The All World Social Touring Company employs guides for the nine tours

Question

The All World Social Touring Company employs guides for the nine tours that it operates separately in nine destinations: Albania, Azerbaijan, Italy, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, Mongolia, Russia, Tibet/Xinjiang, and Turkey. Guides who speak at least one of the qualifying languages for a given tour are eligible to guide that tour.

Each of the All World Social Touring Company’s current guides speaks either exactly three or exactly one of the languages listed in the Qualifying Languages tab.

Bunuel · Answer

Official Solution:

Each guide speaks either  one  or  three  of the listed languages. Therefore, a description is possible if at least one single language or set of 3 languages satisfies it. If no such language or set exists, the description is not possible.
 
 • Ineligible to guide any tour that visits an architecturally significant Muslim mosque 
 
The tours in Albania, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, and Turkey visit a Muslim mosque. To be ineligible for all of them, the guide cannot speak any language that qualifies for any of these tours. This rules out Albanian, English, Italian, Azerbaijani, Russian, Turkish, and Kazakh, leaving only Mandarin.
 
A guide can speak only Mandarin. Therefore, this description is  Possible .
 
 • Ineligible to guide any tour that visits an architecturally significant Buddhist temple, but eligible to guide any of the other tours 
 
The Mongolia, Russia, and Tibet/Xinjiang tours visit a Buddhist temple. Being ineligible for all three rules out Azerbaijani, Kazakh, Mandarin, and Russian.
 
But the Kazakhstan tour requires Kazakh or Russian, and both have been ruled out. Thus, such a guide could not guide Kazakhstan, which is one of the other tours. Therefore, this description is  Not Possible .
 
 • Eligible to guide exactly five of the company’s tours 
 
No single language qualifies a guide for more than 4 tours, so a guide satisfying this description must speak 3 languages.
 
To check whether this is possible, look in the Qualifying Languages table for three language rows that together contain shaded cells in exactly five destination columns. Equivalently, the combined three rows must leave exactly four destination columns unshaded.
 
There are several sets of 3 languages that satisfy this condition, including:
   
Albanian, Azerbaijani, Turkish
 
Azerbaijani, English, Italian
 
English, Italian, Mandarin
 
English, Italian, Turkish
   
For example, Albanian, Azerbaijani, and Turkish together qualify a guide for exactly five tours: Albania, Azerbaijan, Kosovo, Russia, and Turkey. Finding any  one  valid set is enough to establish that the description could apply to a current guide.
 
Therefore, this description is  Possible .

Correct answer:

Ineligible to guide any tour that visits an architecturally significant Muslim mosque  "Possible"

Ineligible to guide any tour that visits an architecturally significant Buddhist temple, but eligible to guide any of the other tours  "Not Possible"

Eligible to guide exactly five of the company’s tours  "Possible"

Bunuel · Answer

Official Solution:

• J.P. is eligible to guide all of the company’s tours 
 
No single language qualifies a guide for all nine tours, so J.P. must speak  three languages .
 
The Kazakhstan tour requires either Kazakh or Russian, while the Tibet/Xinjiang tour requires either Kazakh or Mandarin.
 
If J.P. speaks Russian instead of Kazakh, then J.P. must also speak Mandarin to cover Tibet/Xinjiang. To cover Kosovo, the third language would then have to be either Albanian or Turkish. However, Russian, Mandarin, and Albanian do not cover Turkey, while Russian, Mandarin, and Turkish do not cover Albania. Therefore, J.P. must speak Kazakh.
 
To cover Kosovo, J.P. must then speak either Albanian or Turkish. If J.P. speaks Albanian, no single third language can cover both the remaining Azerbaijan and Italy tours. Therefore, J.P. must speak Turkish.
 
With Kazakh and Turkish, only Albania and Italy remain. Both tours can be covered by either English or Italian. Thus, there are  two possible language sets :
   
Kazakh, Turkish, English
 
Kazakh, Turkish, Italian
  
Since J.P.’s exact set of languages is  not uniquely determined .
 
Answer:  No .
 
 • M.R. is eligible to guide the company’s tours of all destinations except Kazakhstan 
 
M.R. is ineligible to guide the Kazakhstan tour, so M.R.  cannot  speak either Kazakh or Russian.
 
To guide the Tibet/Xinjiang tour, M.R. must speak Mandarin, since the other qualifying language, Kazakh, has already been ruled out.
 
To guide the Russia tour, M.R. must speak Azerbaijani, since the other qualifying languages, Kazakh and Russian, have already been ruled out.
 
With Mandarin and Azerbaijani, M.R. must speak either Turkish or Albanian to cover Kosovo. If M.R. speaks Turkish, then M.R. cannot guide the Albania tour. Therefore, the third language must be Albanian.
 
Thus, the only possible set is Mandarin, Azerbaijani, and Albanian, which qualifies M.R. to guide every tour except Kazakhstan. Therefore, M.R.’s exact set of languages is determined.
 
Answer:  Yes .
 
 • R.T. is not eligible to guide any of the company’s tours that visit an architecturally significant Christian church 
 
The Albania, Italy, Kazakhstan, and Russia tours visit a Christian church, so R.T. cannot guide any of these four tours.
 
Ineligible for Albania: Does not speak Albanian, English, or Italian.
 
Ineligible for Italy: Does not speak Mandarin (English and Italian have already been ruled out).
 
Ineligible for Kazakhstan: Does not speak Kazakh or Russian.
 
Ineligible for Russia: Does not speak Azerbaijani (Kazakh and Russian have already been ruled out).
 
This leaves only Turkish among the listed languages. Therefore, R.T. must speak only Turkish, so R.T.’s exact language is determined.
 
Answer:  Yes .

Correct answer:

J.P. is eligible to guide all of the company’s tours.  "No"

M.R. is eligible to guide the company’s tours of all destinations except Kazakhstan.  "Yes"

R.T. is not eligible to guide any tour that visits an architecturally significant Christian church.  "Yes"

Bunuel · Answer

Official Solution:

We need to determine which of the following languages Mehriban could  not  speak while still being eligible to guide exactly four tours:
 
• English
 
• Russian
 
• Italian
 
• Azerbaijani
 
• Albanian
 
Starting from the top choice: If Mehriban speaks English, then she is definitely eligible to guide the Albania, Italy, and Turkey tours. This is 3 tours so far, so we need to find two additional languages that together qualify Mehriban for only one more tour besides those three.
 
Adding Italian does not qualify Mehriban to guide any more tours, since speaking English already qualifies her for the Albania and Italy tours. Adding Albanian qualifies Mehriban to guide the Kosovo tour, the only additional tour, since Mehriban is already qualified to guide the Albania tour.
 
Thus, if Mehriban speaks English, Italian, and Albanian, she will be eligible to guide exactly four tours: Albania, Italy, Turkey, and Kosovo. Therefore, English, Italian, and Albanian are all languages that Mehriban  could  possibly speak and can be eliminated.
 
We are left with the two options:
 
• Russian
 
• Azerbaijani
 
Speaking Russian qualifies Mehriban to guide the Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, and Russia tours. Thus, if Mehriban speaks Russian only, she is eligible to guide exactly four tours.
 
Russian is therefore also a language that Mehriban  could  speak, so Russian can be eliminated as well, leaving only Azerbaijani as the correct answer.
 
If Mehriban speaks Azerbaijani, then she is eligible to guide the Azerbaijan, Russia, and Turkey tours. Azerbaijani alone therefore qualifies her for only 3 tours, so she must speak two additional languages, since all of the company’s guides speak either one language or three.
 
Of the remaining languages, only Turkish adds just one new tour, Kosovo. But even if Mehriban also speaks Turkish, she must still speak a third language, and every possible third language would qualify her for at least one more tour. Therefore, any three-language set containing Azerbaijani would qualify Mehriban for at least 5 tours.
 
Therefore, Mehriban cannot possibly speak  Azerbaijani  and be eligible to guide exactly four tours.

Correct answer:

If Mehriban is an All World Social Touring Company guide who is eligible to guide exactly four of the company’s tours, then Mehriban CANNOT possibly speak  "Azerbaijani"

The All World Social Touring Company employs guides for the nine tours

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Possible	Not Possible
		Ineligible to guide any tour that visits an architecturally significant Muslim mosque
		Ineligible to guide any tour that visits an architecturally significant Buddhist temple, but eligible to guide any of the other tours
		Eligible to guide exactly five of the company’s tours

GMAT Multi-Source Reasoning (MSR) Questions

The All World Social Touring Company employs guides for the nine tours

Prep Toolkit

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From 555 to 765: 210-point Improvement

Perfect 805 Score Debrief by Julia

My Rewards