THE VOCABULARY DETECTIVE
The extra festival ticket
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legitimate
duplicate
redeem
valid
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Two students stood at the festival gate holding tickets with code F214. The scanner accepted the first sheet and rejected the second five minutes later. “It’s a legitimate ticket,” the second student protested. “It came from the school’s official sales system, with an accepted payment.”
The volunteer could see that the sheets were duplicates: two copies with the same code and purchase number. But did two pieces of paper provide two entries?
To redeem a ticket was to exchange its admission right for entry through the gate. For it to be valid, the ticket had to meet the event’s conditions. The volunteer knew that the closing time was one condition, but wanted to check whether it was the only one.
One person blamed the printer. Another accused the second student of stealing. The volunteer opened the sales record and gate rules. Neither guess could replace checking what the purchase actually allowed.