Chapter 1 Letter to God

Chapter 1 Letter to God | Question and Answers |
NCERT | Class 10 | English | First Flight

Page 5

Question 1. What did Lencho hope for?

Answer 1 Lencho hoped for a good rain as the only thing his field of ripe corn needed was a shower.

Question 2. Why did Lencho say the raindrops were like ‘new coins’?

Answer 2 Lencho compared the raindrops with new coins because raindrops would have helped in getting a better harvest, resulting in the prosperity.

Question 3. How did the rain change? What happened to Lencho’s fields?

Answer 3 A strong wind began to blow and huge hailstones began to fall along with the rain. All the crops in Lencho’s field got destroyed because of the weather conditions.

Question 4. What were Lencho’s feelings when the hail stopped?

Answer 4 Lencho’s soul was filled with sadness as everything was ruined due to hailstorm. There was nothing that he could feed his family with and could see a bleak future for him and his family.

Page 6

Question 1. Who or what did Lencho have faith in? What did he do?

Answer 1 Lencho had faith in God. He believed that God sees everything, even what is deep in one’s conscience and help everyone in one’s problems. He wrote a letter to God demanding him a hundred pesos to sow his field again.

Question 2. Who read the letter?

Answer 2 Postmaster read the letter.

Question 3. What did the postmaster do then?

Answer 3  The postmaster first laughed when he read Lencho’s letter but soon he became serious and was moved by the writer’s faith in God. He didn’t want to shake Lencho’s faith. So, he decided to collect ,money and send it to Lencho on behalf of God.

Page 7

Question 1. Was Lencho surprised to find a letter for him with money in it?

Answer 1 Lencho was not surprised to find a letter with money in it from God because his confidence and faith in God was so much that he had expected  that reply from God.

Question 2. What made him angry?

Answer 2 There were only seventy pesos in the envelope whereas Lencho had demanded a hundred pesos.He concluded that postman employees must have taken the remaining amount.The difference in the amount made him angry.

Thinking about the Text (Page 7-8)

Question 1. Who does Lencho have complete faith in? Which sentences in the story tell you this?

Answer 1 Lencho has complete faith in God. The sentences in the story that shows this are :

1) But in the hearts of all who lived in that solitary house in the middle of the valley, there was a single hope help from God.

2) All through the night, Lencho thought only of his one hope: the help of God, whose eyes, as he had been instructed, see everything, even what is deep in one’s conscience.

3) “God”, he wrote, “if you don’t help me, my family and I will go hungry this year”.

4) He wrote ‘To God’ on the envelope, put the letter inside and still troubled, went to town.

5) God could not have made a mistake, nor could he have denied Lencho what he had requested.

Question 2. Why does the postmaster send money to Lencho? Why does he sign the letter ‘God’?

Answer 2 The postmaster sends money to Lencho because he was completely moved by Lencho’s faith in God.When postmaster reads the letter of Lencho to God, he becomes serious and does not want to shake his faith and decides to answer the letter. He gathers money with the help of his post office employees and friends on behalf of God and signs the letter ‘God’ so that Lencho’s faith does not get shaken.

Question 3. Did Lencho try to find out who had sent the money to him? Why/Why not?

Answer 3 Lencho did not try to find out who had sent the money to him because he had complete faith and confidence in God.He could not believe that it could be anybody else other than God who would send him the money.
His faith in God was so strong that he believed that he had sent money to him for his help in his problem.

Question 4. Who does Lencho think has taken the rest of the money? What is the irony in the situation? (Remember that the irony of a situation is an unexpected aspect of it. An ironic situation is strange or amusing because it is the opposite of what is expected.)

Answer 4 Lencho thinks that the post office employees have taken rest of the money as he had demanded a hundred pesos from God and in the letter there was only seventy pesos and God cannot make such a mistake. So, he assumes that they have stolen the money. The irony in this situation is that it is the post office people who collected and send money to keep his faith alive in God were blamed that they have stolen the money.

Question 5. Are there people like Lencho in the real world? What kind of a person would you say he is? You may select appropriate words from the box to answer the question. 

greedy naive stupid ungrateful selfish comical unquestioning

Answer 5  Lencho is an unquestioning and naive kind of person.I do not think there can be such people in the real world.He is literate and yet doesn’t know who has sent him money or a letter will reach God without any address. It is Lencho’s faith in God.

Question 6. There are two kinds of conflict in the story: between humans and nature, and between humans themselves. How are these conflicts illustrated?

Answer 6 Conflict between Humans and Nature: The conflict between humans and nature is illustrated by the destruction of Lencho’s crop by the hailstorm as Lencho was expecting a good rain to have good harvest as that was the only hope he had for his earning. He worked so hard to feed his family, but nature turned violent and destroyed everything.

Conflict between Humans and Humans: The story also illustrated another conflict, between humans themselves as the postmaster alongwith his friends and staff sent Lencho money that Lencho demanded from God although they didn’t know Lencho. Lencho blamed them for taking away some amount of money. He called them “a bunch of crook”. This shows that man does not have faith in other man, thereby giving rise to this conflict.

 

Thinking about language (Page 8,9,10,11)

Question I. Look at the following sentence from the story. Suddenly a strong wind began to blow and along with the rain very large hailstones began to fall.

‘Hailstones’ are small balls of ice that fall like rain. A storm in which hailstones fall is a ‘hailstorm’. You know that a storm is bad weather with strong winds, rain, thunder and lightning.

There are different names in different parts of the world for storms, depending on their nature. Can you match the names in the box with their descriptions below, and fill in the blanks? You may use a dictionary to help you.

gale, whirlwind, cyclone, hurricane, tornado, typhoon

1. A violent tropical storm in which strong winds move in a circle: __ __ c __ __ __ __
2. An extremely strong wind : __ a __ __
3. A violent tropical storm with very strong winds : __ __ p __ __ __ __
4. A violent storm whose centre is a cloud in the shape of a funnel: __ __ __ n __ __ __
5. A violent storm with very strong winds, especially in the western Atlantic Ocean: __ __ r __ __ __ __ __ __
6. A very strong wind that moves very fast in a spinning movement and causes a lot of damage: __ __ __ __ l __ __ __ __

Answer I

1) Cyclone

2) Gale

3) Typhoon

4) Tornado

5) Hurricane

6) Whirlwind

Question II. Notice how the word ‘hope’ is used in these sentences from the story:
(a) I hope it (the hailstorm) passes quickly.
(b) There was a single hope: help from God.
In the first example, ‘hope’ is a verb which means you wish for something to happen. In the second example it is a noun meaning a chance for something to happen.

Match the sentences in Column A with the meanings of ‘hope’ in Column B

A	B
1. Will you get the subjects you want to study in college? I hope so.	– a feeling that something good will probably happen
2. I hope you don’t mind my saying this, but I don’t like the way you are arguing.	– thinking that this would happen (It may or may not have happened.)
3. This discovery will give new hope to HIV/AIDS sufferers.	– stopped believing that this good thing would happen
4. We were hoping against hope that the judges would not notice our mistakes.	– wanting something to happen (and thinking it quite possible)
5. I called early in the hope of speaking to her before she went to school.	– showing concern that what yousay should not offend or disturb the other person: a way of being polite
6. Just when everybody had given up hope, the fishermen came back, seven days after the cyclone	– wishing for something to happen, although this is very unlikely

Answer II 

A	B
1. Will you get the subjects you want to study in college? I hope so.	– wanting something to happen(and thinking it quite possible)
2. I hope you don’t mind my saying this, but I don’t like the way you are arguing.	– showing concern that what yousay should not offend or disturbthe other person: a way of beingpolite
3. This discovery will give new hope to HIV/AIDS sufferers.	– a feeling that something good will probably happen
4. We were hoping against hope that the judges would not notice our mistakes.	– wishing for something to happen,although this is very unlikely
5. I called early in the hope of speaking to her before she went to school.	– thinking that this would happen (It may or may not have happened.)
6. Just when everybody had given up hope, the fishermen came back, seven days after the cyclone	– stopped believing that this good thing would happen

Question III. Join the sentences given below using who, whom, whose, which, as suggested.

1. I often go to Mumbai. Mumbai is the commercial capital of India. (which)

2. My mother is going to host a TV show on cooking. She cooks very well. (who)

3. These sportspersons are going to meet the President. Their performance has been excellent. (whose)

4. Lencho prayed to God. His eyes see into our minds. (whose)

5. This man cheated me. I trusted him. (whom)

Answer III

1) I often go to Mumbai which is the commercial capital of India.

2) My Mother who cooks very well, is going to host a TV show on cooking.

3) These sportspersons, whose performance has been excellent, are going to meet the President.

4) Lencho prayed to God, whose eyes see into our minds.

5) This man whom I trusted cheated me.

Question IV Find sentences in the story with negative words, which express the following ideas emphatically.

1. The trees lost all their leaves.

2. The letter was addressed to God himself.

3. The postman saw this address for the first time in his career.

Answer IV

1) Not a leaf remained on the trees

2)  It was nothing less than a letter to God.

3) Never in his career as a postman had he seen that address.

Question V. In pairs, find metaphors from the story to complete the table below. Try to say what qualities are being compared. One has been done for you.

Object	Metaphor	Quality or Feature Compared
Cloud
Raindrops
Hailstones
Locusts
		An epidemic (a disease) that spreads very rapidly and leaves many people dead
	An ox of a man

Answer V 

Object	Metaphor	Quality or Feature Compared
Cloud	The Huge mountains of cloud	The mass or ‘hugeness of mountains
Raindrops	A curtain of rain	The draping or covering of an area by a curtain.
Hailstones	The frozen pearls	The resemblance in colour and hardness of a pearl
Locusts	A plague of locusts	The consequences (destruction) of a plague
Locusts	A plague of locusts	An epidemic (a disease) that spreads very rapidly and leaves many people dead
Man	An ox of a man	The working of an ox in the fields (hard work)