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Washington: Spelling
tongue twister "cymotrichous", Greek for having wavy hair, Indian
American Sukanya Roy has won the 2011 Scripps National Spelling
Bee crown to retain the coveted honour for the community for the
fourth year in a row.
Roy, 14, an eighth-grader at Abington Heights Middle School,
Pennsylvania, said she knew as soon as she heard "cymotrichous"
that she'd get the word right and win the championship Thursday
night.
"My heart started pounding, I guess," she said. "I couldn't
believe it. . It's just amazing. It's hard to put into words."
It was Roy's third trip to the national spelling bee, and she had
credited her past experience with keeping her calm and relaxed
heading into the finals. She tied for 12th place in 2009 and 20th
place in 2010.
Roy speaks Bengali and every summer travels to India to visit
family. She hopes to pursue a career in international relations.
Roy is the ninth Indian-American in the last 13 years, a run that
began when Nupur Lala captured the crown in 1999 and was later
featured in the documentary "Spellbound."
The winner will be awarded a $30,000 cash prize, a trophy, a
$2,500 US savings bond, a complete reference library, a $5,000
scholarship and $2,600 in reference works and other prizes.
Anamika Veeramani had scored a hat-trick for Indian-Americans in
taking the crown last year.
Roy was one of the six Indian Americans - Sriram Hathwar, Arvind
Mahankali, Prakash Mishra, Mashad Arora, and Dhivya Senthil
Murugan - who made it to the last 13 in the finals.
The youngest finalist was 10-year-old Dhivya Murugan of Denver,
who was born in India.
The spelling bee kids just keep getting better and better. Even
words like chlorthalidone," "dreikanter," "renminbi" and "helichrysum"
couldn't sufficiently narrow down the field in the semifinals,
which needed 95 minutes of overtime earlier Thursday to whittle
the competitors from 41 to 13.
The week began with 275 spellers. A written test Tuesday and two
oral rounds Wednesday reduced the field for the semifinals.
According to the Scripps Spelling Bee's website, this year brought
contenders ranging in age from 8 to 15 years old from all over the
world.
(Arun Kumar can
be contacted at arun.kumar@ians.in)
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