The Final Question

The final question, to win the game, was on history. As soon as they read the question they started celebrating, figuring that no-one could possibly know the answer. The question was:

"Who swam the Yangtze in 1966?"

Now I honestly had never heard of anyone swimming the Yangtze, so I set about trying to work out a good guess. My reasoning went as follows:

1) There are two reasons why an act like this is notable. It might be that it is the first time some great athletic feat has been accomplished (like the first bloke to swim the 26 miles of the English Channel). Or it might that the feat is not that spectacular, and has been done many times, but that the person doing it is famous (i.e. a publicity stunt).

2) I know that the Yangtze is a big river, but it is still only a river. Given that the English Channel, which must be much wider, was first swam in 1875, this cannot have been the first time it was swum. Therefore it was someone famous doing a publicity stunt.

3) China in 1966 was going through the Cultural Revolution. A cult of personality had grown up around its leader, Chairman Mao. (It was a bit like Stalin during the 1930s).

4) When a country is ruled by an absolute dictator who is fostering a cult of personality, no-one (and I mean no-one) wants to upstage him in any way, for fear of ending up dead.

5) The only person doing a publicity stunt in 1966 would be Chairman Mao.

So I answered Chairman Mao. Which turned out to be right.

They were already pretty upset at this, but when I told them: "But you can work it out!" they went apeshit.

And started throttling me.

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