Casting a spell: Chinese-Canadian boy takes first

Source: Xinhua

After more than 5,000 children competed to be China's best junior speller, it came down to one word.

The winner, 12-year-old Jacky Qiao from Beijing, took his time on Saturday spelling "heliolatry."

The championship word, meaning sun worship, was worth 5,000 yuan (731 U.S. dollars) and an all-expenses-paid trip to the United States for the finals of the world's biggest English-language junior spelling bee.

This is the first time China has sent a contestant to the Scripps National Spelling Bee, an educational icon for eight decades.

Qiao is a Chinese-Canadian seventh grader from Beijing International Singaporean School.

He will be the first student to represent China in the big bee.

Saturday's China final held in the Shanghai Center was run by the Community Center Shanghai and was the culmination of two rounds of competitions over four weeks, involving 16 schools in Shanghai and Beijing.

Seems a bit unfair doesn't it? A Canadian kid that goes to an international school, entering a contest to whup the Chinese kids? This kid won't even get out of the first round in Washington. He might not even get out of the first round in Canada!