Puzzle -1— The Three Fruit Boxes 🍎🍊
Puzzle — The Three Fruit Boxes 🍎🍊
You have three boxes, each labeled:
APPLES, ORANGES, APPLES & ORANGES
You are told all three labels are wrong. You may reach into one box and take out one fruit (without looking inside). By seeing just that one fruit, can you determine the correct label for each box? Explain how.
Solution
Solution — The Three Fruit Boxes 🍎🍊
Great — here’s the full solution.
Label the boxes as written: APPLES, ORANGES, APPLES & ORANGES. You are told all labels are wrong.
-
Pick one fruit from the box labeled APPLES & ORANGES.
-
That box cannot be mixed (because its label is wrong), so it must contain only apples or only oranges.
-
-
Suppose the fruit you pull out is an apple. Then the box labeled APPLES & ORANGES is actually the ALL-APPLES box.
-
Now consider the box labeled ORANGES. Its label is wrong, so it cannot contain only oranges. It also cannot be the all-apples box (you already found that), so it must be the mixed box (apples & oranges).
-
That leaves the box labeled APPLES — its label is wrong, and the only remaining possibility is ALL-ORANGES.
If instead the first fruit you pulled was an orange, everything is symmetric:
-
Box labeled APPLES & ORANGES → ALL-ORANGES.
-
Box labeled APPLES → mixed.
-
Box labeled ORANGES → ALL-APPLES.
So by taking just one fruit from the box labeled APPLES & ORANGES, you can deduce the correct contents of all three boxes. ✅
Puzzle -2 — Merchant and the Bananas
Merchant and the Bananas
A merchant has 300 bananas and a camel. The market is 100 km away. The camel can carry a maximum of 100 bananas at a time, and it eats 1 banana for every 1 km it travels. What strategy should the merchant use to maximize the number of bananas delivered to the market?
Solution
Solution (Step by Step)
-
The merchant starts by carrying bananas in stages.
-
He takes 100 bananas and walks 1 km forward.
-
At the 1 km point, he leaves 99 bananas and eats 1 banana for the distance traveled.
-
He then returns with an empty camel, which costs another 1 banana.
👉 In total, moving bananas forward 1 km in this way requires 5 bananas (to shuttle back and forth).
-
-
He repeats this process until all 300 bananas are moved forward.
-
After doing this for 20 km, he will have finished moving the first 100 bananas.
-
-
Now only 200 bananas remain.
-
At this stage, moving bananas forward by 1 km costs only 3 bananas (instead of 5).
-
He continues until one more set is used up.
-
After 33 km in total, he will be left with 101 bananas.
-
-
At this point (33 km mark), the camel can now carry all the bananas together.
-
From here, it simply walks toward the market, eating 1 banana per km.
-
Distance left = 100 − 53 = 47 km.
-
-
Subtracting the camel’s food:
-
101 − 47 = 54 bananas.
-
✅ Final Answer
The merchant will be able to deliver 54 bananas to the market.
Word Challenge -1
What single four-letter word can be added to the end of each of these words to make new words?
-
Book / Play / Side / Over / Under
Solution
Answer: case
-
Bookcase, Playcase, Sidecase, Overcase, Undercase
Word Challenge -2
All The words in this list have something specific in common. What is it
- Into
- Therefore
- Evaluate
- Benign
Solution
Answer: Last Syllable
The Last Syllable is a Number
- Into – 2
- Therefore – 4
- Evaluate – 8
- Benign -9
Puzzle -3 - Football
The Tigers played the United Stars. In each half, Arjun scored 6 minutes in, and every 6 minutes after that. If the game had two 45-minute halves, how many goals did he score?
Solution
let’s solve it step by step 👇
-
Each half = 45 minutes.
-
Goals start at 6 minutes, then every 6 minutes after.
First half
Sequence of times: 6, 12, 18, 24, 30, 36, 42
👉 That’s 7 goals.
Second half
Same pattern: 6, 12, 18, 24, 30, 36, 42 (again relative to the half)
👉 Another 7 goals.
Total
7 + 7 = 14 goals 🎉
