How to Eat a Guava

When the passage begins, the narrator is ...

• a child

• a grocery store manager

• an adult

• a piece of fruit

What color is a ripe guava?

• yellow

• pink

• green

• orange

According to the passage, what is likely to happen to an inexperienced guava eater?

• Her mother will give her castor oil

• She will buy her guavas at the Shop & Save

• Her lips will purse into a tight O

• The seeds will end up in the crevices of her teeth.

According to paragraph 4, the BEST guavas are those that...

• are displayed in the produce section of the Shop & Save

• are prickly, bumpy and firm

• are very sour

• grow after a season of rain and cool nights

Why did the narrator, along with other children in Puerto Rico, end up eating green guavas?

• They liked the green ones the best

• The children were impatient and couldn't wait for the fruit to ripen

• Green guavas are given to children as medicine when they are sick

• Their mothers made them eat green guavas to punish them

The purpose of paragraph 7 is to ...

• show how awful a sour guava can be

• show how castor oil is used as medicine

• show how children enjoy experiencing all that life has to offer

• show how Shop & Save guavas are better than those from PR

What does the narrator mean in paragraph 7 when she says, "That's when you know for sure that you're a child and she has stopped being one."

• Motherhood is challenging in PR

• Children hate to eat green guavas in PR

• Adults, unlike children, have forgotten the joys of eating the first guavas of the season

• Her mother will always be a child at heart

Which of the following quotations best adds to the tone of nostalgia?

• "A ripe guava is yellow, although some varieties have a pink tinge."

• "It smells faintly of late summer afternoons and hopscotch under the mango tree."

• "A green guava is sour and hard. You bite into it at its widest point."

• "The guava joins its sisters under the harsh fluorescent lights of the exotic fruit display..."

In this passage, the guava is a metaphor for the narrator's

• life experience

• adulthood

• childhood

• motherhood

The narrator's feelings about her life can best be described as

• edible

• exotic

• enticing

• bittersweet