Задание

Read the text below and choose the best answers.

The most beautiful thing

My grandmother is so old, no one knows how old she is. Not me, not my big sister Dawn, not our older cousin Lei. My father always waits patiently when we try to guess her age. He is my grandma's ninth and youngest child, and even he does not know how old she is.

We know that grandma was born on the other side of the world, across a wide ocean. My grandma came from a time and a place where creatures lurked in the jungles, waiting to chase unwary children. She told us that she once looked into the gleaming eyes of a tiger, and felt its hot breath on her face.

By the time I was born, my grandmother already had an old woman's face. Her skin was soft but dry, like paper, and in her mouth was a single tooth. Grandma said, "It is the only thing standing strong in my mouth, this final tooth that my mother and father gave me."

I asked to see a picture of her parents. She said, "They lived in a time long before such things as photographs." She then pointed to her heart, "The only picture I have of them is here." Grandma told me that her mother and father died when she was a little girl. Grandma was just a child herself, but she had to take care of her two younger brothers and baby sister. I looked up at my grandma and I asked her, "How did you get food for them?" Grandma said, "I didn't find enough food. We always lived with hunger eating us on the inside."

All my life with her, even with just her one tooth, grandma never said no when we offered her something to eat.

The ice cream truck was singing its song from down the street. I looked underneath the couch for quarters. There were none. So, I got ice cubes from the freezer and offered one to grandma in my red plastic cup. She smiled at me.

When I wanted a new dress to wear on the first day of third grade, my mother said she did not have enough money. My grandma found some nickels and a dime in her purse and offered them to me. I bought hard peppermint candies from the neighborhood grocery at the corner of our block. When I got home, I offered one to grandma on the palm of my hand. She smiled at me.

At the round table with its shaky legs, I used my spoon to mix and mix in the center soup bowl we all shared. There were no pieces of meat, only bones, and soft greens. My father said, "The price of meat is too expensive at the market." I found a thick chunk of bone and offered it to grandma on my spoon. She smiled at me.

One time, my grandmother looked up from her special stool by the big window. "Kalia," she said. "Look at me." I turned to her. The sun was low in the sky, and its golden light fell on her face.

Grandma asked, "Is my smile not beautiful?" At that moment, I could see all the times my grandmother had smiled at me. I could taste the cold ice cubes that melted summer's heat from our tongues, the sweetness of the hard peppermint candies, and the deep flavours of the bone broth in the bowls of boiled greens. Even now, I can still see my grandma's single tooth, white against the shadows, standing tall in her open mouth.

Her smile was the most beautiful thing.

Illustration

Choose the correct option.

Who knows the age of the grandmother? [The author's father.|Nobody.|The author's sister.]

What is TRUE about the photo of the grandmother's parents? [She has no photo of her parents.|She had many photos of her parents but she lost them.|She has only one photo of her parents.]

What do we learn from paragraphs 6, 7, and 8? [The author was a very demanding child.|The author's family was quite poor.|The author's grandmother likes to smile.]