The Superstitious Boss
Apply your Mind
Ramlal is a night watchman in a large company. On one fine morning when Ramlal was about to leave for home, his boss informs him, “I'll go for a business trip to Colombo. Tomorrow I will depart from Chennai airport”.
Ramlal, however advises him to take a ship.
“Why should I?” inquired the boss.
“Yesterday night I dreamt that the plane to Colombo crashes, just before it will land”, is the response from Ramlal.
The president smiles first, but since he is pretty superstitious he decides to take the ship. When he arrives in Colombo, he is told that the plane which he should have taken had crashed. When the president returns from the trip, he gives a big reward to Ramlal and immediately fires him. Why?
Real Estate Math Problem
Math problems dealing with real estate, debt and income can be a little tricky, but fun and extremely useful in the real world! Check out this real estate math problem to see if you can find the solution!
This puzzle is a DTI--Debt-to-Income--problem that banks usually utilize to calculate whether or not a potential borrower will be able to pay back the loan.
Background Info: Mr. and Mrs. Abrams have a combined yearly income of $90,000. They would like to purchase a commercial property on which to start a business for $215,000. They have spoken with a potential lender, who indicated they can provide a $200,000, 30 year loan at 7% interest if the Abrams can qualify. In addition to the property payment, the Abrams estimate their taxes and insurance to be $145 per month. Mr. Abrams has a student loan payment of $67 a month and Mrs. Abrams has a car payment of $347 a month. Assume an amortization factor of 6.65.
The Pierrot Puzzle
Question on Special Products
The Pierrot in the illustration is standing in a posture that represents the sign of multiplication. He is indicating the peculiar fact that 15 multiplied by 93 produces exactly the same figures (1,395), differently arranged.
The puzzle is to take any four digits you like (all different) and similarly arrange them so that the number formed on one side of the Pierrot when multiplied by the number on the other side shall produce the same figures. There are very few ways of doing it, and you shall give all the cases possible. Can you find them all?
Benediktov Problem
Tricky Problem
The Great Russian poet Benediktov was very fond of mathematics and he collected and compiled a whole volume of trick brain teasers. Though this work was never published, the manuscript was found in 1924. An interesting problem contained in the manuscript, captioned ‘An ingenious Way of Solving a Tricky Problem’ goes as follows:
One woman made a living by selling eggs, had 90 eggs which she wanted her three daughters to sell. So she gave her eldest daughter 10 eggs, 30 to her second daughter and 50 to the youngest.
Puzzle on Barter System
AT A CATTLE MARKET
Three countrymen met at a cattle market. ‘Look here,’ said Hari to Jaggu, ‘I’ll give you six of my pigs for one of your horses, and then you’ll have twice as many animals here as I’ve got.’
‘If that’s your way of doing business,’ said Dinanath to Hari, ‘I’ll give you fourteen of my sheep for a horse, and then you’ll have three times as many animals as I.’
‘Well, I’ll go better than that,’ said Jaggu to Dinanath; ‘I’ll give you four cows for a horse, and then you’ll have six times as many animals as I’ve got here.’
No doubt this was a very primitive way of bartering animals, but it is an interesting little puzzle to discover just how many animals Jaggu, Hari and Dinanath must have taken to the cattle market.
If you enjoy puzzles like this you may also enjoy math classes from an accredited online college.
So You Think You Are Clever?
Here is quiz that is likely to engross you mentally for some time. Ponder on each one of them very carefully. At the end of it you might realize, how clever you are (or you are not). If you can answer 5 or more than that correct, I consider you exceptional.
- If 3 cats kill 3 rats in 3 minutes, how long will it take 100 cats to kill 100 rats?
- Is it legal for a man to marry his widow’s sister?
- A monkey is at the bottom of a 30-foot well. Each day he jumps up 3 feet and slips back two. At that rate when will the monkey reach the top of the well?
- I have 2 minutes to catch a train and 2 Km to go. If I go the first Km at the rate of 30 Km per hour, at what rate must I go the second Km in order to catch the train?
- The number of eggs in a basket doubles every minute. The basket is full of eggs in an hour. When was the basket hall full?
- What is the smallest number of ducks that could swim in this formation: two ducks in front of a duck, two ducks behind a duck and a duck between two ducks?
- A boat will carry only 200 pounds. How a man weighing 200 pounds and his two sons, each of whom weighs 100 pounds, use it to cross a river?
Leave your answers below as a comment.
Online masters degree programs are available for those who want to learn advanced math skills.
Develop Birbal Way of Thinking
This is the second post in the series – “Learn Solving Problems – The Birbal Way”
To solve this problem you’ll require some innovative thinking. Let’s see how many of you can come up with some feasible solution to this problem posed by Akbar infront of everyone. If you can think in “the Bribal way”, you can answer this. So here goes the story –
Akbar-Birbal Tales - Retrieving the Ring
Once Akbar threw his gold ring in to a dry well and asked his ministers to retrieve it without climbing down into the well. Everyone thought deeply but could not come up with a solution. Birbal loved challenges like this. He promised the king to get back his ring before sunset.
What would have you done, had you been in the place of Birbal. Give your solution as a comment below.
If you are fond of such witty tales and you love the insight these stories provide, consider reading the book suggested in the last post - Solve Your Problems – The Birbal Way
There is another equally interesting book – Fix your Problems – The Tenali Raman Way
If you’ve read any other book similar to these, please share with all of us.
Who is behind QuickerMaths?
I am Vineet Patawari - PGDM (IIM Indore), ACA, B.Com(H). My passion for Mathematics, specially Vedic Maths encouraged me to start QuickerMaths
I believe that if trained properly using powerful tools like Vedic Maths, the immense intellect of human mind can be ignited instantly - find out more
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Recent Comments
watchman was paid for awaking not for sleeping so that he can see dreams.. – 05Feb12
as a night watchman he shouldnt have slept at night to get that dream... – 04Feb12
Can u plz give me clarity in ur solution Kaush sir..... – 04Feb12
thanks for these tricks. Are these from the book "quicker maths by m.tyra" ? – 03Feb12
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