The Eight critical questions of the Mauritius Contest
Wednesday, May 7th, 2008There was many reasons why I launched the Mauritius Contest. But some other aspects started to come up as the contest move on. What seems to be good is that I learned new things while searching for the questions. I think that the participants have learned also from this little game. I hope that it was not just a copy and paste action without even looking at the answers. At first, all the questions would have been related to Mauritius, but some participant was not too keen with that, since the informations was not easily available on the internet, and the first prize was maybe not worth that amount of effort.
I wanted to keep this aspect of the competition (i.e related to Mauritius) at least at the end of the competition, so I asked all questions related to Mauritius and to make matter worse ( not for me but for the participant and to make the point worth it’s 5 units ) I tried questions that was not easily found on the internet. Since this was THE questions that would determine the winners, their corrections was as meticulous as the correction of the CPE exam papers for the top 100 children. So here are the questions as well as their answers and a little report, just like Cambridge use to do with the SC and HSC exams papers
1. What famous stamp, from Mauritius, has also its own museum ?
The answer was Blue Penny also known as the Mauritius Blue Penny. The museum is found at Caudan Waterfront. This is among the rarest stamps in the world and a legend in the world of philately. We, Mauritian, can be proud of this local product. The blue penny can be seen in the following places : The British Library in London, the Museum for Communication in Berlin, The Postal Museum of Sweden in Stockholm and of course at the Blue Penny Museum in Mauritius
2.Where is the Embassy of China found in Mauritius ?
The Embassy of China is found at Belle Rose. A lot of people has answered to that question, but they did not seem to have their 5 points. What I have learned in physics was the difference between precision and accuracy. Precision is the amount of details given whereas accuracy is how near the answer is to the real answer. An answer can be very precise but not accurate and a lot of people has given precision on this answer but it was not accurate. A simple Belle Rose as the answer would have been ok, but why people you had to precise that it was found in Rose Hill. Look at this photo taken just after the bus stop of rose hill at the “Magistrature”
And yes people, this is the boundary between Rose Hill and Quatre Bornes in Mauritius. So an answer like Belle rose, Rose Hill cannot be accepted. Technically that place does not exists. You must be more attentive to such details when traveling.
3. What was the Original name of the hypermarket Jumbo, found at phoenix ?
I think this was the most easy question of that part. Shall I say the answer or you already know it? Of course the answer is Continent. It was the first hypermarket that came to Mauritius.
4. In which building was the old MCB of Beau Bassin found ?
This was the question that give me the most amazing answers. Some people just describe the building exactly as it is but without the vital part i.e it’s name. The Building is called Ahmed Building. Just have a look at it in the picture below. This is a picture taken 1 day ago at the round about of Beau Bassin.
5. What are the towns of Mauritius ?
Here is the list of the towns in Mauritius:
- Curepipe
- Rose Hill
- Quatre Bornes
- Beau Bassin
- Vacoas
- Phoenix
As you may have noticed, Port Louis is not in the list. In fact Port Louis got the status of City in August 1966. I know many people will be complaining about that issue, but just mind people that the questions was in English. If both City and Town mean the same thing in French, in English it is different. So all the people that included Port Louis in the list did not make it for the point. Shazia was the only one to exclude Port Louis from the list.
6. What was the smallest (in terms of value not size) money note in Mauritius ?
For this question, I was really expecting no real good answers. To my great surprise there was 2 positive answers from Mahesh and http://www.lucain.com which was miraculously saved by ebay. The right answer was 25 cents. ( yeah I know, just 5 cents too much )
7. In Trianon, what is the name of the club, behind the margarine factory, where the school leavers party 2007 was organized ?
For this answer I got a lot of answer for palladium. Is it because it was recently used for dance fever ?? But I don’t see any margarine factory in front of Palladium, the factory is to it’s right when facing the palladium. The school leavers that was organized in 2007 was at Hua Lien. Ludovic was the first one to give the good answer on this.
8. On the UBS line, from Port Louis to Curepipe via Rose Hill, what is that bus route number ?
The answer to this question is Route Number 2. The route 2A normally is an extension of this route and it’s destination is Forest Side. Since my question was not which bus to take to go to Curepipe, but the route number from Port Louis to Curepipe Via Rose Hill, there is only one possible answe, which is Route Number 2. I have specially included the part of the UBS line not to make any publicity but to prevent answers such as route 102 ( route 102 is a bus from port louis to curepipe via rose hill but via floreal too from the NTC )
Here you are people with the answers of the last set of questions to the Mauritius Contest. Hope that you don’t mind the severe correction of this last part. This is to give the contest quite a good standard. What I can say is that as long as the answers are given on Google everyone give the answers but when he (or it) cannot give the answers it become harder. You can still use msn (not the search engines but the messenger service) since there are people at the other end. Do not tell me that there is not a single person on your contact list that did not know at least one answer ( in other words, do not tell me that there is not at least one person on your msn, facebook or hi5 list that came to the school leavers party 2007 ). When playing conventional quiz, I know people that ask the questions to every single person that they know and met on their way.
I will be glad if it was possible to have some sort of feedback from people that has participated in the contest. The contest system was not perfect but there is still a lot of room for improvements. Do not hesitate to raise your voice hear until it get into the head of the organizer and other collaborator. If you are shy, don’t be shy and if you cannot keep your mouth shut, keep it open 
