Sandy boy takes sixth in National Geography Bee

SANDY — Anthony Cheng will forever remember that a tall, wooden flute called a fujara originated from Slovakia. It was the question that stumped him in the National Geography Bee.

The 11-year-old Sandy resident placed sixth Wednesday in the 22nd annual competition sponsored by the National Geographic Society and moderated by "Jeopardy!" host Alex Trebek.

One of the youngest competitors, the sixth-grader at Peruvian Park Elementary School will go home with $500 in scholarship money.

Asked if he'll compete again next year, Anthony said: "Obviously."

"I've met people who actually want to know more about geography, people like me," he said.

A well-rounded kid, Anthony also is a talented pianist, a skier, a "Star Wars" fan — "Even though it's really outdated and has really bad graphics," he said — and is known as "The Wall" on the soccer field for his defensive skills.

Anthony won his school's geography bee in February and then went on to win the state competition in April. He'd been there once before, taking fifth place in the state event last year. It sparked an interest in geography.

"We never got involved in geography much until then," said Anthony's mother, Wendy Lu Cheng, crediting her son's success to his love of reading. "He has always loved to read. He has read a ton since a young age, like 4."

In the past year, Anthony has been studying with his father, Albert Cheng, and created 420 geography computer games to test himself on the website purposegames.com.

Peruvian Park teacher Marti Davis, who joined the Cheng family in Washington, D.C., said Anthony is confident, a deep thinker and so smart that she often asks him for help with math problems.

"He did this really on his own," Davis said. "There's only so much teachers and schools can do. We can strike an interest, but when the students take it to that degree, that's wonderful for us."

During the preliminaries Tuesday, Anthony competed against students from the other 49 states and three U.S. territories, making it to the finals as one of the top 10 competitors. The preliminaries had harder questions, Anthony said.

"There was one whole round I didn't understand nearly anything," he said. "But the finals, they're full of media, and the media can't understand those weird things, so the questions were easier."