I could read it in English. Finally, after reading Coelho’s life story, I am curious to see how his own struggle to follow his dream shaped the story he wrote.

Your answers will use your own school and town. Here are examples.

• a.Friend: Where is the school library? You: Go out of our classroom and turn left. Walk to the end of the corridor and go down the stairs. At the bottom, turn right. The library is the second room on your left, next to the science lab.
• b.Visitor: Excuse me, is there a bank near here? You: Yes, there’s one on the main road. Go straight down this lane until you reach the main road, then turn right. Walk for about five minutes, past the petrol pump. The bank is on your left, opposite the bus stop.
• c.Friend: How do I get to your house? You: Get off the bus at the Ganesh temple stop. Cross the road and take the small road beside the temple. Go uphill for about 200 meters, past a big peepal tree. My house is the third one on your right, the blue one with a gate.
• d.Visitor: Excuse me, I want to meet the head teacher. You: Her office is in the main building. Go straight across the playground to the building with the flag. Go in through the front door and take the stairs to the first floor. Her office is the first room on your right; her name is on the door.
• e.Sister: Where is the stationery shop? You: Go along our street to the crossroads and turn left. Go past the sweet shop and the pharmacy. The stationery shop is on your left, next to the photocopy shop. You can’t miss it!

There are 22 articles: a 8 times (a dove, a brook, a blade, a shipwrecked sailor, a broken spar, a man, a stone, a distant wood), an once (an ant) and the 13 times (the ant ×4, the bank, the dove ×3, the straw, the shore, the stone, the heel, the pain).
In the first sentence, the dove and the ant are mentioned for the first time: the reader doesn’t know them yet, so they take a and an (an because ant begins with a vowel sound). After that, the reader knows which dove and which ant the story means, so they take the.
Some nouns take the without being mentioned before, because the scene makes clear which one: the bank and the shore of that brook, the heel of that man, the pain of that sting. And a shipwrecked sailor and a broken spar are any sailor and spar, in a comparison (a simile), not real ones in the story.

• a.an, The (first mention, before the vowel sound of expensive; then the guitar we know about)
• b.a (university is said you-, a consonant sound)
• c.The (wearing a black cap picks out which boy)
• d.an (the h of hour is silent)
• e.a (first mention; beautiful starts with a consonant sound)
• f.an (S.P. is said es-pee)
• g.the (a superlative: the hardest)
• h.an (the h of honorable is silent)
• i.a (a rate: Rs. 60 a kilo, meaning for each kilo)
• j.a (European is said you-)

Use the same four parts: the details (title, author, year, publisher, characters, genre), the plot in a few sentences without the ending, your opinion with reasons, and a recommendation (who would enjoy it). Write in the present tense for what happens in the story: Kalam grows up in Rameswaram…

A Review of Wings of Fire

Title: Wings of Fire: An Autobiography

Author: A. P. J. Abdul Kalam, with Arun Tiwari

Year: 1999

Publisher: Universities Press, India

Main people: Abdul Kalam, his father Jainulabdeen, his teachers, the space scientist Vikram Sarabhai

Genre: Autobiography

Wings of Fire is the life story of A. P. J. Abdul Kalam, the scientist who later became the President of India. Kalam grows up in a poor family in the small island town of Rameswaram, where he sells newspapers as a boy to help his family. Encouraged by his teachers, he studies hard, becomes an aeronautical engineer, and joins India’s space program, where he leads the team that builds India’s first satellite launch rocket. Later he heads the work on India’s missiles.

The book’s greatest strength is its honesty. Kalam doesn’t hide his failures: he writes about the rocket that fell into the sea and how his leader took the blame while giving him the credit for later success. His language is simple and warm, and every chapter carries a lesson about hard work, teamwork and faith in yourself. Some technical parts about rockets are hard to follow, but they can be skipped without losing the story.

I recommend Wings of Fire to every student who has a dream but thinks that a small town or an empty pocket will stop them. It shows that it won’t.

• a.One woman is doing housework (cleaning and scrubbing), while the other is watching her and telling her what to do.
• b.They are probably an employer and her maid: the well-dressed woman owns the house, and the other woman works for her as a domestic worker.

• a.mean – iv (unkind)
• b.get through – vi (to manage to do or complete something)
• c.dinner – vii (the main meal of the day)
• d.break down – iii (cease to function; collapse)
• e.pack-horse – ii (a horse that is used to carry heavy loads)
• f.Madam – v (a formal and polite way of speaking to a woman)
• g.dogged – i (not giving up easily)

In the poem, dogged is used in an old saying, I’ll be dogged if…, which means “I certainly will not”; on its own, dogged means determined, not giving up: her dogged effort.

No: in her words she was not mean (she was polite and even said she loved her maid), but in her actions she was unfair, loading one woman with the work of several. The speaker says she wasn’t mean ironically: the list of work that follows shows how hard the Madam really was on her.

She had to clean a twelve-room house; cook breakfast, dinner and supper; take care of the children; wash, iron and scrub; and walk the dog.

The heavy workload: she had far too much work to do for one person, every day.

She cried “Oh, no!”, denying that she was making a pack-horse of her, and said that she loved Alberta very much. But she did nothing to reduce her work.

The poem shows discrimination by class and race: a Black woman worker was given endless work by a rich white employer, who did not see her as an equal.
Our society has several kinds of discrimination too:

• Caste discrimination: so-called “untouchability” against Dalits, in temples, water taps and marriages, though the law has banned it since 2011.
• Gender discrimination: daughters given less schooling or property than sons, the burden of housework on women, and chhaupadi, which sends women out of the house during their periods.
• Discrimination against domestic workers, often children from poor families who work long hours in town houses for little pay, much like Alberta. The kamlari system, in which Tharu girls were sent to work as bonded servants, was abolished only in 2013.
• Discrimination by wealth, language, religion, disability or region.

Nepal’s Constitution (2015) says every citizen is equal, and the law punishes discrimination. But laws change behavior only when people do: by treating everyone with respect, paying workers fairly, and speaking up, as Alberta does.

• a.They are on a street in a city, perhaps one that the man is visiting.
• b.He is probably asking for directions: the way to a place he can’t find on his map.
• c.She is giving him directions, pointing the way he should go.

• a.True (“I was looking for the art museum”)
• b.False (she wanted to walk around and get a feel for the city; the boy advises the bus)
• c.False (the museum is miles away; the bus stop is about five minutes’ walk)
• d.False (she goes down the street by the Royal Hotel to the end, and only then turns right)
• e.False (after the junction she will see the bus stop on her left, not the museum)

Some answer keys give True for c and d. Listen again: “You’re miles away” is about the museum, and “It’s about five minutes’ walk from here” is about the bus stop; and the boy says to go to the end of the street by the hotel, then turn right.

• a.Take a bus.
• b.To feel the city. (In the recording: “to get a feel for the city”, to get to know what the city is like.)
• c.On the corner.
• d.Keep going straight. (Then the bus stop is on her left.)
• e.Ask someone else.

From our classroom, turn right into the corridor and walk to the end. Go down the stairs to the ground floor. At the bottom, turn left and go straight across the hall, past the notice board. The head teacher’s office is the last room on your right, opposite the staff room. Knock before you go in!

• a.✗, a (a meal; a restaurant not mentioned before)
• b.a, the (a nice holiday: a meal or holiday with an adjective; the best: a superlative)
• c.the, the (the nearest: a superlative; the end of a street we both know)
• d.the, a (listen to the radio; a radio, any one, one set)
• e.✗, the (in space; the Moon, there is only one)
• f.the, ✗ (go to the cinema; on television)
• g.a, the (a nice time; rivers take the)
• h.the, the (the head teacher of our school; the second: an order word)
• i.✗, ✗ (meals in general)

Some answer keys give the for the second gap of f. But watch films on television has no article, just as on TV.

Plan five paragraphs: birth and childhood; education; career; works and awards; family, death and why he is remembered. Don’t copy the notes as a list: make each one a sentence, and join the sentences with time words.

Madhav Prasad Ghimire: the National Poet
Madhav Prasad Ghimire, Nepal’s National Poet, was born on 23 September 1919 in Pustun, a village in Lamjung. His mother died when he was very young, so he was brought up by his father and grandfather.
As a boy he learned the Panchanga, the traditional Hindu calendar, at home. He then went to Duradanda, in Lamjung, and later to Kathmandu to study Sanskrit, and he also studied for some time in Banaras, India.
His writing career began in Lamjung, where he worked as a writer for the Bhashanubad Parishad. Later he became an editor of The Gorkhapatra, Nepal’s oldest newspaper.
Over his long life he wrote many books of poetry, among them the epic Gauri, a lament for his first wife; Malati Mangale, Manjari, Indrakumari and Rastra Nirmata; Kinnar-Kinnari, a collection of lyrical poems; and the epic Shakuntala. He also wrote Charu Charcha, a collection of essays. For his work he received many of Nepal’s highest honors, including the Tribhuwan Pragya Puraskar, the Bhanubhakta Award, the Sajha Puraskar, the Gorkha Dakshinabahu and the Distinguished Academy Medal.
Ghimire married twice and had six daughters and two sons. He died on 18 August 2020 in Lainchaur, Kathmandu, at the age of 100, and he was cremated with state honors. His songs and poems are still sung and read across Nepal.

• a.False (there was no school above Grade 5)
• b.True (he taught himself by talking to trekkers)
• c.True (a porter at eighteen, a guide at twenty-five)
• d.False (it is in Kathmandu)
• e.True (he pays the school fees of ten children every year)

• a.an, an (honest: silent h; engineer: a vowel sound)
• b.The, the (a river; a superlative)
• c.✗, the, ✗ (a meal; the news; on television)
• d.an, a, The (first mention; then the umbrella we know)
• e.The, the (only one Sun; a superlative)

Go straight on along Central Street. Cross 1st Street and keep going until you reach the roundabout. Turn right into 2nd Street and walk past the stationery shop. The bus station is on your left, at the end of the street. You can’t miss it!

• a.you’ll miss the boat
• b.is a tall story
• c.see eye to eye
• d.killed two birds with one stone

Pushpa Basnet
Pushpa Basnet is a Nepali social worker who has given more than a hundred children a childhood outside prison. She was born in Kathmandu in 1984 and studied social work. When she was twenty-one, she visited a prison as part of her studies and was shocked to see small children living behind bars with their parents, because they had no one to care for them outside. Soon after, in 2005, she started the Early Childhood Development Center, and later the Butterfly Home, where these children live, eat well and go to school. In 2012 she was named CNN Hero of the Year. She still runs the home.

A Review of Muna Madan
Title: Muna Madan · Author: Laxmi Prasad Devkota · Year: 1936 · Genre: a long poem (khandakavya) in the jhyaure folk rhythm
Muna Madan tells the story of Madan, a young man from Kathmandu who leaves his wife, Muna, and his old mother to go to Lhasa to earn money. On his way home, he falls ill and is left behind by his friends, but a kind Bhote man nurses him back to life. What he finds when he returns home, I won’t reveal.
The poem’s strength is its simple, singing rhythm: it is easy to read aloud and hard to forget. Its message, that a person is great by heart, not by caste, is still powerful today, and its scenes of parting and longing will touch anyone with a family member working abroad.
I recommend it to every reader, young or old.