Cochabamba Grabs U.S. Headlines

I first heard the news from my nephew, while visiting here in California. "Hey, I heard Cochabamba on the news, on the radio last week!"

Did I miss something? Had the city broken out in new protest since I left – over water bills, the price of bread, Manfred's facial hair? Has there been an accident? Maybe the world's largest Jesus had tipped over and landed on its right arm on a parked taxi. Or perhaps some enterprising restaurant had prepared and served the world's largest pique, on a plate the size of Plaza Colon. Would that have made the U.S. news?

Nope, it was this honor that thrust my adopted town into the U.S. headlines. The question that decided that the 2008 U.S. National Geography Bee a week ago was the following:

Cochabamba is the third-largest conurbation in what country?

My nephew says he was screaming at the radio in his car as he drove through the Arizona desert, "Bolivia, Bolivia, Bolivia!" Imagine, he thought, I actually know the answer.

So did the winner of the national competition, 11-year-old Akshay Rajagopal of Lincoln, Nebraska. And as a result, he won a $25,000 scholarship.

I don't know if the question and the competition made headlines in Cochabamba – I am away after all – but I think it should have. Imagine, La Llajta in the news over something other than protest or pique. Actually, I am shocked that Manfred didn’t take credit. Maybe he didn't know what 'conurbation' meant. I didn't. But I probably could have guessed Bolivia anyway.

And, for those who think that young Akshay's fete was not worthy of so prestigious a prize; consider that to even get to Cochabamba the Conurbation, he first had to identify, among other things, the nation in which the well-known metropolis of Tillya Tepe sits. Try naming that one without Google.

Meanwhile, way to go Akshay!