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Grade 9

110.31.b.5 

In Bengali tradition children are given two names at birth: an informal name used only at home and a formal name, or "good name," used in public. In this excerpt, Gogol's parents, Ashoke and Ashima, want to give him a good name to use at school.

from THE NAMESAKE
by Jhumpa Lahiri

1. There is a reason Gogol doesn't want to go to kindergarten. His parents have told him that at school, instead of being called Gogol, he will be called by a new name, a good name, which his parents have finally decided on, just in time for him to begin his formal education. The name, Nikhil, is artfully connected to the old. Not only is it a perfectly respectable Bengali good name, meaning "he who is entire, encompassing all," but it also bears a satisfying resemblance to Nikolai, the first name of the Russian Gogol. Ashoke had thought of it recently, staring mindlessly at the Gogol spines in the library, and he had rushed back to the house to ask Ashima her opinion. He pointed out that it was relatively easy to pronounce, though there was the danger that Americans, obsessed with abbreviation, would truncate it to Nick. She told him she liked it well enough, though later, alone, she'd wept, thinking of her grandmother, who had died earlier in the year, and of the letter, forever hovering somewhere between India and America, containing the good name she'd chosen for Gogol. Ashima still dreams of the letter at times, discovering it after all these years in the mailbox on Pemberton Road, opening it up only to find it blank.

2. But Gogol doesn't want a new name. He can't understand why he has to answer to anything else. "Why do I have to have a new name?" he asks his parents, tears springing to his eyes. It would be one thing if his parents were to call him Nikhil, too. But they tell him that the new name will be used only by the teachers and children at school. He is afraid to be Nikhil, someone he doesn't know. Who doesn't know him. His parents tell him that they each have two names, too, as do all their Bengali friends in America, and all their relatives in Calcutta. It's a part of growing up, they tell him, part of being a Bengali. They write it for him on a sheet of paper, ask him to copy it over ten times. "Don't worry," his father says. "To me and your mother, you will never be anyone but Gogol."

3. At school, Ashoke and Gogol are greeted by the secretary, Mrs. McNab, who asks Ashoke to fill out a registration form. He provides a copy of Gogol's birth certificate and immunization record, which Mrs. McNab puts in a folder along with the registration. "This way," Mrs. McNab says, leading them to the principal's office. CANDACE LAPIDUS, the name on the door says. Mrs. Lapidus assures Ashoke that missing the first week of kindergarten is not a problem, that things have yet to settle down. Mrs. Lapidus is a tall, slender woman with short white-blond hair. She wears frosted blue eye shadow and a lemon yellow suit. She shakes Ashoke's hand and tells him that there are two other Indian children at the school, Jayadev Modi in the third grade and Rekha Saxena in fifth. Perhaps the Gangulis know them? Ashoke tells Mrs. Lapidus that they do not. She looks at the registration form and smiles kindly at the boy, who is clutching his father's hand. Gogol is dressed in powder blue pants, red and white canvas sneakers, a striped turtleneck top.

4. "Welcome to elementary school, Nikhil. I am your principal, Mrs. Lapidus."

5. Gogol looks down at his sneakers. The way the principal pronounces his new name is different from the way his parents say it, the second part of it longer, sounding like "heel."

6. She bends down so that her face is level with his, and extends a hand to his shoulder. "Can you tell me how old you are, Nikhil?"

7. When the question is repeated and there is still no response, Mrs. Lapidus asks, "Mr. Ganguli, does Nikhil follow English?"

8. "Of course he follows," Ashoke says. "My son is perfectly bilingual."

9. In order to prove that Gogol knows English, Ashoke does something he has never done before, and addresses his son in careful, accented English. "Go on, Gogol," he says, patting him on the head. "Tell Mrs. Lapidus how old you are."

10. "What was that?" Mrs. Lapidus says.

11. "I beg your pardon, madam?"

12. "That name you called him. Something with a G."

13. "Oh that, that is what we call him at home only. But his good name should be-is"-he nods his head firmly-"Nikhil."

14. Mrs. Lapidus frowns. "I'm afraid I don't understand. Good name?"

15. "Yes."

16. Mrs. Lapidus studies the registration form. She has not had to go through this confusion with the other two Indian children. She opens up the folder and examines the immunization record, the birth certificate. "There seems to be some confusion, Mr. Ganguli," she says. "According to these documents, your son's legal name is Gogol."

17. "That is correct. But please allow me to explain-"

18. "That you want us to call him Nikhil."

19. "That is correct."

20. Mrs. Lapidus nods. "The reason being?"

21. "That is our wish."

22. "I'm not sure I follow you, Mr. Ganguli. Do you mean that Nikhil is a middle name? Or a nickname? Many of the children go by nicknames here. On this form there is a space-"

23. "No, no, it's not a middle name," Ashoke says. He is beginning to lose patience. "He has no middle name. No nickname. The boy's good name, his school name, is Nikhil."

24. Mrs. Lapidus presses her lips together and smiles. "But clearly he doesn't respond."

25. "Please, Mrs. Lapidus," Ashoke says. "It is very common for a child to be confused at first. Please give it some time. I assure you he will grow accustomed."

26. He bends down and this time in Bengali, calmly and quietly, asks Gogol to please answer when Mrs. Lapidus asks a question. "Don't be scared, Gogol," he says, raising his son's chin with his finger. "You're a big boy now. No tears."

27. Though Mrs. Lapidus does not understand a word, she listens carefully, hears that name again. Gogol. Lightly, in pencil, she writes it down on the registration form.

28. Ashoke hands over the lunch box, a windbreaker in case it gets cold. He thanks Mrs. Lapidus. "Be good, Nikhil," he says in English. And then, after a moment's hesitation, he is gone.

29. When they are alone, Mrs. Lapidus asks, "Are you happy to be entering elementary school, Gogol?"

30. "My parents want me to have another name in school."

31. "And what about you, Gogol? Do you want to be called by another name?"

32. After a pause, he shakes his head.

33. "Is that a no?"

34. He nods. "Yes."

35. "Then it's settled. Can you write your name on this piece of paper?"

36. Gogol picks up a pencil, grips it tightly, and forms the letters of the only word he has learned thus far to write from memory, getting the "L" backward due to nerves. "What beautiful penmanship you have," Mrs. Lapidus says. She tears up the old registration form and asks Mrs. McNab to type up a new one. Then she takes Gogol by the hand, down a carpeted hallway with painted cement walls. She opens a door, and Gogol is introduced to his teacher, Miss Watkins, a woman with hair in two braids, wearing overalls and clogs. Inside the classroom it's a small universe of nicknames-Andrew is Andy, Alexandra Sandy, William Billy, Elizabeth Lizzy. It is nothing like the schooling Gogol's parents have known, fountain pens and polished black shoes and notebooks and good names and sir or madam at a tender age. Here the only official ritual is pledging allegiance first thing in the morning to the American flag. For the rest of the day, they sit at a communal round table, drinking punch and eating cookies, taking naps on little orange cushions on the floor. At the end of his first day he is sent home with a letter to his parents from Mrs. Lapidus, folded and stapled to a string around his neck, explaining that due to their son's preference he will be known as Gogol at school. What about the parents' preference? Ashima and Ashoke wonder, shaking their heads. But since neither of them feels comfortable pressing the issue, they have no choice but to give in.

(Excerpt from THE NAMESAKE by Jhumpa Lahiri. Copyright © 2003 by Jhumpa Lahiri. Reprinted by permission of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.)

AMERICAN APPLE
by Li Jingwen

1. You have to admit that the moon in foreign countries is bigger than the moon in China. I don't even need to bring up the moon landing, spacecraft, UFO studies, and such. Just this apple, no big deal, really. How can the Americans grow such apples? The red ones are so red, green ones so green, shiny, wax like, as if painted on. They are real, but look so artificially made.

2. Not to brag about it, but as a small local newspaper reporter, the first time I saw an American apple was in an illustrated foreign magazine in our internal reference room. It looked like a supermarket with piles of apples neatly arranged, a pile of red apples, then a pile of green apples, then a pile of red apples again, and then another pile of green apples, and so on, stretched out like a dragon. Especially the red apples, they looked so red, so surprisingly red, that there wasn't even a hint of green on them.

3. In this city of ours where people like to chase whatever is fashionable, many kinds of foreign apples flood in like mad, the most attention-catching of which are American apples. The arrival of American apples added to the sorrow in my heart. I felt like a young lad suffering from unrequited love, who, despite his burning desire, does not dare to do anything bolder than cast furtive glances at his beloved girl from a distance. For a thousand times I had let my reporter's imagination run wild and savored in my mind how sweet and fragrant American apples would taste, but I would not walk close to them. One American apple for 50 yuan, more than the price for a whole case of our native "Red Fushi!" Not that my wallet cannot afford a few such American apples. It's just that in my heart I didn't want to waste my money on such hot foreign things.

4. On a weekend I took my daughter shopping. Of the tens of thousands of merchandise on display in the grand shopping mall her eyes were attracted to American apples alone. And she wouldn't give me peace until I said yes. I tried all the tricks I knew to divert her attention elsewhere and even bought her her favorite Haha fruit milk, Wang Wang crispy egg rolls, and fruit jelly, but failed in the end. She pouted unhappily the whole day and evening and didn't want to say one word to me. When she woke up the next morning, she still had not forgotten. I had never seen such stubbornness for so long in my daughter, even at her young age. I was shocked. These red American apples had such scary appeal to the young children.

5. I figured, no matter how I sliced it, I shouldn't have denied my daughter and dampened her fledgling curiosity about the unknown in the world. That is to say, I should have let my daughter experience what the American apple tasted like. So I burned the midnight oil for a few days, sold a few more stories, made a bit more money, and dashed to the grand mall. There I took out a one-hundred-yuan bill and bought two American apples from a young, all-smiling sales girl. When I got home with the two apples, my daughter jumped for joy, but she didn't want to eat them. Instead, she placed the apples right next to the white rabbit, her favorite toy. Every night before going to bed, she would take one last look and feel the apples in her hand gently. I said: Why don't you eat them. I'll buy you more if you like them so much. She would shake her head, her eyes still fixed on the mouth-watering apples. She didn't have the heart to bite into the apples that looked so perfect in her mind.

6. Not long afterwards, at the end of an important business press conference, the sponsors gave each of us veteran reporters an exquisitely-packaged gift box, each containing four American apples. I was so thrilled with the gift, which felt so heavy in my hands. At my insistence, my daughter finally gave in and agreed to eat an apple. Watched by my daughter's eager eyes I peeled off the beautiful skin of the apple with a knife carefully, almost religiously, but still felt as though I was committing a crime.

7. I had expected my daughter to jump for joy again, yet at the very first bite, she froze, a puzzled look in her vivid eyes. She licked her mouth a few times as if not sure of her own taste. Then, with apparent disappointment, she placed the apple in my hand: Why does it taste like this?

8. I took a bite and my eyebrows furrowed right away, too. Indeed it tasted far worse than "Red Fushi."

9. So we left the exquisite box of American apples untouched and forgot about them for a long time. When we thought about them again, the apples inside were already rotten beyond recognition.

In Emory's Gift, Charlie is a 13-year-old boy just out of seventh grade. His mother's death and his father's grief leave Charlie feeling isolated at school, at home, and even at the junior-lifesaving training class he attends, where he practices his lifesaving skills on seventh-graders, otherwise known as sevies. In the excerpt below, Charlie has returned home after class and has walked to the creek to go fishing.

from EMORY'S GIFT
by W. Bruce Cameron

1. During the spring the waters of the creek were dark and cold, a sharp contrast from the milky pool water from which I'd been saving sevies all morning. From bank to bank the stream was more than thirty feet. In the summer, though, with the runoff down to a trickle, the creek bed was mainly dry, littered with rocks and mud and tree branches. The creek itself shrank back until it was only six feet wide, hugging the far bank and deep enough to swim in. That's where the fish liked to lurk, up under the tree root overhang. From the base of our hill the creek had only another couple hundred yards of independence before it joined the river, adding strength to the flow to town.

2. I started casting along the banks of the opposing shore, and it wasn't long before I'd hooked and pulled in a nice little brook trout. I put it in the creel, thinking that a couple more just like it and we'd skip the hamburgers that evening.

3. A few minutes later I had another one, and then another. Man, they were really biting! I left the creel lying on the bank and moved downstream a bit.

4. The fourth trout was the best of all, fat and glistening, bending my rod with authority while I wrestled it ashore. I was carefully pulling the hook from its mouth when I got the sense of being watched.

5. I turned and studied the opposite bank. The slight breeze gave the woods an empty sound, but I knew there was someone there, and I felt the hair on my arms stand up as my skin goose-bumped in alarm.

6. I gave a start when I looked higher up the hill. A pair of amber eyes met mine, unblinking.

7. It was a cougar, watching me from a jumble of rocks.

8. When he saw I'd spotted him, he leaped with nimble ability down the slope, closing the gap between us. With a soaring jump that was almost absurdly graceful, he cleared the part of the creek that was deep water and bounded to a sudden halt in the shallows, making scarcely a spray.

9. It all happened so quickly I never even had time to gasp. He stopped, staring at me, evaluating the situation. No more than fifteen feet of rocky creek bed lay between us.

10. There was no retreat possible. Behind me the bank was sandy, capable of supporting some sparse grass but no trees-as if climbing a tree would save me from a cat. If I tried to scramble up the bank the cougar could easily take me from behind. The deep water was too far away and there wasn't enough of it anyway. There were no good options.

11. The mountain lion was not running away. His rear end was lowered, his gaze intent. I was reminded of what my dad had said: Ever see a cat jump on a string? That's what the cougar looked like to me now, a cat getting ready to pounce.

12. There were no sticks nearby. My rod was handy but so thin I doubted it would be intimidating. What was it Dad said? A bite-sized boy like you could make a tasty meal.

13. My fear was so strong and real I was sick with it. Stand up big and tall, my father had instructed. What you want is for that cougar to see you as a meal that's going to cost him, put up a real fight.

14. I took in a shuddering breath, raising my trembling hands over my head.

15. The cougar moved again, holding his body low, slinking toward me. There was absolutely no question of his intentions. He stopped, crouching. I stood my ground, quivering.

16. "Go away," I said in a whisper.

17. The cougar stood motionless. His muscles bunched; he sank lower; his lips drew back.

18. I found my voice. "Grrrr!" I roared at him. There was no reaction at all.

19. "Grrrr!"

20. I watched in terrified fascination as the tension built in the big cat's shoulders. His eyes were locked on mine. This was it. I braced myself for the attack. I would put up a good fight. 

21. I would make him decide that, as meals go, I was too much trouble to bother with.

22. I swallowed. I would put up a good fight, or I would die.

23. He was coiling to spring and then he froze, raising his head sharply, his eyes widening. I actually saw the irises turn dark with alarm. The cougar stood still for only a second and then turned and rocketed away, scampering up the bank and disappearing into the brush.

24. My legs were still weak and trembling. I wasn't sure what had happened. How had I gone from bite-sized to intimidating in midpounce? I stared after the big cat, terrified he might return, but after ten seconds, then twenty, there was no sign of him.

25. I was safe.

from CHASING REDBIRD
by Sharon Creech

1. Beyond the ash tree was a rose garden: twenty bushes planted by Uncle Nate the year that baby Rose died. Aunt Jessie loved those roses. She could see them from her bedroom window, and that summer, she and I would walk through them, counting the blooms.

2. When the first frost came in November, Aunt Jessie fretted. She stared out the window at the few remaining blossoms, stiff and matted with frost. "They'll all die soon," she said. It sent a shiver through me.

3. Each year after that, she was thrilled in the spring when the first rosebud appeared, and each year, with the arrival of winter, she became dejected all over again, as if she didn't believe or didn't remember that spring would come again.

4. Several years after Uncle Nate had planted the roses, I was with my family one Saturday at a store in Chocton. Each of us kids had a dollar. The boys were sifting through the candy, May and Gretchen were at the makeup counter, and Bonnie and I were wandering around the store, unable to make up our minds what to choose. Then I saw it. It was perfect: a red plastic rose on a stiff green stem. I bought it and kept it in my closet until October, when I snuck it into the rosebushes in the yard, tying it to a branch.

5. When Aunt Jessie started to fret over the frost and the dying buds, I'd say, each morning, "There's still a few left," and, finally, "There's still one left." She didn't seem impressed and said, "It'll be dead soon."

6. By December, after we'd had two snowfalls, she could no longer ignore the single rose still blooming in the garden. On one of our walks, she headed for the bushes. "I want to see this rose," she said. I tried to discourage her, tried to pull her in another direction, but she was determined. She reached across the bush in front and touched my plastic rose.

7. "What?" she said, tugging at it. "What-?" She pulled it loose, and the look on her face I'll never forget: such disappointment, such dismay. She threw the rose to the ground. "It's fake! Who would do such a mean and nasty thing?"

8. My own face must have betrayed my guilt.

9. "You?" she said. "You did that? How could you?"

10. I ran to the barn, ashamed and confused.

11. Later, she apologized, saying that she knew I hadn't meant to hurt her, that I must have thought it would please her. She didn't know why she had reacted the way she did. "I so much wanted that rose to be alive," she said.

12. Shortly afterward, she restored the red plastic rose to the rose garden, and it has bloomed there year round ever since, faded nearly to white, but still there. When Aunt Jessie died, Uncle Nate bought a second plastic rose and added it to the other one in the rose garden.

Measures 1 skill from
Grade 9
ELAR (2009)
Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS)

Our brand new solo games combine with your quiz, on the same screen

Measures 1 skill fromGrade 9ELAR (2009)Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS)

Our brand new solo games combine with your quiz, on the same screen

Measures 1 skill from
Grade 9
ELAR (2009)
Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS)