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The Honolulu Advertiser
Posted on: Thursday, May 30, 2002

Tough list stumps Hawai'i's speller

By Susan Roth
Advertiser Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON — Jessica Palola made it through the first round of the 75th annual Scripps Howard National Spelling Bee yesterday without tearing her hair out, but she did not advance beyond the second round.

Jessica Palola, of Hanalani School in Mililani, correctly spells "trichotillomania." That put her in Round 2, where she was eliminated.

Gannett News Service

Jessica, 14, correctly spelled "trichotillomania," the name for an abnormal desire to pull out one's hair, in the first round while parents and coaches in the audience tittered at the thought of their own struggles to prepare for the bee.

The Hanalani School eighth-grader said the laughter "sort of eased my tension." She said she knew the word from studying with her sister, Jackie, 15, also a champion speller and her coach at home when she wasn't studying with principal Wayne Yoshino at their school in Mililani.

But the difficult second round, which for the first time this year consisted of a written test, stopped her progress.

The youngsters had to spell 25 words that were announced along with their meanings. To advance to the next round, the contestants had to spell 16 or more of the words correctly. Bee officials said the written test was created to reduce stress but also to reduce the number of contestants in the third round, trimming back the bee to two days instead of three.

Jessica, a cheerleader and math whiz who spelled 11 of the words correctly, said it was hard. She and her parents, Ernesto and Beth Palola of 'Ewa Beach, were disappointed at the outcome, but were not that upset.

"She's always my champion, no matter what," her mother said.

But Jessica said she might be disappointing her principal, who told her he would accept nothing lower than a third-place finish from his star pupil.

Today, when the final rounds are shown on ESPN, "He'll say, 'Where is she?' " Jessica said.

She grimaced, then said: "I did my best. I'll show him the word list and say, 'See if you can spell these.' "

The written test included such words as "ananym," a pseudonym that is the real name written backwards; "dyskinesia," impaired or abnormal muscle movement; and "geusioleptic," pleasantly flavored.