Read the following passage carefully. "Mum!" I shouted. "Are you okay?" I saw her little tent shuddering in the gale and listened closely for her response. Her voice was almost casual: "Oh, yes, I’m fine." That’s my mother. It was the first night of our cycling trip through the interior of Iceland—a region so remote and inhospitable that for centuries, according to legend, it was abandoned. The weather was decidedly hurricane-like, but Mum wasn’t concerned. Months ago, I told her about my plan to pedal across Iceland. "It will be really difficult," I said. "The roads are unpaved and often washed out, and the wind is blowing constantly — sometimes so hard that it pushes you off the road." There was silence for a moment. Then she asked, "Can I come?" "Sure," I replied. "But like the rest of us, you have to train to do two 160 kilometres a day back-to-back," "Wow," she said, "I could never do that." I had more faith in my mother’s physical abilities than she did. I’d seen her raise six children and put in long hours doing physical labour on our small farm. "Sure you can," I told her, "Start tomorrow." What really concerned me was what 1 perceived to be her frustrating humility: I thought her too self-depreciating about her intellect just because she had not completed college. 1 felt she underestimated her attractiveness just because she was not the type to wear makeup or fancy clothes. As I had grown into adulthood, the life I’d chosen seemed light-years away from Mum’s quiet existence, still caring for her children and her children’s children. Sometimes, on a visit home, I’d describe some recent trip I’d taken, and her blue eyes would shine with interest. So I couldn’t help thinking this trek might revitalize Mum, who had started to slow down in her 50s. It might spice up what I saw as her humdrum life. And it might be a boost to her tentative and retiring persona. Mum trained furiously, months in advance. As the trip roster was pared down to Mum, my good friend Allen and me, she stood as the most dedicated. Soon she was riding 80-100 kilometres per day, and was as strong a rider as Allen or I. On the basis of your reading of the passage, answer the following questions briefly: (a) How does the narrator describe the weather and road conditions in Iceland? (b) What training did the adventure cycling trip require? Why did the narrator have faith in his mother’s physical ability to undertake the trip? (c) In what way did the narrator think the trip would help his mother? (d) When were the narrator and his friend sure about his mum’s preparation?
Answers
Answer:
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The correct answers of the passage are -
(a) The inhospitable weather condition in the Iceland area has been decidedly like hurricane. By continuously blowing strong wind, the road has been too much damaged, and there is also no hard surface.
(b) The training involved running back-to-back, 160 kilometers a day. The narrator has faith in the physical ability of his mother as he saw her as she raised her six children and succeeded in spending long hours doing physical work on a small farm.
(c) The narrator felt this trip could give his mother, who had begun slowing down in the 1950s, enthusiasm and a new life and he thought it would spice up her boring life and improve her retired and tentative persona.
(d) The narrator's mother had vigorously prepared months in advance for the cycling trip. His girlfriend, his friend Allen and her, stood as the most devoted among him, and soon was biking 80-100 kilometers a day.