Multiple Choice by Alejandro Zambra Read Free Book Online

stayed on his feet, maybe to reestablish a protocol that had been lost: the teacher stands, the students sit. “You’ll still come out ahead,” he told us. “You don’t know how privileged you are.”
    â€œBecause we go to the National Institute?” I asked.
    He puffed anxiously on his cigarette, perhaps already somewhat drunk, and he was silent for so long that it was no longer necessary to answer, but then an answer came. “The National Institute is rotten, but the world is rotten,” he said. “They prepared you for this, for a world where everyone fucks everyone over. You’ll do well on the test, very well, don’t worry—you weren’t educated, you were trained.” It sounded aggressive, but there was no contempt in his tone, or, at least, none directed at us.
    We were quiet; it was late by then, almost nighttime. He sat down looking absorbed, thoughtful. “I didn’t get a high score,” he said, when it seemed there wouldn’t be any more words. “I was the best in my class, in my whole school. I never cheated on an exam, butI bombed the aptitude test, so I had to major in religious education. I didn’t even believe in God.”
    I asked him if now, as a Metro conductor, he earned more money. “Twice as much,” he replied. I asked him if he believed in God now, and he answered that yes, now more than ever, he believed in God. I’ll never forget his gesture then: with a lit cigarette between his index and middle fingers, he looked at the back of his hand as if searching for his veins, and then he turned it over, as if to make sure that his life, head, and heart lines were still there.
    We said good-bye as if we were or had once been friends. He went into the cinema, and we headed down Bulnes toward Parque Almagro to smoke a few joints.
    __________
    I never heard anything more about Segovia. Sometimes on the Metro, when I get into the first car, I look toward the conductor’s booth and imagine that our teacher is in there, pressing buttons and yawning. As for the Covarrubias twins, they’ve gained a certain amount of fame, and as I understand it, they never separated again. They became identical lawyers; I hear it’s hard to tell which is the more brilliant and which the more corrupt. They have a firm in Vitacura, and they charge the same rate. They charge what such good service is worth: a lot.
    Â 
Exercises:
    67.   According to the text, the Covarrubias twins’ experience in their new school:
    (A)  Marked their final break with the values their parents had instilled in them.
    (B)  Was traumatic, because it forced them to make rash decisions and separated them for good.
    (C)  Gradually shaped them into productive individuals who contributed to Chilean society.
    (D)  Transformed two good and supportive brothers into unscrupulous sons of bitches.
    (E)  Marked the start of a difficult period, from which they emerged stronger and ready to compete in this ruthless and materialistic world.
    68.   The best title for this story would be:
    (A)  “How to Train Your Twin”
    (B)  “To Sir, with Love”
    (C)  “Me and My Shadow”
    (D)  “Against Lawyers”
    (E)  “Against Twin Lawyers”
    69.   Regarding multiple-choice tests, the author affirms that:
    I.  They were regularly used at that particular school in order to prepare students for the university entrance exams.
    II.  It was easier to cheat on those tests, any way you looked at it.
    III.  They did not require you to develop your own thinking.
    IV.  With multiple-choice tests, the teachers didn’t have to make themselves sick in the head by grading all weekend long.
    V.  The correct choice is almost always D.
    (A)  I and II
    (B)  I, III, and V
    (C)  II and V
    (D)  I, II, and III
    (E)  I, II, and