First, take the words and assign a letter—like letting my age be 'x'. Then 'three times my age' becomes '3x', so the equation is my father's age = 3x. To check, put a number in place of 'x' and see if the relationship holds true in both the words and the equation.
I know this because Didibhai at the neighbourhood tuition centre made me practice with our own ages. She said, "Ei dekho, tomar baba'r boyosh jodi tomar cheye tin gun hoy..." and we worked it out.
But the book never mentions that sometimes the 'answer' feels strange—last week, my equation showed my father as 45, but he passed away when I was small. So I quietly use my uncle's age instead, and the algebra still works.
#relationships#family
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