Extra Questions
1. Who welcomed Mridu and Tapi? Who rushed Mridu in?
~
Mridu and Tapi were welcomed by Mridu’s aunt Rukku Manni. Mridu’s cousins Ravi and Meena rushed out, and Ravi pulled Mridu into the house.
2. What did Mridu do before entering? How were the other pair of
slippers?
~
Mridu took off her slippers and set them out neatly near a pair of large black
ones.
Those pair of the black shoe were grey, actually, with dust. Only the clear mark of
every toe on the front part of each slipper could be seen. The marks for the
two big toes were long and scrawny.
3. Where did Ravi drag Mridu? Where and how was the cat? What was
the cat doing?
~ Ravi
dragged Mridu to the backyard, behind a thick bitter-berry bush.
In the
backyard inside a torn football lined with sacking and filled with sand, lay a
very small cat.
The
cat was lapping up milk from a coconut half-shell.
4. Where did they find the cat? Why was the cat a secret?
~ They
found the cat the very morning outside their gate. The cat was mewing and
mewing.
They
asked Mridu to keep it a secret because they had a fear that Paati would leave
Paddu mama’s house if she comes to know about the cat.
5. What was Ravi’s opinion about the hypocrisy of the people about
being kind to animals?
~ Ravi
says to Meena that people always tell others to be kind to animals, however,
when people do that they ask to leave the animal outside because it is dirty
and unhygienic.
6. How did Ravi manage milk for the kitten?
~ Ravi
gets milk from the kitchen saying that he is hungry. He often drinks most of it
to prove Paati that he was hungry indeed. He then gets the milk in a glass in
the backyard and empties it in the coconut shell.
7. What was the name given to the kitten? How did Mridu react to
this name?
~ Ravi
names the kitten as Mahendran,
Mahendravarma
Pallava Poonai.
Mridu was impressed to hear the name as it was
a real name, not just a cute cat’s name.
8. What was the full name of the kitten according to Ravi? What
connection did Ravi make with lion and Pallava emblem?
~
According to Ravi, the full name of the kitten was Mahendravarma Pallava
Poonai.
Ravi
informed that he could make it from its fur that it was a fine breed cat, a
close relative of lions family like the one that Pallava kings used in their
emblem.
9. What did Ravi see in Mahabalipuram? How is the kitten connected
to the Mahabalipuram statue?
~ On
his school trip to Mahabalipuram, Ravi had seen a statue of a lion.
Ravi
believed that the lion was the ancestor of the kitten. He was proud that his
small kitten was the descendent of Mahabalipuram Rishi cat.
10. What did Ravi say about Mahabalipuram Rishi cats and cats in
Egypt?
~ Ravi says that cat is descended from the
Egyptian cat-god. He also says that one of the descendants of that cat-goddess
was a stowaway in one of the Pallava ships, and his descendant was the
Mahabalipuram Rishi-Cat, whose descendant is his kitten Mahendran.
11. How can you say that Ravi likes to talk and lecture?
~ Ravi
was an intelligent boy, he had good knowledge about history. His imagination
power was too high. The way he was explaining about the kitten and about its
ancestors in details to his cousins, we can conclude that he likes to give
lectures.
12. Who is Bastet? How is Bastet connected to the kitten in the
story?
~
Bastet is the goddess of ancient Egyptian religion, worshipped as early as the
second dynasty.
Ravi
says that cat is descended from the Egyptian cat-god. He also says that one of
the descendants of that cat-goddess was a stowaway in one of the Pallava ships,
and his descendant was the Mahabalipuram Rishi-Cat, whose descendant is his
kitten Mahendran.
13. How did the Kitten react to the sound of ‘whoop Eek’ and
‘kreech’?
~ The
kitten looked up and sharpened his claws on the edge of the coconut shell as he
heard a “kreech” sound from the window. He was frightened out of his
wits. Hair standing on end, he bounced up and scurried towards a bamboo tray of
red chillies that had been set out to dry.
14. What was the source of ‘kreech’? How was Lalli different in
violin play that the music master?
~ The
kreech sound was made whenever Lalli learned to play the violin.
Ravi
exclaims that Lalli will never learn a thing. The music master just goes on
playing like a train whizzing whereas while Lalli’s all the time derailing. She
always goes off track.
15. How was Lalli awkward in music playing?
~
Lalli always goes off track. She sits a
little
distance away, awkwardly holding her violin and bowstring, her elbows jutting
out and her eyes glazed with concentration.
16. Give a physical description of the music master.
~ The music master was bony figured. He had a
mostly bald head with a fringe of oiled black hair falling around his ears and
an old-fashioned tuft. The master had a gold chain gleamed around his neck and
a diamond ring on his hand which glided up and down the stem of the violin. He
had a large foot which stuck out from beneath his gold-bordered veshti edge,
and he was beating time on the floor with the scrawny big toe.
17. According to Ravi how was the music of the music master?
~ Ravi
said the music-master’s notes seemed to float up and settle perfectly into the
invisible tracks of the melody. It was like the wheels of a trained fitting
smoothly into the rails and whizzing along.
18. What did the mother of Ravi say about the beggar? What was the
opinion of Paati about the beggars coming from alms?
~
Rukku Manni called Ravi and asked him to send the beggar away as she was fed up
with the beggars.
Paati
was fed up with the beggar coming to her house from a week and now she wanted
him to find another house.
19. When Ravi, Mridu and Meena went to inform the beggar about the
thoughts of Rukku Manni and Paati what was the beggar doing?
~
Ravi, Mridu and Meena found that the
beggar
was already in the garden, making himself comfortable. He had spread his upper
cloth under the neem tree, and was leaning against its trunk, and was about to
snooze.
20. What had been the reaction of the beggar when he heard that he
would have to return empty-handed?
~ Hearing from the children that he would have
to return empty-handed, the beggar opened his eyes very wide and gazed at each
of them. In a voice choked with feelings, he said that the Ladies of the house
were very kind. He exclaims that he couldn’t believe, he kept his body and soul
together on their generosity for a whole week and now they would return him
away empty-handed.
21.”Amma! Amma-oh!” Tell us how did the author reflect the sentence.
~ The beggar when he came to know that he had to go empty-handed, got disappointed and raised his voice saying “Amma! Amma-oh!”. Being empty stomach it wasn’t much feeble. It began in a deep, strong rumble somewhere in his withered belly, and came booming out of his mouth, with its few remaining teeth.
It was so heart touching. He had no shoes, got blisters in his feet’s. He was empty stomach striving for food. It was not fair to return the man empty-handed.
22. Why did the beggar want to rest a while before leaving? How were his feet?
~ The beggar told the children that he would leave after taking a little rest as it was too hot outside and he had blisters in his feet.
The beggar had pink, peeling blisters on the soles of his bare feet as he was walking unshod.
23. How did Mridu react to seeing the blisters on the soul of the beggar?
~
Mridu was in pain after seeing the blisters on the sole of his bare feet as he was walking unshod in the hot land. Mridu concluded that he might have no money to buy a shoe. She asked her cousin Ravi and Meena if they had any extra pair of shoes and suggested to help him by giving him a pair of shoe.
24. How did Ravi react to the fact that the beggar would burn his feet on the hot road?
~ Ravi asked his cousins to keep patience while he was thinking that ‘it’s not being fair with the beggar. He wanted to help him as he knew that the beggar will fry his feet on the hot road, already he had caught blisters on them. He wanted to help the beggar by gifting him a pair of shoes.
25. What solution did the children decide to protect the beggar from frying? Whose chappals, at last, did they manage?
~ The children’s were in pain after seeing the blisters in the beggar’s feet due to the hot land. They concluded that he might have no money to buy a pair of shoes so they decided to gift him a pair of shoes.
The children gave away the music masters chappals to the beggar.
26. How did the beggar react when he got the chappals?
~ The feet of the beggar was blistered due to the hot land so on getting a gift of chappals, the beggar muttered a blessing to the children’s and vanished in a minute because he did not want to lose the gift of those chappals. It was the best gift and would help him a lot.
27. When the music master came out of the house what did he find about the three children under the tree? Then whom did he call and why?
~ The music-master came out of the house and took an unappreciative look at the three children’s sitting quietly under the tree, playing marbles.
The music master called Lalli as he couldn’t find his pair of chappals which he had opened in the verandah.
28. How did the music master and Lalli search the chappal? What did the music master say highly about his chappal?
~
Lalli and her music master searched every corner of the verandah for the chappal. The music master scurried around, looking over the railing and crouching near the flower pots.
The music master said that his chappals were Brand new which cost a whole month’s fees. He also said that he went all the way to Mount Road just to buy them.