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This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What does odar mean?
(a) Infidel.
(b) Non-believer.
(c) Other.
(d) Turk.

2. Where did Franklin Delano Roosevelt attend prep school?
(a) Exeter.
(b) Groton.
(c) Lawrenceville.
(d) Andover.

3. What did Aunt Nona major in while at Barnard?
(a) English.
(b) Economics.
(c) History.
(d) French.

4. About how many words did the World Book encyclopedia have on Armenia when Balakian tried to research his culture?
(a) 200.
(b) 100.
(c) 500.
(d) 400.

5. At what age did Aunt Nona begin institutional schooling?
(a) Fourteen.
(b) Twelve.
(c) Sixteen.
(d) Fifteen.

6. What was the name of the private school Balakian was made to attend for high school?
(a) Tanglewood.
(b) Lawrenceville.
(c) Marbury.
(d) Englewood.

7. What fruit does the spice mahleb come from?
(a) Wild cherry.
(b) Pomegranate.
(c) Fig.
(d) Plum.

8. What is berek?
(a) A rice dish.
(b) Kebabs.
(c) A pistachio dessert.
(d) Cheese-filled filo triangles.

9. Where did Balakian and his father meet the Indian dressed as a chief during their cross-country tour?
(a) Arizona.
(b) Yellowstone.
(c) Illinois.
(d) The Black Hills.

10. What Biblical figure were the Jewish boys arguing about during the baseball game in "An Armenian Jew in Suburbia"?
(a) Joshua's wife.
(b) Abraham's wife.
(c) Noah's wife.
(d) Moses' wife.

11. What kind of ice cream did grandmother buy Peter when they accidentally got off the subway in Harlem?
(a) Popsicle.
(b) Creamsicle.
(c) Italian ice.
(d) Fudgsicle.

12. In what New Jersey town did Bedros Aroosian work in the silk mills?
(a) Tenafly.
(b) Paterson.
(c) Newark.
(d) Teaneck.

13. What was the lowest mark Balakian's female relatives gave to the houses they viewed during their Sunday drives?
(a) Ugly.
(b) Hum hum.
(c) F.
(d) Next.

14. What book caused a racial flareup among the football players during Balakian's freshmen year at college?
(a) Eldridge Cleaver's Soul on Ice.
(b) W.E.B. DuBois' The Souls of Black Folk.
(c) The Autobiography of Malcolm X.
(d) Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man.

15. To what town was Balakian taking his girlfriend when he refused to return home for his grandmother's memorial service?
(a) Amherst.
(b) Boston.
(c) Princeton.
(d) Cambridge.

Short Answer Questions

1. What injury did Balakian sustain on the football field during August practice before his sophomore year?

2. Why did Balakian not like the works of Anais Nin, who was friends with his aunt?

3. What baseball team did Peter and his grandmother root for?

4. How many Crusades passed through Byzantium on the way to the Holy Land?

5. What was Peter shocked to see his grandmother doing as she read late at night?

(see the answer keys)

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