Every year, almost 300 kids head to Washington, D.C., for the Scripps National Spelling Bee, where they compete to be the last person spelling in the three-day event. The boys, who hail from Texas and NY, respectively, are the third duo in a row to share the win.
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“The Spelling Bee is the IIT for NRI parents”, someone remarked tartly on social media, as a video featuring a six-year old, first-grader Indian-American speller went viral. Jairam is the younger brother of the 2014 co-champion.
Each receives $45,000 in cash and prizes.
The 11-year-old was asked to spell “Taoiseach” – and he instantly asked ‘is that an Irish word for prime minister?’ before casually reeling off the spelling.
“I’m just speechless. I can’t say anything”.
Cooper said the atmosphere on stage got progressively more tense as the field was whittled down to 10.
Before that, Janga – nicknamed “The Machine” during the competition, correctly spelled words like bailliage, euchologion, promyshlennik and others that we may or may not know how to spell ourselves.
Last year’s winners were Vanya Shivashankar of Olathe, Kansas, and Gokul Venkatachalam of Chesterfield, Mo. Finally, it came down to Jairam and Nihar.
Add to this eight of the 11 National Geography Bee titles, including the last five, it leaves them with a reputation as masters of rote learning and general knowledge. Janga himself is the youngest ever title victor at eleven.
Nihar loves spelling, and he puts a lot of determination and dedication into learning new words.
Fifth grader Nihar is from Texas, while seventh grader Jairam is from NY.
Snehaa Ganesh Kumar, 13, of Folsom, Calif., reacts to correctly spelling her word during the final round of the Scripps National Spelling Bee in National Harbor, Md., Thursday, May 26, 2016.
Jairam plans to study medicine at Harvard, and Nihar wants to be a neurosurgeon.
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“We do definitely have our verbal fights, not physical”, Sriram said. But the real action was in Oxon Hill, where all the drama of the Scripps National Spelling Bee unfolded.
