An entrepreneur and lawyer, Vivek Sood has found another vocation... That of a riddle master. On the birthday party of his only daughter, his ‘body parts quiz’ was such a hit with the kids that he made more increasingly for older age groups. An alumni of Carmel Convent (he did pre-school from there) and St John’s, Vivek tried it on more students and adults till he had enough to turn them into a book.
Go Figure is a slim volume with 60 riddles that have a visual hint as one flips the page, and of course, the answers and explanations at the end of it all for Rs 110. He’s been getting favourable response to his ‘mind games’ on Whatsapp group but he would rather want children and young adults to go hold the book in hand, and he’s perfectly okay if then they turn to their I pads looking for clues.
“My wife and I are home schooling our daughter Kismet, and riddles are one of the many alternate means on how we teach her,” he spills the beans. With a collection of over 1,000; 500 out of which are on Chandigarh itself (that he created for his ex students’ reunion treasure hunts), some 60 make it to Go Figure. And there is range – personalities, monuments, battles and birds, words and events make it to the book. Rhythmic, they are keeping it light and fun and divided into five sections – from Rookie to Raw to Skilled to Expert and Pro. Take for example this one from Raw ‘Noise they make gives them their name/ Caribbean Island is the land of the same/ Food they have is more than they weigh/ As for size, they are pretty small, let’s say.’
Whether you guess it or not, Vivek feels that riddles have a power to make the humdrum stay memorable and relevant long after it’s used. As for him, its two three new ones a day. — TNS
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