Topic: wordplay

As funny as it is to watch videos of spelling bee contestants almost faint under the pressure of articulating impossibly tricky words, the video of Scripps National Spelling Bee champion Sukanya Roy spelling the final word is so sweet. She does what many kids do — writing frantically on her hand to visualize the letters — but you see the moment where she realizes, halfway through the word, that she’s through the worst part. As she announces the last few letters, her face lights up and she even lets out a relieved laugh on the final “s.” Oh, and the word is cymotrichous, a Greek-to-French word which describes having wavy hair. More »