The BQC Open Quizzes 2013 Are Coming!

And with that Paul Revere-esque opening, we'd like to invite you to attend our third annual weekend of competitive quizzing in this tiny western outpost of the country.

We're hosting six quizzes over two days (2-3 March, 2013), and we'd like to have as many people over as we possibly can. Last year, we had a most wonderful turnout, and we're hoping to top that this year.

Not only have we scheduled the events so that locals and visitors from out of town can make it to the events and back comfortably, we've also put together a wide range of topics for our quizzes, and INR 60,000 in prize money.

Schedule, venue and other fun details of the event below:

The Venue: Bhagini Samaj Hall, Road No. 3, Hindu Colony, Dadar (E), Mumbai - 400014.

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Day 1 - Saturday, 2 March 2013

• The Sports Quiz
• Teams of 3 or fewer
• Start Time: 1030 hrs
• Quizmasters: Atul Mathew and Srinath TB

• The Bombay Quiz (Written)
• Teams of 3 or fewer
• Start Time: 1430 hrs
• Quizmaster: Shubhankar Gokhale

• The Movies Quiz
• Teams of 3 or fewer
• Start Time: 1600 hrs
• Quizmasters: Abhinav Dasgupta and Vibhendu Tewari

Day 2 - Sunday, 3 March 2013

• The Literature Quiz
• Teams of 3 or fewer
• Start Time: 0930 hrs
• Quizmasters: Anannya Deb, Sumant Srivathsan and Vibhendu Tewari

• The Roti Kapda Makan Quiz (Food, Fashion and Literature - Written)
• Teams of 3 or fewer
• Start Time: 1330 hrs
• Quizmasters: Amit Pandeya, Govind Grewal and Vikram Joshi

• The Bombay Open Quiz
• Teams of 3 or fewer
• Start Time: 1500 hrs
• Quizmasters: Aditya Gadre, Rajiv Rai and Sumant Srivathsan

Entry Fee: INR 150 per team per quiz. All-student (college/school) teams quiz free.

We will update the break-up of the prize money shortly. Meanwhile, book your tickets, clear your calendars, and inform the folks at home. And your friends too, if they'd like to join us as well. 

The Kala Ghoda Arts Festival Literature Quiz 2012

Anannya Deb, Sumant Srivathsan and Vibhendu Tewari, on behalf of the Bombay Quiz Club, cordially request your presence at the Literature Quiz conducted annually as part of the Kala Ghoda Arts Festival's Literature calendar. This year's edition is the fourth of its kind, and therefore, it will not have a name, and we will refer to ourselves by obscure symbols that Robert Langdon will spend his next novel appearance deciphering. Yes, Govind Grewal, this is a Led Zeppelin reference. And a Dan Brown reference too, but you won't hold that against us, I hope.

When: Saturday, 11 February 2012. We start at 5 PM, so please be there at least 15 minutes earlier.

Where: Bombay Natural History Society Auditorium, Hornbill House, Kala Ghoda. Here's the Google Maps listing, where you can find directions, bus routes and a strangely named location called Lion Gate.

The Rules:

• Teams of two. If you're flying solo, we'll play QuizSaathi.com. Stags will not be turned away. In fact, nobody will be turned away. Not even Salman Rushdie.
• Bring a pen and something to support a sheet of paper. There will be a written elimination round.
• The top six teams will qualify for the finals, wherein there will be blood. We don't mean the film based on Upton Sinclair's short story Oil!.
• We need help hiding the bodies once the winners have been identified, so please do stick around and watch the finals. Don't make us lock the doors.
• We're serious about the door-locking.

The Prizes:

• They exist. In cash. Just don't plan to finance your vacation. It will suffice, however, to buy the drinks when you win.
• There is also a second and a third prize. You can sponsor the soft drinks that people put into their drinks.
• If you're underage, ask your parents what to do with your loot. Ask them for books.

The BQC - IIT Bombay Quizzes - Recaps, Reviews and Recognition

On 6 March, 2011, the BQC and IIT Bombay hosted the inaugural Bombay Open quizzes, a day-long event with up to four quizzes. We'd like to thank IIT-B and its students for support with:

• the venue - a new, large and comfortable lecture hall;
• printing posters and directions;
• audio-visual equipment, including the buzzers which were used in all quizzes;
• research for the Open Sports and General quizzes; and
• a generous number of student participants in all quizzes.

And our sponsors:

• Anand Sivashankar, Anannya Deb and Atul Mathew, for contributing Rs. 5,000 each towards prizes, particularly for the Sports Quiz;
• Rajiv Rai, for contributing Rs. 12,000 towards prizes and a dozen other expenses; and
• Vibhendu Tewari, for not asking for Rs. 7,000 back from the BQC for earlier expenses.

In the absence of formal corporate sponsorship, it's wonderful that these guys can open up their wallets to host an event of this nature. Particularly when they're giving up a significant amount of time to go with their financial contributions. Many thanks, gentlemen, and here's hoping we can set a trend with benefactors growing in strength.

Vikram Joshi Haazir Ho

This week's BQC session will be hosted by freshly-minted Landmark Mumbai champ Vikram Joshi. The quiz should be fun, of course, but this is an ideal opportunity to fleece Vik for an all-you-can-consume booze-up afterward. Provided he can be captured for the duration of footing the bill.



Quizmaster: Vikram Joshi

When: 3 PM, Sunday, 16 May, 2010 (Please be there by 2:45 PM for team assignments)
Where: Pinstorm, Ground Floor, Swati House (Next to Kotak Bank on Linking Road), North Avenue, Santa Cruz (W).
Directions: From the south: If you come north on Linking Road from Bandra to SantaCruz, you'll find a large Benetton Store on the right. At the end of that block is a Kotak Bank at the corner. Take a right and it's the next building, take the first gate and tell the sentry you've come for the quiz. From the north: If you get on to Linking Road at the airplane park end, you'll cross a HDFC Bank. A block later, you'll see a Kotak Bank on the corner - do not cross it. Take a left at that point and it's the building next to Kotak Bank.

The Urban Legend Lit Quiz

Once upon a time, there were rumblings of a literature quiz in Pune. Originally expected to take place in 2009, it had been postponed due to several unforeseen circumstances, including H1N1, the Landmark Quiz, Pune, and general inertia. Imagine our surprise, then, that it actually happened, with eyewitnesses testifying to its existence.

So, in an effort to independently verify these rumours, we have asked Anand Sivashankar to present it at the Bombay Quiz Club. Come on over, in the true scientific spirit, we shall explore the legend of the Lit Quiz. After that, we can safely move on to UFOs, the Chupacabra and the Abonimable Snowman.


Quizmaster: Anand Sivashankar

When: 3 PM, Sunday, 25 April, 2010 (Please be there by 2:45 PM for team assignments)

Where: Pinstorm, Ground Floor, Swati House (Next to Kotak Bank on Linking Road), North Avenue, Santa Cruz (W).

Directions: From the south: If you come north on Linking Road from Bandra to SantaCruz, you'll find a large Benetton Store on the right. At the end of that block is a Kotak Bank at the corner. Take a right and it's the next building, take the first gate and tell the sentry you've come for the quiz. From the north: If you get on to Linking Road at the airplane park end, you'll cross a HDFC Bank. A block later, you'll see a Kotak Bank on the corner - do not cross it. Take a left at that point and it's the building next to Kotak Bank.

New Season Kicks Off

We'll be kicking off the new BQC 2010-11 season with an old-but-mostly-unseen quiz. Rajiv Rai will play quizmaster, with questions from the excellent Kurukshetra Open 2010 held in January. Some of us were there for that quiz, and we'll be sitting this one out. The rest of you, this is going to be awesome.

This is also a good time to make two announcements:

• If you hosted a quiz for us last season and have not shared your questions with me, please do so ASAP. There are plenty of online storage services which you can use to send out large files. Our subscriptions are incentivized through this sharing, so we absolutely must have them sent out.
• Speaking of subscriptions, it's that time of the year again, and I'll start passing the hat around on Sunday. Please to be contributing generously. :)

Quizmaster: Rajiv Rai


When: 3 PM, Sunday, 11 April, 2010 (Please be there by 2:45 PM for team assignments)

Where: Pinstorm, Ground Floor, Swati House (Next to Kotak Bank on Linking Road), North Avenue, Santa Cruz (W).

Directions:

From the south: If you come north on Linking Road from Bandra to SantaCruz, you'll find a large Benetton Store on the right. At the end of that block is a Kotak Bank at the corner. Take a right and it's the next building, take the first gate and tell the sentry you've come for the quiz.

From the north: If you get on to Linking Road at the airplane park end, you'll cross a HDFC Bank. A block later, you'll see a Kotak Bank on the corner - do not cross it. Take a left at that point and it's the building next to Kotak Bank.

The No Enthu Da Open

Aadisht Khanna first talked about doing a 3-way No Enthu Da Open in three cities - Bombay, Bangalore and Madras - sometime last year, but in an appropriate nod to the team name, NED was put, and it didn't quite work out. This year, considerably less NED has been put by Karthik, Aadisht and Aswath, and we will have an NED Open in all three cities on Sunday. Of course, we said "considerably less" NED. Since our QM is going to be in Madras this weekend, a Monkee will jump into the breach and host the quiz here.

Though we're calling it an Open, this is a regular BQC session. Seeding and randomisation of teams will be done before the quiz.

Quizmaster:Atulya 'Monkee' Bharadwaj


When: 3 PM, Sunday, 28 March, 2010 (Please be there by 2:45 PM for team assignments)

Where: Pinstorm, Ground Floor, Swati House (Next to Kotak Bank on Linking Road), North Avenue, Santa Cruz (W).

Directions:

From the south: If you come north on Linking Road from Bandra to SantaCruz, you'll find a large Benetton Store on the right. At the end of that block is a Kotak Bank at the corner. Take a right and it's the next building, take the first gate and tell the sentry you've come for the quiz.

From the north: If you get on to Linking Road at the airplane park end, you'll cross a HDFC Bank. A block later, you'll see a Kotak Bank on the corner - do not cross it. Take a left at that point and it's the building next to Kotak Bank.

Double-Barrelled BQC

We'll have a half-and-half session this Sunday, courtesy Amit Varma and Mahesh Murthy (who's already done one quiz for us this season). It's IPL time, so please try to be there on time, so that we won't hold back all the eager T20 fans from their frenzy. :)

Quizmaster: Amit Varma, Mahesh Murthy

When: 3 PM, Sunday, 14 March 2010 (Please be there by 2:45 PM for team assignments)

Where: Pinstorm, Ground Floor, Swati House (Next to Kotak Bank on Linking Road), North Avenue, Santa Cruz (W).

Directions:

From the south: If you come north on Linking Road from Bandra to SantaCruz, you'll find a large Benetton Store on the right. At the end of that block is a Kotak Bank at the corner. Take a right and it's the next building, take the first gate and tell the sentry you've come for the quiz.

From the north: If you get on to Linking Road at the airplane park end, you'll cross a HDFC Bank. A block later, you'll see a Kotak Bank on the corner - do not cross it. Take a left at that point and it's the building next to Kotak Bank.

Back In Blog - But It's Just Business As Usual

We haven't been too regular about updating the blog announcements and results for quite a while now. But that doesn't mean we haven't been quizzing - so we'll try and catch up on the results and league standings as soon as possible.

Meanwhile, it's quizzing as usual on Sunday, and Abhinav Dasgupta, who filled in on short notice in December (thanks, mate!) will do a proper quiz this weekend. The short quiz was good fun, so we should certainly expect more of the same this time around. Details and directions below.

Quizmaster: Abhinav Dasgupta

When: 3 PM, Sunday, 28 February, 2010 (Please be there by 2:45 PM for team assignments)

Where: Pinstorm, Ground Floor, Swati House (Next to Kotak Bank on Linking Road), North Avenue, Santa Cruz (W).

Directions:

From the south: If you come north on Linking Road from Bandra to SantaCruz, you'll find a large Benetton Store on the right. At the end of that block is a Kotak Bank at the corner. Take a right and it's the next building, take the first gate and tell the sentry you've come for the quiz.

From the north: If you get on to Linking Road at the airplane park end, you'll cross a HDFC Bank. A block later, you'll see a Kotak Bank on the corner - do not cross it. Take a left at that point and it's the building next to Kotak Bank.

The Celebrate Bandra Quiz

The folks at the Celebrate Bandra Festival asked us to put together a quiz for this year's edition. Details below - and cash prizes are there. I'm not sure how much, but it should be worth the early escape from work. The quiz, that is. We all know real quizzers don't get rich. ;-)

Quizmaster: Sumant Srivathsan

Research: Anannya Deb, Amit Pandeya and others. :)

When: 4:30 PM, Saturday, 28 September, 2009

Where: Crossword Bookstore, Linking Road, Bandra

Teams: Two or fewer members, no bars of any kind. Until after the quiz.

Monkee Business

Atulya Bharadwaj will do his quiz this Sunday, as we get into the thick of quizzing season. We will start an hour later than usual (see the new time below) as many of the regulars will be in South Bombay attending Dhananjay Shettigar's JBIMS Quiz. Dhananjay tells me that he will finish by 2 PM, which should give us all adequate time to get back to Santacruz for our regular season. For those who plan to be in Bangalore for the next season of the Landmark Quiz, this should be a great chance to sharpen your skills.

Quizmaster: Atulya 'Monkee' Bharadwaj

When: 4 PM, Sunday, 25 October, 2009 (Please be there by 3:45 PM for team assignments)

Where: Pinstorm, Ground Floor, Swati House (Next to Kotak Bank on Linking Road), North Avenue, Santa Cruz (W).

Directions:

From the south: If you come north on Linking Road from Bandra to SantaCruz, you'll find a large Benetton Store on the right. At the end of that block is a Kotak Bank at the corner. Take a right and it's the next building, take the first gate and tell the sentry you've come for the quiz.

From the north: If you get on to Linking Road at the airplane park end, you'll cross a HDFC Bank. A block later, you'll see a Kotak Bank on the corner - do not cross it. Take a left at that point and it's the building next to Kotak Bank.

Yokozuna

Once upon a time, a fellow quizzer and I shared a desk in school. Since then, we have both grown large enough to no longer fit in such a desk. But Bombay is a big city, and it can accommodate many such large types. Sumo hosts his first BQC session on Sunday, and as always, it should be a cracker.




Quizmaster: Rajen 'Sumo' Prabhu


When: 3 PM, Sunday, 20 September, 2009 (Please be there by 2:45 PM for team assignments)

Where: Pinstorm, Ground Floor, Swati House (Next to Kotak Bank on Linking Road), North Avenue, Santa Cruz (W).

Directions:

From the south: If you come north on Linking Road from Bandra to SantaCruz, you'll find a large Benetton Store on the right. At the end of that block is a Kotak Bank at the corner. Take a right and it's the next building, take the first gate and tell the sentry you've come for the quiz.

From the north: If you get on to Linking Road at the airplane park end, you'll cross a HDFC Bank. A block later, you'll see a Kotak Bank on the corner - do not cross it. Take a left at that point and it's the building next to Kotak Bank.

The Results So Far - Part 2 of 2

The rest of the results from this season. Regular service will continue with Amit on Janardhan's quiz.


QM: Anannya Deb

First
Anand Sivashankar
Balakrishnan S.
Rajen Prabhu

Second
Pravin
Srinath Narayan
Sumant Srivathsan

Third
Akanksha Mohan
Janardhan R.
Rajiv Rai

QM: Ajith Prabhakar


First
Kritika B.
Nandan Krishnaswamy
Rajiv Rai
Souvik Basu

Second (Tie)

Anand Sivashankar
Atulya Bharadwaj
Dipankar Goswami
Vibhendu Tewari

Amit Pandeya
Arvind Krishnaswamy
Gautam Chaturvedi
Sandip Sen


QM: Sarat Rao/Vibhendu Tewari


First
Abid EH
Atulya Bharadwaj
Bikash Mohapatra

Second
Ameya Samant
Mayuresh Madbhavi
Sritanu Chakraborty
Sumant Srivathsan

Third
Dipankar Goswami
Pradeep Ramarathnam
Prasann Potdar
Srinath Narayan


QM: Ameya Samant/Sumant Srivathsan (QFI Open)


First
Anand Sivashankar
Dharmendra
Pradeep Ramarathnam

Second
Ameya Samant
Bikash Mohapatra
Sarat Rao
Sumant Srivathsan

Third
Anannya Deb
Mayuresh Madbhavi
Srinath Narayan
Tanul Mishra

The Results So Far - Part 1 of 2

I've been way behind in doing this, but here are the point-scorers in each of the quizzes so far since May.

QM: Vijay Shankar/Amit Pandeya

First
Sumant Srivathsan
Sumit Roy
Vibhendu Tewari

Second
Anannya Deb
Kaustuv Gupta
Pradeep Ramarathnam

Third

Atul Mathew
Bikash Mohapatra
Srinath Narayan

QM: Govind Grewal

First
Abhik Ghosh
Anannya Deb
Diwakar Pingle
Shiv Anant Tayal

Second
Ajith Prabhakar
Amit Pandeya
Devang Ghia
Francis Rodrigues
Vijay Shankar

Third
Ameya Samant
Dipankar Goswami
Janardhan R.
Mukund Sridhar
Sumit Roy

QM: Mukund Sridhar

First
Anand Sivashankar
Jitaditya Narzari
Mehar Sridhar
Roshith Mohan
Sumant Srivathsan

Second
Anannya Deb
Atulya Bharadwaj
Sarat Rao
Vishwesh Ramnath

Third
Ajith Prabhakar
Atul Mathew
Shruthi Ravi
Vikas Sahu

QM: Mahesh Murthy

First
Ajith Prabhakar
Rajiv Rai
Sumit Roy
Vibhendu Tewari

Second
Dipankar Goswami
Jay Menon
Mukund Sridhar
Souvik Basu

Third
The scoresheet is missing, so we don't know who came third. If you know, please tell us and we'll update the sheet.

Emergency Measures Quiz This Sunday

Atul Mathew and Pradeep Ramarathnam were supposed to give us a full quiz this Sunday. However, due to a variety of reasons (which can be approximated to them being lazy gits, if one is so inclined :)), they won't be able to do the quiz they'd originally planned. So Atul will share with us questions from a recent BCQC session. As always, the dirty details:

Quizmaster: Atul Mathew (with a little help from our friends in Pune)

When: 3 PM, Sunday, 6 September, 2009 (Please be there by 2:45 PM for team assignments)

Where: Pinstorm, Ground Floor, Swati House (Next to Kotak Bank on Linking Road), North Avenue, Santa Cruz (W).

Directions:

From the south: If you come north on Linking Road from Bandra to SantaCruz, you'll find a large Benetton Store on the right. At the end of that block is a Kotak Bank at the corner. Take a right and it's the next building, take the first gate and tell the sentry you've come for the quiz.

From the north: If you get on to Linking Road at the airplane park end, you'll cross a HDFC Bank. A block later, you'll see a Kotak Bank on the corner - do not cross it. Take a left at that point and it's the building next to Kotak Bank.

This Sunday's BQC Session

Janardhan R. will host his first quiz for the BQC this Sunday. It should be fun - and hopefully we'll see a lot more first-time QMs at the BQC in subsequent sessions.

QM: Janardhan R.

Time: 3 pm, Sunday, August 23, 2009 (Please be there by 2:45 pm.)

Venue: Pinstorm, Ground Floor, Swati House (Next to Kotak Bank on Linking Road), North Avenue, Santa Cruz (W).

Directions:

From the south: If you come north on Linking Road from Bandra to SantaCruz, you'll find a large Benetton Store on the right. At the end of that block is a Kotak Bank at the corner. Take a right and it's the next building, take the first gate and tell the sentry you've come for the quiz.

From the north: If you get on to Linking Road at the airplane park end, you'll cross a HDFC Bank. A block later, you'll see a Kotak Bank on the corner - do not cross it. Take a left at that point and it's the building next to Kotak Bank.

The Talented Mr. Deb

The monsoon might have been a bit of a damp squib this year, but the BQC has been quite a bit of fun so far. More fun and games this Sunday, courtesy of Anannya Deb, who puts his leaderboard position on the line and becomes QM for the afternoon. If his last quiz was any indication, this one should be a doozy. Be there, it's not like you'd rather be doing something else.

QM: Anannya Deb

Time: 3 pm, Sunday, August 9, 2009 (Please be there by 2:45 pm.)

Venue: Pinstorm, Ground Floor, Swati House (Next to Kotak Bank on Linking Road), North Avenue, Santa Cruz (W).

Directions:

From the south: If you come north on Linking Road from Bandra to SantaCruz, you'll find a large Benetton Store on the right. At the end of that block is a Kotak Bank at the corner. Take a right and it's the next building, take the first gate and tell the sentry you've come for the quiz.

From the north: If you get on to Linking Road at the airplane park end, you'll cross a HDFC Bank. A block later, you'll see a Kotak Bank on the corner - do not cross it. Take a left at that point and it's the building next to Kotak Bank.

The Prodigal Returns

Ajith Prabhakar sent us all a nice email saying goodbye to the BQC, apparently for something better in Trivandrum. Clearly he left something behind, because he's in town this weekend, and asking questions. We'll call it the Ajith Prabhakar Farewell Special, and buy him beer afterwards.

You should join us - for both quiz and beer.

QM: Ajith Prabhakar

Time: 3 pm, Sunday, July 26, 2009 (Please be there by 2:45 pm.)

Venue: Pinstorm, Ground Floor, Swati House (Next to Kotak Bank on Linking Road), North Avenue, Santa Cruz (W).

Directions:

From the south: If you come north on Linking Road from Bandra to SantaCruz, you'll find a large Benetton Store on the right. At the end of that block is a Kotak Bank at the corner. Take a right and it's the next building, take the first gate and tell the sentry you've come for the quiz.

From the north: If you get on to Linking Road at the airplane park end, you'll cross a HDFC Bank. A block later, you'll see a Kotak Bank on the corner - do not cross it. Take a left at that point and it's the building next to Kotak Bank.

It's That Time Of The Month

You know the one, where you look in your email/feedreader/alternate blog-tracking source and go, "Damn, I forgot it was this weekend," followed by shuffling up to the spouse/other and mumble, "Honey, I can't take you to Goa this weekend."

She, who heard you right the first time, will say, "What was that? I didn't get that."

You will repeat, and she will glare. As you wilt under that fierce power, you will reveal the dastardly plot behind your change of plans.

"Ameya Samant is conducting this weekend's quiz at the BQC," you will whisper, awe and respect punctuating your hushed words. She will rave about your irresponsible ways, your negligence towards family, and the preference of infant-chomping cultists over her and the kids.

But a higher power calls, and you must follow, so you will trudge out of your home and onto the mean streets of Bombay.

If you're a woman, of course, you'll probably leave a note on the fridge and come over to Pinstorm on Sunday.

The Details:

Who: Ameya Samant
When: 3:00 pm, Sunday 22 June, 2008 (Please be there by 2:30 pm)
Where: Pinstorm, Ground Floor, Swati House (Next to Kotak Bank on Linking Road), North Avenue, Santa Cruz (W).

Directions:

From the south: If you come north on Linking Road from Bandra to SantaCruz, you'll find a large Benetton Store on the right. At the end of that block is a Kotak Bank at the corner. Take a right and it's the next building, take the first gate and tell the sentry you've come for a meeting.

From the north: If you get on to Linking Road at the airplane park end, you'll cross a HDFC Bank. A block later, you'll see a Kotak Bank on the corner - do not cross it. Take a left at that point and it's the building next to Kotak Bank.

Back to Square One

The phrase comes from radio commentary on football matches, as the old chestnut tells us (and which we hopefully eliminate from our quizzes by using it in blog posts).

Samrat Sengupta will kick us off on a brand new season with a quiz that he conducted at the BCQC in Pune (and coincided with our own season-ender). Much fun can be anticipated, given past experiences.

As always, details and directions below:

When: 3:00 PM, Sunday, April 13, 2008

Location:

Pinstorm, Ground Floor, Swati House (Next to Kotak Bank on Linking Road), North Avenue, Santa Cruz (W).

Directions:

From the south: If you come north on Linking Road from Bandra to SantaCruz, you'll find a large Benetton Store on the right. At the end of that block is a Kotak Bank at the corner. Take a right and it's the next building, take the first gate and tell the sentry you've come for a meeting.

From the north: If you get on to Linking Road at the airplane park end, you'll cross a HDFC Bank. A block later, you'll see a Kotak Bank on the corner - do not cross it. Take a left at that point and it's the building next to Kotak Bank.