This Ten-Year-Old Girl From Bhubaneshwar Is A Walking-Talking Atlas!

Sunday, August 28 2016, 03:33:36

Priya Motiani

JWB Blogger

This Ten-Year-Old Girl From Bhubaneshwar Is A Walking-Talking Atlas!

JWB Post

March 16, 2016

Meghali Malabika Swain, a ten-year-old girl from Bhubaneshwar, is a human version of the atlas.

Don’t believe me? Ask her about any of the major rivers of the world. Or better still; draw a line resembling a major river on a black world map.

Go on. I dare you to do that. Because this little girl will have your wits all disheveled though her immense and accurate knowledge of the world’s geography, particularly of rivers.

I think she has a peculiar fancy for them, which is why it takes her barely ten minutes to recite the names of as many as 1000 rivers. And what’s more? She recites them as effortlessly as reciting the English alphabets.

Not only this, she also knows the origin, destination, and the cities situated on the banks, of all of these books.

I believe Meghali is bestowed with the precious gift of photographic memory (technically known as eidetic memory).

Her father Prafulla Kumar Swain, who is an Odisha administrative officer, discerned this quality of hers when she was just 4 years of age, and to further hone her skill, he got her tons of maps and geography books. Consequently, it so happened that Meghali was able to memorize all 196 countries, their neighbouring countries, capital cities, currencies, rivers, flags of even little-known countries, and all major mountains, plateaus, plains, peninsulas, islands, deserts, oceans, seas, bays, gulfs and straits.

And all this just at the mere age of six! Isn’t that remarkable?

Meghali’s next feat is to play the violin. And in this context as well, she is amazing. She plays the classical notes almost effortlessly, which her batchmates take months to learn.