Neighbors _Tim Winton All Questions and Answers from NEB Grade 12 Book

Understanding the text

Answer the following questions.

a. Describe how the young couple’s house looked like.

 The house of the young couple was small, but its high ceilings and paned windows gave it a feel of an elegant cottage. From the study window of the young man, he could see out over the rooftops and used car yards the Moreton Bay figs in the park where they walked their dog.

b. How did the young couple identify their neighbours in the beginning of their

arrival?

 Young Couples were foremostly intimidated by the activities of neighbours. The neighbours used to spit, wash and water, which the couple found really disgusting. The couple were living their previous life in expansive outer suburbs where the neighbours were seldom intimate to one another. So, the newly changed lifestyle made them troublesome to adjust. Also, the variation of waking time of young couples and their neighbours was seemed perplexing for them. Overall, the young couple identified their neighbours as disturbing, querying and judging nature.

c. How did the neighbours help the young couple in the kitchen garden?

  In the kitchen garden, the neighbours advised the couple about the spacing, spacing, chilling and mulching. Furthermore, a neighbour (a big woman with black eyes and a butcher's arm ) gave the young man, a bagful of garlic cloves in order to prepare the compost manure for the plants. In this way, neighbours assisted them in the kitchen garden as per their practice.

d. Why were the people in the neighbourhood surprised at the role of the young man

and his wife in their family?

   The people in the neighbourhood were surprised at the role of the young man and his wife in their family because it was strange to observe the scenario of woman working outside and a man living inside the home, preparing his thesis works and doing household jobs. It was not easy for them to digest the change in gender roles.

e. How did the neighbours respond to the woman’s pregnancy?

  The neighbours were consistently smiling at them for such early pregnancy after their marriage. Afterwards, the man in the deli gave the woman small presents of chocolates and for the man, a packet of cigarettes. Greek women stopped the young lady in the street, touched her belly by pulling skirt and assumed that, the baby would be a boy. In this way, neighbours comically and somehow unpleasantly responded to the woman's pregnancy.

f. Why did the young man begin to weep at the end of the story?

   The young man began to weep at the end of the story because he was feeling so affectionate from his neighbours; which was completely unexpected for him. In his previous home, he had seldom acquired such nearness and a sense of familiarity from the neighbours. Hence, tears were inevitable for him.

g. Why do you think the author did not characterize the persons in the story with

proper names?

   Giving proper names to the character would seem much vernacular and could not connect the plot with larger readers. Moreover, the issues of multiculturalism faced by the immigrants are universal. So, the writer is representing such immigrants as a whole in the characters of the story. Hence, the author did not characterize the persons in the story with proper names.