Plenty turn out for campus spelling bee

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Thirty minutes. Seventeen competitors. Twenty-five words. Three free T-shirts. One spelling bee champion.

The Student Activities Board hosted a spelling bee last Thursday night. The rules were simple: competitors had 90 seconds to spell the word they were given, once a letter was said it was locked in and competitors could use any tools or tricks they needed to spell the word.

“You can do whatever you want as long as it is in a minute and a half and you spell the word right,” Glo Kamae said to competitors. Kamae, a genetics and biotechnology major from Orlando, Fla., spearheaded the planning of the spelling bee.

[media-credit name=”Photo by Luke Hansen” align=”alignleft” width=”300″][/media-credit]
Forest Lamb put his spelling skills to the test during the spelling bee in the Varsity Theater on Wednesday night. Lamb won with the word "rayonnant."
The atmosphere of the bee was upbeat and friendly and not the stereotypical, intense atmosphere.

“It’s mainly about having fun,” Kamae said.

The competitors took this advice to heart. Dan Benson made fun of the time limit by setting a timer on his watch, asking for both the definition and the word in a sentence and proceeding to look at his watch after each letter. He ended up spelling the word liliaceous wrong. Scott Ogden was asked to spelled the word geriatrics. He spelled “idonotknow,” much to the appreciation of the audience.

Most of the spectators were friends of the competitors and didn’t have a vested interest in spelling bees.

“I’ve never been in a spelling bee, but I was in a geography bee in the fourth grade, but that was only in Kansas,” said Jimmy Sweeney, a junior from Kansas City, Kansas. “I would never enter a spelling bee. I know I would lose on a stupid word like ‘definitely.'”

Sweeney needn’t have worried. Most competitors were out after the first round. Some of the missed words were autobahn, chauffeur, infinitesimal and potpourri. Confused looks broke out at some of the more unusual words contestants were asked to spell: Chautauqua (a meeting, usually held in the summer outdoors or under a temporary tent, providing public lecture combined with entertainment like concerts and plays), klomp (a wooden shoe worn in the low countries) and pityriasis (any various skin diseases of humans and animals, characterized by epidermal shedding of flaky scales).

If anyone is wondering, rayonnant, the final word, refers to “darting forth rays, as the sun when it shines out.”

Natalie Nysetvold came in third, misspelling piquancy. Hiebert came in second, misspelling raucous.

Both planners and competitors were surprised at the turnout.

“I didn’t think very many people were going to be here,” Lamb said.

“Neither did we,” replied the spell master.

 

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