Christmas University Challenge.
Asking the questions, Amol Rajan.
Hello and welcome to Christmas University Challenge,
our short seasonal competition in which alumni compete on behalf
of their alma maters.
This match is the fourth of seven first-round heats from which
only the four highest-scoring winning teams progress.
If tonight's winners can manage around 160 points,
they have a good chance of going through.
Leeds Trinity University is making its first appearance
on any series of this programme and it's represented by,
firstly, a presenter and radio DJ
who achieved record-breaking listening figures
as host of the BBC Asian Network Breakfast show.
She's also presented CBBC's Saturday Mash-Up
and currently has her own show on Virgin Radio.
Their second player is a journalist and film-maker
known for his access-based documentaries,
for which he's won a Grierson Award,
a Royal Television Society Award and a Bafta.
His most recent film, The Soldiers That Saved Britain, shines a light
on the role of the British Indian Army in World War II.
Their captain began her on-screen career at CBBC,
where she presented shows including The Dengineers
and made Emmy-nominated documentaries for Newsround.
More recently, she's been part of the BBC's
Eurovision presenting line-up,
and she currently co-hosts Life Hacks
and the Official Chart First Look on Radio 1.
Completing the team is a best-selling author
whose work has been translated into 30 languages.
Her books include the Sunday Times bestsellers My Best Friend's Girl
and The Ice Cream Girls, and she's also the creator
of The Happy Author, a podcast that aims to demystify
the publishing industry.
Let's meet our first-ever team from Leeds Trinity.
I'm Harpz Kaur and I got my undergrad in media studies in 2011,
and I also got my postgrad in broadcast journalism in 2012.
I'm Mobeen Azhar. I did a postgrad in broadcast journalism in 2004.
Before that, I got a law degree and a master's in Islamic Studies
at the University of Leeds.
Back then it was the same university. And their captain.
I'm Lauren Layfield and I have a postgraduate degree
in broadcast journalism, and I got that in 2012.
I'm Dorothy Koomson.
I graduated with a BA Honours
in psychology and public media in 1993.
APPLAUSE
They're facing a team of Nottingham graduates which includes, firstly,
a conservation scientist
who specialises in elephant behaviour and welfare.
She also works in the wildlife film industry as a presenter
and researcher, and is the co-host of the BBC Earth podcast.
She's joined by one of the most familiar voices in football.
Since starting his career at Nottingham's Radio Trent
in the 1970s, he's commentated on nine World Cups,
nine European Championships
and 30 European Cup and Champions League finals,
among countless other matches for ITV, the BBC
and most recently CBS Sports and Amazon Prime.
They're captained by a leading chemical engineer
working in the field of clean energy.
She's lent her expertise to multiple TV and radio programmes
and has recently published her first book, Power Up, which explores
how energy is produced, moved and used around the world.
Their final player is a professor of applied criminology
at the University of Derby.
Before entering academia, she worked in the criminal justice system
for 30 years, which included 13 years as governor of HMP Whatton.
Her work focuses on rehabilitation and preventing reoffending,
and in 2017 she received an OBE
for public and voluntary services to prisoners.
Let's hear them introduce themselves.
I'm Rutendo Shackleton and I did a bachelor's degree
in veterinary medical sciences, graduating in 2013.
My name is Clive Tyldesley.
I occasionally studied industrial economics and politics,
somehow graduating in 1975. And their captain.
I'm Yasmin Ali. I studied chemical engineering,
graduating in 2010.
I'm Lynn Saunders.
I studied sociolegal studies and I got a PhD in 2020.
APPLAUSE
Welcome to University Challenge, guys.
You look between terrified and excited.
How are you feeling? I feel like their team
has got a lot more... To prove! ..qualifications than us.
To prove, actually.
OK. Yeah. Worried. Worried a little bit over here.
Don't be. Fingers on buzzers - here's your first starter for ten.
Best of luck.
The engineer and businessman Ken Kutaragi
is widely referred to as the father of which video game console?
Believing that the electronics company he worked for should...
Is it Nintendo?
No, and I'm afraid you lose five points. Nottingham,
you can hear more of the question, but you may not confer.
..the electronics company he worked for
should be breaking into the gaming market,
he persuaded his CEO to collaborate with Nintendo
and produce an add-on for the SNES
that would enable it to play CD-ROMs.
The partnership with Nintendo broke down, but Kutaragi
developed his design into a stand-alone console
that was launched in December 1994 by Sony.
PlayStation. It is indeed the PlayStation. Well done.
Your bonuses, Nottingham, are on five-letter words
that can be made using the letters of the word "frankincense."
Give each word from the definition.
First, the edible fruit of Blighia sapida.
They have large, shiny black seeds surrounded by creamy white flesh
and a woody reddish shell, and are widely considered
the national fruit of Jamaica.
Is it lychee?
Is that... No, that's... No, there's no L in frankincense, is there?
Um...
Jackfruit?
Jamaica...
Pass. It's ackee.
It's delicious. It looks like scrambled eggs.
Secondly, a fermented milk drink originating in the Caucasus
that is sour-tasting and slightly effervescent.
Distinctively, it is produced using small gelatinous balls
of yeast and bacteria, usually called grains.
K... Kefir?
Kefir? Kefir. Kefir, is that...?
Does that have all the letters that we need in it?
Um...yeah. Nearly everything is in frankincense.
Kefir. Kefir.
It is kefir. Well worked out.
Finally, the common name of a genus of yellow-flowered shrubs
in the pea family. The pods of the Alexandrian species
are widely sold as a natural laxative.
Senna. Senna. Hmm?
Yeah? Nominate Saunders.
Senna. Yes. That's correct.
APPLAUSE
Another starter question.
What member of the carrot family has a common name
derived from the Latin for "little hay"?
Its Florentine variety has a bulbous root used as a culinary vegetable,
while its leaves resemble those of dill, and its seeds
are a regular ingredient of traditional five-spice mixes
in India, Bangladesh, and China,
contributing a flavour similar to that of aniseed.
Is that fennel? It is fennel. Well done.
Three questions for you, then, Leeds Trinity.
on the men's T20 Cricket World Cup held in 2024.
The tournament was hosted in multiple countries
across the West Indies, with three additional venues in which country
hosting Cricket World Cup matches for the first time?
America?
For the first time? Yes.
I think it was America. Really?
She's got... Because they've never done it before.
Go on. I might be wrong, though.
Do it. LAYFIELD: Nominate Kaur.
America.
It was America, yeah.
No need to whisper, by the way, it's nice to hear your deliberations.
Especially when you get it right. Less so when you don't.
Along with the USA, which African team
made its Cricket World Cup debut in either format of the game?
Nicknamed the Cricketing Cranes, they won their first-ever World Cup
match in the group stages, beating Papua New Guinea
in a low-scoring encounter.
I'd have said it was an African country. Mm.
Sierra Leone?
If you've got a hunch. Because... Do you...? I don't know.
Yeah. Yeah, go for it. We're not sure. If you...
Nominate Koomson.
Sierra Leone.
No, it's Uganda.
One of the biggest upsets in the T20 World Cup history came
when the US beat which major cricketing nation
in the group stage? The game was tied after 20 overs
with the US claiming victory in the deciding super over.
Um...
Are you going to say Pakistan? Yeah. Yeah.
Go for it. Nominate Azhar.
Is it Pakistan? It is indeed, yes. Well done.
Another starter question now and we're going to take a picture round.
For your picture starter, you're going to see a national flag.
For ten points, name the country it represents.
Albania. It is Albania.
Well done. For your picture starter there, Nottingham,
you saw the flag of Albania,
which won its first-ever Olympic medal at the 2024 Olympics,
when Chermen Valiev took a wrestling bronze.
Your picture bonuses will be the flags of three more countries
that won their first Olympic medals at Paris 2024.
Name the country in each case. First...
Is it Pakistan? Is that...?
I don't think so. No.
Caribbean? Yeah. Caribbean, maybe.
Um... Oh, is it Trinidad and Tobago?
No, I think they've won many in the past.
It's that woman who ran...
It was a woman, wasn't it? Who ran the...
I'm not sure.
Shall we go with...?
Just guess.
Saint Kitts and Nevis? Nominate Tyldesley.
Saint Kitts and Nevis.
No, that was Dominica.
Thea LaFond won gold in the triple jump. Secondly...
Um, does that look South Seas? Or...
I don't know. I don't recognise that flag.
Who else was in the Olympics?
We could just guess a random one.
Well, everybody was in there! Come on.
I don't know. Pass?
Pass. That was Cape Verde,
and David de Pina won a joint bronze in boxing.
And finally...
This is the lady that you're talking about.
Yeah. Where was it?
It was one of the... One of the Caribbean, wasn't it?
Yeah. Caribbean. Small island.
Yeah. Aruba?
Aruba? No.
Shall we try that?
Yeah?
Aruba? No, bad luck.
That was Saint Lucia with Julien Alfred, who won gold
in the women's 100m.
Another starter question now.
in 2024, which writer was appointed
the new UK Children's Laureate?
His books include The Astounding Broccoli Boy,
the Carnegie Medal-winning Millions,
which was made into a Danny Boyle film, and...
Is it Frank Bot... Cottrell-Boyce?
All right, we'll take that because it's Christmas.
Your bonuses then, Leeds Trinity, are on literature.
In each case, I need the sobriquet given to the following characters
in the titles of novels or plays.
First, a young boy called Shmuel, whose tragic friendship
with nine-year-old Bruno during the Second World War
is told in a 2006 novel by Irish author John Boyne.
The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas. Yeah.
Er, Boy In The Striped Pyjamas. Yes.
Second, Anna Fierling.
She earns her nickname when she runs through a bombardment in Riga
during the Thirty Years' War in order to sell her loaves of bread
to support her three children in a play by Bertolt Brecht.
Oh...
THEY CONFER
I have no idea. Maybe The Library Thief? I don't know.
I really don't know. So I'm relying on you guys here.
Should we pass it? Yeah. We'll pass that one.
Mother Courage,
as in Mother Courage And Her Children.
Finally, Alden Pyle, a naive idealist whose murder in Vietnam
is at the centre of a 1955 work by Graham Greene.
OK, anyone?
Er.. You've got this. You know this.
I can see it on your face. It's there. It's there.
I can't think. Um...
Graham Greene... Graham Greene...
Come on.
No? No.
Pass? We'll pass.
It's The Quiet American. Scores level.
Another starter question. Located in the Arctic Ocean
north of Siberia, Wrangel Island is believed to have been the home
of the last surviving population of what extinct mammal
as recently as 2000 BCE?
Though synonymous with largeness,
it was, in fact, roughly the same size as one of its closest
living relatives, the African elephant.
Mammoth. It was the mammoth.
If only you had one of the leading elephant conservationists
in the world... I did buzz it! ..on your team.
Bonuses, then, Nottingham.
Three questions on films whose final scenes involve dancing.
Released in 2023,
what film's final scene features a character played by Barry Keoghan
dancing nude to the song Murder On The Dancefloor
by Sophie Ellis-Bextor?
Saltburn. Saltburn, yeah. Saltburn.
Fantastic scene, isn't it? Which 1999 Claire Denis film
ends with a character played by Denis Lavant
performing a solo dance to Rhythm Of The Night by Corona?
I can sing it.
I don't know if that helps us.
No.
Pass.
That's Beau Travail.
Finally, which Taika Waititi film ends with the title character
dancing to David Bowie's German-language version of Heroes?
Don't know.
He's done...
He's done What We Do...
Hunt For The Wilderpeople. What We Do In The Shadows.
Yeah. Shall we...? Shall I try...?
Yeah. Try Thor: Ragnarok, maybe? Hmm? Thor: Ragnarok?
Thor: Ragnarok. No, it's Jojo Rabbit.
Another starter question. Which fairy tale,
one of those principally popularised by Charles Perrault,
has formed the basis of operas by Pauline Viardot, Jules Massenet
and Gioachino Rossini, as well as a ballet by Sergei Prokofiev?
The score for the latter has a part in Act Two for pendulums,
in a number titled Midnight.
Peter And The Wolf.
No. Anyone from Leeds Trinity want to have a go?
Buzz if you want to...
Is it Cinderella?
It is Cinderella.
Midnight, innit? Midnight.
One of the key things about buzzers
is you don't need to put your hand up.
We're still learning.
Three bonuses for you on similar words.
First, what word for a band or company,
often with hostile intent,
comes from a shortening of a Latin phrase
meaning "force of the county"?
It originally referred to a body of citizens summoned by a sheriff
to assist in maintaining public order.
An army?
Posse or...
Um...
Oh, militia?
I think posse... Or militia?
I don't know. Let's go... I'd go for posse. Yeah. Nominate Koomson.
Posse. Yes. Shortening of posse comitatus.
What British dessert can be made by simmering cream with sugar
as well as the juice and zest of a lemon?
Originally, the name was used to describe a hot drink of milk
that had been curdled with ale or wine.
SHE WHISPERS
Ooh! Nominate Koomson. Posset.
It is. What large group of the marsupial order Diprotodontia
includes species known as eastern pygmy, common ringtail
and mountain brushtail?
Er... Lemur? I was going to say pig.
But no, I think you've got it right. Pig?
Yeah. But, no, I think you've got it right. Go on.
I think... I think what Lauren said. Yeah, yeah.
I think it's a lemur.
No, it's similar words. It's possum.
Oh! Right, music round now.
For your music starter, you're going to hear a piece
of popular music. For ten points
I need you to name the group performing.
# Frosty the snowman was a happy... #
The Ronettes. Well done. It is indeed.
For your music starter, you heard the Ronettes version
of Frosty The Snowman, taken from the album A Christmas Gift For You,
featuring a number of artists signed to the Philles record label.
For your bonuses, three more tracks taken from that album.
Five points for each performer you can name. First, this group.
# He sees when you are sleeping
# He knows when you're awake... #
Any ideas? Sounds like the Ronettes again!
# So be good for goodness' sake... #
Santa Claus Is Coming To Town.
# You better not pout I'm telling you why... #
The Shirelles or...
Shirelles...
Yeah? Try that?
The Shirelles. No, it's the Crystals.
Secondly, either this group, or the name of its lead singer.
# And so, my beloved
# When red leaves are falling
# The love bells shall ring out... #
THEY CONFER
Clive, any...? Come on. No?
Unless it's Martha and the Vandellas, I don't know, no.
Try that. Martha and the Vandellas.
No, that was by Bob B Soxx and the Blue Jeans.
Lastly, this performer.
# They're singing Deck the Halls
# But it's not like Christmas at all... #
It might be Brenda Lee.
Brenda Lee... Yeah? I don't know.
Yeah, let's go Brenda Lee.
Brenda Lee.
No, that's Darlene Love with Christmas (Baby, Please Come Home).
Another starter question.
Located at an altitude higher than any in the UK,
what present-day capital city has a name meaning "cold water"
in a local Nilo-Saharan language?
It developed from a colonial railway settlement established in the 1890s,
became the capital of the British East Africa Protectorate in 1905,
and lies approximately 136km south of the mountain
after which the country is named.
Nairobi. It is Nairobi. Well done, yeah.
Your bonuses, Nottingham, are on the history
of the science of heat.
In his 1789 elementary treatise on chemistry, which French chemist
argues that heat is a real and material fluid substance
that acts on other bodies, which he terms caloric?
He had earlier advanced this idea in papers attacking
the theory of phlogiston.
I don't think I know this one.
No idea.
French chemists? I don't even want to know.
I'm struggling to think of...
OK, pass.
It was Antoine Lavoisier. In the 1840s,
which Salford-born physicist carried out notable experiments
into the relationship between heat and mechanical work,
which helped disprove caloric theory
and establish that heat is a form of energy?
The Si unit of energy bears his name.
THEY CONFER
Joule?
Or...Watt? Would it be James Watt?
Is it energy? Energy, yeah.
Joule. Isn't it Joule?
It's either Joule... I'm trying to think. So energy.
Yeah. Yeah, yeah.
Joule. It is Joule, yeah. James Prescott Joule.
In the 1850s, which Belfast-born scientist worked closely
with Joule on his heat experiments
and co-discovered an effect that now bears both their names?
His other contributions to the field
include proposing an absolute scale of temperature.
THEY CONFER
It's Kelvin?
I think that's what it is. Yeah?
Er, Kelvin.
Yes, Kelvin. William Thomson.
Another starter question now.
The 2024 film Hard Truths saw actor Marianne Jean-Baptiste
reunite with which director
28 years after the release of their previous collaboration,
Secrets And Lies?
Mike Leigh.
It is Mike Leigh. Well done.
Your bonuses, then, Leeds Trinity, your three bonuses are on animals
that are named after pigs.
What African mammal with a long snout, which it uses to burrow
for food, takes its name from the Afrikaans for earth pig?
Is it aardvark?
Oh... Oh, that sounds good.
What was that? Aardvark.
I think that... Yes. That makes more sense.
That would work. That would work.
Nominate Koomson.
Aardvark. Correct. Taken from the Greek for "female swine,"
the name of what carnivorous mammal is thought to have developed
in reference to the hog-like bristly mane that runs down their back?
Um, porcupine.
Oh! Yeah? Yeah. Nominate Azhar.
Porcupine? No, it's the hyena. Oh!
With a name derived from the Old French for "pig fish,"
what family of mammals forms part of the Cetacea order
alongside dolphins and whales?
Oh!
Um, would it be a porpoise? Yes. Maybe.
Excellent. Porpoise?
Yes. Well worked out.
Five points in it. Picture round now. For your picture starter.
you will see a photograph of an animal found in the UK.
For ten points, name the animal.
Oh, no. I'm afraid if you buzz,
you must answer straight away. So, Nottingham,
anyone want to have a go?
Pine marten?
No, it's a stoat.
We'll take your picture bonuses when we get the next starter right.
Named Greensward, a plan by the landscape architect
Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux was the winning entry
in a competition of 1858 to design what public space?
Its current features include the Harlem Meer, the Sheep Meadow,
and the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Reservoir.
Central Park. It is Central Park in New York City, yes.
Your picture starter a moment ago was a photograph of a stoat,
which in the north of the UK is noted for its dramatic
winter transformation from a brown to white coat.
For your picture bonuses, Nottingham,
you'll see three more animals found in the UK
that have notable winter coats or plumages.
For five points, name the animal.
From here you'll be seeing the winter variations
of these animals.
First, this bird.
Any bird-watchers in the group?
It's pigeon-like, isn't it? Yeah.
Is there a snow pigeon or anything like that?
I don't know. I don't know.
Pass. It's a rock ptarmigan.
Next...
Looks similar to the last one to me.
It's the same again.
Looks like a sparrow, but I can't imagine it is.
Should we try that? Sparrow?
No, it's a snow bunting.
Finally, this animal found in Scotland and the Peak District.
I need a two-word name here.
Something hare, isn't it? Something hare, yeah.
Snow something? Snow hare?
Highland? Highland hare? Yeah.
Try a Highland hare.
It's a mountain hare. Bad luck. Five minutes to go.
The mineral sphalerite is the primary ore of what metal?
A group 12 element with atomic number 30,
it is applied as a protective coating to iron
in the process known as galvanisation,
and it is alloyed with copper to make brass.
Anyone want to have a guess?
No? I'll tell you, it's zinc. Another starter question.
2024 saw the 100th anniversary of which English football club's
first of three consecutive and to date...
Huddersfield Town. Correct, yes.
Three bonuses for you on a contemporary author.
Both broadly focused on Indian American society,
the short story collections Unaccustomed Earth
and the Pulitzer Prize-winning The Interpreter Of Maladies
are both works by which author?
I don't know.
Don't know. No. Pass.
It's Jhumpa Lahiri.
Lahiri's 2003 novel The Namesake features a child
named after which author born in modern Ukraine in 1809,
whose short stories include
The Nose, Nevsky Prospekt and The Overcoat?
Anyone? I don't know. No?
Pass. It's Nikolai Gogol.
Jhumpa Lahiri's recent writings are predominantly
in which European language, also used for a quartet of novels
beginning with the 2011 work My Brilliant Friend?
French? Hmm? French? Try that? Yeah.
French? No, it's Italian. Another starter question.
In slightly varying shades,
which three colours are the only ones that appear
on all the following national flags?
The Maldives, Burundi, Madagascar,
Iran, Bulgaria, Hungary and Italy.
Red, white and green.
Correct. Well done. Your bonuses, Leeds Trinity,
three questions on biological terms that contain
a double letter O.
Also called an egg cell, what term denotes the female gamete?
Ovum. Just say ovum.
Nominate Koomson.
Ovum. No, it's an oocyte.
Called animalcules by the Dutch scientist van Leeuwenhoek,
what more modern term encompasses, among others, bacteria and viruses?
Would it be microbe? Yeah, go on.
Say it, yeah. Nominate Azhar.
Microbe? No, it's microorganisms.
What field of study concerns the distribution, habits
and classification of animals?
Oh, like... Zoology.
Oh, yeah.
Zoology? It is zoology, yes.
Another starter question.
Quote, "Brady and the Cooper Union speech
"made me President of the United States."
These words are attributed to which man
referring to his photographic portrait by Mathew Brady
at a meeting at the Cooper Union in New York in 1860?
Abraham Lincoln. It is, of course, Lincoln. Yes.
Your bonuses are on Africa south of the equator.
In each case, identify the country from the list of its geographical
and cultural features. First, Unesco World Heritage Sites,
including the Matobo Hills, Victoria Falls
and the ruined city with which the country shares its name.
Victoria Falls is in...
South Africa?
No, um...
Not, um, Botswana?
Might as well just...
Come on. Go for it. Yeah, just go for it. Botswana?
Botswana. No, Zimbabwe.
Second, the Okavango Delta, the Makgadikgadi salt pan,
and much of the Kalahari Desert.
Just say anything. I know this.
Go on, just say anything.
Go on. No, no.
Come on. Botswana again.
It is Botswana! And finally, Lake Nyasa,
the Zambezi delta and the eponymous channel
between this country and Madagascar.
Oh!
Tanzania, is it?
Yeah.
Nominate Koomson.
Tanzania. No, it's Mozambique. Another starter question.
Who is the title character of the 1938 novel,
sometimes published as Murder For Christmas or A Holiday For Murder,
in which the person in question travels to Gorston Hall
in order to investigate the death of millionaire Simeon Lee?
Poirot? Yes, Hercule Poirot.
Your bonuses are on words that begin with the letters T-R-I
but are etymologically unrelated to the number three.
In each case, give the word from the description.
First, a ceremony in ancient Rome celebrating a victorious general
after a significant battle or conflict.
Triumph...
Yeah? It might be something more than triumph.
Tri...triumvirate?
Or is that Roman?
That sounds like a three thing, doesn't it?
Come on. Triumph?
Triumph. Yes, it is. Oh! Secondly, the scientific study of
interacting surfaces, including friction and lubrication.
Trilogy, or...?
No. No, it's not related to three.
Um...
Don't know. Pass. It's tribology.
Finally, a traditional English dessert that perhaps inspired
the Italian dish zuppa inglese.
In everyday speech, it means something of little significance.
Trifle? Yes, it is trifle. Another starter question.
Derived from an old French word meaning "small spring,"
what word can follow anterior, posterior, sphenoid and mastoid
to refer to the gaps present between non-fused bones in the skulls
of newborns, more commonly known as soft spots?
Is it a fulcrum?
No, anyone from Nottingham? You may not confer.
Guess now. No? I'll tell you.
It's the fontanelle. Another starter question.
GONG
And at the gong,
Leeds Trinity have 100
and Nottingham have 115.
APPLAUSE
Ah, Leeds Trinity.
The thing is, it was a fantastically tight game,
but it was a low-scoring game because you guys -
well, all of you - just so enjoyed
talking to each other during the bonuses.
And I kind of admire how you treated it as a social experience
as much as... We just had a good old catch-up.
We had a really good time.
And we didn't do too bad being the first team from Leeds Trinity.
And you did Leeds Trinity proud.
We had a fantastic time watching you.
Thank you so much for playing and bringing your wonderful mascot.
Nottingham, I mean, you did brilliantly,
you just did brilliantly quite slowly. That was the trouble.
That was the trouble. And I'm afraid to tell you,
I don't think 115 is going to be enough,
so it means we're not going to see you again.
But, I mean, when you answered, you generally got it right,
so that's the most important thing.
Have you enjoyed it? Was it a good time?
Yeah, of course. We've loved having you.
Well done and well played. Hope you can join us next time
for another match in this Christmas series.
But until then, it is goodbye from Leeds Trinity...
Bye! ..it's goodbye from Nottingham.
ALL: Bye.
..and it's goodbye from me. Goodbye.
APPLAUSE